Poll: "The METI Controversy": Should Detection by an Exo Civilization Be Viewed as a Threat?

[CAPPINJACK]

If I were in the position of these aliens, I wouldn't even bother to call/respond. At least not as long as people on this pathetic world are still incapable of distinguishing the proper context for 'Your' and 'You're'.

 

[delet]

I can't wait for them. Maybe they can get rid of a good amount of idiots surrounding me...

Yes but what if they decide, that by their standards, your also an idiot, along with the rest of Humanity, and they destory us before we damage the galaxy further?
Take a look at the world. The rich west reliant on oil, the third world countries, the unrest in the middle east, the oppression of China, Japan.
We need to sort our own issues before even thinking about other species and the issues they will bring.

I'm thinking it'd be like a nice reset button, and we kind of need that. I say it's worth it

 

[ElephantGuts]

Well on one hand it is being paranoid, and just because we are less primitive than a species doesn't mean they will automatically hurt us.

However, there are plenty of reasons why they would. Perhaps our planet has more resources than them? Maybe they're just naturally hostile? Maybe they think we are a threat?

I'd say it's about a 50/50 chance that aliens will or won't attack us. But considering how potentially disastrous the situation could turn out, we really can't afford to take chances. So I agree we should take extreme precautions regarding meeting alien life.

 

[Doug]

Spoiler: Space saving

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

You're caps-lock is on and, despite conventional knowledge, it is not cruise control for cool.

As far as the subject at hand goes I think there is a serious logistical problem that people are over looking. Assuming that the alien species we contact has not advanced far enough to break the speed of light (which Hawkings himself would say is impossible), depending on where this species resides it could take hundreds of years for them to get here. This makes dominating the planet kind of difficult and not really cost effective.

What could a species want with our planet?

1) Slaves*: Not the most logical option in my opinion (if they're as advanced as everyone says, they'd have robots to do their bidding. Slaves are superflous.) but certainly one of the more popular complaints. Firstly, a human who had been enlaved would not survive the trip back to the home planet hundreds of light years away. If you believe in cryogenics it's possible to make the argument that they would but, again, it's vital to look at cost effectiveness. Traveling half a millenia to acquire a boatload of slaves who may or may not be able to survive on your planet without expensive machines in order to make one sale on the home planet is not an ineffective way to do business. Adding to the fact that a human could never be as apt a worker as a machine (even at our technology level) and that, therefore, a machine must reach a higher price at market and we have a situation that makes human slaves an entirely unrealistic business venture.

2) Resources*: One of the more likely rationales but once again unrealistic in application. First of all they couldn't take anything radioactive because the half-lives of the substances would drastically reduce the amount and quality of the resource as they traveled the hundreds of years back to their home planet (I choose hundreds of years as a concession to the oppossition. If their planet was, for example 700 light years from earth than it would be a 1,400 year round trip. Hundreds of years is the smallest reasonable guess, the minimal travel time). They also could not take anything biological because it would completely decompose by the time they got it to their home planet. Perhaps the most damning refutation is, once again, cost effectiveness. Their transport ship would have a maximum capacity, there is only so much it could carry, and any resources they take would be balanced by resources lost through propelling the ship across hundreds of light years of empty space. The more they carried, the more the ship would weigh, the more fuel they would lose to space as they tried to get the ship back home. Overall it's far simplier to mine on their home planet or adjacent planets in their solar system than to travel to an inhabited world on the far reaches of the galaxy.

3) Territory*: I respect this option for being one of the few that actually provides a rationale for aliens traveling half the galaxy to meet us. Assuming they live on a planet like ours, and are therefore capable of inhabiting ours, planets like Earth are few and far between. It's possible that an alien species suffering from over-population would send hive ships to earth simply because earth is the closest inhabitable planet. However, under this circumstance making our presence known is not detrimental to us. Announcing that there are humans on Earth would not incite an invasion that wasn't already coming. Simply knowing that there are weird fleshy creatures on a rock half way across the galaxy doesn't suddenly bump it to the top of your conquer list. An alien species would conquer planets on the basis of return on investment (How many of our kind can the planet support? What resources are present? Does control of this planet give our species more influence in the region?), and on that basis knowing that the planet in question is already populated does not factor into your decision to rule it. If anything it makes conquering the planet more costly as you have to send an extermination force along with your settlers. The only reason to assume that announcing our presence would call unwanted attention to our planet would be that all alien creatures lived in the same sort of environment and, therefore, knowing that some species inhabits earth means that your species will be able to inhabit earth as well. I feel this assumption is flawed. If there is alien life it is vast and varied and may survive in entirely different climes than ours.

So, in summary, there is no cost-effective rationale for taking slaves or resources from earth and if aliens species are planning to conquer the planet to ease their over-population problems knowing that we're here isn't going to get them any more interested in the planet than they already would be and may in fact shift the return on investment ratio far enough for them to invest in a different planet. I don't think that Hawking is the Einstein of our century and (at the very least) he is a poor economist.

*contentions may very if you believe in teleportation, time travel or other soft-sciences.

Nicely summarised, and I agree with the rationale, although there is one big problem I see with trying to predict alien behaviour:- They are, by definition, alien to our understanding.

We assume that most of the Galaxy and/or Universe is like here - fair enough, I say, we can see lot of stars similar to ours, and the Universe looks fairly uniform. However, to take that assumption and apply to it alien sentients is, in my opinion, a mistake. We only know of ourselves as a sentient technological species (Dolphins, Chimps, Whales, Dogs, Pigs, etc, etc, probably are sentient but not technological). As such, we only have ourselves as a sample point - and hence, we don't know if we are a typical sentient species or an oddity or if every species acts differently. Hence, to take our values and understanding of concepts, even basic ones we assume are oblivious and Universal, such as cost-effectiveness, is unproven. It might be that the aliens are just inheriantly 'evil' like the Dregnin from galactic civilizations. Of course, this might just be my fancyful thinking, and not apply to reality, heh.

As for FTL, according to our current (and incomplete) understanding of physics, it seems impossible. But do bare in mind our understanding of the world around is very incomplete (see Quantum Physic vs General Relativity - both are 'true' and yet they are mutually incompatible). And hence, FTL might be lurking in the 'here be dragons' areas of the map of the 'theory of everything'.

It's a valid point that we can't accurately predict the behavior of other technological species because we haven't encountered any, but I think there are a few basic assumptions you can make about them working solely from the criteria that they are technological.

I associate (perhaps wrongly) a recognition of cost-effectiveness with the drive to produce continually advancing technology. From the start when people realized that it was easier and provided a larger long term return on investment to create wheels and carts to push around things rather than carry them by hand to today where people debate the merits of nuclear power over wind energy as they relate to cost effectiveness and, most importantly, their individual advantages over current energy producing techniques. Again, that is unfortunately based solely on observation of our own species and therefore could have a bias but I can't help but feel that a species that didn't recognize ideas like cost effectiveness and return on investment wouldn't have the incentive to improve their technology. I think they'd be happy with whatever they were using at the time because it worked and it wouldn't be necessarily useful to research superior methods.

That aside, I suppose it's possible they would try to wipe us out for illogical reasons. Whether it be via a crusade or as a xenophobic measure or simply because one of our translators misspoke and the aliens have a highly elevated sense of honor (particularly when it comes to defending it). All of those are possible but I can't help but feel that a species more advanced than ourselves would have mastered impulses like this. I don't think all of those factors would make for a very stable civilization and I think you'd need a pretty steady homefront before you could debate the merits of conquering civilizations halfway across the galaxy.

As for FTL I personally wouldn't be surprised if we found a way to make it happen at some point in the future. Honestly, it wouldn't shock me much if we found a way to make it happen during my lifetime. But I set out to debunk Hawking's conclusion using the same assumptions he would have made and that includes the impossibility of faster than light travel.

True on all points - though I didn't realise you where disagreeing with Hawks before And I think Hawk's is abit overrated - smart guy, obviously, but I'm not sure he's a true genius.

Anywho, it is quite probable that 'cost-effectiveness' is a feature of all/most technological species - that say, we're viewing this as a species to whom that concept is pretty clear and obvious, heh.

 

[Lazarus Long]

or simply because one of our translators misspoke and the aliens have a highly elevated sense of honor

I seem to be having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle.

I've always figured first contact would be something along the lines of The Day The Earth Stood Still. The real one, with Michael Rennie. We're a backwards, primitive, warlike species, and we have no place in galactic civilization until we grow up, that kind of thing.

And I believe wormholes skirt around the FTL problem nicely.

 

[Onlythestrong]

We have already been contacted....garaunteed....and some douche president or king or some such probablly told em to jog on....just a guess.
But I say hells yes we answer if called!

 

[Agayek]

Yeah, no problem at all, Mr. Hawking. When the aliens show up, I'll stall and you all start evolving. I'll try to buy you some time. Is 100 million years enough?

What makes him assume our evolutions would have to do with our intelligence? Maybe we'd just grow wings. Is this guy really our century's Einstein? Sorry, Mr. Hawking, but if you think evolution works like that... You're doing it wrong.

He means technologically, at least that's what implied. It's a very real possibility that any extraterrestrial species we come into contact with will act exactly like the European invaders in the Americas back in the 1500s. They'll show up, and their technology will be beyond our comprehension. As such, they will have an incredibly easy time completely decimating our society(s) and enslaving the entirety of the human race. If we are sufficiently advanced technologically, we will be able to fight back and stop that from happening.

From what I've gathered, all he's saying is that we need to be very, very cautious about extraterrestrial life, because if it's sentient, it's probably fairly similar to us, insofar as the "Rape, pillage and steal everything one can get away with" mentality.

 

[13lackfriday]

Yeah, no problem at all, Mr. Hawking. When the aliens show up, I'll stall and you all start evolving. I'll try to buy you some time. Is 100 million years enough?

What makes him assume our evolutions would have to do with our intelligence? Maybe we'd just grow wings. Is this guy really our century's Einstein? Sorry, Mr. Hawking, but if you think evolution works like that... You're doing it wrong.

I don't believe he meant "evolution" specifically as the genetic mutation and subsequent improvement over time.

He might mean the evolution of our civilization.
The Kardashev Scale, some Russian's way of ranking civilizations based on their ability to harness all the available energy at hand, is a decent way of deeming our preparedness for meeting an extraterrestrial civlization.
For example, if they're traveling at light speed and popping in black holes at will while we're utterly dependent on fossil fuels and just getting started on solar energy, it's fair to say we'd need to stay on their good side.

See this [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AbusingTheKardashevScaleForFunAndProfit] for reference.

 

[Samurai Goomba]

Yeah, no problem at all, Mr. Hawking. When the aliens show up, I'll stall and you all start evolving. I'll try to buy you some time. Is 100 million years enough?

What makes him assume our evolutions would have to do with our intelligence? Maybe we'd just grow wings. Is this guy really our century's Einstein? Sorry, Mr. Hawking, but if you think evolution works like that... You're doing it wrong.

I don't believe he meant "evolution" specifically as the genetic mutation and subsequent improvement over time.

He might mean the evolution of our civilization.
The Kardashev Scale, some Russian's way of ranking civilizations based on their ability to harness all the available energy at hand, is a decent way of deeming our preparedness for meeting an extraterrestrial civlization.
For example, if they're traveling at light speed and popping in black holes at will while we're utterly dependent on fossil fuels and just getting started on solar energy, it's fair to say we'd need to stay on their good side.

See this [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AbusingTheKardashevScaleForFunAndProfit] for reference.

Yeah, no problem at all, Mr. Hawking. When the aliens show up, I'll stall and you all start evolving. I'll try to buy you some time. Is 100 million years enough?

What makes him assume our evolutions would have to do with our intelligence? Maybe we'd just grow wings. Is this guy really our century's Einstein? Sorry, Mr. Hawking, but if you think evolution works like that... You're doing it wrong.

He means technologically, at least that's what implied. It's a very real possibility that any extraterrestrial species we come into contact with will act exactly like the European invaders in the Americas back in the 1500s. They'll show up, and their technology will be beyond our comprehension. As such, they will have an incredibly easy time completely decimating our society(s) and enslaving the entirety of the human race. If we are sufficiently advanced technologically, we will be able to fight back and stop that from happening.

From what I've gathered, all he's saying is that we need to be very, very cautious about extraterrestrial life, because if it's sentient, it's probably fairly similar to us, insofar as the "Rape, pillage and steal everything one can get away with" mentality.

Already addressed this point.

Doesn't matter how advanced our machines are when aliens arrive, if people in authority are still stupid, petty and obsessed with self-gain. Technological advancements don't count for crap if people can't stop being jerks and rise out of their own bile and filth.

Excuse me, I think I'm gonna go watch a few David Fincher movies now.

We done here? Either alien society will be completely incomprehensible to us, and thus we'll attack it and be destroyed, or the aliens will be like us, only superior. In which case they'll kill us and take our stuff.

Doesn't matter how advanced we are, because if the aliens have contacted US, then they can either shift dimensions or move at faster-than-light speeds.

Even if we have the technology to stand up to them, we will be destroyed by our lack of unity, general arrogance and stupid leaders. Nothing any scientist does will make our leaders any less petty and moronic. You honestly think all of humanity is capable of uniting against a common threat?

But I guess it's futile to argue what might happen, because it quite obviously hasn't happened yet. Future predictions of the sort Mr. Hawking is talking about... It's real easy to say whatever you want about the future, isn't it? If you're wrong nobody cares, if you're right everyone treats you like a messiah.