SinisterGehe said:
I been just thinking while watching some really bad TV-documentary about aliens.
Simple question came to mind: "Why do we always assume that alien creature will be hostile towards us?"
Question is interesting in my opinion - so what you think?
Also we are not please do not open the discussion about do they exist - it leads nowhere. This is more of psychological/philosophical discussion about the behavior we have towards aliens.
Is it just the Pop-culture? Or do we really think that whatever is out there is out to kill us - no discussion of motives. Just that they are hostile by default.
In my opinion: If someone spends milenia and massive amount of resources to find another living and thinking creature, they aren't going to wipe out what they find just because... It doesn't seem logical.
So what you think.
Solvemedia: "No brainer" - fitting in my opinion.
I think a lot of it is projection, based off our own experiences with ourselves. Nearly every time an advanced group of humans has traveled to a new land, one of the first things they do is wipe out the more primitive indigenous population. Whether that's through outright genocide, or enslavement, or unintentional disease tends to vary from case to case. I mean, one of the first great accomplishments of homo sapiens was wiping out the three or so other human species that inhabited Earth at the same time.
Granted, this was the work of more primitive civilizations, with much different, often much more brutal, worldviews. But the fear is still there, the fear that we'll encounter other lifeforms and they will be a bit too much like us for comfort. I do think assuming an interstellar species will behave like pre-industrial civilizations is kind of unrealistic... but post-industrial and modern humans have done all kinds of horrible stuff to each other too.
Now, I will admit that the most common justification for an alien invasion that "they want our resources" is pretty silly. Space is massive, and it's literally full of resources. Why waste the time and effort to invade a world purely for resources you could find on a million uninhabited moons, or could be pulled from the atmosphere of gas giants, or from planets otherwise unsuited for colonization? It's just silly to think that a space-faring species would put boots on the ground on Earth over, like, gold, or some shit, when it's literally floating around everywhere.
The only reasonable scenario for aliens to invade Earth is, well, if they want it. Colonists, basically. Even that is extremely situational and depends on factors we can't know, like just how many Earth-like planets are out there, how common they are, how far apart are they spaced out? It would also depend on the tech of aliens in question too. If their FTL tech is good enough, and Earth-like worlds are common enough, there's really no reason to waste time wiping out a species over it.
Or maybe they find us and it just turns out they're a bunch of assholes? That is also a possibility. Could be a culture based around domination and/or slavery. Although, there is the possibility that most cultures like that would simply wipe themselves out before achieving interstellar status. It's all an interesting thought experiment to be sure.
