Stephen Hawking says beware intelligent aliens.

[Urien]

It's certainly possible that technologically advanced aliens might find conquering and/or exterminating other species a logical and reasonable course of action.

We extrapolate from our own experience, that over time we have become in aggregate less warlike/repressive/brutal. Now we would likely hold out the hand of peace and cooperation to any discovered sentients.

However, we wouldn't want to meet Asher's Prador, Hamilton's Primes or Bank's Affront. I think the logic behind the Prime's action was perhaps the most convincing.

Beware of what you wish for. Hope to meet the Federation...

 

[HareBrain]

My view is that any species that develops advanced technology has a fairly short window in which to evolve out of its animal-based aggressive habits before it destroys itself or its environment. So any species that has achieved true interstellar capability would, I believe, very likely be "enlightened".

 

[Parson]

My view is that any species that develops advanced technology has a fairly short window in which to evolve out of its animal-based aggressive habits before it destroys itself or its environment. So any species that has achieved true interstellar capability would, I believe, very likely be "enlightened".

Or they captured it from an enlightened species. Or they achieved a scientific kismet and viola. Or the prevalent view of their culture is that only creatures with smurlifizmnd can possibly be intelligent. (and on and on the possibilities go.)

 

[skeptical]

The basic problem is that we do not know. We can talk all we like about the options, and whether aliens are enlightened or xenophobes. We simply do not know.

One thing that is predictable, is that aliens will be, well.... alien!

We are talking of a species that came into existence elsewhere and evolved totally without contact with Earth. We are more closely related to a tapeworm. How the alien evolved is totally unpredictable. They might be angels or devils.

One thing I predict, they will not be like the blue 9 foot high skinny natives in Avatar. They will be totally unhuman.

 

[Moonbat]

They will be totally unhuman.

Sadly we don't even know this.

 

[Dave]

Sadly we don't even know this.

True.

It really depends on how rare life is. If 'Life' is really very unusual in the Universe, any other life would also be based on Carbon chain chemistry and water as a solvent. That means DNA is the most likely method of replication, (whether or not you believe in Panspermia.) Intelligent life would most likely also have developed binocular vision, hands with opposable thumbs and bipedal walking. So they may be blue, green or grey, and they may have scales or feathers or something weird and alien, but by the process of convergent evolution (by which both Birds and Bats independently have Wings) they are likely to look similar to us. And to defeat my earlier argument, they probably would be just as aggressive as us too.

If life is very common, there could be all kinds of life. Life based on Silicon (the Horta from Star Trek.) Life based on Ammonia as a solvent on cold worlds. And all kinds of Life, not as we know it! - 'beings of pure energy' etc. etc.

 

[skeptical]

In the Star Wars series of movies, there was only one alien I thought was convincing. Jabba the Hutt. And he was convincing only because he was so different.

An alien might be a sea dweller, closer to a squid than a human, or even to a slug. Or it might be like a balloon floating through the air. It might even have evolved in a gas cloud in space, and be more like a cloud than an animal. Ever read Fred Hoyle's "The Black Cloud"?

Stuff convergent evolution. There is no reason to believe it will be anything like humans at all. If it has legs, it might have 2 or 200. It may have any number of eyes, or no eyes at all. After all, dolphins get along extremely well in water so turbid they cannot use their eyes, and rely on sound. Or maybe they sense electric fields. Or imagine a giant space dweller than detects gravity waves.

We do not know, and speculation really does not help that lack of understanding.

 

[jojajihisc]

That's true, speculation does not help that understanding nor is it meant to. It's meant to entertain.

The Hawking interview, from the sound of it in the article that is linked, sounds like he should be trolling around this forum. I think he's a fan.

I don't know how many times the old "aliens-raid-the-planet-for-its-resources-because-they've-already-exhausted-their-planet's-resources" story has turned up but I think it's a lot. Those profligate aliens. That aliens could exist inside of stars sounds like Kevin J. Anderson's Saga of the Seven Suns. In that series they are known as the "faeros", of course. There might also be, according to Hawking, Anderson et. al., "hydrogues" lurking in the high atmospheric pressures of Jupiter, and "wentals" swimming around in hydrocarbon seas on Titan (and if that's the case then Hawking is too late and they already know we're here. See: Cassini Mission).

Also, if the Christopher Columbus analogy is an accurate one shouldn't we want to be the ones out exploring in hopes of finding the aliens before they find us first? Because apparently it's that simple: be the ones who do the discovering.

 

[Scifi fan]

I have a different problem.

Astronomers and physicists aren't trained in world history, political science, or international relations, and they make a lot of ignorant comments about current affairs.

But they are not alone. Professors of international relations have also gotten it very wrong about the world. in the 1970's, Kissinger wanted detente with the Soviet Union (remember the hammer and sickle?) modelled after the Congress of Vienna, but detente collapsed after Nixon left (or was driven from) office, and, a decade after that, the Warsaw Pact collapsed, followed by the Soviet Union a few years later. If Kissinger had known that, he would have done as Reagan did - ie, run the enemy into the ground and not negotiate.

And, during the time of Reagan, the scholars were talking of how Japan was going to take over the US in economic strength, and how the Asian Century had dawned. I was one of the minority who said otherwise, and I thought that the American era would continue well into the 21st Century.

I was right, of course, and I am still right. But neither I nor any scholar ever thought that the Soviet Union would shrivel overnight, and even a free-market enthusiast like me did not realize how capitalism would become the accepted paradigm all over the world, even among professors of political science.

So the track record of social scientists and the students of social scientists is not very good. And, if they cannot get it right, how much less can physicists and astronomers? And, if it's so hard to understand human relations, how much harder must it be to understand how star-faring aliens think?

So, when Stephen Hawkings talks of how aliens can come and conquer us, I wonder how accurate that is. Would gorillas in a nature preserve really understand how modern humans think?

 

[skeptical]

scififan

Did you miss the point?

We have been emphasizing the fact that we cannot know. Aliens, if they exist, are a complete question mark. Anything might happen.

 

[Urien]

Skeptical,

Precisely anything might happen; but we act as if only the benevolent versions of aliens might happen. Hence SETI, broadcasts and even nice little diagrams and maps on the Voyagers, which in the wrong hands/paws/tentacles might as well say EAT HERE.

The logical (and dull) position is it seems to keep our collective heads down and hope that we don't attract any attention, given that death and slavery trumps "The nice aliens brought us a cure for cancer".

 

[Stephen Palmer]

In today's Grauniad:

Is Stephen Hawking right about aliens? | Science | The Guardian

 

[Dave]

Seth Shostak is right, the argument is dead anyway, it is already to late to stop broadcasting to them if they are out there.

If we really want to keep them away, keep showing TV and films showing them how hostile we are, and the News reports that emphasise the fact the Influenza, Ebola and HIV pandemics are only a few years away. That would work for me.

 

[Scifi fan]

scififan

Did you miss the point?

We have been emphasizing the fact that we cannot know. Aliens, if they exist, are a complete question mark. Anything might happen.

I just said it in a different way.

 

[skeptical]

Dave

I am sorry, but your fatalistic argument does not stack up.

Our television and radio transmissions are very low power. By the time we look a few light years away from Earth, they have dissipated to the point where, as I said before, you would need an antenna half the size of our solar system just to detect them. By the time you get to, say, 20 light years away, even this becomes impossible.

Our radio and TV transmissions will not be picked up by hypothetical aliens. However, a high powered, and beamed transmission might. Such a transmission will punch through much greater distances. These have not been sent, but a whole lot of very naive scientists want to send them, under the ridiculous assumption that any alien receiving them has gotta be friendly!

Personally, I think it is very low probability that even a high power, beamed transmission will ever be received by aliens, but I still think we would be much wiser not to send any.

 

[Starbeast]

Stephen Hawking reckons aliens are out there but we should be wary of inviting a smart ET home to tea. He likens it to Europeans landing in North America in the 15th century.

To me it sounds like Mr Hawkings knows something and he is hinting at the truth.

 

[Boneman]

But does it mean we should talk to stupid aliens? (convince them of the merits of Timeshare..?). As Calvin so convincingly said: "The surest sign that there is intelligent life in the Universe, is that none of it has visited here".

 

[Rosemary]

That you know of, Boneman! Who's to say aliens have been among us for a long long time?

If they looked like us, no one would know. Just because we haven't seen any unusual looking green skinned aliens, doesn't mean to say there are none.

I myself just can't agree with all the money spent trying to get in touch with aliens.

 

[Chinook]

I know I'm a bit late on the draw for this one, but I was kind of busy, and I was catching up when this thread caught my eye.

I would like to note that most, if not all of the members posting in this thread seem to believe that "intelligence" is commensurate with sentience. Is that an accepted fact? I'm not sure. Intelligence as a concept may well be relative. Therefore is it possible that anything that can "think" is intelligent?

Here is a quote from Wiki:

Individuals differ from one another in their ability to understand complex ideas, to adapt effectively to the environment, to learn from experience, to engage in various forms of reasoning, to overcome obstacles by taking thought. Although these individual differences can be substantial, they are never entirely consistent: a given person’s intellectual performance will vary on different occasions, in different domains, as judged by different criteria. Concepts of “intelligence” are attempts to clarify and organize this complex set of phenomena. Although considerable clarity has been achieved in some areas, no such conceptualization has yet answered all the important questions, and none commands universal assent. Indeed, when two dozen prominent theorists were recently asked to define intelligence, they gave two dozen, somewhat different, definitions.

So I say "intelligence" is relative. Here is a thought: What if the Universe is Intelligence? http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/#cite_note-Neisser1998-2

 

[J-WO]

I think we need a wider set of words in this area. We're limited by language here.