Beware of Aliens

In a recent article by the Times UK, the physicist Stephen Hawking reaffirmed the certainty of alien life, but cautioned that the seeking out of such life by human beings could be disastrous. Hawking says that the high probability for advanced alien life comes down to the law of averages. Given the massive size and expanse of the cosmos it's only logical that evolved life, like humans, exists somewhere out there.
According to Hawking, humans should be cautious because "a few life forms could be intelligent and pose a threat," and that "contact with such a species could be devastating for humanity." He suggests that there could be alien species that wish to raid Earth for its resources and then move on. He points out that "we only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn't want to meet." Of course this is possible according to the law of averages. But if we accept this possibility we may be selling ourselves short and submitting to a fear based dogmatic view of contact.
Image: "Klaatu" by scott*eric on Flickr courtesy of Creative Commons Licensing.
- 4-27-10
- Chris Kaplan's blog
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Comments
Of course...
Of course there is alien life. Although it is only "out there" if we assume that the millions of UFO sightings and tens of thousands of abduction accounts are all products of imagination. If ETs posed a threat to planet Earth, we would know by now. I don't think we would exist to ponder the question.
"we only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn't want to meet."
The problem with this statement is that human civilization will likely self-destruct before we have the ability to travel to other life-inhabited planets That is unless we dramatically change our direction by, of course, evolving our consciousness in which case we will no longer resemble "ourselves".
we're aliens
i for one, hope that the ETs that are out there intervene with earthly politics soon. we need something to put us past boundaries of race, religion, and geography. because we're sure as hell not mature enough as a species to do it on our own. yet.
we are celestial beings. earth is our temporary home.
Renowned British scientist
Renowned British scientist Stephen Hawking says aliens may not come in peace...they could be more interested in exploiting our natural resources than sharing their technology with us...they'll be even worse than we are....blah, blah, blah.
First off, any ET race who beams here in light ships can take us as an afterthought. Given that they've been here for thousands of years already, that's clearly not part of the program. Secondly, human physicists have been more detrimental to life on earth than any "alien" race. Thirdly, guys like Hawking will become obsolete overnight when we have direct meaningful access to wisdom and proven solutions from our neighbors. Finally, just because Hawking and the rest of the stooges in the military-industrial-complex managed to find the only service-to-self ET's in the galaxy and become their pets, does not mean the rest of the humanity will make the same ugly mistake.
Trotting out Hawking (and other hacks) to crank up the fear strikes me as sad and desperate. Say a prayer for these people. Their party is over and they are terrified. Regardless, we're ready for truth over lies, love over fear, and service over selfishness.
Bring it!
Dedicated to the proposition
Nah, Hawking's dope...
Nah, Hawking's dope... Dunno if I agree with this, but checkka:
http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/07/stephen-hawking-the-planet-has-entered-a-new-phase-of-evolution.html
Physicists really aren't that bad, I know a couple. Really nice people.
Hawking is some kind of crazy info-ape archetype. Trapped inside a nearly useless body, unable to communicate without a machine, renowed for his command of thought... Really seems like he should be more of a character in a book or something.
Alien life, yin and yang.
IndigoEric, you are correct
IndigoEric, you are correct in pointing out that we already have a nasty ET infestation. So, I suppose what we're really talking about is disclosure rather than warnings about as yet unknown evil green men.
The disinformation about aliens is more than likely another attempt to derail, control, or sway the disclosure dialog. The more fear, the better for the powers that be. Once the cat is out of the bag, it will become impossible to control who has access to the various species on the planet.
Dedicated to the proposition
Blights and Berzerkers
But the deafening silence, save the "Wow!" signal, could be a sign something terrible is out there.
I refer at first to Olaf Stapledon's "Star Maker" where he had most races that managed to transcend their worlds into space being peaceful, there was an epoch that was dominated by the "Blights". "Blights" were, to him, an unlikely but with the number of races and sheer length of time in the universe a near-tragic certainty. When a race became capable of traveling between the stars, but kept it's old warlike/predatory nature -or- went insane after it launched, it caused untold horror on the more primitive worlds it conquered or just destroyed in the pursuit of it's "Glorious Destiny".
Another possibility is the "Berzerker" or ancient war machine left over from some ancient interplanetary war between two advanced civilizations. Long past the war, they wait in the dark between the stars till their sensors pick up some sign of life. Then, not knowing any other commands, they simply keep attacking until the source is silenced, by moving meteors, using vastly powerful radiation beams, unleashing viruses or nanotech...
Why is there silence? There should be a few "Pulses" in the "Hydrogen Wavelength" as SETI keeps looking for at least. A few codes from far distant stars, too complex to be natural, but so far none.
Several possiblities:
1. Is our government itself, perhaps wanting control, perhaps a millitary mind has the same dark fear I speculated on, holding any evidence of ET intelligence/life secret?
2. Is SETI compliant with a government cover-up? -They'd probably want to deck me for even suggesting this, but frankly just from "Reflection" from other planets we should get tons of potential "Wow" signals...
3. Is it not that hard, but rather so easy once technology is mastered to communicate over astronomical distances (?Quantum teleportation of infromation?) and to travel as such that there's no real need for "Beacons"? That just due to the vastness of the galaxy and the relative 'remoteness' of our system we haven't had contact?
4. Is life so rare that we are the only intelligent species in the galaxy at this time?
5. Or, is there something advanced and ancient hiding in the dark between the stars that hates all other life and destroys it when it detects it?
I imagine the first thing
I imagine the first thing the ET Overlord says to Barack Obama on the White House lawn will be, "Will you PLEASE turn off those god damned radios?! Nobody, and I mean NOBODY uses the radio to call another planet! ...and stop with the rockets. You don't think we actually flew here do you?"
Or words to that effect. :-)
Dedicated to the proposition
Well, shows how much I know!
Well, shows how much I know! Turns out, maybe they DO use radios (perhaps for our benefit in this case).
Facebooker Claim, NASA Astronomer Decipher Intelligence Signal From Nearby Stars http://www.ufo-blogger.com/2010/05/nasa-astronomer-decipher-intelligence...
Dedicated to the proposition
They've survived themselves to get here..
One would hope that a civilization that would reach the point of technology to be able to find and travel to other planets containing life without first destroying themselves with that technology would be wise enough to be conscientious in their dealing with the life on that planet.
brotherhood
Science-fiction
I agree with Dr. Hawkings... most of our technological developments (i.e. space travel) have been the result of our highly advanced military R&D. Any alien showing up would probably come from a similar culture and be interested in "colonial expansion"; there are no hunter-gatherers in the space race.
And really, are our imaginations so limited and ego-centric we can only imagine aliens with distinctly human attributes? Is there not a possibility "life" (whatever that is) could have evolved differently on different planets? Non-carbon based, perhaps? Can Mars' incredible mountains, valleys, wind-storms, etc. be considered "life", even if there is no "life" on Mars to observe it?