Why do we always assume aliens are more advanced than us?
122 replies, posted
[url]http://projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3aa.html#apesorangels[/url]
[QUOTE]Apes or Angels
Consider the high improbability that any two Earth-like planets will form and evolve to the exact and ideal conditions that develop and support carbon-based life.
Consider also the number of mass extinctions that have occurred in Earth's past. It is unlikely that the same number of these would occur on another Earth- like world at exactly the same time and with the exact same frequency.
Finally, consider the cultural developments in Earth's history, and apply a few "What Ifs." What if Democracy had never developed beyond the conceptual stage? What if Rome had never fallen? What if Columbus had never received any financial backing from the Spaniards? What if the Nazis had developed the atomic bomb first?
[SPECULATION]
Would any of one of these events have delayed or advanced human development by as much as 0.001%? One value given for the age of the Earth is 4.567 billion years. A +/- 0.001% change would set human evolution back by 4.567 million years (Apes), or advance it by 4.567 million years (Angels).
Thus, by “Apes & Angels” one could say that any two worlds that formed at exactly the same time, and that have had billions of years to go from dust to sentient life, could differ by as much as 9.134 million years in evolution!
A divergence of only 0.000001% would still separate the two extremes by 9.134 thousand years. With this value, one alien world could have a bronze-age culture (year = 2560 BCE), while another could be far ahead of our own, both culturally and technologically (year = 6574 CE). Maybe not “Apes & Angels” but perhaps “Spearchuckers & Supermen”?
[/SPECULATION]
My Example: The planet Earth will have a life-span of roughly ten billion years. Mankind (Homo sapiens) appeared on Earth approximately 100,000 years ago. The bronze age began about 5300 years ago. The Industrial Revolution began about 250 years ago.
When will we humans evolve into angels? Vernor Vinge thinks the Singularity will happen no later than the year 2030. But I'll be generous and use 500 years from now, using John Barnes' rule of thumb. How long will the angels last? No idea. For lack of anything else, let's say 100,000 years from now, placing us current humans midway between apes and angels.
Now, assuming that the Daniel Boone only visits planets that be hosts to alien species, and assuming that each planet will only produce one alien species (which is a very questionable assumption), this means that the chance of discovering a living alien species is about 200,000/10,000,000,000 = 0.00002 = one chance in 50,000.
The poor Daniel Boone will on average have to visit fifty thousand planets in order to find one alien species. (Of course the Daniel Boone will probably be targeting planets about the same age as Earth and using other strategies to drastically reduce the number it will have to visit.)
Now, say that somehow the Daniel Boone manages to visit enough planets to discover 267 alien species. What level with they be at? Doing the math, 133 in 267 will be angels, 126 in 267 will be cave men, 7 in 267 will be on par with ancient Egypt, and only one in 267 will be a technological species. Keeping in mind that in this case, "technological" means it has technology ranging from steam power to something out of Star Wars (the 1760's to the 2500's).
The Daniel Boone will encounter 126 planets full of cave-man level aliens that they can play "Chariots of the Gods" with, and will have to avoid 133 planets with god-like species eager to put our intrepid explorers into giant petri dishes for their experiments with primitive life forms.
If these figures do not suit you, this is your opportunity to play with the various values until more reasonable numbers appear. But you will be forced to live with the implications of any values you change.
In those science fiction novels that care about technical details, there are some solutions mentioned. They all rely upon some method to start all the alien species in a stellar region simultaneously. This means that they will all develop at roughly the same rate, and encounter each other at roughly the same technological level. Solutions include postulating some alien race at the dawn of galactic history seeding planets, or disasters like gamma-ray bursters destroying all life in a galactic zone, forcing the planets to start re-evolving life starting at the same point in time.[/QUOTE]
God obviously made humans better that's why we are center of universe.
Maybe on alien planets they think that we are very advanced, as though we are living in the Jetsons.
[QUOTE=ProboardslolV2;21575424]What if aliens are to the point where they don't abuse they're environment? what if these aliens don't hate their planet?[/QUOTE]
Then they've probably found a stable, safe source of energy.
[sp] Also, here on Earth, we don't hate our planet, as you imply. We just do not have the means to produce energy with the efficiency of fossil fuels. Although we could do without them, most of us are just too lazy to change.[/sp]
[QUOTE=ProboardslolV2;21575424]
What if they're LESS advanced even, and just stumbled upon space exploration by accident?[/QUOTE]
This doesn't happen.
-snop-
[QUOTE=ProboardslolV2;21575424]What if aliens are almost exactly like us, technology wise, but look different, and they're just as disappointed as us when we contact them.
What if our planets are (For example) 500au's apart. What if we just kind of, meet half-way at 250au's?[/QUOTE]
That happens in this book
[img]http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/ciu/d0/22/c6c7225b9da022604ea92110.L.jpg[/img]
It's pretty awesome p. much my favorite space opera book of all time for some reason
but whos to say there aliens that need resoureces and need ceartain things to survive.the human brain can't think outside of the box or think of diffrent life forms of that have the same sort of features as us.
[QUOTE=yuper11;21577811]but whos to say there aliens that need resoureces and need ceartain things to survive.the human brain can't think outside of the box or think of diffrent life forms of life that have the same sort of features as us.[/QUOTE]
This is an English forum. Use it.
OH-MY-GOD!
I have constantly made this argument throughout life,
The chances of a species evolving the way we did in the manipulation of technology is close to none, multiply that by the fact of how limited life is in the universe and you find that we are a very, very, unique species, and its not crazy to think that we're not just the kinds of the earth, but possibly, much, much more than that, and the odds that a species is not just equal to us but GREATER is close to none
Even if Aliens did have more advanced technologies, they would've found war obsolete, given us some-what of an edge, seeing as we live with it daily
From reminding ourselves of constant movie scenarios we are prepared for pretty much the worst
[QUOTE=ForTehWolf...2!;21577854]
Even if Aliens did have more advanced technologies, they would've found war obsolete, given us some-what of an edge, seeing as we live with it daily[/QUOTE]
Who's to say an alien society would settle conflicts by war in the first place? Maybe they have their best athletes compete in a tournament for land, maybe they never diversified and have always been one unified mass without the notion of conflict.
The fact is, social development without a slate to build from is an incredibly entropic process.
I wish I could observe it in action, it's a very interesting concept.
[QUOTE=Quo Vadi;21577901]Who's to say an alien society would settle conflicts by war in the first place? Maybe they have their best athletes compete in a tournament for land, maybe they never diversified and have always been one unified mass without the notion of conflict.
The fact is, social development without a slate to build from is an incredibly entropic process.
I wish I could observe it in action, it's a very interesting concept.[/QUOTE]
Yes, but the route of social evolution undergone is a very unique one, what i'm saying is that the Aliens wouldn't know war as we do, the war we know is harsh and merciless with gigantic machines and weapons, while they may have the athletes as you suggested
I really find it amazing how our civilization is getting to the point, where nature, and anything natural is no longer a threat, at the exponential rate that technology has advanced in just 200 years, with little to no slowing down, think of what the human race with have developed in 2,000 years?
You either completely misunderstood my post or your cat walked across your keyboard and, by some chance, wrote a post that somehow disagreed with mine whilst confirming that everything I stated was true, all the while managing to take a meat cleaver to the English language.
I don't doubt other intelligent life in our Universe, in f act I highly support the idea. And I also believe that it won't be rare to find slower developing aliens on other world's. I view the Universe as one big Earth if you will. Back in Colonial days there were Native Americans--for example--living off of the land using primitive tools while Europe and Asia were progressing quite quickly.
Well, most developing countries are still developing countries because their pasts are filled with slavery and conflict, both of which are incredibly counter-intuitive to scientific development.
Either way, if they pose any threat, I hope to god we can win.
What if we are living in the matrix?
[QUOTE=Daddy-of-war;21578306]Either way, if they pose any threat, I hope to god we can win.[/QUOTE]
I don't. It'd be pretty interesting to be taken over by an alien race, in my opinion, but that's my escapist side talking.
maybe cuz they are green
[QUOTE=Quo Vadi;21578352]I don't. It'd be pretty interesting to be taken over by an alien race, in my opinion, but that's my escapist side talking.[/QUOTE]
Personally, if they didn't enslave us, and just wanted to become part of our civ. then that would be fine, but you know the moment one alien or human kills another war is going to break out.
Aliens meeting humans is like when whites first discovered blacks.
Aliens are less advanced
[img]http://www.theodoresworld.net/pics/0407/illegal_aliens_FUCK_You.jpg[/img]
[QUOTE=Daddy-of-war;21578404]Personally, if they didn't enslave us, and just wanted to become part of our civ. then that would be fine, [b]but you know the moment one alien or human kills another war is going to break out.[/b]
Aliens meeting humans is like when whites first discovered blacks.[/QUOTE]
Seems like a product of plot vehicle cliche to me. You been hanging out with Uwe Boll?
[QUOTE=Daddy-of-war;21578404]Personally, if they didn't enslave us, and just wanted to become part of our civ. then that would be fine, but you know the moment one alien or human kills another war is going to break out.
Aliens meeting humans is like when whites first discovered blacks.[/QUOTE]
I don't wanna meet these aliens if their gonna be like Leopold II!
Well considering the number of planets there are out there, it's likely that there are some civilizations both more and less advanced than us.
And then, you know, multiverse theory.
Simply because the age of the universe, the chance of aliens being within 5000 years of us technologically is incredibly slim.
If they were less advance...lets go Combine Occupation on them.
:smug:
Because the earth and our sun is very young compared to what's out there.
Aliens and all that have already evolved, they've just moved away because the Milky Way galaxy sucks.
If I found an alien space blob that didn't hurt me I'd use it for fornication.
:smug:
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