@[email protected] Three Body Problem has an answer.
@[email protected] since there isn’t any intelligent life on Earth, no reason to visit. It would be like humans traveling to a dump in Bangladesh to make contact with the fermented contents of a diaper.
@[email protected] The only thing that makes sense for alien sentient species to do is to trade intellectual property, and perhaps entertainment content. Traveling at or near speed of light may not be possible, but sending information is rudimentary. I bet they would enjoy watching Star Trek episodes a great deal, and I wonder what types of technology they would trade for each episode/film...
I agree, however surely if they were say 100 ly away they would detect our world as it was in 1924, as light would have taken 100 years to reach them.
@[email protected] makes sense to me
@[email protected] I have it on good authority that when aliens' GPS accidentally steers them into this neighborhood, they roll up the windows, lock the doors, and step on it at Warp 9
I'm pretty sure the reason they haven't made contact with us is because we're made of meat.
Source: Terry Bisson, April 1991 (OMNI)
https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/thinkingMeat.html
@[email protected] Welllll… why are we studying lemurs, fungi, asteroids, cockroaches, jellyfish, bacteria, horses, ball lightning, cloud formations, rocks, seaweed, and basically everything else there is to see?
@[email protected]
This to me was one of the aspects of the Star Trek Prime Directive. Not just protecting minority culture but also avoiding it until it can get on the highway and you really can’t.
Anyway, let’s keep working for the betterment of humanity!
@[email protected] okay but what about the other aliens? And the other other aliens? Why should we assume there's only one alien group? And that they're homogeneous over endless space and time?
Would every single alien ever for all time agree to never ever contact us?
@[email protected] Our memetic infections are probably more dangerous in the long run than our physical infections and they cross freely between minds even if our biology is incompatible.
@[email protected] earth could be a nice place to grow plants and raise cattle. Kinda like how we keep screwing around with the Arab countries cause we want their oil.
@[email protected] Isn't there some saying about extra-terrestrial life intelligent enough to invent interstellar travel would also be smart enough to not come here?
I so dislike it when people allegedly friendly to my ideology take it for granted that the other side defines humanity. Yes, there's a lot of awful in us. There's a lot of wonderful, too. Let the other side say we're crud. Let's not say it about ourselves.
@[email protected] either that or the filter is Orange and social media
@[email protected] I guess we won't be having a "Day The Earth Stood Still" event any time soon.
Earth is the Galactic version of that bad neighbourhood you try not to go to, and if you have to drive through it you do it with your doors and windows locked, and never after dark.
@[email protected] I literally wrote that short story:
Either that or they have the prime directive.
Ahead warp factor 9 past Earth, Mr Sulu.
@[email protected] I believe the answer can be found in the (new) Outer Limits episode 'Final Exam'.
@[email protected] If they are around, and I still doubt that they’d spend the effort to visit this backwater, the obvious conclusion is exactly that.
If there existed a real version of Star Trek, would not the Prime Directive preclude a Captain Sulu from contacting a civilization as undeveloped, violent, and addicted to unrestrained capitalism as the present one on earth?
Better to let it progress or not on its own, as it attempts to explore a universe beyond its small star system. That could take some time, which would give the Federation - or the Klingons - more time to develop a suitable way of interacting with it.
@[email protected] Proof that there is intelligent life 'out there':
They got here, took one look, said "OH HELL NO!" and went home.
That's the proof they're intelligent.
@[email protected] Welllll… why are we studying lemurs, fungi, asteroids, religions, cockroaches, languages, jellyfish, music, viruses, ball lightning, cloud formations, rocks, seaweed, food, and basically everything else there is to see or imagine?
My solution to the Fermi paradox is: they’re cringing at our ceaseless churning-out of increasingly desperate and speculative solutions to the Fermi paradox. :P
@[email protected] Exactly.
Also, why did we even try SETI. If a more advanced race has interstellar travel, they have found a short cut. That would be highly unlikely to be sensed by radio.
Not by choice mind you. the speed of light is so slow compared to the size of the universe they don't know we are here.
Yeah, Stephen's got a point. We don't play well with other races.
@[email protected] can't blame them - even i, as human, want to avoid as much humans i can avoid 🤷 😄
@[email protected] A little egocentric.
@[email protected] They have their own "Prome Directive" and we are not ready for contact yet. The way we act, maybe never!
@[email protected] To be fair, can were blame them? We either look like free labor or proverbial insects to annihilate on one end of the spectrum or probably seem horrible primitive, uncultured, and barbaric (as a species) on the other side.
@[email protected] Visit to a small-minded planet?
@[email protected] well it's already been established that apart from an accident back in 1957, aliens will basically avoids us until April 5, 2063 😉
@[email protected] perhaps if someone specific would stop terrifying them :)
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