I've heard the argument that another species so advanced as to be able to visit would be "beyond" agression and war...in sci-fi movies that's usually just before the aliens start sucking out our brains.
I'd like to believe it, of course, but in reality I'd never stake my species' survival on it. "Trust but verify" seems like the smart policy; one hand open, the other on a weapon.
If evolution works elsewhere according to the same rules as on Earth (and there's little reason to speculate otherwise), whoever gets to the top of a particular planet's heap will have done so by being the biggest badass on the planet. Do they continue to grow linearly, just getting more and more competent at killing? Or do they cross a threshold and learn the value of cooperation over aggression? Again, I'd like to believe the latter; and consider fictional warlike aliens such as Klingons a bit improbable on the grounds that they couldn't have organized themselves sufficiently to make it to space while busy slaughering each other...but again I'm conscious of the risk of anthropomorphising.
Space/Science » in reply to It is just nice...
re: It is just nice...
The whole thread (49 posts)
- Many, Perhaps Most, Nearby Sun-Like Stars May Form Rocky Planets
- There's no PROOF for their claim. (n/t)
- Translation: Very good news for SETI weenies.
- I was never too worried about it
- How about admitting: "We don't know"...and search from there
- re: I was never too worried about it
- colonization's always been a one-way trip
- It's obvious you don't believe space aliens will be Democrats. (n/t)
- "Intelligence"
- Fermi Shmermi
- It is just nice...
- I was never too worried about it