techstepgenr8tion wrote:
Vigilans wrote:
There are a lot of people on Earth already who fear extraterrestrials, who think it would be detrimental to the Human race to have contact with them. That we could be colonized and enslaved. I think on other planets with sentient life that considers the possibility of life elsewhere they have this fear as well. It could be that when space faring civilizations meet they never get along. So perhaps aliens do not want to be found
Pshht...nah.
A society advanced enough to get here had to have developed AI a long time ago. They wouldn't need slaves if they already had AI or replicators handling all of that. Now, killing every man woman and child to strip the world for its resources - not likely but, it could happen.
Brings up another good point on why aliens wouldn't bother contacting us; if they already have sufficient technology to where scarcity doesn't exist - they've got no reason, especially knowing how utterly gross and clingy a level zero culture would be who's never met another race before.
I'm not talking about a society that can visit us but one that is at a similar level of development. Even a little bit more advanced. They probably had analogous experiences to human history where more advanced civilizations conquered less advanced ones.
I also suspect there are a great many intelligent civilizations that do not fit our criteria of "friendly". "Enslavement" can mean a lot of things. They might conquer planets and utilize the unique elements of it's environment to further themselves. To that end they might destroy human civilization but keep humans and/or other creatures and genetically engineer them to something we barely recognize but that serves their purposes, such as efficiently and rapidly stripping the planet of everything useful without them having to bring much equipment.
When there is no scarcity internally the entire purpose of this alien civilization becomes expansion as its population grows; another species is bound to get in the way at some point. I don't think there ever will be "no scarcity" as the more advanced we get the larger and more costly are the projects we will undertake. Scarcity on a personal/societal level might disappear but as a species we will always be hungry for more. I see no reason why it would not work this way for other civilizations
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Opportunities multiply as they are seized. -Sun Tzu
Nature creates few men brave, industry and training makes many -Machiavelli
You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do
03 Feb 2012, 6:21 pm
