Stephen Hawking Warns Against First Contact

[Jim147]

You guys are thinking too hard.
Stephen just watched Battlefield Earth.

jim

[AJ Dual]

The VISUAL equivalent of Vogon poetry... 

[seeker_two]

I've always wondered why a highly-evolved intelligent race would even want to come to Earth.....it would be like vacationing with the Aborigines or something...

[MechAg94]

One argument I've heard regarding alien life as being more advanced than our own, in the technological and possibly even biological manner, makes sense to me.

Earth has had many setbacks of varying nature over the course of its life--one fine example is dinosaurs.  If the mass-extinction event that wiped them out didn't happen, they would most likely be the dominant form of life here, with several million years' worth of evolution on us.

Aside from that, human history has had its own setbacks as well.  Falls of great civilizations, dark ages, "total war," etc.  Many advances made during the course of the Roman Empire were lost until we figured them out again centuries later.  Things like the Antikythera mechanism and the Aeolipile, both from the BC era, are of a level of technology that didn't come about again until the 18th and 19th centuries.  If an alien civilization retained such knowledge and continued to improve upon them, it wouldn't be very difficult at all for them to be many, many years ahead of us--and that's if they equal us in intelligence.  No telling what point they'd be at if they were smarter.

That all assumes they started at relatively the same time which isn't necessarily true. 

[T.O.M.]

When I was aroudn nine years old, at Cub Scout camp, I was looking up at the night sky.  One of the first times I was alone (kind of...on the other side of the campground) looking up at a night sky not overwhelmed by the city lights.  I was simply awed by the number of stars in the sky.  And I very clearly recall how I suddenly wondered if one of those stars had a planet going around it, and if on that planet it was nighttime, and if there was a kid of some kind, like me, looking up at the stars in the night sky and wondering if someone was looking back at him...  I still wonder that now when I look up at the sky on a good night, with no clouds to hamper my view.

As for their intentions, did anyone see the movie "Planet 51"?  Kind of a funny flick, but if you think about it, what would happen if the aliens we come across are just like us, but just appearing different, or with different technology?  Probably not a good thing...  Maybe sitting quiet here is not such a bad idea...

[tyme]

Hawking should stick to theoretical physics.

Maybe he should be more worried about AI.  It also has the possibility of being malevolent, and (if it's possible at all) will probably emerge before we make contact with extraterrestrial life (if that exists), and unlike most ETs, AI would actually have a reason for competing with us for Earth's resources, since it would for a time be stuck here, the same as us.

I figured if a few blades of grass would insist on peeping out there, in the  middle of all that concrete, there must be other life in the universe.

Does not follow.

[MechAg94]

It might not be Earth's resources either.  What if they just come in and start mining asteroids or outer moons.  We wouldn't like it much, but there is not a hell of a lot we could do about it. 

[AZRedhawk44]

It might not be Earth's resources either.  What if they just come in and start mining asteroids or outer moons.  We wouldn't like it much, but there is not a hell of a lot we could do about it. 

+1.

Some space-faring race comes along and strip-mines [insert rare unobtanium mineral here] from the outer moons of the gas giants... the only place where it naturally occurs, and this [unobtanium] is necessary for interstellar flight.

So:  secondary race strip mines the moons around Jupiter and Saturn, then move on.

We get ignored by them... but even worse:  We can't build interstellar ships.  We are forever stuck on the island of Earth.

Very speculative and fanciful... but it may not be a gas giant issue.  It could be a comet issue, or some sort of interstellar energy resource floating in the black of space just outside of our Sun's gravity well, or whoknowswhat.

Life is competition.  Be it sexually-paired mammals or asexual colony-critters.

[Tallpine]

Hawking’s logic on aliens is, for him, unusually simple. The universe, he points out, has 100 billion galaxies, each containing hundreds of millions of stars. In such a big place, Earth is unlikely to be the only planet where life has evolved.

Well, if there isn't life out there, it's an awful waste of space 

[erictank]

My understanding is, that all the extrasolar planetary systems we have discovered so far are extremely unpromising.  The very best is the one we're sitting in. The numbers aren't looking real good.

This is an oft-argued subject.

We've gotten not-very-good looks at a few to several hundred local star systems - we can't even visually resolve an Earth-size planet yet! - in a single galaxy of several hundred *BILLION* stars.  Which galaxy itself is a medium-sized galaxy in a universe billions of light-years across - I have a photo from Hubble's Deep Field image a few years back as a background on my netbook.  Every point of light in it is supposed to be a *GALAXY*, not a star.  Times a few hundred BILLION stars each, for each of the several hundred in that picture, which is itself from a section of sky the apparent size of a piece of paper an inch square held at arm's length...

The numbers aren't NEARLY as bad as you seem to think.  The time scale might be long, but I'm reminded of Sagan's line from Contact - “The universe is a pretty big place. It’s bigger than anything anyone has ever dreamed of before. So if it’s just us… seems like an awful waste of space." (from the film version, spoken by Jodie Foster's character)

It is, IMO, the height of hubris to imagine that we're alone.

[Harold Tuttle]

what color is your system lord?

[alex_trebek]

If an alien race has the ability to travel faster than light, which is required if their plan is to send out cargo ships to bring stuff back, they probably have a really good grasp of the energy/matter conversion/manipulation thing.  The resources, as we define them, would more or less be irrelevant. What few they would need to mine could be done in any given system.

If they just travel around in a ginormous mothership independence day style, then their resource requirements would greater. It would still be easier to mine uninhabited bodies though.

Now, if it is possible to travel significantly faster than light, then assuming our race doesn't die off it is only a matter of time before we figure it out.  If the aliens are anything like us, they would probably want to do a preemptive strike and eliminate us before we can become a threat. Or they we might be tasty or make good pets in their opinion.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Surprising lack of imagination IMHO.

Indeed.

"Aliens are just like eeevil white colonists, we should avoid 'em."

Sounds more like the plot of some hack Avatar type screed than the kind of rigorous scientific thought Hawking is known for.

[mellestad]

I really think the idea that the earth is special enough for an alien race to want it badly enough to kill us all is fairly self centered.  Earth doesn't have anything that is rare in the universe and any alien that is able to colonize between star systems isn't going to 'need' a planet for anything in particular, especially considering the time involved to get anywhere.  Too much risk and too much time involved.

The game theory stuff is more likely, but there is literally nothing we can do about that except hope that an advanced species doesn't see us as a threat needing a large kinetic strike.  The above point might still apply though, but really the tech to shoot a big rock at a planet in another solar system isn't that far beyond what we have now (if we could see the target).  We might be able to do it now if we really wanted to.

Although now that I think about it, if we wanted to shoot a rock off that wouldn't impact for hundreds of years (or thousands) it would probably be 'smarter' to get off our planet for safety rather than hope no-one is shooting back.

Magic FTL travel changes things of course, which is why most sci-fi uses that tech.  Space at our timescale is pretty boring without it, even space teeming with aliens.

[lee n. field]

Space at our timescale is pretty boring without it, even space teeming with aliens.

Ever read Vernor Vinge's Deepness in the Sky?

[BrokenPaw]

This subject reminds me of Iain M. Banks' Excession.

If a spacefaring race were to show up on our doorstep, it would be a de facto Outside Context Problem for us; a singularity of existence, beyond which we have no way of speculating about the future.

From Excession:

The usual example given to illustrate an Outside Context Problem was imagining you were a tribe on a largish, fertile island; you'd tamed the land, invented the wheel or writing or whatever, the neighbours were cooperative or enslaved but at any rate peaceful and you were busy raising temples to yourself with all the excess productive capacity you had, you were in a position of near-absolute power and control which your hallowed ancestors could hardly have dreamed of and the whole situation was just running along nicely like a canoe on wet grass... when suddenly this bristling lump of iron appears sailless and trailing steam in the bay and these guys carrying long funny-looking sticks come ashore and announce you've just been discovered, you're all subjects of the Emperor now, he's keen on presents called tax and these bright-eyed holy men would like a word with your priests.

[Perd Hapley]

It is, IMO, the height of hubris to imagine that we're alone.

How so?  Where does pride or arrogance enter into it? 

[gunsmith]

Hawking says talking to aliens would be dangerous, & I can understand his point- I've seen "Independence Day" too. However, "Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" instructs us that not knowing what they're doing can be pretty bad also.

[mellestad]

How so?  Where does pride or arrogance enter into it? 

Well, if we were alone that would make us unique as special.  As it stands now, there isn't any scientific reason to assume the earth, life on earth, or even intelligent life is special in any way.  Lots of starts and lots of planets means there are bound to be many, many worlds with conditions suitable for life, if life even needs conditions similar to what exists on the earth.

Usually when people say it is hubris they are commenting on humanity being the sole intelligent life in the universe is just an extension of the earth being the center of the universe.

I don't think it is necessarily hubris, but at a minimum it is an argument from ignorance or incredulity.

[mellestad]

Ever read Vernor Vinge's Deepness in the Sky?

Nope, I'll check it out though.

http://www.amazon.com/Spin-Robert-Charles-Wilson/dp/076534825X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1272321997&sr=8-1 <-- Spin has some trippy ideas.

[Ron]

As it stands now, there isn't any scientific reason to assume the earth, life on earth, or even intelligent life is special in any way.  Lots of starts and lots of planets means there are bound to be many, many worlds with conditions suitable for life, if life even needs conditions similar to what exists on the earth.

There is nothing scientific about this statement at all.

So far as science is concerned we only know of and can prove that life exists in one place, earth.

Everything else is speculation.

[mellestad]

There is nothing scientific about this statement at all.

So far as science is concerned we only know of and can prove that life exists in one place, earth.

Everything else is speculation.

I said there was no scientific reason to assume life only exists on earth, not that science proves life exists in other places.

I'm not sure how your statement is applicable to what I wrote?

[Ron]

I said there was no scientific reason to assume life only exists on earth, not that science proves life exists in other places.

I'm not sure how your statement is applicable to what I wrote?

Do you believe there is a "scientific" reason to believe that life does exist elsewhere?

 

[Devonai]

There is ample scientific evidence that a "sweet spot" exists around a few star types that would facilitate the possibility of hospitable worlds, all other variables notwithstanding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hertzsprung%E2%80%93Russell_diagram

A more ontological approach would simply be that {infinity -1} star systems would result in more than one habitable world, and {infinity -1} ecological systems would result in more than one form of sentient life.

[French G.]

We need to fall back on Frank J. and nuke our own moon. No one will screw with a bunch crazy enough to nuke our own moon.