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Stephen Hawking takes a hard line on aliens

F107HyperSabr

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Stephen Hawking takes a hard line on aliens | Leo Hickman | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Aanyone see this ?
Stephen Hawking takes a hard line on aliens

The prfominent scientist warns that if there is life out there, we probably don't want it messing with us. Hawking further said
: "If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn't turn out well for the Native Americans."

Wonder what Hawking thinks about the Arizona Alien contact law ? Is there a correlation between HAWKING'S aliens and the ones we have landing in Arizona ?
 
Stephen Hawking takes a hard line on aliens | Leo Hickman | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Aanyone see this ?
Stephen Hawking takes a hard line on aliens

The prfominent scientist warns that if there is life out there, we probably don't want it messing with us. Hawking further said

Wonder what Hawking thinks about the Arizona Alien contact law ? Is there a correlation between HAWKING'S aliens and the ones we have landing in Arizona ?

They would both be here illegally. While one group is here cleaning toilets, the other group would be here teaching rocket science.

Damn, I am going to get the crap flamed out of me for this one. :mrgreen:
 
Hawking is right. If anyone is "out there" and can come here, we had better hope they are benevolent or we are screwed.
 
They would both be here illegally. While one group is here cleaning toilets, the other group would be here teaching rocket science.

Damn, I am going to get the crap flamed out of me for this one. :mrgreen:

HA HA HA hew he he !!! it's tough being an intellect but someone has to do it !! :rofl
 
Yeah, I saw that.

The world's most renowned physicist suddenly discovers a science fiction theme as old as the War of the Worlds, and we're supposed to be impressed or something.

Fact of the matter is that Hawking clearly doesn't understand space resources or the exploitation thereof, and he's not bothering to ponder the meaning of trillions of barrels of liquid petroleum reserves on planet earth.

That those reserves have never been tapped tells us:

1) There's no intelligent life in this part of the galaxy.

2) That interstellar travel is probitively expensive and difficult.

3) Or that any aliens that have visited the planet are so thoroughly exploiting the resources of space that they don't need to crawl around on the ground sucking up oil.

Any one or any combination of the three are possible.

Certainly no in their right mind is going to come to earth to mine iron or copper or aluminum or any other metal, not when there's easier places to get it, like the asteroids.

The atmosphere of titan is just a hydrocarbon muck, and it would be easier to scoop that than to drill baby drill.

Vegetation and organic matter might be scarce, but if they're not going to plant a colony, the aliens would have scooped it and left.

Whatever, there is zero evidence of any alien visitation ever, and zero evidence of any intelligent aliens in the universe. It took this one planet almost five billion years to produce us. I suspect that technological civilizations are very rare indeed.
 
Hawking is right. If anyone is "out there" and can come here, we had better hope they are benevolent or we are screwed.

yeh , the Injuns should have said to Columbus, take your Pinto and shove it.. and the ships that you rode in on !!!!
 
yeh , the Injuns should have said to Columbus, take your Pinto and shove it.. and the ships that you rode in on !!!!

but do leave the blankets please :2razz:
 
Yeah, I saw that.

The world's most renowned physicist suddenly discovers a science fiction theme as old as the War of the Worlds, and we're supposed to be impressed or something.

Fact of the matter is that Hawking clearly doesn't understand space resources or the exploitation thereof, and he's not bothering to ponder the meaning of trillions of barrels of liquid petroleum reserves on planet earth.

That those reserves have never been tapped tells us:

1) There's no intelligent life in this part of the galaxy.

2) That interstellar travel is probitively expensive and difficult.

3) Or that any aliens that have visited the planet are so thoroughly exploiting the resources of space that they don't need to crawl around on the ground sucking up oil.

Any one or any combination of the three are possible.

Certainly no in their right mind is going to come to earth to mine iron or copper or aluminum or any other metal, not when there's easier places to get it, like the asteroids.

The atmosphere of titan is just a hydrocarbon muck, and it would be easier to scoop that than to drill baby drill.

Vegetation and organic matter might be scarce, but if they're not going to plant a colony, the aliens would have scooped it and left.

Whatever, there is zero evidence of any alien visitation ever, and zero evidence of any intelligent aliens in the universe. It took this one planet almost five billion years to produce us. I suspect that technological civilizations are very rare indeed.

Ya think we need to check their ID's ?
 
yeh , the Injuns should have said to Columbus, take your Pinto and shove it.. and the ships that you rode in on !!!!

Well, they should have, but they had a couple of little problems. They wanted things that the white guys had, and they were still too tribal-minded to win in a real conflict.
 
but do leave the blankets please :2razz:

Nah, skip the blankets. White man had a habit of floating blankets containing smallpox down the rivers to Indian tribes. You could say that these were the first documented cases of biological warfare.
 
Hawking is right. If anyone is "out there" and can come here, we had better hope they are benevolent or we are screwed.

Seriously, we do need to be very careful or hope that some hyper advanced peckerheads from West Nebula are not aggressive or that we or our planet is not tasty morsel such as caviar for them.
 
Nah, skip the blankets. White man had a habit of floating blankets containing smallpox down the rivers to Indian tribes. You could say that these were the first documented cases of biological warfare.

Didn't the white man take syphillis back to Europe from here?
 
Seriously, we do need to be very careful or hope that some hyper advanced peckerheads from West Nebula are not aggressive or that we or our planet is not tasty morsel such as caviar for them.

Yes, let's be serious. If there is any advanced civilization that is able to travel light-years in order to come here, they are most likely pretty mentally and psychologically advanced in comparison to us. I genuinely figure that we would be much more likely to be aggressors to them than they to us. They might blast us all into space on our first strike, but I really doubt they would have bad intentions toward us. Maybe I'm wrong, because it's all speculation.
 
Nah, skip the blankets. White man had a habit of floating blankets containing smallpox down the rivers to Indian tribes. You could say that these were the first documented cases of biological warfare.


The small pox innuendo was exactly what I was going for with my quip.. you ALMOST got my joke :2razz:
 
Yes, let's be serious. If there is any advanced civilization that is able to travel light-years in order to come here, they are most likely pretty mentally and psychologically advanced in comparison to us. I genuinely figure that we would be much more likely to be aggressors to them than they to us.[...]

You're assuming that mental/psychological development is necessarily related to pacifism and/or compassion toward those less advanced...don't know if that's the case, but I hope you're right!
 
Hawking's view on First Contact has been the one I've always held since evolution can only work with a species evolving due to a sustained environment of extreme competition. When a species is "perfect," as with the mosquito, e.g., it simply ceases to become smarter and badder, whereas human beings in their multitudes of generations sucked so bad that they had to change many times over, becoming increasingly vicious and cunning to the point that we became the earth's dominant species.*

With only our own example to go by as to how intelligent life might develop, it's only reasonable to assume that an alien technological civilization would be at least equally competitive. And with carbon-based life as the only example, it's only reasonable that such a species would find our world to be a tasty morsel.

I believe it was highly irresponsible to send out the voyager advertising our whereabouts before we were, as Hawking said, independently colonized on various worlds and thus better suited to dealing with a superior and hostile alien force. Much wiser would have been to conduct passive research: finding alien civilizations quietly, studying them anonymously, and only making first contact when we understood them adequately.



*opposable thumbs didn't hurt, either.
 
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On topic.. even though I do consider Hawkings statement a "no **** sherlock" kinda statement, it has garnered a surprisingly large amount of press and attention since it aired last Sunday on Discovery.. actually I first heard about this prior to the show even airing.

I thoroughly enjoyed both episodes of Stephen Hawkings Universe when they aired last Sunday, and I am eager to see the next episodes this Sunday as well, great eye candy, and fascinating subject material, even if it is material that I was already acquainted with that was pureed into a diluted pulp to spoon feed the masses.
 
You're assuming that mental/psychological development is necessarily related to pacifism and/or compassion toward those less advanced...don't know if that's the case, but I hope you're right!

I can't say with certainty, but evolution tends to produce improvements in general, and living in societies requires a certain level of compassion or at least tolerance. The more mentally oriented one becomes (as opposed to functioning on a purely emotional level) the more reasonable and thoughtful one tends to be, or so it seems to me.
 
Yes, let's be serious. If there is any advanced civilization that is able to travel light-years in order to come here, they are most likely pretty mentally and psychologically advanced in comparison to us. I genuinely figure that we would be much more likely to be aggressors to them than they to us.

Were the Spanish Conquistadors more peaceful for their ability to pass the vast expanses of the ocean? Were the Native Americans the aggressors?

They might blast us all into space on our first strike, but I really doubt they would have bad intentions toward us. Maybe I'm wrong, because it's all speculation.

But then, the Spanish certainly only had good intentions for the Native Americans. They did, after all have Christianity to spread. Well, they also came to plunder gold, which the natives didn't even know was such a big deal in the first place.

Using human history as an example (because it's the only damn example we've got), it's completely illogical to assume that aliens will be enlightened and pacifist.
 
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Nah, skip the blankets. White man had a habit of floating blankets containing smallpox down the rivers to Indian tribes. You could say that these were the first documented cases of biological warfare.
Nope. The Indians beat the white man to it with their tuberculosis "peace" pipes and gonorrhea totem poles. I've also heard that they would catch buffalo, give them the black plague, and then release them in areas populated by whites.
 
Were the Spanish Conquistadors more peaceful for their ability to pass the vast expanses of the ocean? Were the Native Americans the aggressors?



But then, the Spanish certainly only had good intentions for the Native Americans. They did, after all have Christianity to spread. Well, they also came to plunder gold, which the natives didn't even know was such a big deal in the first place.

Using human history as an example (because it's the only damn example we've got), it's completely illogical to assume that aliens will be enlightened and pacifist.

The Christians from Europe completely exterminated the Arawak tribe, a nice "Christian" act..... NOT.
 
Using human history as an example (because it's the only damn example we've got), it's completely illogical to assume that aliens will be enlightened and pacifist.

Look at Europeans today as compared to the Spanish Inquisition. Look at Americans today as compared to the European arrival on this continent. We aren't generally pacifist by any means, but we are definitely less aggressive today.
 
Look at Europeans today as compared to the Spanish Inquisition. Look at Americans today as compared to the European arrival on this continent. We aren't generally pacifist by any means, but we are definitely less aggressive today.

The 20th century was the most deathtastic century in human history, and last I checked we (humanity) have been bombing the bejeezus out of everything that walks since I've been born. There's nothing less aggressive about us. Splitting hairs over who's been doing the majority of the killing in the last couple decades is missing the larger point.
 
The Christians from Europe completely exterminated the Arawak tribe, a nice "Christian" act..... NOT.

Only the Arawak tribe? Really?
 
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