What kind of aliens?

[Guest Schwarzwald]

Arthur C. Clarke, in his 2001 series, postulated that any alien intelligence advanced enough to cross the stars would have reached a point where all it valued was intelligence, and might even go so far as to try 'cultivating' intelligent life thruout the universe simply to create 'company' for itself and intellectual diversity. Clarke honestly believes that a sentient race would reach the point where it outgrew primal urges and violence, and develop into a race that respected and valued all intelligent life, for when your techno,ogy can do anything you want, the only new or interesting thing in the universe is an alien mind.

 

Fre Saberhagen postulated that no matter how intelligent a race got, it would never outgrow it's primal nature, and would thus always see all alien life as a threat, competition or simply something to get in the way, and accordingly would want to destroy all other life out of the simple, basic urge to expand, grow and wipe out all competition. Hence his aliens created the Berzerkers, Von neuman machines programmed to seek out and annihilate all other life in the universe.

 

Ok, so we have two extreme views on aliens here, and each has a certain logic and validity to it. Which do you find more likely, or do you believe anything re encounter will be somewhere inbetween these two extremes?

[Lord Liaden]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

If we're talking "real" aliens, as opposed to the creations of our imagination, my own belief is that whatever we encounter is likely to be in some ways as alien mentally as they are physically, so I don't think that either of these extremes are sufficient, assuming that either of them will apply at all. IMHO it's more likely that the aliens will be significantly incomprehensible to us.

[austenandrews]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

I don't particulary agree with either as a median condition, though I'd say the "average" is probably closer to Saberhagen's view than Clarke's. Assuming we're talking about planetbound organisms roughly akin to Earth's, generating and directing the energies necessary for space travel implies an advanced degree of safeguards and problem-solving ability. Sans any reason to anthropomorphize other organisms with human emotions, I believe it's reasonable to presume that such organisms would apply their safeguards and problem-solving to contact with alien intelligences. Which is to say, organism/species survival would be a top priority. Aliens would most likely be regarded as a potential problem to solve. To me, that leans more toward Saberhagen's view.

[Curufea]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

I think both cases are generalised too much. An alien race isn't a single entity - their governing authorities would not necessarily follow the same policy from year to year, let alone all the time. Indivduals within the race would vary between extremes of their racial outlooks.

All in all, I think you would have mixes of both types, and moderates and extremists of both types. Similar to the cultures we have on earth.

[keithcurtis]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

With only earth to go by as a guideline, I believe that alien life would pretty much follow the pattern of life everywhere: eat things that are weaker than you and your kind and hide from/run away from things that are stronger and can eat you.

 

"Eat" being an abstract term.

 

Keith "Eat or be eaten" Curtis

[David Johnston]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Fre Saberhagen postulated that no matter how intelligent a race got, it would never outgrow it's primal nature, and would thus always see all alien life as a threat, competition or simply something to get in the way, and accordingly would want to destroy all other life out of the simple, basic urge to expand, grow and wipe out all competition. Hence his aliens created the Berzerkers, Von neuman machines programmed to seek out and annihilate all other life in the universe.

 

Er...no. Although he did have violent aliens who created the Berserkers it was the very fact that Earth humans were so much capably violent than other species that made them uniquely qualified to be the life's champions against the killer robots. The mystical guys with the math fetish were totally nonviolent by inclination. What does come to mind are the Solonoids and Paranoids of Gall Force: Eternal Story: http://www15.brinkster.com/gallforce/eternalstory.htm who are simply intellectually incapable of making peace even when their mutual annihilation is at hand.

 

Ok, so we have two extreme views on aliens here, and each has a certain logic and validity to it. Which do you find more likely, or do you believe anything re encounter will be somewhere inbetween these two extremes?

The idea that there's anything inevitable or even particularly likely about a species outgrowing aggression strikes me as absurd. But there is also no denying that humans are capable of making peace when they feel the risks outweigh the rewards or of just deciding that even an easy profitable war is wrong. There's no reason to think the typical alien would be less flexible.

 

Of course I did once do an sf campaign where there were only three spacefaring alien species known to humanity and none of the three were capable of warfare as such. Didn't make them nice guys, though. One of them specialised in manipulating all other species into destroying themselves, another used projective empathy to manipulate humans into being compliant and a third was backing a human world who wanted to conquer the Federation and turn it into a military dictatorship so that the military dictatorship could protect them against a future threat they knew about but were keeping secret from their allies.

[Nyrath]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

There are some rather frightening reasons why aliens will be more like Saberhagen's Bezerkers than not.

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3aa.html#killingstar

Dr. Pelligrino makes a compelling case, and I cannot find any serious holes in his logic.

 

In any event, becoming (as Heinlein put it in STARSHIP TROOPERS) a race that "ain't gonna study war no more" is more difficult that it first appears. Go to

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3t.html

and scroll down to "Chips on distant shoulders"

[Lord Liaden]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

With only earth to go by as a guideline, I believe that alien life would pretty much follow the pattern of life everywhere: eat things that are weaker than you and your kind and hide from/run away from things that are stronger and can eat you.

 

"Eat" being an abstract term.

 

Keith "Eat or be eaten" Curtis

 

The thing is, we don't know whether predation is "the pattern of life everywhere." Maybe another world's ecosystem would be dominated by organisms living in symbiosis, and that could affect the mentality of any sentient species.

 

Lord "Here come the space communists" Liaden

[David Johnston]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

The thing is' date=' we don't know whether predation [b']is[/b] "the pattern of life everywhere." Maybe another world's ecosystem would be dominated by organisms living in symbiosis, and that could affect the mentality of any sentient species.

 

Lord "Here come the space communists" Liaden

 

But such a symbiotic network would have had to dominate by displacing those organisms who would not fit into it. They might be far more aggressive than people who evolved the way the human race did.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Unless it "dominated" by passively assimilating other organisms, due to the evolutionary advantages of becoming part of the symbiotic network. Or unless organisms who didn't fit in were all extinct before sentient life evolved on this planet, so that the sentients would have no precedent to color their conception of the "natural order."

 

I'm not saying you're necessarily wrong in your assumption of the symbiotes' aggressiveness - just that there's more than one way to look at how it could have fallen out. We are talking alien, after all.

 

Maybe "dominance," "competition" and "aggression" aren't universal elements of life. I can't really imagine them not being so, but of course I'm only human. Could make for an interesting sci-fi story premise, though. As a matter of fact, I read a story rather like that many years ago, The Prodigal Sun by Phillip E. High. In the story it was revealed that most of the aggressive behavior of species on this planet was the result of radiation from our sun warping the natural order. Screening out this radiation resulted in a rapid evolution toward cooperative rather than competitive organisms, right down to single-celled ones.

[Cancer]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

A lot of the answer to this depends on what the interstellar transport is like, how long it takes and how expensive it is. Predation will evolve only if an attempted act of predation is almost always survived by the predator AND is successful often enough so there's a net profit in resources over all the attempts.

 

Competition between "equals" for resources and space is different, but that can end up pushing both sides into ultimately destructive "him or me" sorts of contests.

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

I don't think there are aliens out there, but if there were, I'd be leaning more towards the 'still susceptible to primal natures' theory.

[Ranxerox]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

There is a saying that goes, 'To a hammer, everything is a nail.' We are tool users and any alien species that we encounter that could threaten us is likely to be tool users; and to a tool user, everything is a tool. Therefore, I would expect any intelligent life we run into to try to exploit us for there own benefit and exterminate us alright only if it became apparent we were too grave of a threat to leave alive or too big of an obstacle for them tolerate in their path.

 

We are also social beings and as such like to form relationships. I think any alien life forms that we would view as being intelligent would also more likely than not be social beings, though there are admitly other possibilities. So unless we are simply too alien to one another to permit the forming of relationships, I would expect them to occur. Those these are not necessarily going to be relationships of equals.

 

So as the songs says, we'll make great pets.

[David Johnston]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Unless it "dominated" by passively assimilating other organisms, due to the evolutionary advantages of becoming part of the symbiotic network.

 

If the symbiotic network doesn't squeeze out nonsymbiotes there are no evolutionary advantages to becoming part of the symbiotic network. If it can't defend its ground and take new ground, soon it will have no ground.

Or unless organisms who didn't fit in were all extinct before sentient life evolved on this planet, so that the sentients would have no precedent to color their conception of the "natural order."

 

But an inherent part of being sentient is the ability to learn. Such beings might not start out aggressive, but after dealing with creatures like us for a while, they'd pick up the knack. Of course there's more than one way to be aggressive. In the campaign I mentioned, the aliens were each in their own way passive aggressive. (The reason why humans hadn't yet encountered spacefaring people who fought wars like humans will was because the Destroyers had already wiped them all out in a wide sphere. Eventually I planned to have outsiders invade once the war between the humans was resolved.)

[austenandrews]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

But an inherent part of being sentient is the ability to learn.

That's the most important and least agreed-upon element of the question - what constitutes "intelligence?"

[Nyrath]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Could make for an interesting sci-fi story premise' date=' though. As a matter of fact, I read a story rather like that many years ago, [i']The Prodigal Sun[/i] by Phillip E. High. In the story it was revealed that most of the aggressive behavior of species on this planet was the result of radiation from our sun warping the natural order. Screening out this radiation resulted in a rapid evolution toward cooperative rather than competitive organisms, right down to single-celled ones.

Philip E. High hints at that premise in some of his other novels, most notably Invader On My Back, but as you say it is developed most fully in The Prodigal Sun.

[Nyrath]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

There is a saying that goes' date=' 'To a hammer, everything is a nail.' We are tool users and any alien species that we encounter that could threaten us is likely to be tool users; and to a tool user, everything is a tool. Therefore, I would expect any intelligent life we run into to try to exploit us for there own benefit and exterminate us alright only if it became apparent we were too grave of a threat to leave alive or too big of an obstacle for them tolerate in their path.[/quote']

Therein lies the rub. Waiting for it to become apparent that an alien species is "too grave a threat to leave alive" could be fatal. There is a chance that any delay at all will give them enough time to exterminate you and your entire race.

 

This is Charles Pelligrino's point: What is an allowable risk to take of having your entire species exterminated? Ten percent? One percent? 0.000001% ?

No, the logical percent is zero, or as close as you can possibly get.

 

Since there is a non-zero chance that a given alien species could exterminate your species, the logical thing to do upon discovering them is to exterminate them as soon and as safely as possible.

 

And keep in mind that they will probably be aware of the same train of logic.

[austenandrews]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Since there is a non-zero chance that a given alien species could exterminate your species' date=' the logical thing to do upon discovering them is to exterminate them as soon and as safely as possible.[/quote']

A Mutually Assured Destruction scenario would alter that logic. The trick is, how do you achieve MAD unless you start a planet-killer moving long before the fact, and then hide it?

[David Johnston]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Therein lies the rub. Waiting for it to become apparent that an alien species is "too grave a threat to leave alive" could be fatal. There is a chance that any delay at all will give them enough time to exterminate you and your entire race.

 

This is Charles Pelligrino's point: What is an allowable risk to take of having your entire species exterminated? Ten percent? One percent? 0.000001% ?

No, the logical percent is zero, or as close as you can possibly get.

 

Since there is a non-zero chance that a given alien species could exterminate your species, the logical thing to do upon discovering them is to exterminate them as soon and as safely as possible.

 

And keep in mind that they will probably be aware of the same train of logic.

 

It's an unsound line of reasoning though. The bigger a potential threat the species poses, the riskier it is to start something you might not be able to finish. The only species you could destroy with perfect safety are the ones that didn't pose a threat in the first place.

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

It's an unsound line of reasoning though. The bigger a potential threat the species poses' date=' the riskier it is to start something you might not be able to finish. The only species you could destroy with perfect safety are the ones that didn't pose a threat in the first place.[/quote']

 

Meaning it's time to perfect begging, pleading, and asskissing.

 

Unless we're attacked by the assless globrophites of Antares IV, of course.

[TheRavenIs]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Has anyone considered that an alien species might actually want to make peaceful contact, not out of a pure drive to improve another species that are intelligent or that other alien's would automatically see another species as a threat.

 

Maybe after searching for other intelligences they just want to know that they are not alone, that they might have some one to ask questions of that they have asked themselves, or heck just to play cards and party?

[McCoy]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

But such a symbiotic network would have had to dominate by displacing those organisms who would not fit into it. They might be far more aggressive than people who evolved the way the human race did.

Or assemilate those organisms al la the Borg.

[McCoy]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

In any event' date=' becoming [i'](as Heinlein put it in STARSHIP TROOPERS)[/i] a race that "ain't gonna study war no more" is more difficult that it first appears.

You do realize that Bob was quoting an old Spiritual, which in turn was paraphrasing the Bible?

 

Isaiah 2:4 And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. [KJV]

 

First, we have one lifebearing planet, and one intelligent species. The problem with trying to plot a curve from a single point are that all curves fit. Until we meet the Others this will be pure speculation.

 

But having said that, speculating, I'm inclined to think that a species that does not overcome those "primal urges" will not make it out of their home system.

[Markdoc]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

The thing is' date=' we don't know whether predation [b']is[/b] "the pattern of life everywhere." Maybe another world's ecosystem would be dominated by organisms living in symbiosis, and that could affect the mentality of any sentient species.

 

Lord "Here come the space communists" Liaden

 

Why not? OUR ecosystem is dominated by organisms living in symbiosis or commensalism. Predators are the exception, not the rule, and simple biological energy analysis suggests that patern is likely to be ominant.

 

cheers, Mark

[Markdoc]

Re: What kind of aliens?

 

Dr. Pelligrino makes a compelling case' date=' and I cannot find any serious holes in his logic.[/quote']

 

 

Holes in his logic? I can't even find any logic for there to be holes in. He makes a bunch of guesses and then constructs an argument around them. He may be right, he may be wrong - without any real facts, it's impossible to be sure.

 

It's entirely possible that to an advanced spacefaring species, a near lightspeed missile holds all the danger of a spitball, in which case the basic thesis of the first part of his first argument wifts off like so much steam. Or not. Who's to know?

 

It's possible that advanced species (if they exist) retain violent levels of competitiveness. It's possible they don't. Sentient races may well find other sentient races sufficiently interesting/useful to go for first contact rather than first strike, just as potentially hostile human cultures did/do. If humans behaved the way he says that all intelligent cultures must behave, Iran, the USSR and North Korea would already be smoldering radiation wastelands.

 

Since humans don't behave the way he suggests that all sentient races must behave, I'm sceptical how much it applies to a totally alien race.

 

cheers, Mark