Minds that think alike...(re: Aliens)

[Rramjet]

They come here for cheeseburgers.

Which also explains the cattle mutilations...they don't come anywhere close to us in the area of beef grinding technology.

You miss the point entirely! They are not after mineral wealth... they are after DNA! DNA can manufacture chemicals (antibiotics, drugs, enzymes, herbicides, growth promoters, DNA repair mechanisms, etc) that we can only dream of. There are literally millions (if not billions) of microbial species on earth - spread over the whole earth. If you were an alien you would be very interested in the potential of this diverse DNA (and sampling them would take some time).

 

[Robo Sapien]

You miss the point entirely! They are not after mineral wealth... they are after DNA! DNA can manufacture chemicals (antibiotics, drugs, enzymes, herbicides, growth promoters, DNA repair mechanisms, etc) that we can only dream of. There are literally millions (if not billions) of microbial species on earth - spread over the whole earth. If you were an alien you would be very interested in the potential of this diverse DNA (and sampling them would take some time).

!!!THEORY WARNING!!!

That is a good assessment, I've felt similarly for a while. From observing evolution, we can see the positive feedback loop of information that formed and caused our species to move forward in huge steps. First we got smart, which led to our first boom in population as a new species. Then subsequent booms occurred with the advent of tools > language > government > industry > technology. Thus it seems plausible to me that the next step (or maybe one or two down the line) is the advent of deliberate self-replication.

Technology mimics nature in that everything we create is based off our ability to replicate natural processes, and our tech advances further as we are able to study things on progressively smaller levels. Starting with the first machines based on processes that are observable by the naked eye, all the way down to those based on observations through an electron microscope. The natural conclusion would then be mimicking the first self-replicating molecule.

So, considering a) the positive feedback loop of information, and b) that DNA is the most tightly-packed form of raw information, I would suspect that the ultima of evolution is the ability to not only construct life, but to assimilate the DNA of other lifeforms and selectively mutate without necessarily facing adversity. In other words, the ability to calculate natural selection. We already have the ability to develop intuition by running through thousands of hypothetical situations unconsciously during REM sleep, so there is an open possibility there to unconsciously test hypothetical DNA configurations.

If life elsewhere in the universe evolves in a similar construct, there is a good chance we'd be assimilated. Beware of the Borg.

 

[Trent Wray]

!!!THEORY WARNING!!!


That is a good assessment, I've felt similarly for a while. From observing evolution, we can see the positive feedback loop of information that formed and caused our species to move forward in huge steps. First we got smart ..... *snip* ....

I see a correction needed almost right off the bat ...

 

[quarky]

Oh, but what exactly would we do? You know, James Cameron's Avatar is not exactly a faithfull representation of how mining companies act nowadays. Looks nice on the big screen and reinforces the beliefs of many a leftist greenie but its a big fat lie.

If you want metals, asteroids have plenty of it and in metallic state. Stuff which is much easier to process than what you would find down on Earth. Oh, and no gravity well. If you want water, there's the Oort cloud... Have I mentioned that in both cases there would be no annoying meat bags around?

Now, what would we actally do if we could travel to other planets? Wait, we already can! And what are we actually doing? Sending robotic probes to do science.

Deep down, when it comes to alien behavior, what people do is to project beliefs and fears. See us as ruthless imperialists? You'll project evil conquerors. See value in our scientific enterprises and believe our civilization will evolve better ethics? You'll project scientists tracking our evolution.

Mining is so "yesterday".
The aliens are way beyond such clunky needs.
If they show up here, it will be for sex...sex with our women, specifically.

At least I can trace my own exploratory urges to this underlying impulse.





Oh yeah...and spices.
Isn't that what the early Earth explorers were after?
(Spices and/or drugs)

 

[Resume]

On the other hand, Hawkings once referred to alleged alien abductees as "weirdos."

 

[Rramjet]

Deep down, when it comes to alien behavior, what people do is to project beliefs and fears. See us as ruthless imperialists? You'll project evil conquerors. See value in our scientific enterprises and believe our civilization will evolve better ethics? You'll project scientists tracking our evolution.

On a national news channel just last night they reported on Hawking's latest pronouncements on his aliens theory. They included clips of "War of the Worlds" and "Independance Day" (and various other clips from films depicting "aliens as monsters hell bent on earthly and human destruction") and the reporter then stated "And yet I have spent some time with UFO buffs and they are all lunatics" (!!!). After the blatant trashing of aliens and Hawking, the presenter came back to us with a smile that said "If you believe in aliens you are a lunatic" and moved on to another story.

THIS is the treatment the media dishes out to even one of the most eminent and respected scientists of our age?

So you are wrong Correa Neto. It is NOT what people "project" at all, it is what we are being fed by the media that causes the public reaction. For those with only a passing interest (or none at all), such treatment by the media (and Hollywood) simply affirms the bias they already have gotten from the media and Hollywood. Aliens are evil. People who believe in aliens are lunatics.

It is only when we begin examining the evidence more closely that we begin to realise that "something is going on" and that something does not accord with the ridicule and denial that pervades the media and society.

The hypothesis put forward in this thread is that aliens are here for DNA. Not minerals, not "sex", not earthly destruction or domination - not even as "scientists tracking our evolution". It is DNA, the most powerful resource on this planet and (probably) entirely unique to this planet. Everything else they can get elsewhere. But DNA...THAT is the unique feature of planet earth, and THAT is why they come.

But no, the UFO deniers persist in their ridicule and denial. "Mineral resources, sex and domination". THAT IS the "projection of our own fears" - and it is coming from the UFO deniers side!

 

[bruto]

Why was it necessary to point this out, I wonder? Why not just say "images of humans"?

Perhaps because they are not just images of humans. They are a telling cultural artifact in their own right. In the picture the man has genitals. The woman does not.

 

[Orphia Nay]

On the other hand, Hawkings once referred to alleged alien abductees as "weirdos."

Do you mean this talk?

http://www.ted.com/talks/stephen_hawking_asks_big_questions_about_the_universe.html

He actually goes further than that, in that he doesn't say it about alleged abductees, but merely those who say they've seen aliens/UFOs.

At 5:02 he says "On the other hand, we don't seem to have been visited by aliens. [...] Why would they [UFOs] only appear to cranks and weirdos?"

 

[Frying Dutchmen]

I thought you didn't believe in aliens are visiting us Rramjet. Go figure you would lie in another thread to score points in a game that you are playing by yourself.

 

[Brainache]

...
The hypothesis put forward in this thread is that aliens are here for DNA. Not minerals, not "sex", not earthly destruction or domination - not even as "scientists tracking our evolution". It is DNA, the most powerful resource on this planet and (probably) entirely unique to this planet. Everything else they can get elsewhere. But DNA...THAT is the unique feature of planet earth, and THAT is why they come.

...!

What makes you think that aliens don't have DNA? Or that the form of DNA that we have is superior to theirs?

These beings are capable of travelling here from realms outside of what we would call reality, but biochemistry is too hard for them?

Seriously?

 

[McHrozni]

In my speculative opinion, extraterrestrials that would have been traveling around space for awhile now would have, at some point, succumb to disease via viruses. As they evolved, within the confines of their ships, the viruses would have eventually become the dominant organism as they mutated to overcome the attempts by the aliens to suppress them. What would be advantageous, would be for the virus to eventually adapt to the host in such as a way as to control the host to "do it's bidding", thus the host and the virus would essentially be "one". And as one host died, the virus could infect another one, spreading onward from host to host, controlling the host in attempts to maintain a population and individual lifespan for the virus, not the host.

Although this is theoretically possible, the problem is in that an intelligent organism can adapt a lot faster than one relying purely on evolution can. In human terms, we're talking in months versus tens of thousands of years, for your scenario. Because of this, and because the aliens also evolve naturally (perhaps in an intelligent way - we could do it now if we wanted to), this scenario is highly implausible.

McHrozni

 

[Aepervius]

Come to think of it, why the hell would a civilization capable of interstellar travel want to harvest mineral commodities on Earth's gravity well when you can find them all floating around as asteroids and nebulae?

If they found the way to cross such distance, the only reason for them to come into a gravity well, is either to communicate (we are not alone) and exchange info or make sure they stay the dominant specie (let us kill the potential concurrence while it is still stuck in a gravity well).

Unless I am missing obvious other reason, it is a true dichotomy .

 

[Aepervius]

I think that the scientific knowledge to be gained from genuine alien contact outweighs any purely social concerns. We're pretty resilient. We'll cope. And what we'd learn..!

Not to be paranoid, but you have to be much more than resilient if alien from outer space wants to wipe you out. Above at the top of the gravity well, they just can wait it out, and tow asteroid to throw in the well, shoot the rare stuff coming up (wasn't that they way alien killed most of humanity in the "moon is a harsh mistress" ?). They don't need advanced tech, just energy, tow vehicule, newtonian physic calculation, and patience.

 

[Aepervius]

"If they show up here, it will be for sex...sex with our women, specifically."

Seeing how they seem to be fixed on anal, on both side of the spectrum, they might not caremuch about the genders of those they "diddle" with.... I know ! I know ! Alien are already on earht and they are catholic priests !

/get a coat and go out under a huge wave of "boooooo"

 

[McHrozni]

Unless I am missing obvious other reason, it is a true dichotomy .

There is another possibility: their minds work significantly differently from ours, and could come visit for entirely alien reasons. Since we can hardly imagine how they would even look like we can't say how they would think, or even if their thinking and their concepts would make any sense whatsoever to our mind.

McHrozni

 

[Aepervius]

There is another possibility: their minds work significantly differently from ours, and could come visit for entirely alien reasons. Since we can hardly imagine how they would even look like we can't say how they would think, or even if their thinking and their concepts would make any sense whatsoever to our mind.

McHrozni

I think it is a cope out and a bad one at that. We can infer that for some part their mind will work on similarly as ours, like concentrating on protecting one own's specie, and furthering one own's specie knowledge, as well as primordial requirement, food, reproduction. They might have mysterious social structure and belief, but I doubt seriously as a whole that they would depart so far away from the schema above that every single of their action would be incomprehensible or that their goal would be fully undecipherable.

 

[Monketi Ghost]

Depends on if you buy the alien dinner first.

Overlooked win.

 

[Correa Neto]

If they found the way to cross such distance, the only reason for them to come into a gravity well, is either to communicate (we are not alone) and exchange info or make sure they stay the dominant specie (let us kill the potential concurrence while it is still stuck in a gravity well).

Unless I am missing obvious other reason, it is a true dichotomy .

Eventually, if you need samples, diving in to the gravity well may be required. Sure, robotic anal probes can do the job and no alien would have to get its hands/tentacles/etc dirty.

But as you wrote later, when it comes down to handling eventual perceived competition stuck at a planet's surface, bombardment from space is a winner. Nukes, lasers, kinetic energy weapons, death rays, you choose. The last act of the poor creatures stuck at the planet's gravity well will be to witness the firepower of your fully operational battleship.

 

[Correa Neto]

...snip...
So you are wrong Correa Neto. It is NOT what people "project" at all, it is what we are being fed by the media that causes the public reaction. For those with only a passing interest (or none at all), such treatment by the media (and Hollywood) simply affirms the bias they already have gotten from the media and Hollywood. Aliens are evil. People who believe in aliens are lunatics.

What a load of bullcrap. It seems it safe to say science is not the only subject you are ignorant about. The media features the products of certain people's minds, created with the main motivation of building profit. Writers and producers use concepts of aliens which quite often were created by many individuals not necessarily directly linked to the media. Spielberg and Cameron make money with movies and TV series about good aliens; Roland Emmerich make money with the type of aliens proposed by Hawking and Wells; Michael Bay makes money with good and bad aliens created by cartoon writers and toy makers; Star Trek and Stargate producers make money over alien concepts built by a plethora of people and the list goes on. Grab your alien concept, build a script for it and try to make money out of it.

Prove your claim that people who believe in aliens are seen as lunatics. Remember, we're talking about the belief (or conclusion) that the existence of sentient alien lifeforms somewhere else is plausible. We are not talking about your "aliens" and/or UFOlogy's wild claims. These, yes, they mostly are composed by lunacy, pseudoscience and crackpotery. If you disagree, feel free to join Jaime Maussan, the planet UMMO folks and why not, Jacques Valee to investigate, for example, the lead masks case.

It is only when we begin examining the evidence more closely that we begin to realise that "something is going on" and that something does not accord with the ridicule and denial that pervades the media and society.

Yes, "something is going on", but judging from the material you presented so far to back your claims, there are no reliable evidences that this "something" is alien or "alien". And as long as UFObuffs bring Jaime Maussan-quality material to back it, ridicule is what is deserved. If you think something good (other than laughter) will come out of it, you are the one in denial. Someone with real scientific training would understand that.

There are no reliable evidences for "aliens from beyond the border of what we call nature" here on Earth. There are plenty of evidences, however, for lunatics, crackpots and people ignorant of science attempting to validate UFOlogy claims.

 

[bruto]

I think it is a cope out and a bad one at that. We can infer that for some part their mind will work on similarly as ours, like concentrating on protecting one own's specie, and furthering one own's specie knowledge, as well as primordial requirement, food, reproduction. They might have mysterious social structure and belief, but I doubt seriously as a whole that they would depart so far away from the schema above that every single of their action would be incomprehensible or that their goal would be fully undecipherable.

Decipherable is one thing, but utterly bizarre or utterly destructive is another. If some aliens decide that we're a delicacy, or that the earth is in the way of their view, or that to them coal is as precious as diamonds and worth slaughtering or enslaving the entire population of our little world, our understanding would not be enough. If they see us as the fulfillment of a prophecy and their holy scripture tells them to unravel our entrails with hot pliers to keep the god that lives in their belt buckles from setting them on fire, or if some intergalactic Christo conceives his magnum opus by exploding ten thousand solar systems including ours in a carefully laid out row that spells out their word for cat snot, realizing that they think more or less like us will be cold comfort.

By the way, the singular of "species" is species. Specie is money.