Stephen Hawking, the famous cosmologist, astrophysicist, theoretical physicist and other things ending in ist, has been noted as saying, "If aliens ever visit us, I think the outcome would be much as when Christopher Columbus first landed in America, which didn't turn out very well for the Native Americans," meaning that the history of an advanced civilization meeting a less advanced one isn't pretty. The civilization on the lesser end of things might face anything from being taken advantage of to being nearly wiped out for the sake of “progress” of more advanced one. This very scenario has been played out time and time again throughout history and been explored more times then one can count in film. Today I found myself thinking about this very subject and also the fact that some scientists think it would be a bad idea for us to send signals into the black void we call space, all for the very reasons above.
The fact is, unfortunately we've already unintentionally been advertising our presence since the creation of the radio. While it might not be the biggest billboard in the world, we send all sorts of signals besides radio into space that increase it's size significantly. Advanced intelligences from other worlds could be listening to our music, monitoring our communications, or even watching our television shows. It was this that got me to wondering, could they be watching our programs on “them”, whether it be science fiction like Star Trek or documentaries like the History Channel's Ancient Aliens? In the case of the later, could that show or others on ancient astronaut theory be used to their advantage if they happened to harbor some not so friendly intentions? What better way to gain the favor of an unassuming, less advanced species then to come down claiming to be their gods of old despite the fact they aren't? We're essentially giving them a prepackaged cover story.
Perhaps I'm thinking to much into it, then again perhaps I'm not. We could for all we know been unintentionally shooting ourselves in the foot all those signals we unintentionally send into deep space. Blaming ourselves however is really worthless, after all, we have no reason to even assume that that's the case, and from what I know of the UFO phenomenon, things in the end are probably a lot more complicated then we may truly know. However before future scientists decide to fire up a new fangled super strength communication method, perhaps they need to stop and ask what might happen if it works to well.
2 comments:
Too, you have to take into account our history of reaction to slavery, tyranny, and the injustices of those things. Remains we want what they've got, right? ...presuming it's superior to what we have which seems likely. Moreover, a retired combat flyer and career soldier, I'm a first hand and subject matter expert with regard to how bad _we_ can be, which I submit is far beyond and away from Dr. Hawking's experience. I don't have the high opinion of ourselves most seem to prefer that I have... it _may_ be they're not as bad as we. That's my intuition at any rate.
I think the above Hawking statement is a terribly ignorant utterance. What Hawking is really saying is that he fears that aliens will be as messed up and sociopathic as we humans. Like Alfred, I am not convinced that we humans are all that and a bag of chips.
There are other utterances out there that i believe put this numbskull Hawking rumination in a more reasonable perspective. Einstein said: "it is appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity." Contactee Dan Fry said that there are three branches of science: Material science, social science and spiritual science.
"If any civilization in the Universe is to develop fully and successfully, each of the three sciences must be pursued with equal effort and diligence. The Spiritual and Social sciences must come first. There can be no dependable development of Material Science until you have first built a firm foundation of spiritual and social science. Unless some ways and means are found to stimulate the growth of the spiritual and social sciences on your earth, a time will inevitably come when emphasis on matters which are material instead of spiritual will cause your civilization to collapse. Your race is now in constant danger of total destruction by an agency which it has itself produced. Why should people be menaced by their own creations? Simply because they have not progressed enough spiritually and socially to enable them to determine the proper uses to which these creations should be put.”
I think Fry got it just right. And, if we but think about this a little, it is easy to see how ANY race would have to overcome such lunk-headedness if they are to survive to become itinerant elders in the universe. To skimp on this evolutionary speed-bump is certainly a recipe for self destruction. A recent issue of Mother Jones put the problem as succinctly as possible: "Evolve or Die".
Apparently Hawking does not believe that such evolutionary growth is possible. That also shows that intelligence (or I.Q.) does not equate with wisdom. It is kind of bad when a disgraced contactee shows more common smarts that the Lucasian chair in mathematics at Cambridge....
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