Why do we assume that aliens would be far more advanced than us?

[Jacco]

I was just reading the Wikipedia article on the "Wow" signal and it mentioned this:

Scientists say that if the signal came from extraterrestrials, they are likely an extremely advanced civilization, as the signal would have required a 2.2-gigawatt transmitter, vastly more powerful than any on Earth.

Now that strikes me as an odd conclusion to draw because it completely disregards the idea of sectionalized technological advancement.

I remember when the film "Battle: LA" came out, lots of people were like "that's unrealistic because if the aliens could travel through space to get here, they would be able to stomp us easily." Ditto with Independence Day, and any other alien invasion film you can think of.

I just don't get why that is such a popular assumption. I mean, sure they might be more advanced in space flight if they can travel through space, but that doesn't necessarily mean they have developed highly advanced military technology. Or with the Wiki article, just because they might have vastly more powerful radios doesn't mean they have developed computer technology to our level.

I guess what I'm saying is that because they are aliens, they will certainly have developed along different parameters than we have so their technology in one area might be far beyond ours but an area of ours might be far beyond theirs as well.

Thoughts?

Capcha: Hot sauce.

I agree. Our hot sauce technology sets the bar for everyone.

 

[IceForce]

Well, if they've developed highly advanced space travel technology, they'd be silly not to have developed highly advanced weapons technology too, to defend themselves.
If you're heading into the great unknown, you're gonna want to defend yourself.

Then again, it's possible they might be a 100% pacifist alien civilization, and the entire concept of battle and combat is completely foreign to them.

 

[Jacco]

Well, if they've developed highly advanced space travel technology, they'd be silly not to have developed highly advanced weapons technology too, to defend themselves.
If you're heading into the great unknown, you're gonna want to defend yourself.

Then again, it's possible they might be a 100% pacifist alien civilization, and the entire concept of battle and combat is completely foreign to them.

Defend yourself from what? The odds of the galaxy being populated with dozens of advanced civilizations are so minimal. Realistically, a space faring civilization would only need weapons capable of destroying natural threats like asteroids and possibly for fighting other members of their own species, neither of which would require Death Star planet lasers. On the off chance you did encounter an alien species, you both would likely be too interested in studying each other to just start shooting.

Unless they're the Covenant in which case we're boned.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

It'd be like if Columbus (or whichever European really set foot on the Americas) came to the Americas and found a vastly superior civilization that had no idea of the Eurasian landmass.

The explorers or discoverers obviously have the more sophisticated tech to find the new (less technologically inclined) civilization, obviously. It can go both ways, easily, with Earth having the better stuff and finding worse off aliens, or aliens having the better stuff and finding the worse off us.

But the former doesn't build quite as good of a movie. It requires giving Earth a motive to attack the more primitive species, it requires making a new race of aliens and the world and civilization they live in, and a reason why the two races interact.

Avatar did it, and the main reason Avatar pulled it off was with role reversal. Humans were painted as bad, imperialistic, unsympathetic conquerors, while the Navi were seen as the underdogs with incredibly humanoid traits that didn't make them entirely uncanny or unlikable by appearance. And if Avatar hadn't painted advanced humans as bad and invaded aliens as good, it'd be like going into a movie about The Trail of Tears and the entire movie was about how America was right to push out the Native Americans and that the Native Americans were savage and had no right to stay.

It works, but it works under certain cultural circumstances.

 

[Serioli]

I think it's the idea/assumption or indeed 'truth'? of parallel technology. If you have technology to move you between stars it is likely you would have materials that could withstand any pressures or stresses involved and an energy source that can power this technology. It could then be argued that material/shield technology which allows FTL travel/existence in hyperspace or whatever can be used as armour. At its most basic a weapon is shifting energy at a target in such a way the target is harmed or destroyed. E.g Large amount of kinetic energy, perhaps focused in a small area is currently the most common on Earth. It is then possible/likely to think that the space travel power source can be used or focussed in a harmful way.

At least that's the way I look at it.

 

[Thaluikhain]

I just don't get why that is such a popular assumption. I mean, sure they might be more advanced in space flight if they can travel through space, but that doesn't necessarily mean they have developed highly advanced military technology. Or with the Wiki article, just because they might have vastly more powerful radios doesn't mean they have developed computer technology to our level.

I guess what I'm saying is that because they are aliens, they will certainly have developed along different parameters than we have so their technology in one area might be far beyond ours but an area of ours might be far beyond theirs as well.

Yes and no. On the one hand, they'd not need to have the concept of a military for all we know, maybe they live in peace and harmony and haven't developed any weapons. Changing that mindset might be difficult, or impossible.

On the other hand, the technology to get from their system to ours is pretty fancy. As in, way beyond our comprehension. If they then decided to make something that goes "bang", they'd not find it that difficult.

Really big transmitters does not require computers though.

EDIT: I do remember, though, someone wrote a sci-fi story where space travel was very easily done, just not discovered by humans, who get invaded by pre-gunpowder aliens.

 

[piinyouri]

Considering the distances in space, something would have to have either faster than light travel or some way to bend space-time. There could be other ways we haven't even begun to ponder as possibilities for space travel, but the point is if they come here, they're almost certainly coming from a very very long ways away. A distance that would require some rather extraordinary technology. It could easily just be a human thing, but most I think would find a way to apply that technological ability to weapons. If not to dominate at the very least for self defense.

 

[cheap_beer]

Well, any alien species that arrived on Earth would have to have created some form of faster-than-light travel - which, according to my limited understanding of physics, would require absurdly massive amounts of energy. Any species capable of harnessing such a level of energy that goes far beyond anything human technology is capable of could easily convert that energy to destructive purposes.

 

[DefunctTheory]

Space flight (FTL), at its most basic level, is one of the most monstrously powerful weapons ever conceived (Or imagined, anyway). Simply by showing up here, they've displayed the ability to generate more power then we currently produce in a year. If they're clever, and have gotten here with less than that, thats even worse.

'True' FTL Travel (Actually going faster then the speed of light)(Star Trek, Mass Effect), is obviously destructive. Passing through another dimension (Star Gate, Event Horizon, Warhammer 40k) presents another destructive method of space travel, from simply chucking nukes through worm holes or dragging your opponents landspace into literal hell.

As I said, the mere act of showing up shows that their better then us at just about everything. These aliens are breaking physic's back over their knees - Even if they hadn't weaponized it prior to showing up, it shouldn't take much effort to do so in a very short amount of time.

On the flip side, Mass Effect is actually an exception to the rule. Humanity may not be the most powerful race (At least prior to 3, which I didn't play single player), but man for man they whip the shit out of just about everyone and scare them shitless. Humanitys simply better at war, according to the lore.

 

[Ihateregistering1]

Well, you also have to remember that if using an example like "Battle: LA" or "Independence Day", in this particular case the Aliens are extremely warlike. I mean, they show up, don't even attempt to communicate, and then just proceed to attack. Any civilization that is THAT warlike is obviously going to have invested quite a great deal of time and effort into weapons research.

The other obvious point is that, if we're following the hyper traditional sci-fi story of "Aliens invade, humanity unites to fight against them", it'd be pretty boring if the Aliens were running around with bows and arrows and we defeated them without breaking a sweat. Funny? Yes, but I don't think it would fly for a mega-blockbuster movie.

 

[Callate]

Robert Heinlein wrote an excellent essay expressing the need for funding of space exploration on the grounds of all the benefits technology designed for use by NASA had brought to Earth.

It's not impossible that a culture could develop communication or interstellar travel that far outstripped their other areas of development, but our observations of our own culture suggest it unlikely. Indeed, it seems far more likely that a civilization would destroy itself before devising any such capabilities- so any society that didn't would be that much more remarkable.

 

[Rack]

These things tend to run in parallel anyway. Heck an ftl drive is effectively a weapon to begin with. The more power you can generate the bigger the explosion you can make. If you have an incredibly advanced ai that can plot coordinates over long distances then slap it on a missile and you have a super advanced smart missile. If you have a military at all it can only be a few decades at most behind where we would be.

 

[xemnahort]

You guys are all basing this on a single assumption. The aliens are coming from too far away for conventional travel. But for us wouldn't the step after reaching the end of the galaxy be to check the next one over not immediately go for multi-galactic jumps? What if the aliens are just barely ahead of us and are just barely ahead of us and just happen to have the raw resources to travel by jet propelled rockets to the next galaxy over? Think about it.

 

[Yopaz]

Well, if they've developed highly advanced space travel technology, they'd be silly not to have developed highly advanced weapons technology too, to defend themselves.
If you're heading into the great unknown, you're gonna want to defend yourself.

Then again, it's possible they might be a 100% pacifist alien civilization, and the entire concept of battle and combat is completely foreign to them.

Defend yourself from what? The odds of the galaxy being populated with dozens of advanced civilizations are so minimal. Realistically, a space faring civilization would only need weapons capable of destroying natural threats like asteroids and possibly for fighting other members of their own species, neither of which would require Death Star planet lasers. On the off chance you did encounter an alien species, you both would likely be too interested in studying each other to just start shooting.

Unless they're the Covenant in which case we're boned.

If a species is advanced enough to go through enough space travel to make contact with us it's likely that it's advanced enough to scout ahead to confirm if there is life on the planet or not and if weapons might be needed or not. Scouting the earth I think it would be obvious that weapons would be needed.


OT: Why do we assume these beings will be violent and have advanced weapons? The same reason we assumed that the world must be created by something that looks a little like us. The same reason we assume aliens must be humanoid.

We predict evolution on different planets based on what we know of our own evolution (which betrays our complete lack of understanding of evolution). We are on the top of the food chain (kinda) because of our technology, but are weapons really a necessity for our intelligence? If we had evolved in a strictly herbivore lifestyle in an area without predators and somehow evolved the intelligence we have now we wouldn't have needed weapons. If we had evolved to be a deadly predator without the need for weapons we might not end up having such advanced weapons either.

It is entirely possible that we would go down the same path with war or fights within populations which would eventually lead to weapons technology, but it's far from a necessity to becoming advanced.

 

[Dimitriov]

You guys are all basing this on a single assumption. The aliens are coming from too far away for conventional travel. But for us wouldn't the step after reaching the end of the galaxy be to check the next one over not immediately go for multi-galactic jumps? What if the aliens are just barely ahead of us and are just barely ahead of us and just happen to have the raw resources to travel by jet propelled rockets to the next galaxy over? Think about it.

Everything in space is too far away really. The nearest star to us would still take more than 4 years to reach travelling at the speed of light... never mind "the next galaxy over."

Which would be something like the Andromeda galaxy at 2.5 million light years away

 

[Guffe]

Well I think that if the Aliens come to Earth that would be the case. Mainly because we can send people to Mars but to come here from another planet would require a higher technological ship than we have here. Unless the alien in some kind of bird that can fly in space.
Then again if/when we get to such space levels and get to other planets with life, then I guess we are the more technological advanced ones, if there even is any "smart" liifeforms there and not only animals.

 

[wulfy42]

First, we could have both created a space station, and probably created stations on the moon (and been mining for minerals/ore on the moon to build bigger space stations etc) long ago.....if we worked at it as a unified race instead of seperate nations...and if we prioritized it.

Second, you don't need nearly our level of technology to create a ship that could sustain life over centuries..thus allowing a race to "send out" pods meant to colonize other potential planets.

Adding weapons to any such vessel would drastically increase the resources required...even if the technology was available.

Certainly aliens could arrive in our solar system who are at around our level of technology...or even slightly below it.


Consider this for a second. Our planet is fairly high in resources. It's quite likely that another planet that could sustain life would have far less resources and by the time the life forms on it were approaching our level of technology...they would be running out of resources needed to sustain it. We are not THAT far behind doing that ourselves.

At that point, the civilization might concentrate all of its resources on searching for other planets it could use to get resources from, even if they were not within it's solar system.

The problem there is....without some form of FTL travel...your talking about extremely large amounts of time to get anywhere...and the pretty much certainty of the trip being one way.

The most logical solution is to create "pods" much like a plant would...sending them out to a variety of systems that might have a planet that could sustain life, or be easily tera-formed (like Titan for instance). For humans you would want planets/moons that had water and a high enough gravity to hold an atmosphere.

With enough pods....you have at least some chance that one of them will grow and your species can then start to expand again from that new location.

It's quite likely that any alien life that did find out...would be in the exploration phase and possibly have barely enough resources to set down and start teraforming. It's not likely that those "pods" would be prepared to discover other sentient life.

The chance of finding life at all on a planet that even has the possibility of sustaining life...is extremely small. The chance of finding sentient life on such a planet....is even much smaller then that. Finally the chance of finding sentient life that is technologically advanced enough to need any defense against....is insanely small. Look at how long this planet has sustained life...and how long we as a species have had enough technology to even matter to any creature that could travel here.

 

[DefunctTheory]

You guys are all basing this on a single assumption. The aliens are coming from too far away for conventional travel. But for us wouldn't the step after reaching the end of the galaxy be to check the next one over not immediately go for multi-galactic jumps? What if the aliens are just barely ahead of us and are just barely ahead of us and just happen to have the raw resources to travel by jet propelled rockets to the next galaxy over? Think about it.

That would require gathering more 'useful' material to achieve then we have in our entire solar system. Think about that - if we took every atom in out solar system, converted it to fuel, and then just tried to bust your ass out of the galaxy, you'd fail to get anywhere fast, and you'd certainly run out of power and food before you got anywhere. I don't even think you can theoretically use rockets to break 0.1c without a stupid expenditure of energy that still dwarfs what we could exert on a space fairing vessel. Even in complete void, its not as simple as cranking the juice.

And even if you could get something to even close to half of the speed of light using rockets (Which may be possible), you then run into the first problem of an FTL ship - Running into shit in space, where something the size of your fist, which is completely stationary, is so destructive that we simply have no idea of how to deal with it without getting into the theoretical science stuff.

So basically, they'd have to be obscenely advanced to collect the material required in great enough quantities, more advanced to figure out how to live through the trip, and stupidly advanced to keep their ship in one piece.

Intergalactic travel is way, way beyond us at this point for a reason. We're more then a baby step away from it.