So, Aliens...

[oskar]

Neil Degrasse Tyson accuses science fiction writers of a lack of imagination. I don't think so. I think they might be too creative. Regardless of how they evolved, the most basic commodities don't offer that much variation. If you build a house, it makes sense to make it a box. You probably have eyes, so you want windows. You'd have an anus, so you'd want a facility to dispose of your waste. If you are carbon based, you would want running water. You don't want a sore ass, so you'd have a couch.

So my theory is that in every intelligent alien race someone at some point walked through a door, sat on a couch and looked out a window.
Rebuttals?

[rong]

Inhospitable surface of a planet means they live under ground in tunnels. No Windows.

[OngBonga]

Inhospitable surface of a planet means they live under ground in tunnels. No Windows.

Nah. If they evolved into something intelligent, then I'm not buying an inhospitable planet. Such a planet would be a breeding ground for extremophiles, and these hardy little bastards don't really develop the desire to look at nice views while being comfortable. I can't see intelligent life (by our standards) evolving purely from underground.

[a500lbgorilla]

What if they don't have an anus? Their waste is consumed by another, whose waste in-turn is consumed by the first. They don't crap it out, but leech it from one or the other. Society is built around the communal need for a varied diet.

[spoonitnow]

Neil Degrasse Tyson accuses science fiction writers of a lack of imagination. I don't think so. I think they might be too creative. Regardless of how they evolved, the most basic commodities don't offer that much variation. If you build a house, it makes sense to make it a box. You probably have eyes, so you want windows. You'd have an anus, so you'd want a facility to dispose of your waste. If you are carbon based, you would want running water. You don't want a sore ass, so you'd have a couch.

So my theory is that in every intelligent alien race someone at some point walked through a door, sat on a couch and looked out a window.
Rebuttals?

Dolphins.

[oskar]

Dolphins.

Eolutionary dead end. No dexterity. If anything under water ever gets to the point of civilization it would have to be a squid. And one thing every squid wants is a roof over its head.

[OngBonga]

Dolphins aren't an evolutionary dead end. In evolution terms, they started out in the water, got out, then got back in. They could get back out of the water an evolve thumbs. Then we'd be fucked.

[spoonitnow]

Sharks have been around since before trees.

[givememyleg]

What if they don't have an anus? Their waste is consumed by another, whose waste in-turn is consumed by the first. They don't crap it out, but leech it from one or the other. Society is built around the communal need for a varied diet.

i've seen a movie related to this concept.

[wufwugy]

Best we can do without buttholes is a sponge

Agree with OP, but also I think while reality is stranger than fiction, it's also more boring. The type of thing I'm getting at is that I think any species advanced enough for intergalactic travel is no longer a species. It is machines whose origin was at one point an advanced biological species. The machines are consciously integrated and have no desire to travel intergalactically. Faster than light travel requires energy levels impossible to generate and distort spacetime fabric so much that they're inoperable. Not to mention they would require somebody already on the other side who built a receiving machine, like in The Fly

Outerspace and aliens hold meaning to humans in how we relate to humanoids. If we're being realistic, scifi has been TOO creative and has given us all sorts of unrealistic stories of Earthy things

I speculate that inter-solar-system travel by conscious entities has never happened. Biology is too primitive to do it, and by the time that biology has been taken over by machines, the machines have no desire to do it. If Earth created the most advanced AI technically possible, it wouldn't even bother looking at Jupiter. It would likely just be hardware floating somewhere, harvesting sunlight and raw materials and avoiding collisions, with software perpetually engaged in virtual reality of whatever purpose. If it has a human footprint, it has been uploaded

[eberetta1]

An advanced lifeform is able to float right thru walls. To think an alien needs a door is ridiculous with their current abilities, much less taking their intelligence into account.

[oskar]

citation needed.

[oskar]

I speculate that inter-solar-system travel by conscious entities has never happened. Biology is too primitive to do it, and by the time that biology has been taken over by machines, the machines have no desire to do it. If Earth created the most advanced AI technically possible, it wouldn't even bother looking at Jupiter. It would likely just be hardware floating somewhere, harvesting sunlight and raw materials and avoiding collisions, with software perpetually engaged in virtual reality of whatever purpose. If it has a human footprint, it has been uploaded

There is an obvious benefit to interstellar travel in the long run: survival. The fact that nobody is here yet could mean a few things. One of those would be that to a sufficiently advanced intelligence survival is no longer a priority. If I have any religious feeling it would be that an eternal mind would make itself mortal. I get bored watching re-runs of the simpsons. Imagine watching your billionth universe collapse.

But back on topic:
Aliens have buttholes. ebretta, if you want to suggest there are aliens without buttholes I am on the edge of my seat waiting for your idea how that contraption would evolve. And would it not spend a long time walking across the fields wondering why it kept getting larger.

[wufwugy]

There is an obvious benefit to interstellar travel in the long run: survival. The fact that nobody is here yet could mean a few things. One of those would be that to a sufficiently advanced intelligence survival is no longer a priority. If I have any religious feeling it would be that an eternal mind would make itself mortal. I get bored watching re-runs of the simpsons. Imagine watching your billionth universe collapse.

I think any entity within the universe experiencing anything not of the universe is a dream. The most advanced entity possible in this universe will not even see the death of this one because it will die before the universe does (universe death is a misnomer anyways, it's possible this thing will never technically end)

As for survival of advanced entities, I think that becomes easier and easier over time. Our distant artificial ancestors will survive for trillions of years. Trillions and trillions, likely. It will die in year trillion^trillion or whatever it is when all the stars die and the universe is nearing uniform absolute zero.

I do not think interstellar travel does anything for survival. That assumes biological forms that need earths for sustenance. I assume biology will be long dead in maybe 10k years (probably much sooner). I see no reason why our ancestors won't have quantum generators that create whatever raw material is needed just by manipulating the particles contained within it. I suspect distant life will just be floating through space, not worried about anything outside its hub except collisions that would smash its hardware

[a500lbgorilla]

There is an obvious benefit to interstellar travel in the long run: survival.

Benefits don't look ahead in biology, only behind. Citation: Anthropogenic Climate Change.

Life brute forces every solution but that doesn't mean it keeps trying everything.

[OngBonga]

citation needed.

Wins his own thread.

[OngBonga]

I think the idea though is that aliens don't have physical form, in the same sense we do. They can just float through walls and shit in the same way your wifi signal does. Walls are a minor inconvenience. Does your wifi need to shit? Of course it doesn't. So neither do aliens. Because aliens are exactly the same as your wifi. Shit we don't undertand, aka witchcraft.

[a500lbgorilla]

I think the idea though is that aliens don't have physical form, in the same sense we do. They can just float through walls and shit in the same way your wifi signal does. Walls are a minor inconvenience. Does your wifi need to shit? Of course it doesn't. So neither do aliens. Because aliens are exactly the same as your wifi. Shit we don't undertand, aka witchcraft.

...

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We don't understand wifi?

...
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Wifi is life?


...
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Start your cult soon. I'll bring the kool-aid.

[Savy]

At least the aliens won't be able to get me in my living room.

[oskar]

trillion^trillion

If I have learned anything from procrastinating, it is that no matter how long you postpone something, eventually it has to happen.

[wufwugy]

If I have learned anything from procrastinating, it is that no matter how long you postpone something, eventually it has to happen.

What if total death is an asymptote?

[oskar]

That sounds too much like religion.

[OngBonga]

Start your cult soon. I'll bring the kool-aid.

You'll need more than kool-aid. You'll need a $200 registration fee, $100 a month in expenses, and please bring as many easy-to-manipulate females as possible.

[JKDS]

I dont see why couches are mandatory. It assumes the alien is a biped, whereas an intelligent race of dog people or giant Men In Black Cockroaches wouldnt even know how to sit on a couch.

Similarly, beds may not be necessary either if the creature has sufficiently hard skin/exoskeleton.

Doors and Windows of some variety seems legit. Waste disposal im mixed on. It seems highly unlikely that a being could be 100% efficient in the breakdown of its food, but just because i havent seen it doesnt mean it cant happen. Nor does it mean that the waste is useless to the aliens either, so it may be that waste wouldnt need to be disposed.

[wufwugy]

Being frank about it, I think we have all the evidence we need on Earth. The digestive tract is necessary for utility of product and it creates waste that only those with narrow needs can utilize. A sponge just sits there like a dickhead because it has no digestive system. Things with digestion are at liberty to specialize and advance. The better a being's digestion, the more capable of advancement it is, but necessarily its waste is less utilized by advanced beings

The Earth is like an apple in a bucket. Put different apples in different buckets and they'll be pretty much the same. Organize matter all sorts of ways all across the universe, and biology will end up pretty much the same. Advancement necessarily requires focused consumption and extraction, opposable appendages, some form of non-uniform form

[JKDS]

[wufwugy]

I feel shitty for making you feel like that

[JKDS]

Im sorry, but responding to the apple buckets argument will take more time more than I have.

I'll give you this: A mobile lifeform is what we're talking about, and those require lots of energy to operate...and known alternatives to digestive systems dont provide such energy (like plants/sponges).

But humans are not the epitome of evolutionary perfection. The human body sucks, and is incredibly inefficient and wasteful. Most (all?) earth life is. Given different evolutionary paths though, isnt it possible that a more efficient way to get energy could be obtained? If not through a single being, why not through a symbiotic relationship between two beings?

[spoonitnow]

You'll need more than kool-aid. You'll need a $200 registration fee, $100 a month in expenses, and please bring as many easy-to-manipulate females as possible.

Redundant

[eberetta1]

But back on topic:
Aliens have buttholes. ebretta, if you want to suggest there are aliens without buttholes I am on the edge of my seat waiting for your idea how that contraption would evolve. And would it not spend a long time walking across the fields wondering why it kept getting larger.

My comment was not concerning holios. My comment was ... An advanced lifeform is able to float right thru walls, so a species may have no need for doors.

[Galapogos]

Sort of related, I found this cool article about aliens and you guys have "aliens" in your thread title, good enough for me. You guys ever read about the Fermi Paradox? I thought this was a really cool blog post about it.

http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html

[wufwugy]

^^Great article. For a while I've felt like the Fermi Paradox is a misnomer. I don't think there is any paradox. I think the assumption of mass colonization is wrong, and the best explanation for why in that article is probably "Possibility 3".

[oskar]

My comment was not concerning holios. My comment was ... An advanced lifeform is able to float right thru walls, so a species may have no need for doors.

What do you mean 'right thru walls'? Explain yourself! Why would that be a natrual progression? Why would it even be beneficial? You'd fall right through floors, too! You're talking absolute shit!

[eberetta1]

What do you mean 'right thru walls'? Explain yourself! Why would that be a natrual progression? Why would it even be beneficial? You'd fall right through floors, too! You're talking absolute shit!

It is not a natural progression. The species would be born with it. No intelligence needed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yW--eQaA2I

[rong]

Sort of related, I found this cool article about aliens and you guys have "aliens" in your thread title, good enough for me. You guys ever read about the Fermi Paradox? I thought this was a really cool blog post about it.

http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html

Cool, but kinda depressing.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Evolution (of species) is the result of Natural Selection happening over many generations as a species responds to changing environmental pressures.
Natural Selection is the result of random non-fatal mutations which can occur when a cell clones itself (e.g. mitosis, meiosis).

If the mutation did not cause the offspring to be infertile (or in some other way prevent it from reproducing), then it goes into the gene pool.

The thing that produces the most fertile children has higher chance of long-term influence on the species as a whole. If it happens to also be a bit taller or bear majestic plumage or be able so survive the pending ice-age or whatever... so it goes. Those traits may or may not have anything to do with the thriving of the species.


So... given unknown environmental pressures... seemingly infinite variability and heartiness in forms of life... the sheer number of planetary systems in the galaxy...

Obviously Klingons or gtfo.


Do I have you right?

[oskar]

I don't think an alien race would evolve with some kind of superpower. If you don't need to hunt for food and fight for survival, then you have no need for a brain. Like wuf said, you could conceive a life form that travels on solar rays and feasts on its own sense of self satisfaction, but it wouldn't have to be smarter than a sponge. As we can see on our own planet, evolution doesn't aim for perfection, it does the bare minimum to survive. Much like myself.
You could assume that traits that have evolved many times independently on this planet would also be beneficial on other earth like planets, like stereoscopic vision, wings, flippers. Anything intelligent is most likely squishy and agile. The more armor you have naturally the less pressure you have to be smart. All of that makes me think that a life form that becomes self aware would be very much like us in a lot of ways. Of course, on the billions of planets that are out there, one might find a completely different route, but the vast majority, I believe, would be surprisingly similar to us.

[MadMojoMonkey]

OK, saying earth-like planets wins you points there. Similar environmental pressures could yield similar results.

There are so many planets that are not earth-like, though. Even in our own solar system only 12.5% of the planets are Earth-like, and we're the go-to spot in the galaxy for Earth-like planets (citation needed).


I don't think it takes too much imagination to think up a crystal structure that grows and expands, and in doing so, its structure becomes complex in a way that it becomes self-aware. We know that matter and energy are interchangeable, so it is conceivable that this being could find a way to propel itself (or bits of itself) into space. If the bits grow to become like the previous whole under any circumstances, then this can be a cycle of life. Evolution is patient when it comes to time scales.


I think this is ultimately all that Dr. Tyson is trying to say. He is a playful guy, with a sense of humor, after all.

I think the greater problem is "selling" a believable science fiction character to a human audience. This is amplified in visual media and complicated by the drive of the narrative to engage the audience. If we can't sympathize with the antagonist at least a little bit, it makes the hero's struggle stagnate into a single theme (stop the evil).