4 ms·

"Nope, humans were trying to figure out how to manage the consequences of nuclear weapons, which were judged to be a necessary strategy to end World War II to a

"Nope, humans were trying to figure out how to manage the consequences of nuclear weapons, which were judged to be a necessary strategy to end World War II to attempt to defeat fascism and save democracy. " Fascism and WWII were created by humans. If you were an alien species and observing the earth from afar it's pretty insane how foolish we look. We've built the worlds greatest nuclear arsenal, then pointed them at each other. The Fermi paradox plays into this. If life is possible throughout the galaxy where is everyone? It's possible that life just destroys itself.

adventured 7y ago
> If you were an alien species and observing the earth from afar it's pretty insane how foolish we look. There's no reason to actually believe that those very aliens aren't just as foolish and survived, competed and advanced in part through a process of killing their fellow tribes of aliens to reach supremacy.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  In fact, if game theory is something to go by, these problems aren't "human stupidity", but they're inherent in any system that has thinking agents who have values, and no way to immediately, simultaneously and fully meet all of them. The hypothetical aliens would have some of those issues too.
tehjoker 7y ago
It's worth noting that European fascism was mostly defeated by the Red Army at the expense of millions of lives, not the US which got into it late. In the Pacific sphere, there is fairly convincing evidence that the bomb was not at all necessary to convince Japan to surrender that is worth reading about: https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-japan-stalin-did/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-jap...
- dTal 7y ago
  More relevant to the assessment of the morality of dropping The Bomb is whether it was reasonable to think it was necessary at the time. (I can't confidently assert that one way or the other, though I'm sure opinions differed even then)
- proctor 7y ago
  this reminds me of the documentary "the fog of war"[0] in which robert macnamara talks about the conventional type bombing of japan's cities with firebombs before using any atom bomb. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War
antepodius 7y ago
You don't actually mean aliens. You're talking about 'advanced' aloof beings that basically share your values but in a more sophisticated form. I really hate this 'aliens would be disgusted at out foolishness' meme. There's no reason to think that. That's how you, with your particular disposition that some proportion of humans share, would react if you were teleported to a flying saucer in orbit- shake your head and cluck your tongue. You're projecting on to aliens to make your own view look more sophisticated by comparison. Now, I don't know how aliens would think. But when we look at bacteria, or ants, we don't point moral judgements on their actions and get annoyed when the microbes acy a certain way- and to do so has a term associated with it, anthropomorphisation, that's generally seen as a foolish mistake. You don't get emotionally charged at the actions of microbes when you observe them because, in part, you can kind of understand what they're doing. You have a bird's eye view. You don't get angry at them for not banding together and solving their toxic waste problems. You don't shake your head and cluck your tongue at their foolishness. If we're going to anthopomorphise aliens, we should at least get the situation to something of comparable scale.

adventured 7y ago

> If you were an alien species and observing the earth from afar it's pretty insane how foolish we look. There's no reason to actually believe that those very aliens aren't just as foolish and survived, competed and advanced in part through a process of killing their fellow tribes of aliens to reach supremacy.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
In fact, if game theory is something to go by, these problems aren't "human stupidity", but they're inherent in any system that has thinking agents who have values, and no way to immediately, simultaneously and fully meet all of them. The hypothetical aliens would have some of those issues too.

tehjoker 7y ago

It's worth noting that European fascism was mostly defeated by the Red Army at the expense of millions of lives, not the US which got into it late. In the Pacific sphere, there is fairly convincing evidence that the bomb was not at all necessary to convince Japan to surrender that is worth reading about: https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-japan-stalin-did/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-jap...

dTal 7y ago
More relevant to the assessment of the morality of dropping The Bomb is whether it was reasonable to think it was necessary at the time. (I can't confidently assert that one way or the other, though I'm sure opinions differed even then)
proctor 7y ago
this reminds me of the documentary "the fog of war"[0] in which robert macnamara talks about the conventional type bombing of japan's cities with firebombs before using any atom bomb. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War

antepodius 7y ago

You don't actually mean aliens. You're talking about 'advanced' aloof beings that basically share your values but in a more sophisticated form. I really hate this 'aliens would be disgusted at out foolishness' meme. There's no reason to think that. That's how you, with your particular disposition that some proportion of humans share, would react if you were teleported to a flying saucer in orbit- shake your head and cluck your tongue. You're projecting on to aliens to make your own view look more sophisticated by comparison. Now, I don't know how aliens would think. But when we look at bacteria, or ants, we don't point moral judgements on their actions and get annoyed when the microbes acy a certain way- and to do so has a term associated with it, anthropomorphisation, that's generally seen as a foolish mistake. You don't get emotionally charged at the actions of microbes when you observe them because, in part, you can kind of understand what they're doing. You have a bird's eye view. You don't get angry at them for not banding together and solving their toxic waste problems. You don't shake your head and cluck your tongue at their foolishness. If we're going to anthopomorphise aliens, we should at least get the situation to something of comparable scale.