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I forget where I read it, but I remember reading that we can tell some information about E.T.s based on how they approach us. The consensus reported by what I r

I forget where I read it, but I remember reading that we can tell some information about E.T.s based on how they approach us. The consensus reported by what I read was that if they stop at some distance like Jupiter or at most the asteroid belt, then they are less likely to be aggressive. It's the equivalent of stopping on the porch and ringing the doorbell vs. just walking into the house, which is what showing up in our planet's orbit would be. Realistically, fighting them is out of the question. If they have a superluminal drive there's a good chance they could accelerate things to just under the speed of light and steer them to the Earth. The effects of a 5kg steel ball hitting the Earth's atmosphere at 99% the speed of light are debatable [1], but all the opinions agree the devastation would be massive, with probably heavy to total casualties within 300 miles, and possibly massive seismic activity if it drilled into the Earth's crust instead of being converted into X-Rays and a fireball by the atmosphere. I suspect at some point we will advance enough to get to the Oort cloud at the edge of our solar system, find a beacon warning all ships away from the nascent primitive sentients, and figure out how to turn off the beacon. If we survive as a species that long and then are able to do that it could serve as passing a basic racial intelligence test, and allow us to interact with other species. Until then, only approved researchers agreeing to secrecy would be allowed to visit us and observe. This is all conjecture though, there is no evidence as far as I can tell. [1] https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-to-Earth-if-a-5kg-metal-ball-from-space-is-thrown-toward-it-at-99-99-of-the-speed-of-light https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-to-Earth-if-a-5kg-me... [2]https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-to-the-Earth-if-it-were-hit-by-a-1-kg-steel-ball-going-at-99-the-speed-of-light https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-to-the-Earth-if-it-w...

karmakaze 6y ago
There's good logic in each of these ideas but may be based on false premises. e.g. porch distance may be just outside our solar system or a light year. I hardly expect that beacons are set up around uninteresting life forms. It would be like save the x species of insect--who does that? And even then, we're presuming inclinations similar to our own values. The only thing that does makes sense is that the only time to even consider aggression is if we were closely matched which has negligible likelihood. Or perhaps we should quickly figure out what constitutes as 'cute' or 'entertaining' to our visitors, if we are to model their behavior to our own.
- argvargc 6y ago
  We'd doubtful be deemed uninteresting after figuring out world-destroying weapons and space-travel. Especially if we were considering mixing the two together. [0] I'd argue these developments would be most interesting, and justifying of a warning beacon, or even some kind of a barrier, were such behaviour to be detected as originating from an uncontacted species. [0] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A119 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A119
  - Communitivity 6y ago
    So this is a weird post, even for me. It is almost entirely speculation and extrapolation from some bizarre assumptions: UFOs are real, UFOs are alien, the aliens are not alien enough to make us unable to reason about their behavior. The jury is still out for me on UFOs, even with all that's come to light. There's something there..but occam's razor would indicate it's not aliens. Still, IF it was then there's a correlation I find interesting. The number of recorded UFO sightings (whatever the cause) was minuscule before WW II. Looking at www.ufoevidence.org (not exactly peer reviewed, but it's there), the pre-1940s cases number 12. The 1940s hav 20. The 1950s have 64. The 1960s have 92. 1970s 131. Then it curiously drops in the decade the Soviet Union fell and nuclear war became less likely. 1980s has 58, 90s 59, and only 118 from 2000 to 2020. If UFOs exist and are aliens, then I don't suspect they are visiting us for some altruistic purpose but for research. After all, if our scientists had the chance to see a pre-industrial race on the verge of collapse or advance, like the Mayans just before meeting Cortez, our scientists would jump at that chance. And there is the Fermi paradox - maybe most species kill themselves off and aliens want to observe to form theories on why.
    - argvargc 6y ago
      Our context here is: "What Should We Do If Extraterrestrials Show Up?". Assuming they exist is central to exploring this context. This doesn't mean anyone exploring the idea necessarily believes or disbelieves they exist. There were a bunch of ex-military who testified publicly as to UFO events surrounding nuclear facilities in the US and the former Soviet Union around the cold war. The UFO's were reportedly deactivating missiles on both sides simultaneously. I don't recall the source exactly but I'm sure it's out there. Anyway, it at least makes some sort of sense (versus other claims about aliens sticking things up peoples butts). I mention it as if this happened, and was some kind of intervention, and presumably successful, it might make sense they subsequently laid low for a bit, potentially matching your correlation. Again, I'm not suggesting any of this is real, it's just an interesting idea within the context of this post.

karmakaze 6y ago

There's good logic in each of these ideas but may be based on false premises. e.g. porch distance may be just outside our solar system or a light year. I hardly expect that beacons are set up around uninteresting life forms. It would be like save the x species of insect--who does that? And even then, we're presuming inclinations similar to our own values. The only thing that does makes sense is that the only time to even consider aggression is if we were closely matched which has negligible likelihood. Or perhaps we should quickly figure out what constitutes as 'cute' or 'entertaining' to our visitors, if we are to model their behavior to our own.

argvargc 6y ago
We'd doubtful be deemed uninteresting after figuring out world-destroying weapons and space-travel. Especially if we were considering mixing the two together. [0] I'd argue these developments would be most interesting, and justifying of a warning beacon, or even some kind of a barrier, were such behaviour to be detected as originating from an uncontacted species. [0] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A119 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A119
- Communitivity 6y ago
  So this is a weird post, even for me. It is almost entirely speculation and extrapolation from some bizarre assumptions: UFOs are real, UFOs are alien, the aliens are not alien enough to make us unable to reason about their behavior. The jury is still out for me on UFOs, even with all that's come to light. There's something there..but occam's razor would indicate it's not aliens. Still, IF it was then there's a correlation I find interesting. The number of recorded UFO sightings (whatever the cause) was minuscule before WW II. Looking at www.ufoevidence.org (not exactly peer reviewed, but it's there), the pre-1940s cases number 12. The 1940s hav 20. The 1950s have 64. The 1960s have 92. 1970s 131. Then it curiously drops in the decade the Soviet Union fell and nuclear war became less likely. 1980s has 58, 90s 59, and only 118 from 2000 to 2020. If UFOs exist and are aliens, then I don't suspect they are visiting us for some altruistic purpose but for research. After all, if our scientists had the chance to see a pre-industrial race on the verge of collapse or advance, like the Mayans just before meeting Cortez, our scientists would jump at that chance. And there is the Fermi paradox - maybe most species kill themselves off and aliens want to observe to form theories on why.
  - argvargc 6y ago
    Our context here is: "What Should We Do If Extraterrestrials Show Up?". Assuming they exist is central to exploring this context. This doesn't mean anyone exploring the idea necessarily believes or disbelieves they exist. There were a bunch of ex-military who testified publicly as to UFO events surrounding nuclear facilities in the US and the former Soviet Union around the cold war. The UFO's were reportedly deactivating missiles on both sides simultaneously. I don't recall the source exactly but I'm sure it's out there. Anyway, it at least makes some sort of sense (versus other claims about aliens sticking things up peoples butts). I mention it as if this happened, and was some kind of intervention, and presumably successful, it might make sense they subsequently laid low for a bit, potentially matching your correlation. Again, I'm not suggesting any of this is real, it's just an interesting idea within the context of this post.