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A slight tangent, but I sometimes wonder how 'humanoid' any potential intelligent alien species must be, if they exist. Some science fiction writers depict alie

A slight tangent, but I sometimes wonder how 'humanoid' any potential intelligent alien species must be, if they exist. Some science fiction writers depict alien species as quite morphologically similar to humans – Romulans and Klingons in Star Trek – or radically different – Hutts in Star Wars, Hanars and Krogans in Mass Effect. If you take a quick look at "Star Wars alien species" or "Mass Effect alien species", most of the differences imagined by writers are around the head shape, and the overall distribution of muscle mass around the rest of the body. So most alien species you meet in pop sci fi is 90% identical to humans, with a different head. Human heads in this sense are pretty basic. We don't have a leku like Twi'leks, ridged foreheads like Klingons, long necks and slender frames like Kaminoans, a small ring of horns and skin patterns like Zabraks, or scalp-crests like Asari. But if we did, would these traits ever go away? Would human evolution eventually "revert" us back to our present form? Because something tells me that we wouldn't, and the selection process would basically say "good enough". In other words, the reason we don't look like Asari or Twi'leks is probably pure luck, and the reason alien species may look the way they do (again, if they exist) is also pure luck. But they probably share some of the general characteristics of humanoids, such as limbs not necessary for motion and with opposable fingers, a head separate from the rest of the body, etc.

mikepurvis 5y ago
> 90% identical to humans I mean, we share 90% of our DNA with mice, and 70% with worms.
- Victerius 5y ago
  I mean, physiologically. But, yes.
  - mikepurvis 5y ago
    I know we're both just being trite, but it is an interesting point that nearly all of our genetics are concerned with the "inside bits" of our proteins, organs, and so on. Whereas when we talk about a hypothetical extra-terrestrial being that has the basic external configuration of a human, that could well be a sulfur or graphite-based life form, or something else entirely. Basically it could look like a smooth, slender, big-headed human but under the hood have much less in common with us than an earthworm does.
tomrod 5y ago
Some humans have freckles and others have thicker hair. As evolution has no mind or will, if there is nothing pressuring these traits to leave the gene pool then it would be negligible probability that they do. Same with any morphological traits, I reckon (I am not an evolutionary biologist).
retrac 5y ago
> I sometimes wonder how 'humanoid' any potential intelligent alien species must be, if they exist. TV uses humanoid aliens because they're easy to cast :) Just look at the other intelligent life on Earth. Some birds, whales, elephants are near the top. If we hadn't nearly wiped elephants out maybe in another 10 million years they'd be making spaceships with their trunks (which have a fine manipulation ability approaching the human hand). A little further away evolutionarily, jellyfish are remarkably intelligent and seem to even have individual personalities, and they don't have a brain.
- andrewl 5y ago
  As retrac says, it’s easier to cast for humanoids. And decades ago the special effects technology was nowhere near what we have now, so there were fewer options for more unusual forms and they were expensive. Novelists had no such restrictions, so Larry Niven could create Pierson’s Puppeteers in 1966: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierson%27s_Puppeteers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierson%27s_Puppeteers
  - Scarblac 5y ago
    And Douglas Adams could invent a hyper intelligent shade of the colour blue :)
- raverbashing 5y ago
  > Some birds, whales, elephants are near the top. They're different from humans, but much closer than we expect: mammals (apart from the birds, sure), with similar skeletal structure, similar overall "how it works" biology (brains, skeleton, digestive system, circulatory system, etc) The closest "intelligent alien" we know of is the octopus. That's really something else. But even then a lot of biology is shared. If you want to get creative don't think of humans mating neanderthals, think animals re-evolving from an earthworm or a jellyfish.
heymijo 5y ago
> I sometimes wonder how 'humanoid' any potential intelligent alien species must be Great question. I enjoyed Andy Weir's take on this in his most recent book Project Hail Mary. If anyone hasn't read it yet and they're intrigued, I would suggest picking it up without finding out any more about it.
xwolfi 5y ago
Yeah it's probably not pure luck but instead complete adaptation to the particular environment. Now you talk of aliens breathing and eating meat which can be conceived but... what of a pure liquid helium planet ? The intelligence there might be completely different, with reproduction cycles we cant imagine and energy transformation that may not even require eating other life form like us.
stirfish 5y ago
> selection process would basically say "good enough". You ever start a refactor, find some dead code, and realize you could work it into a new feature? I wonder if vestigial organs are ever reused like that.
jareklupinski 5y ago
"They're made out of meat." "Meat?" https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/thinkingMeat.html https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/think...
albert_e 5y ago
thinking-aloud -- alien life may be so different from what we are familiar with ... that we may not even recognize it as life when we encounter it first the differences may be in sheer size of the organism -- think licens and moss at planetary scale -- or even loosely collected soup or vapors of chemicals the difference could be in metabolism that we may need 4-5 generations of humans to see them live and grow and die -- or they might live for only a fraction of a second just like there are billions of microbes living in each of our bodies (and they have no mental capacity to comprehend us or our world) ... we may in-turn be microbes inside a much grander macro-cosm that we can never wrap our heads around
messe 5y ago
> Hutts [...] and Krogans I would hardly classify these as radically different. Hutts have two arms, two eyes a nose and a mouth, and vocalize similarly to humans. Krogans are very much humanoid as well and follow the same basic body plan. I'd agree about the Hanars. Better examples of radically different would be the Dwellers from the Algebraist, the Tines from A Fire Upon the Deep, or Alex Ries' Birrin[1]. Even then, they are all relatively human-like in their culture. [1]: http://abiogenisis.deviantart.com/ http://abiogenisis.deviantart.com/
- rsynnott 5y ago
  For a _really_ alien alien, try Peter Hamilton’s MorningLightMountain.
adolph 5y ago
Not at all. An example is the intelligence embodied in cephalopods such as the octopus. The fork between us and them occurred maybe 600m years ago. Suggested reading: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40910274-the-deep-history-of-ourselves https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40910274-the-deep-histor... https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28116739-other-minds https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28116739-other-minds

mikepurvis 5y ago

> 90% identical to humans I mean, we share 90% of our DNA with mice, and 70% with worms.

Victerius 5y ago
I mean, physiologically. But, yes.
- mikepurvis 5y ago
  I know we're both just being trite, but it is an interesting point that nearly all of our genetics are concerned with the "inside bits" of our proteins, organs, and so on. Whereas when we talk about a hypothetical extra-terrestrial being that has the basic external configuration of a human, that could well be a sulfur or graphite-based life form, or something else entirely. Basically it could look like a smooth, slender, big-headed human but under the hood have much less in common with us than an earthworm does.

tomrod 5y ago

Some humans have freckles and others have thicker hair. As evolution has no mind or will, if there is nothing pressuring these traits to leave the gene pool then it would be negligible probability that they do. Same with any morphological traits, I reckon (I am not an evolutionary biologist).

retrac 5y ago

> I sometimes wonder how 'humanoid' any potential intelligent alien species must be, if they exist. TV uses humanoid aliens because they're easy to cast :) Just look at the other intelligent life on Earth. Some birds, whales, elephants are near the top. If we hadn't nearly wiped elephants out maybe in another 10 million years they'd be making spaceships with their trunks (which have a fine manipulation ability approaching the human hand). A little further away evolutionarily, jellyfish are remarkably intelligent and seem to even have individual personalities, and they don't have a brain.

andrewl 5y ago
As retrac says, it’s easier to cast for humanoids. And decades ago the special effects technology was nowhere near what we have now, so there were fewer options for more unusual forms and they were expensive. Novelists had no such restrictions, so Larry Niven could create Pierson’s Puppeteers in 1966: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierson%27s_Puppeteers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierson%27s_Puppeteers
- Scarblac 5y ago
  And Douglas Adams could invent a hyper intelligent shade of the colour blue :)
raverbashing 5y ago
> Some birds, whales, elephants are near the top. They're different from humans, but much closer than we expect: mammals (apart from the birds, sure), with similar skeletal structure, similar overall "how it works" biology (brains, skeleton, digestive system, circulatory system, etc) The closest "intelligent alien" we know of is the octopus. That's really something else. But even then a lot of biology is shared. If you want to get creative don't think of humans mating neanderthals, think animals re-evolving from an earthworm or a jellyfish.

heymijo 5y ago

> I sometimes wonder how 'humanoid' any potential intelligent alien species must be Great question. I enjoyed Andy Weir's take on this in his most recent book Project Hail Mary. If anyone hasn't read it yet and they're intrigued, I would suggest picking it up without finding out any more about it.

xwolfi 5y ago

Yeah it's probably not pure luck but instead complete adaptation to the particular environment. Now you talk of aliens breathing and eating meat which can be conceived but... what of a pure liquid helium planet ? The intelligence there might be completely different, with reproduction cycles we cant imagine and energy transformation that may not even require eating other life form like us.

stirfish 5y ago

> selection process would basically say "good enough". You ever start a refactor, find some dead code, and realize you could work it into a new feature? I wonder if vestigial organs are ever reused like that.

jareklupinski 5y ago

"They're made out of meat." "Meat?" https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/thinkingMeat.html https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/think...

albert_e 5y ago

thinking-aloud -- alien life may be so different from what we are familiar with ... that we may not even recognize it as life when we encounter it first the differences may be in sheer size of the organism -- think licens and moss at planetary scale -- or even loosely collected soup or vapors of chemicals the difference could be in metabolism that we may need 4-5 generations of humans to see them live and grow and die -- or they might live for only a fraction of a second just like there are billions of microbes living in each of our bodies (and they have no mental capacity to comprehend us or our world) ... we may in-turn be microbes inside a much grander macro-cosm that we can never wrap our heads around

messe 5y ago

> Hutts [...] and Krogans I would hardly classify these as radically different. Hutts have two arms, two eyes a nose and a mouth, and vocalize similarly to humans. Krogans are very much humanoid as well and follow the same basic body plan. I'd agree about the Hanars. Better examples of radically different would be the Dwellers from the Algebraist, the Tines from A Fire Upon the Deep, or Alex Ries' Birrin[1]. Even then, they are all relatively human-like in their culture. [1]: http://abiogenisis.deviantart.com/ http://abiogenisis.deviantart.com/

rsynnott 5y ago
For a _really_ alien alien, try Peter Hamilton’s MorningLightMountain.

adolph 5y ago

Not at all. An example is the intelligence embodied in cephalopods such as the octopus. The fork between us and them occurred maybe 600m years ago. Suggested reading: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40910274-the-deep-history-of-ourselves https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40910274-the-deep-histor... https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28116739-other-minds https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28116739-other-minds