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> If this is the case, then two possibilities follow: first that its intentions are entirely benign and second they are malign Even framing this objects action

> If this is the case, then two possibilities follow: first that its intentions are entirely benign and second they are malign Even framing this objects actions using human concepts (benign, malign) is very short sighted. It’s possible any alien life experiences complexities were fundamentally unable to comprehend (there’s some good sci fi short stories that explore this).

JumpCrisscross 1y ago
> It’s possible any alien life experiences complexities were fundamentally unable to comprehend Possible. But I’d argue unlikely. We can’t make many assumptions about alien life, generally. We can about a technological civilisation that sends out interstellar probes.
- tialaramex 1y ago
  A sufficiently advanced technology might make the construction of probes trivial, so that it has no great significance to its creators - the "Roadside picnic" situation. Our unfathomable advanced technology is their disposable object. "Why did you send us this probe?" would be like asking America to account for a discarded Coke can. "I dunno, probably somebody was thirsty? What the fuck are you asking us for?" Aliens are completely unknowable, that's the thing most fiction trips up on. We don't understand what the hell is going on with other humans. They're like us but different, their motivations sometimes are mysterious or maybe they don't have motivations at all? It's confusing, and those aren't even a different species let alone aliens.
  - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
    > sufficiently advanced technology might make the construction of probes trivial, so that it has no great significance to its creators The point is they bothered constructing probes. My cat isn't constructing space probes. If he up and began doing so this evening, I would be able to conclude certain things about him. > would be like asking America to account for a discarded Coke can You're saying you can't conclude anything useful about American culture and civilisation from a discarded Coke can? (As well as the act of casually discarding it.) > Aliens are completely unknowable, that's the thing most fiction trips up on Aliens, yes. Aliens who make contact with us, no. The latter is a subset that requires certain attributes and heavily implies others.
    - ben_w 1y ago
      > You're saying you can't conclude anything useful about American culture and civilisation from a discarded Coke can? (As well as the act of casually discarding it.) Not the op, but I would aver that we have a good chance of concluding false things from the alien version of a discarded Coke can. Given the subject, I would point to the actor who played the lead role in "The Gods Must Be Crazy" (a story about a discarded coke glass bottle), who did not understand the money he was given for the role: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C7%83xau_ǂToma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C7%83xau_ǂToma
    - tialaramex 1y ago
      > The point is they bothered constructing probes. Right, why did somebody make this metal cylinder covered in elaborate symbology and then place it here? Was this place of great importance to them? What were they trying to communicate to me by constructing the cylinder and placing it? It's just a discarded coke can. You are the one who decided it's required to have great significance. If you haven't read "Roadside Picnic" I suggest at least reading a summary.
    - asdff 1y ago
      >You're saying you can't conclude anything useful about American culture and civilisation from a discarded Coke can? (As well as the act of casually discarding it.) Could an ant? This is the scale we may be operating on. One of the biggest fallacies with the alien question is that they'd operate on our scale. Let alone "think" as we've observed thinking on earth, but that is another story. Some science fiction has explored this concept based on gravity or metabolism leading to dramatically different scale in either space or time for a species and the implications that brings when meeting a species on a different scale.
  - the-mitr 1y ago
    along similar lines is His Master's Voice by Stanislaw Lem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/His_Master%27s_Voice_(novel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/His_Master%27s_Voice_(novel) > We will make it undecipherable for all who are not yet ready; but we must go further in our caution — so that even a false reading will not be able to supply them with any of the things that they seek but that should be denied them.
  - lloeki 1y ago
    > "Why did you send us this probe?" "hey zarqzon! someone found the camera you accidentally dropped into that asteroid field while trying to take a selfie with that cool gas giant! damn you were so wasted that time" "what? I just bought a new one as replacement!"
jerf 1y ago
This isn't really that important. I don't care if the probe is here because of magh'Kveh or because its creators are really motivated to zzzzssszsezesszzesz. What I care about is whether it's going to be benign (which includes just cruising through doing nothing) or malevolent to me. I don't even care if the aliens think they are doing us a favor by coming to a screeching halt, going full-bore at Earth, and converting our ecosystem into a completely different one that they think is "better" for whatever reason. However gurgurvivick that makes them feel, I'm going to classify that as a malign act and take appropriate action... because what else can I even do? And from that perspective, "benign" and "malign" aren't that hard to pick up on. They are relative to humanity, and there is nothing wrong with that. In fact it would be pathological to not care about how the intentions are relative to their effect on humanity. Whatever happens, it's not like we can actually cause an interstellar incident at this phase of our development. Anything that they would interpret as an interstellar incident they were going to anyhow (e.g. "how dare you prevent our probe from eliminating your species?") and that responsibility is on them, not us. You can't blame a toddler that can barely tie their shoelaces for international incidents, likewise for us and interstellar incidents.
- nathan_compton 1y ago
  > and converting our ecosystem into a completely different one that they think is "better" for whatever reason. You could theoretically be convinced that they are right and resign yourself to death.
- sebastiennight 1y ago
  One problem with your assumption here is that "humanity" has no definition of "benign" and "malign". If we did have such a thing, extrapolated coherent volition would be solved and that would solve half of the AI alignment problem. This hypothetical "alien" problem is actually pretty much equivalent to the AI alignment problem. One half is, we don't know what we want, and the other half is, even if we knew... we don't know how to make "them" do what we want.
  - alariccole 1y ago
    I feel confident that we do.
stevenwoo 1y ago
Sort of the impetus (which at least gives us a reason unlike the movie adaptation Edge of Tomorrow but is not as important as the impact) in the novella All You Need is Kill.
827a 1y ago
We don't even need good sci-fi to explore that idea. We brush against it every day with ChatGPT.

JumpCrisscross 1y ago

> It’s possible any alien life experiences complexities were fundamentally unable to comprehend Possible. But I’d argue unlikely. We can’t make many assumptions about alien life, generally. We can about a technological civilisation that sends out interstellar probes.

tialaramex 1y ago
A sufficiently advanced technology might make the construction of probes trivial, so that it has no great significance to its creators - the "Roadside picnic" situation. Our unfathomable advanced technology is their disposable object. "Why did you send us this probe?" would be like asking America to account for a discarded Coke can. "I dunno, probably somebody was thirsty? What the fuck are you asking us for?" Aliens are completely unknowable, that's the thing most fiction trips up on. We don't understand what the hell is going on with other humans. They're like us but different, their motivations sometimes are mysterious or maybe they don't have motivations at all? It's confusing, and those aren't even a different species let alone aliens.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago
  > sufficiently advanced technology might make the construction of probes trivial, so that it has no great significance to its creators The point is they bothered constructing probes. My cat isn't constructing space probes. If he up and began doing so this evening, I would be able to conclude certain things about him. > would be like asking America to account for a discarded Coke can You're saying you can't conclude anything useful about American culture and civilisation from a discarded Coke can? (As well as the act of casually discarding it.) > Aliens are completely unknowable, that's the thing most fiction trips up on Aliens, yes. Aliens who make contact with us, no. The latter is a subset that requires certain attributes and heavily implies others.
  - ben_w 1y ago
    > You're saying you can't conclude anything useful about American culture and civilisation from a discarded Coke can? (As well as the act of casually discarding it.) Not the op, but I would aver that we have a good chance of concluding false things from the alien version of a discarded Coke can. Given the subject, I would point to the actor who played the lead role in "The Gods Must Be Crazy" (a story about a discarded coke glass bottle), who did not understand the money he was given for the role: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C7%83xau_ǂToma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C7%83xau_ǂToma
  - tialaramex 1y ago
    > The point is they bothered constructing probes. Right, why did somebody make this metal cylinder covered in elaborate symbology and then place it here? Was this place of great importance to them? What were they trying to communicate to me by constructing the cylinder and placing it? It's just a discarded coke can. You are the one who decided it's required to have great significance. If you haven't read "Roadside Picnic" I suggest at least reading a summary.
  - asdff 1y ago
    >You're saying you can't conclude anything useful about American culture and civilisation from a discarded Coke can? (As well as the act of casually discarding it.) Could an ant? This is the scale we may be operating on. One of the biggest fallacies with the alien question is that they'd operate on our scale. Let alone "think" as we've observed thinking on earth, but that is another story. Some science fiction has explored this concept based on gravity or metabolism leading to dramatically different scale in either space or time for a species and the implications that brings when meeting a species on a different scale.
- the-mitr 1y ago
  along similar lines is His Master's Voice by Stanislaw Lem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/His_Master%27s_Voice_(novel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/His_Master%27s_Voice_(novel) > We will make it undecipherable for all who are not yet ready; but we must go further in our caution — so that even a false reading will not be able to supply them with any of the things that they seek but that should be denied them.
- lloeki 1y ago
  > "Why did you send us this probe?" "hey zarqzon! someone found the camera you accidentally dropped into that asteroid field while trying to take a selfie with that cool gas giant! damn you were so wasted that time" "what? I just bought a new one as replacement!"

jerf 1y ago

This isn't really that important. I don't care if the probe is here because of magh'Kveh or because its creators are really motivated to zzzzssszsezesszzesz. What I care about is whether it's going to be benign (which includes just cruising through doing nothing) or malevolent to me. I don't even care if the aliens think they are doing us a favor by coming to a screeching halt, going full-bore at Earth, and converting our ecosystem into a completely different one that they think is "better" for whatever reason. However gurgurvivick that makes them feel, I'm going to classify that as a malign act and take appropriate action... because what else can I even do? And from that perspective, "benign" and "malign" aren't that hard to pick up on. They are relative to humanity, and there is nothing wrong with that. In fact it would be pathological to not care about how the intentions are relative to their effect on humanity. Whatever happens, it's not like we can actually cause an interstellar incident at this phase of our development. Anything that they would interpret as an interstellar incident they were going to anyhow (e.g. "how dare you prevent our probe from eliminating your species?") and that responsibility is on them, not us. You can't blame a toddler that can barely tie their shoelaces for international incidents, likewise for us and interstellar incidents.

nathan_compton 1y ago
> and converting our ecosystem into a completely different one that they think is "better" for whatever reason. You could theoretically be convinced that they are right and resign yourself to death.
sebastiennight 1y ago
One problem with your assumption here is that "humanity" has no definition of "benign" and "malign". If we did have such a thing, extrapolated coherent volition would be solved and that would solve half of the AI alignment problem. This hypothetical "alien" problem is actually pretty much equivalent to the AI alignment problem. One half is, we don't know what we want, and the other half is, even if we knew... we don't know how to make "them" do what we want.
- alariccole 1y ago
  I feel confident that we do.

stevenwoo 1y ago

Sort of the impetus (which at least gives us a reason unlike the movie adaptation Edge of Tomorrow but is not as important as the impact) in the novella All You Need is Kill.

827a 1y ago

We don't even need good sci-fi to explore that idea. We brush against it every day with ChatGPT.