Re: The Fermi Paradox and SETI Success

On Aug 22, 2:25�pm, "Chris.B" <chri...@mail.dk> wrote:

On Aug 21, 3:46�pm, Robert Carnegie wrote:

(I'm not responsible for the tastes of aliens. �Except, I did imagine
them. �As it happens I'm Scottish, so...)


Well, nobody is perfect. Isn't that really the point about
civilisations? Despite my dislike for hierarchy this has proved to be
one of the most enduring a useful tools for the human race.


We are social animals. Hierarchy is a tool, I suppose,  if you
consider breathing to be a tool.

We
progress and survive on the efforts of a few unique individuals per
generation. Most of us are mere extras on the stage of life. Worker
ants programmed to carry out all the vital/ utterly pointless tasks
allotted to our particular place/role in society.


Do you believe that the typical hunter-gatherer's life was pointless?
If not, why was hers profound and a modern factory worker's is not? I
do not consider my life pointless; my only real complaint is that it
will likely be too short.

If there were no
criminals there would be no need for a lot of walk-on extras. Just
imagine if there were no politicians! Most the cast would become
redundent overnight.


If there were no politicians then the *real criminals would have a
field day.


Anthropomorphism is a serious weakness in the arguments/guesswork
concerning "aliens". Many seem completely unable to acccept that
anything which has developed intelligence cannot be just like us but
with naturally larger breasts. I wouldn't want to a meet any alien
which pretended to be my mother in law in any shape or form.


My mother in law is a rather nice lady.

We place
such importance on appearance that anything falling outside of "the
norm" might be rather terrifying or downright ugly to most of us.
Hairy legs in women? Cleft lips? Thinning hair? Cross-eyed? Acne? An
odd skin colour? Sweaty hands? These are all unattractive features to
most of us. God help anything turning up on the White House Lawn with
any of these characteristics. Or worse, a combination of all the
above.


There are evolutionary explanations for why most of us find some of
these characteristics unattractive. Yes, aliens might be ugly by our
standards, and we will have to get around that. Do you think most of
us have not considered that already?


None of you seem grasped the significance of my earlier ("bizarre")
posting styles. Don't we all carry a heavy load of prejudices around
with us concerning communication?


So, it seems clear now that you are not totally insane; you were being
deliberately uncommunicative. To what end?

I'd hate to meet you on a desert
island if I was made to learn your language rather than the converse.


My preferred language is English.

Most folks on a foreign shore find it to their advantage to learn the
local language.

Shouldn't we choose an intermediate language which neither of us know?
Just to be fair to both?


That should help communication. Can you think of any examples where
people have actually done that?


How do you judge the format and quality of a message from space? By
your own standards of educated, middle class, 21st century English,
competent punctuation, broad vocabulary and decent spelling? You'e not
going to get far with the four tones with that lot in your baggage!


If you tried, oh, I dunno, *reading, you would discover that these
ideas are discussed and investigated by many folks, and have been for
decades. There might even be regulars here who have worked in these
fields.

Are these the same standards you apply to dolphins and whales? Can you
speak dolphin? It can't just be all about �fishing, racing against
ships and sex. Can it? Do dolphins have local accents and hierarchy?
Upstream boy and downstream girl? Shouldn't we know by now?


There have been scientists working on non-human communication for
generations. Even if there were as smart as we (whatever that might
mean), they are very different from us. Even culture can divide people
with a common language, making it difficult to talk to them.

It might
be important. Who knows what vital secrets they hold? It might be the
one rite of passage which the aliens are just waiting for us to manage
alone before showering us with their technological gifts.
Communicating with the aliens living on our own world could be our
vital step to emancipation. May our many fantasy gods help us if the
aliens are women! We'll be stuck here for another bl��dy millenium.
*<;^{#


While you're waiting for bosomy aliens, some folks are working on
communication.

You might want to try:
1. Communicating from the start, when possible, and
2. Changing the political system that annoys you so much.

Kermit