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Hollywood films and science fiction literature fuel the belief that aliens are monster-like beings, who are very different to humans. But new research suggests that we could have more in common with our extra-terrestrial neighbours, than initially thought.
In a new study published in the International Journal of Astrobiology scientists from the University of Oxford show for the first time how evolutionary theory can be used to support alien predictions and better understand their behaviour. They show that aliens are potentially shaped by the same processes and mechanisms that shaped humans, such as natural selection.
The theory supports the argument that foreign life forms undergo natural selection, and are like us, evolving to be fitter and stronger over time.
[...] The paper also makes specific predictions about the biological make-up of complex aliens, and offers a degree of insight as to what they might look like.
[...] 'There are potentially hundreds of thousands of habitable planets in our galaxy alone. We can't say whether or not we're alone on Earth, but we have taken a small step forward in answering, if we're not alone, what our neighbours are like.'
http://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2017-10-31-aliens-may-be-more-us-we-think
[Also Covered By]: phys.org
Darwin's aliens (open, DOI: 10.1017/S1473550417000362) (DX)
Evolutionary exobiology: towards the qualitative assessment of biological potential on exoplanets (DOI: 10.1017/S1473550417000349) (DX)
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Thursday November 02 2017, @02:44AM (17 children)
yes, just like us, extinct in 10,000 to 15,000 years.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Thursday November 02 2017, @03:01AM (4 children)
That's incredibly optimistic.
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(Score: 2) by zocalo on Thursday November 02 2017, @07:46AM (2 children)
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday November 02 2017, @08:11AM
Maybe it is a reference to a length of time that homo sapiens sapiens (+ a few Neanderthal genes) [wikipedia.org] or modern civilization [wikipedia.org] has been around.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @04:52PM
There are 7+ billion of us. Even if there's a global nuclear war that ends modern civilization it won't wipe all humans out. At least tens of thousands will still survive. We might even still outnumber the current population of many other primates.
Some of those survivalists would probably be enjoying it and doing well (assuming enough people die, otherwise they might get laughed at ;) ). While some tribal/aboriginal people in the middle of nowhere might not even notice much except the weather not being "normal". Many might die of cancer earlier but that won't stop them all from breeding successfully. Lots of Hiroshima survivors lived till quite long. Look at those affected by Chernobyl - not everyone died at "extinction rates". Plenty are still living 30 years later. Radiation is good at killing a significant percentage of a population but you need a LOT more radiation to cause extinction.
As for Nuclear Winter, humans have lived through the last ice age.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @07:14PM
Because they have Trumpulians
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 02 2017, @03:01AM (11 children)
I think h. sapiens has already made it past the 15,000 year mark, we've even survived 5000+ years of agriculture and city building. Electricity was probably the beginning of the end for us, starting with Tesla - after that the rate of technological progress and change really picked up, almost simultaneously with the halting of natural evolution.
I doubt we'll go extinct anytime soon, we may have a population shrink from 7 billion down to 70,000, but I think that as a species, we're clever enough to survive our own foolishness for quite a while.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by ewk on Thursday November 02 2017, @08:23AM (1 child)
but that hubris...
Don't get me started on that! :-)
I don't always react, but when I do, I do it on SoylentNews
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 02 2017, @04:11PM
Well, the real question is: if we do bork ourselves back to the stone age, will we come out on top in the next iteration, or will something evolve that can take us out? That something doesn't have to beat us at our own games, it just has to beat us at the basic games of life: obtaining food, procreating, and sheltering in-between.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Funny) by c0lo on Thursday November 02 2017, @08:47AM (1 child)
Homo sapiens will go extinct in this very generation**. It will be replaced by Homo Faecebookensis.
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** We must allow some exception, though. There are fortunate people in this world without access to Internet, they'll last one generation longer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 02 2017, @02:05PM
That's true enough, like I said, it started with Tesla and has been all downhill since.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by shrewdsheep on Thursday November 02 2017, @12:49PM (6 children)
This is certainly a mistaken belief. Selective forces are alive and acting. There is still natural selection (a.k.a pruning selection), sexual selection and all other types of selection acting on the human population now. More important, the current times are one of the most interesting in terms of evolutionary development. Arguably, natural selection is pruning less of the population than before (more infants survive, disease kills less). This is complemented with an exponential expansion of the population retaining more genetic variation than would be the case in a population of constant size. Historically, biological innovation happened under such circumstances as the difficult step to accumulate several potential harmful mutations to arrive at biologically superior solution becomes more likely. As a result, speed of human evolution is much increased at the moment as compared to earlier times.
What I can agree on is that biological is outpaced by technological development and we will not see the results of this evolution on steroids happening now.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 02 2017, @01:14PM (5 children)
What does "biologically superior" even mean for humans anymore?
What we are seeing in terms of population growth today is the explosion of children of people who are willing to have children, and as a "fitness function" I find that dubious, at best.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @02:04PM
LGBTQIAH2SPAO [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Thursday November 02 2017, @03:52PM (3 children)
That's a question evolution will answer. My personal guess is it has to do with intelligence, but what do I know.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 02 2017, @04:07PM (2 children)
Looking around me, humans' intelligence seems to be (loosely) negatively correlated with number of offspring... it's one of my larger concerns about the future of the human race.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Thursday November 02 2017, @05:59PM (1 child)
Yep, Idiocracy in action.
I submit that attractiveness counts for way more than intelligence (no matter what the women claim on the dating sites).
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday November 02 2017, @06:27PM
Well, at risk of perpetuating a stereotype - the beauty queens I have known all tend to have more than 2 children, usually early, and often by multiple fathers. Pretty much following the Erin Brokovich storyline: no use for school, they had other ways to "feel powerful" in the world.
🌻🌻 [google.com]