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Stephen Hawking: Intelligent Aliens Could Destroy Humanity, But Let's Search Anyway

posted by martyb on Friday July 24 2015, @03:47AM   Printer-friendly
from the To-Serve-Man dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

Since at least 2010, Hawking has spoken publicly about his fears that an advanced alien civilization would have no problem wiping out the human race the way a human might wipe out a colony of ants. At the media event announcing the new project, he noted that human beings have a terrible history of mistreating, and even massacring, other human cultures that are less technologically advanced — why would an alien civilization be any different?

And yet, it seems Hawking's desire to know if there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe trumps his fears. Today (July 20), he was part of a public announcement for a new initiative called Breakthrough Listen, which organizers said will be the most powerful search ever initiated for signs of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.
...
  Jill Tarter, former director of the Center for SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) also has expressed opinions about alien civilizations that are in stark contrast to Hawking's.

"While Sir Stephen Hawking warned that alien life might try to conquer or colonize Earth, I respectfully disagree," Tarter said in a statement in 2012. "If aliens were to come here, it would be simply to explore. Considering the age of the universe, we probably wouldn't be their first extraterrestrial encounter, either.

"If aliens were able to visit Earth, that would mean they would have technological capabilities sophisticated enough not to need slaves, food or other planets," she added.

So, who's right, Jill Tarter, or Stephen Hawking? Will advanced aliens have no need of human popplers, or will survivors of the Centauran Human Harvest & BBQ of 2057 call this moment, "Pulling a Hawking?"

See also our earlier stories: Stephen Hawking and Yuri Milner Announce $100 Million "Breakthrough Listen" SETI Project and More Warnings of an AI Doomsday — This Time From Stephen Hawking.

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  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Friday July 24 2015, @05:17AM

    by takyon (881) <takyonNO@SPAMsoylentnews.org> on Friday July 24 2015, @05:17AM (#213023) Journal

    The only complex life we know of requires water, carbon, oxygen, DNA, phospholipid bilayers, etc. If there are other seriously different types of environments capable of supporting life, they will exist alongside millions or billions of planets similar to Earth, especially if the dynamics of solar system formation tend to put rocky, water-rich planets with magnetospheres and higher gravity than Mars in the habitable zone (or habitable moons around gas giants). Mars is a great clue for us because it is so close to being able to support life. We practically have two habitable bodies in our 1 solar system, not counting the potential of liquid oceans under icy surfaces.

    Beyond composition, all life in the universe will likely be fighting and evolving to survive, meaning that intelligent organisms will likely have an aggressive side due to natural selection. But these organisms will have to cooperate, communicate, and become less violent before they can develop space travel. And by the time they can travel from star to star, they won't have need of human slaves/meat/bitcoins/etc.

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  • (Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday July 24 2015, @05:32AM

    by captain normal (2205) on Friday July 24 2015, @05:32AM (#213029)

    Sounds a lot like Klingons... a fictional species that were based on Human traits. :-)

    --
    Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--

    • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday July 24 2015, @12:56PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday July 24 2015, @12:56PM (#213123)

      The only way Klingons make any sense at all is to presume that they never invented interstellar travel themselves, but instead somehow stole it from another species.

      • (Score: 1) by similar_name on Friday July 24 2015, @06:24PM

        by similar_name (71) on Friday July 24 2015, @06:24PM (#213248)
        Considering rockets were developed during war along with nuclear fission I'm not sure I would agree. The space race was the result of a cold war. It actually might make more sense if Klingons were the most advanced species in Star Trek given that necessity is the mother of invention and war is the father of necessity.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 24 2015, @08:09PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 24 2015, @08:09PM (#213309)

          rockets were developed during war

          The first liquid-fueled rockets were developed during peacetime [wikipedia.org] by a guy working without Department of War funding.

          Had you used the word "improved" or "further" or "weaponized", you would have been accurate.

          along with nuclear fission

          That chronology is accurate [wikipedia.org]
          ...but again, only if you change the wording to include "controlled" or "weaponized" and you realize that you can't "develop" a process that already exists in nature.

          -- gewg_