Would intentionally trying to communicate with aliens be a bad idea?

[mathew101281]

We might eventually run into an alien civilization by complete accident. But is trying to find aliens on purpose a good idea?
You generally have two trains of thought on this.

1. It might be dangerous given the history of cultural conflict on our planet.

2. Advanced enough alien races might have evolved beyond the need subjugate less advanced cultures.

This argument generally comes down to whether you believe that conflict and subgegation are things you grow out of as a society, or merely something you grow more sofisticated at with time.
I'm generally in the former camp, that believes it might be really dangerous to alert alien civilizations to our presence. And I have many reasons for that.

A. I'm not sure technological advancement and ethical/moral advancement go hand and hand. Go to any point in human history and you will find that the most technologically advanced culture in that period wasn't the most peaceful culture, but more often the culture trying to subgegate the cultures around it.

B. Their is an alarming connection between intelligence, and predatory violence among fauna and in human society. Make a list of the most intelligent creatures on earth and you will find that it's very predator heavy. Intellegence seems to have a predatory bias. That means it's very likely that any alien culture out there might have been or still is predatory in nature. Pychopaths and sociopaths tend to be suprisungly intelligent and manipulative.

C. War and conflict seem to be the primary engine for tech development. Fighting for your life seems to make you really inventive. Give me someone to compete against and I'll put a man on the moon, make me the only super power and I'll start to question global warming and weaken the science taught in schools.

Something to ponder.

[Carabas]

What do you mean, would? We've intentionally and unintentionally been trying to do just that for ages.

[mathew101281]

What do you mean, would? We've intentionally and unintentionally been trying to do just that for ages.

I mean if we found actual evidence of aliens. What we are doing now is essentially throwing random messages out there and hoping someone answers. Suppose we find the alien equivalent to the Pioneer plaque (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_plaque)floating around in space one day?

[jeanvaljean]

We should definitely ask them to take Trump.

[Lee Stone]

Some interesting points.
And it's likely one has already discovered us and is either waiting for us to obliterate ourselves or reach their level of transcension.

[Carabas]

I mean if we found actual evidence of aliens. What we are doing now is essentially throwing random messages out there and hoping someone answers. Suppose we find the alien equivalent to the Pioneer plaque (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_plaque)floating around in space one day?

Well, we have absolutely no way to even begin to aswer that, what with out absolute zero experience with actual extra-terrestrials.
Any answer we give is going to be 100% informed by our personal level of pessimism.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

It's entirely possible aliens don't exist or at the very least are so far away that the lifecycle of a planetary system would never last long enough for the inhabitants to evolve enough to connect to any extra terrestrial life.

My answer is no, not until we haven't had a war as a specious for 1000 years.

[ed2962]

The intelligent space whales from the X-Men probably wouldn't hurt us.

The intelligent plant people called the Cotati are nice too. Other space plant people might be iffy.

I'm not sure about contacting aliens that look like humans. Most of them act exactly like humans so you'd be taking your chances.

[beetheb]

Well, we have absolutely no way to even begin to aswer that, what with out absolute zero experience with actual extra-terrestrials.
Any answer we give is going to be 100% informed by our personal level of pessimism.

Pretty much nailed it here. Until we're informed by harder data than the movie Independence Day, it's impossible to answer this with any certainty. You'd basically just be writing another movie.

[C_haos]

I'm not saying I Believe , but who's to say we haven't already. But in the event we haven't it's probably best we don't no telling what the result would be colonizing, taking resources or worse

[John Ossie]

It could turn out to be a bad idea if they have bad intentions towards us. Then again, we wouldn't know what their intentions are unless we tried to communicate with them so I guess we kinda would have to try which is made more difficult by not knowing what is offensive in their culture.

[beetheb]

Do we think we'd be meeting The Vulcans or The Borg, is what it boils down to. Impossible to know until we meet them, though the detriments of meeting the Borg would outweigh the benfits of meeting the Vulcans, in my mind. We'll eventually develop any technology a benevolent alien civilization could show us on our own, but not if they conquer, subjugate, and/or destroy us first

[Sharkerbob]

Of course it would be a bad idea. If we try to communicate with them first, they might discover a weakness to exploit before we nuke them and take all their resources. Everyone knows the smart policy is "Shoot first, shoot again, shoot some more, then maybe after everyone's dead, ask a question or two."

[Tami]

Of course it would be a bad idea. If we try to communicate with them first, they might discover a weakness to exploit before we nuke them and take all their resources. Everyone knows the smart policy is "Shoot first, shoot again, shoot some more, then maybe after everyone's dead, ask a question or two."

Sharkerbob for President...then comes the alien apocalypse.

[Sharkerbob]

Sharkerbob for President...then comes the alien apocalypse.

This time, We're The Real Monsters! (TM)