Stephen Hawking is Afraid of Aliens.

[Big Phil]

Patrick - exactly what point are you trying to argue? I've read through this thread twice, and as far as I can tell all you're arguing is "nuh uh! FTL is impossible!" Which has what exactly to do with the OP?

[Bakustra]

What exactly is this proof that would satisfy you? We have too little information to really determine, for example, whether fusion can occur cheaply enough to allow us to produce high-acceleration torchships, or whether a Bussard ramscoop is practical (not likely, but still not resolved), or a number of other figures (such as how small we can make an ecosystem if we have a living crew, or the practicality of uploading if we go for an electronic crew). But this does not mean that it is automatically uneconomical, curiously enough. We can simply say "not enough information either way" and therefore, unless we are directly arguing about the practicality of interstellar travel, decide whether to incorporate it as practical or not in a particular thread. Of course, this is what the thread was initially predicated upon, but rather than argue about that, you decide that you would prefer to turn this into an extended debate on a ground too shaky to allow anybody to argue against your carefully-chosen position.

Really? And trade which would take decades/centuries by relativistic slowboat is economically viable... how, exactly? Because without unobtanium, that's what you're facing in any situation no matter how good the STL drive technology is. Really, this is not all that difficult to work out.

I see that my crack about senility and failing memory does apply to you. Either that, or you just have stock answers prepared without actually reading the thread. I was not, in fact, talking about trade. Nor was Oni Koneko Damien, nor was anybody. It would do you good in the future to a) read the actual arguments of other people and b) not automatically assume stupidity on the part of other people.

A third possibility had occurred to me, that you sincerely believe that economics means trade, but I dismissed that one out of hand.

Marvelous rhetorical skills, but unfortunately, feeble powers of discussion.

Your own? Most certainly. I'd be a lot more embarrassed by the leaps of logic you so eagerly make if I were you, however.

Put up or shut up. Let's see your calculations supporting your claim that my arguments are physically impossible, which is what "violating a principle of relativity" means.

It also presupposes, does it not, that we even know where to signal in the first place, that anybody would hear it, and that the mentality of an alien species is analogous to our own. Nevermind the assumption that the aliens, whomever they might be wherever they might be, would be using the same sort of principles in their communication.

Marvelous! You do have a brain within that skull! Unfortunately, you then decide to immediately move to what I call the appeal to Cthulhu. You also decide to nitpick, rather than make actual points. Considering what you've been accusing me of, it seems as though you seek to single-handedly validate Freud's defense mechanisms. But you do make two points worth actually discussing.

Firstly, the idea that aliens might be totally different from the intelligent species we are familiar with is actually supportive of my argument. Expanding the potential mindsets results in the chances of aliens approximating our system of reason becoming far, far smaller, which in turns make them far more dangerous, because now we are far less able to predict their actions.

Invoking Cthulhu and his starspawn in this case neglects the central aspect of Lovecraft's stories about Cthulhu; the only thing humanity has in common with Cthulhu is the concept of hunger. As a result, Cthulhu will wipe out humanity if he should awaken, because he is incapable of noticing us as intelligent beings, or of caring if he did. Consider carefully the parallels to any "truly alien" species.

Um, if aliens are operating on a very different mindset from anything we are familiar with, they would not have the sort of motivations you yammered your fool head off about at the beginning of this exchange. The whole "religious anathema to bipedal life" was your first of many leaps-of-logic you merrily advertised as "fact". Further, saying that the aliens think differently than we do does not automatically mean they would be Cthulhu-like. Black/White Fallacy on your part and hardly a discussion "point" supportive of your "argument". As it is, even if there are aliens with different mindsets to anything in our experience, they are still going to be forced along certain pathways of action dictated by what the laws of physics allows them to do. And any orbital civilisation is still going to be forced to choose certain imperatives to sustain that civilisation in the event they have to leave their own homesystem and find another, such as: which star is nearest in range which has sufficient luminosity and a preponderance of rocky planets/moons/asteroids to provide metals, carbon and silicon to provide for their material needs —reachable in the shortest possible time and the least expenditure of energy. We may not at all understand their philosophy, but predicting what they have to do in terms of practicalities is not that difficult an exercise.[/quote]

You know, you have a bad habit of taking illustrative examples and assuming that they are fact. They are not, and I will not argue this point with you until you are capable of understanding that. I look forward to seeing you in about ten years, judging from your performance so far.

Your next point is merely worthless. If they somehow don't use the electromagnetic spectrum or have a concept of exponentials, logarithms, or numbers, then of course we cannot communicate with them. I do not see how they could develop space travel without them, but if they exist, then we cannot talk to them, but we would not want to, because they couldn't talk to us either.

And here we go with another of your stupid strawmen. No, child, I said NOTHING about them not having concepts of mathematics, and my statement about their using different principles of communication meant that they would have moved on to either using something exotic like gravitational pulses or something as basic as the next logical development away from radio: tight-beam laser transmission. In which case the use of radio communication would fall into disuse in the same way that signaling towers or carrier pigeons or speaking tubes to convey messages has fallen into disuse. Is it really going to be necessary to have all the dots connected for you?

So in your world, they wouldn't have these little things called "radio telescopes" or "RADAR receivers" that would pick up radio signals? I remember you specifically arguing in favor of the idea that any starfaring civilization would make use of radio astronomy in other threads. I suppose that you feel free to discard that argument in the vain hope that it will somehow devastate your opponents to argue otherwise. In other words, your little connect-the-dots only adds up to a clever calligraphic slogan: "Debating Chameleon".

Oh, you're an arrogant one, aren't you?

Look who's talking.[/quote]

And you demonstrate that, despite your claims to preferring a more forthright debate, that you actually would rather dissect paragraphs to make cheap shots. You're not actually helping yourself in any way here; you refuse to provide proof, you offer vague, inane statements that only prove to be more inane when clarified, and you insult fiercely to cover this up. No one's impressed.

There are principles that, while they violate your pathetic understanding of inertia and relativity, do not violate the actual principles. Now, if you wish to claim that they do, I have a request first: put up or shut up. Let's see your feeble, decaying mind run the numbers. While I cannot be so optimistic to assume that you will comply with either part of this request, I feel better having said it.

No no, child, you first: do demonstrate your superior grasp of physics and outline for the class those "principles" which will allow anybody to one day circumvent relativity limitations and the laws of inertia. I'm waiting for this one. Another claim you put forth, and now your burden of proof on that one as well. YOU put up or shut up. And I do hope you're going to be a bit more original than invoking Alcubierre.

The fuck? You think I'm... I really do believe that you just copy'n'paste these arguments. What in your fevered, atrophied brain makes you think that I am arguing in favor of the discovery of a warp drive or other form of FTL? I am arguing that the limitations of relativity do not preclude little things like "spare fuel", "lightsails", "magsails" and "brain uploading" which would make undirected interstellar travel easier. How you got from there to "FTL DURR DURR" would no doubt be a fascinating study in psychology, but only baffles me.

The possibility of a closed ecosystem on a level small enough to fit in a practical spaceship. The practice of carrying reserve fuel in case of emergency maneuvers while in interstellar space. The idea of uploading simulations of a brain onto a computer and cutting your necessary mass down by an immense factor, making your starship far lighter and requiring less fuel.

The latter gets you a smaller starship, certainly. It does not erase the physical problems involved in decelerating a mass from high relativistic velocity or changing its vector while moving at said velocity. Nor does it erase the problem of fuel conservation. The former is dictated by how many persons the starship is designed to carry, which for a very large population is going to translate into a large spaceship no matter how you try to slice it.

Thank you for reverting from insanity back to Master-of-the-obvious-hood. However, problems do not, in this case, prove to be impossibilities, especially if you make use of light-sails for initial acceleration to save fuel, or light-sails and magnetic sails to slowly brake and turn, or any number of means to conserve fuel. For that matter, it is possible, theoretically, to make use of a ramjet system if the interstellar medium is thick enough (which can be used to accelerate or decelerate), but I find that an unlikely possibility.

What a bullshit non-answer you give forth after declaring a number of your leaps-of-logic and assumptions as "fact". Very amusing indeed.

Stop that. Stop that right now. You do not have carte blanche to project your faults onto me. Granted, you are small-minded enough to consider this a victory, but it's more pathetic than anything else.

Empty bluster does not impress me, child. Neither do your delusions of adequacy. You gave a non-answer and now you goldplate it. That is the truly pathetic thing here.

I don't feel that it is necessary to give long-winded explanations of your projective attitude, curiously enough.

In any case, please show how a nonrotating neutron star or black dwarf in the path of the starship would not necessitate some means of altering course.

Sayeth the child who's throwing a temper-tantrum because his bullshit isn't taken seriously.

Temper tantrum? This is actually delight at being on a board where I can insult freely, and therefore do not have to suffer arrogant blowhards such as yourself.

What did I just say about not being impressed by empty bluster, child? Try to pay attention.

Keep bloviating! That way you can convince yourself that you're the reasonable one, despite: your apparent belief that you are immune from having to provide evidence, your inability to attack anything but strawmen while decrying my apparent habit of doing so, your belief that insulting can cover up these defects, and your astounding arrogance while doing so. Well, whatever helps you sleep at night.

[Bakustra]

Patrick - exactly what point are you trying to argue? I've read through this thread twice, and as far as I can tell all you're arguing is "nuh uh! FTL is impossible!" Which has what exactly to do with the OP?

He started off by arguing that the scenario was impossible because interstellar travel is, well, he objects to uneconomical for some reason, but that is the best word. Now, though, he does seem to be arguing against FTL travel.

If you would like, I will lay my position out, because I find this back-and-forth mindnumbing at best.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Put up or shut up. Let's see your calculations supporting your claim that my arguments are physically impossible, which is what "violating a principle of relativity" means.

You are seriously asking someone to prove a negative? Do you really not understand the concept of burden of proof?

[Bakustra]

Put up or shut up. Let's see your calculations supporting your claim that my arguments are physically impossible, which is what "violating a principle of relativity" means.

You are seriously asking someone to prove a negative? Do you really not understand the concept of burden of proof?

He is the one claiming that my proposition violates the theory of relativity. He has not actually shown that it does so, and this is not a negative claim. We do not automatically assume that something violates a physical law until proven otherwise, do we not? A proposal cannot be said to violate reality until it is shown that it does so. I would not have to prove that a solar panel is not a perpetual motion machine of the second order, the person claiming it is would have to do so. While in this case there is a burden of proof on me to show that my proposal is feasible, there is also a burden of proof upon Mr. Degan to show that it violates the theory of relativity and principle of inertia, as he is claiming.

[Rye]

Put up or shut up. Let's see your calculations supporting your claim that my arguments are physically impossible, which is what "violating a principle of relativity" means.

You are seriously asking someone to prove a negative? Do you really not understand the concept of burden of proof?

If someone says the bombardier beetle violates evolution, it's up to them to prove it. Do YOU not understand the concept of the burden of proof?

[Iosef Cross]

This a rather brief article, but interesting none the less:

Stephen Hawking: alien life is out there, scientist warns

"If aliens ever visit us, I think the outcome would be much as when Christopher Columbus first landed in America, which didn't turn out very well for the American Indians."

Telegraph.co.uk

I have a nasty feeling the contact between humans and hostile aliens would resemble Europeans in their sailing ships landing on some tropical shore, but oversized termites overwhelming a rabbit warren.

The situation would be completely different than the discovery of America situation. There the vast majority of mortality was caused not by conscious design of the Spanish conquerors, but by bacteria and viruses carried from Europe to America.

This situation wouldn't occur with Aliens. The most probable situation would be like you described: They will ignore us from the political perspective. We would present no threat to them.

[Big Phil]

Patrick - exactly what point are you trying to argue? I've read through this thread twice, and as far as I can tell all you're arguing is "nuh uh! FTL is impossible!" Which has what exactly to do with the OP?

He started off by arguing that the scenario was impossible because interstellar travel is, well, he objects to uneconomical for some reason, but that is the best word. Now, though, he does seem to be arguing against FTL travel.

If you would like, I will lay my position out, because I find this back-and-forth mindnumbing at best.

I'm just having a lot of trouble understanding PD's point - Hawking is arguing that there is probably alien life out there, and that if we met them it might be very bad for us. And yet Patrick is screeching about how aliens would NEVER come to Earth and FTL is impossible and god only knows what else. Hawking didn't say: "Aliens will land in Picadilly Circus on the 15th of May bringing alien viruses that will kill us." So I just don't understand what's he's so ornery about

[Iosef Cross]

Oni Koneko Damien, your arguments in this thread are almost pure retardation.

Aliens that could reach us would have to be advanced enough to not be warlike. Modern civilization is much more pacific than less advanced ones, that's because the most advanced a civilization is, the greater is the restrain in the use of force. Since high tech is the fruit of the absence of aggression. If today we found some indigenous civilization on some island, we wouldn't act like the Spanish conquerors of the 16th century.

And even if they were warlike, we wouldn't be a valid target, since we would be so weak that they would ignore your existence completely. Like moving armies ignore ants, even thought they could step on some.

The argument that they would exterminate us to use earth's natural resources doesn't make sense considering that a civilization capable of interestelar travel would be capable of producing anything from anything. We currently aren't very far from being independent from many natural resources.

If there is a reason for aliens paying attention to us, it is because we are sentient, in fact, the most valuable thing on earth are us. Exterminating us to get your natural resources would be retarded.

And the argument that retarded genocidal aliens could discover earth before intelligent pacific ones is based on lack of understanding that before any retarded alien could find us, intelligent pacific aliens would have already found us. That's because the discovery of sentient life would be important to any civilization, and they would allocate intelligence to catalog intelligent species. Earth being discovered first by an alien psychopath is very improbable. Like the probability of an asteroid crashing into you head right now.

[Serafina]

The situation would be completely different than the discovery of America situation. There the vast majority of mortality was caused not by conscious design of the Spanish conquerors, but by bacteria and viruses carried from Europe to America.

This situation wouldn't occur with Aliens. The most probable situation would be like you described: They will ignore us from the political perspective. We would present no threat to them.

Do you have ANY KNOWLEDGE at all?
Seriously...at all?

This claim is not only wrong, it is also pretty sick to just deny the slaughter done by european conquistadors.

[Bakustra]

Oni Koneko Damien, your arguments in this thread are almost pure retardation.

Aliens that could reach us would have to be advanced enough to not be warlike. Modern civilization is much more pacific than less advanced ones, that's because the most advanced a civilization is, the greater is the restrain in the use of force. Since high tech is the fruit of the absence of aggression. If today we found some indigenous civilization on some island, we wouldn't act like the Spanish conquerors of the 16th century.

And even if they were warlike, we wouldn't be a valid target, since we would be so weak that they would ignore your existence completely. Like moving armies ignore ants, even thought they could step on some.

The argument that they would exterminate us to use earth's natural resources doesn't make sense considering that a civilization capable of interestelar travel would be capable of producing anything from anything. We currently aren't very far from being independent from many natural resources.

If there is a reason for aliens paying attention to us, it is because we are sentient, in fact, the most valuable thing on earth are us. Exterminating us to get your natural resources would be retarded.

And the argument that retarded genocidal aliens could discover earth before intelligent pacific ones is based on lack of understanding that before any retarded alien could find us, intelligent pacific aliens would have already found us. That's because the discovery of sentient life would be important to any civilization, and they would allocate intelligence to catalog intelligent species. Earth being discovered first by an alien psychopath is very improbable. Like the probability of an asteroid crashing into you head right now.

Welcome to four pages ago! Take a number, get to the back of the line. If you have some evidence for your assertions other than "I said so", then you may proceed directly to the front of the line.

[Iosef Cross]

Could you direct me to where you refute my arguments?

[Iosef Cross]

Do you have ANY KNOWLEDGE at all?
Seriously...at all?

This claim is not only wrong, it is also pretty sick to just deny the slaughter done by european conquistadors.

You don't.

The diseases killed millions.

The Conquistadores killed probably a few thousands. They didn't have the logistics to maintain armies in America of the size capable of killing so many people to affect their overall population growth.

For example, Francisco Pizarro's army that conquered the Inca Empire had 106 men and 62 horses. Hernán Cortés army that conquered the Aztec empire was larger, had 600 men, 15 horseman and 15 cannons...

And where I do deny the slaughter? Of course they killed people, but it wasn't in the millions as some stupid historians have propagated.

[Serafina]

Yes, because the results of later occupation can totally be ignored

But by all means, show that you are right - you know what a "source" is, rihgt?
Well, that's what normal people use to show that what they say is not just a figment of their disease-ridden imagination (brought by the conquistadors, obviously). I know you can barely believe that there is a world outside your fever-narrowed sight, but it's true!

So please, by all means, show me a credible source comparing the deaths resulting from diseases and the deaths resulting from violence during that period.

[Iosef Cross]

To kill millions without weapons of mass destruction you need millions of soldiers.

There are few cases in history were military invasions killed millions, in these cases the invasion occurred versus opponents of similar technology.

The German invasion of the USSR, for example, is the best case of a massive slaughter. The Germans killed 27 million Soviets, including the deaths from hunger and privation caused by the war (indirect deaths). How the Germans did it? They invaded with an army of 3.5 million soldiers, and suffered ~7 million casualties during the war with the USSR, considering that they had to replace their permanent casualties (with were 40-50% of their total losses) the overall number of men committed to the invasion of the USSR was in the neighborhood of 7 million. Each soldier killed on average 4 people.

The Conquistadores probably didn't commit more than a few thousand men overall to conquer most of America. So, they probably killed a few thousands. And they were less violent than the Germans in WW2, with invaded the USSR to cleanse the land from the "untermensch". The Conquistadores were less genocidal, they only wanted gold and riches, they killed people to get that, while the Nazis killed people as and end in itself.

The Mongols were the other case of mass slaughter in an invasion. Like the Russo/German war, they had the same technological level of the Chinese, actually, they were less advanced overall. It took a massive death tool, estimated in 30 million people (probably exaggerated) but the conquest of China took some 6 decades and was a very long and hard struggle.

History shows that the greatest slaughters occurred in wars were both foes were quite evenly matched. If they weren't defeat follows quickly and ends the killing.

[Serafina]

To kill millions without weapons of mass destruction you need millions of soldiers.

Really..how interesting.

I guess you deny the Holocaust, Stalins purges both Chinas and the USSRs famines as well, since they were all done without the aid of "millions of soldiers" - not that that would surprise me the least.
But by all means, look at the number of people that died due to the occupation. I am feeling generous right now and therefore assume that you are capable of looking something like that up on your own.

[Iosef Cross]

Serafina, the Conquistadores increased the average life expectancy of Latin America by introducing new technologies, like the domesticated animals they brought.

The changes that they made to the continent, except by the bacteria, were positive or neutral, with the exception of the use of native labor force to do the mining work, with reduces the life expectancy since it is a dangerous. But the proportion of the native American population that worked on the mines was very small in proportion to the total population.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Oni Koneko Damien, your arguments in this thread are almost pure retardation.

Aliens that could reach us would have to be advanced enough to not be warlike. Modern civilization is much more pacific than less advanced ones, that's because the most advanced a civilization is, the greater is the restrain in the use of force. Since high tech is the fruit of the absence of aggression. If today we found some indigenous civilization on some island, we wouldn't act like the Spanish conquerors of the 16th century.

Of course not. We have far more insidious ways of destroying cultures now. Say these natives were sitting atop a proven 100 billion barrel oil field. There would be people hatching plans to get these people "educated" and introduced to the conveniences of the modern world. That way, they'll sell the rights to their land to the oil companies. Even if said natives weren't sitting on anything important, enough contact with our culture will have a profound impact on theirs.

And even if they were warlike, we wouldn't be a valid target, since we would be so weak that they would ignore your existence completely. Like moving armies ignore ants, even thought they could step on some.

Why wouldn't we be a valid target? After all, if an interstellar civilization is taking the extremely long view; we might be a direct competitor millions of years from now. We're also apt to kill ourselves before we achieve interstellar civilization status, so an alien species may figure it's doing us a favor by dropping a rock on us now. Or "uplifting" us, which would have the happy side-effect of doing horrible things to our culture. Unless there were some more powerful interstellar civilizations around to discourage others from doing Bad Things to the cavemen of the universe; there's no real penalty to dicking around with them.

The argument that they would exterminate us to use earth's natural resources doesn't make sense considering that a civilization capable of interestelar travel would be capable of producing anything from anything. We currently aren't very far from being independent from many natural resources.

Wow. No-limits fallacy much? For that matter, the astonishing idiocy of your statement only grows with each re-reading. Independent from natural resources? So, where do the hydrocarbons to make plastics and fertilizer come from? The Magical Free-Market Fairy?

For that matter, one can argue that planets occupied by industrialized cavemen offer huge supplies of conveniently pre-extracted and pre-refined metals, ceramics, and polymers. All you have to do is deal with a few pesky cavemen. For that matter, if the advance front of an interstellar civilization's galactic colonization effort was comprised of self-replicating VNs; they may not care that the planet they're converting into solar-powered antimatter or magnetic monopole generators is covered with organic matter that feels strongly that the mass of the planet in question ought to remain in one place.

If there is a reason for aliens paying attention to us, it is because we are sentient, in fact, the most valuable thing on earth are us. Exterminating us to get your natural resources would be retarded.

We have nothing of value to offer an interstellar civilization. Except maybe a few artistic curios. To a super-intelligent AGI capable of performing fine-grained ancestor simulations, or some other non-trivial computing task, we're little better than chimpanzees. If it wanted to amuse itself, or preserve humans for posterity while it converted Earth's mass into orbital habitats for the Empire of Zeta Reticuli; it could simply upload a selection of humans and simulate the development of human civilization on a virtual digitized Earth.

And the argument that retarded genocidal aliens could discover earth before intelligent pacific ones is based on lack of understanding that before any retarded alien could find us, intelligent pacific aliens would have already found us. That's because the discovery of sentient life would be important to any civilization, and they would allocate intelligence to catalog intelligent species. Earth being discovered first by an alien psychopath is very improbable. Like the probability of an asteroid crashing into you head right now.

What is the intrinsic value of some seven billion sapient beings barely sophisticated enough to work out that they're committing ecological suicide, even as they step up the pace of said suicide in pursuit of dangerously outmoded instinctive drives? What is the value of said sapients to a civilization with a population potentially numbering in the trillions or even quadrillions of sapients? Especially if said sapients could have millions or billions of variants created through natural selection, or outright bio and/or software engineering?

[Iosef Cross]

Serafina, clearly, you aren't interested in anything I say, but only to continuously refute my assertions as to make me continuously use counter argument for the sake of it. In other words, you are a troll.

[Serafina]

Serafina, clearly, you aren't interested in anything I say, but only to continuously refute my assertions as to make me continuously use counter argument for the sake of it. In other words, you are a troll.

Of course i am. Just give me some numbers.

Hey, it's YOUR claim, so it's YOUR burden of proof. Just dig up some somewhat reliable numbers, and you win this argument.
I am throwing you a bone here.

[Einzige]

What a great way to ignore the iron law equivalence, you worthless fucking moron. How many people were the "thousands" that the Spanish imperialists killed worth to the Native Americans relative to their population size?

[Iosef Cross]

Of course not. We have far more insidious ways of destroying cultures now. Say these natives were sitting atop a proven 100 billion barrel oil field. There would be people hatching plans to get these people "educated" and introduced to the conveniences of the modern world. That way, they'll sell the rights to their land to the oil companies. Even if said natives weren't sitting on anything important, enough contact with our culture will have a profound impact on theirs.

You are watching too much Avatar.

1- If they found natives sitting over 100 billion barrels of oil, the natives will get a lot of money.

2- And what is bad about cultural influences?

Why wouldn't we be a valid target? After all, if an interstellar civilization is taking the extremely long view; we might be a direct competitor millions of years from now.

Competitors? Much better to integrate our civilization with theirs into a single civilization. The gains from integrating more sentients into their economic system are positive, while the gains of exterminating us are negative (the cost of exterminating, the small as it may be).

Or "uplifting" us, which would have the happy side-effect of doing horrible things to our culture. Unless there were some more powerful interstellar civilizations around to discourage others from doing Bad Things to the cavemen of the universe; there's no real penalty to dicking around with them.

You assume that contact with an alien civilization is bad for your human culture, just a contact with of an tribe with your civilization is bad for the tribe.

It's the same stupid mentality of the censors of my country with wanted to limit the amount of foreign movies that people here could watch.

Wow. No-limits fallacy much? For that matter, the astonishing idiocy of your statement only grows with each re-reading. Independent from natural resources? So, where do the hydrocarbons to make plastics and fertilizer come from? The Magical Free-Market Fairy?

You are so proud of your ignorance...

The economic importance of the natural resources sectors of the economy (mining and agriculture) are growing smaller in each passing day. For an advanced alien civilization, their weight would tend to be zero.

We don't have any reason to believe otherwise, considering the reduction in importance of these sectors since the beginning of the industrial revolution.

For that matter, one can argue that planets occupied by industrialized cavemen offer huge supplies of conveniently pre-extracted and pre-refined metals, ceramics, and polymers. All you have to do is deal with a few pesky cavemen

An advanced civilization capable of reaching your star would be able to produce several orders of magnitude more value from the cost of the trip to earth than the value of everything that people produced.

While the gains of integrating your 7 billion sentients into a interestelar economic system are positive.

For that matter, if the advance front of an interstellar civilization's galactic colonization effort was comprised of self-replicating VNs; they may not care that the planet they're converting into solar-powered antimatter or magnetic monopole generators is covered with organic matter that feels strongly that the mass of the planet in question ought to remain in one place.

1- That's a case of an irrational process. To us that would be like an natural process, i.e. like our sol going into a supernova.

2- An advanced alien civilization wouldn't be interested in destroying accidentally other civilizations.

We have nothing of value to offer an interstellar civilization. Except maybe a few artistic curios. To a super-intelligent AGI capable of performing fine-grained ancestor simulations, or some other non-trivial computing task, we're little better than chimpanzees. If it wanted to amuse itself, or preserve humans for posterity while it converted Earth's mass into orbital habitats for the Empire of Zeta Reticuli; it could simply upload a selection of humans and simulate the development of human civilization on a virtual digitized Earth.

If they are beyond your level of sentience, why they would need natural resources from earth? Why they would even care about rocks if they don't care about a network of 7 billion human brains?

What is the intrinsic value of some seven billion sapient beings barely sophisticated enough to work out that they're committing ecological suicide, even as they step up the pace of said suicide in pursuit of dangerously outmoded instinctive drives? What is the value of said sapients to a civilization with a population potentially numbering in the trillions or even quadrillions of sapients? Especially if said sapients could have millions or billions of variants created through natural selection, or outright bio and/or software engineering?

It is positive, although small. Just like the contributions of Chile to the global economy are small, although positive. Just as your individual contribution to the world is small and positive.

Why don't other people kill you? If all world governments decide that you should die, you cannot do anything about it, you will die. But they don't do that, because you aren't a threat to other people.

Earth would be in a analogous position to an massive interestelar civilization, we would become a almost insignificant individual member of it, just like you are insignificant to your country. That if that civilization that discovered us is not so advanced that we aren't outright ignored.

What's the value of the rocks of earth to a interestelar empire of trillions/quadrillions of sapients? Zero. The life of earth? A little more. The sapient life of earth? Us. The best earth can offer!

[Serafina]

1- That's a case of an irrational process. To us that would be like an natural process, i.e. like our sol going into a supernova.

2- An advanced alien civilization wouldn't be interested in destroying accidentally other civilizations.

Um...do you even know what a VN is? Spoiler

(von-Neumann probe

If they are beyond your level of sentience, why they would need natural resources from earth? Why they would even care about rocks if they don't care about a network of 7 billion human brains?

Yeah, right, because an AI totally does not need resources to sustain itself

Earth would be in a analogous position to an massive interestelar civilization, we would become a almost insignificant individual member of it, just like you are insignificant to your country. That if that civilization that discovered us is not so advanced that we aren't outright ignored.

We are not part of their civilisation. We are not even on the same level. We are not even the same species. Most of the citizens most likely don't even know about us.
So how is that analogous to your example again?

[Patrick Degan]

Put up or shut up. Let's see your calculations supporting your claim that my arguments are physically impossible, which is what "violating a principle of relativity" means.

You are seriously asking someone to prove a negative? Do you really not understand the concept of burden of proof?

He is the one claiming that my proposition violates the theory of relativity. He has not actually shown that it does so, and this is not a negative claim. We do not automatically assume that something violates a physical law until proven otherwise, do we not? A proposal cannot be said to violate reality until it is shown that it does so. I would not have to prove that a solar panel is not a perpetual motion machine of the second order, the person claiming it is would have to do so. While in this case there is a burden of proof on me to show that my proposal is feasible, there is also a burden of proof upon Mr. Degan to show that it violates the theory of relativity and principle of inertia, as he is claiming.

And that, child, is yet another strawman of my arguments, and an evasion. You claimed the existence of principles which, as you said, "while they violate your pathetic understanding of inertia and relativity, do not violate the actual principles". You have not done so. In fact, you REFUSE to do so and bluster your way around the challenge. I will put this to you on rather basic terms: demonstrate the backup for your claims or just kindly concede them.

Burden of proof, child, is your own. Get cracking. I grow tired of your bullshit.

[Bakustra]

He is the one claiming that my proposition violates the theory of relativity. He has not actually shown that it does so, and this is not a negative claim. We do not automatically assume that something violates a physical law until proven otherwise, do we not? A proposal cannot be said to violate reality until it is shown that it does so. I would not have to prove that a solar panel is not a perpetual motion machine of the second order, the person claiming it is would have to do so. While in this case there is a burden of proof on me to show that my proposal is feasible, there is also a burden of proof upon Mr. Degan to show that it violates the theory of relativity and principle of inertia, as he is claiming.

And that, child, is yet another strawman of my arguments, and an evasion. You claimed the existence of principles which, as you said, "while they violate your pathetic understanding of inertia and relativity, do not violate the actual principles". You have not done so. In fact, you REFUSE to do so and bluster your way around the challenge. I will put this to you on rather basic terms: demonstrate the backup for your claims or just kindly concede them.

Burden of proof, child, is your own. Get cracking. I grow tired of your bullshit.

I'll do it when you present the evidence for your claim that my proposal violates the theory of relativity and the principle of inertia, as you have claimed oh-so-many times:

No no, child, you first: do demonstrate your superior grasp of physics and outline for the class those "principles" which will allow anybody to one day circumvent relativity limitations and the laws of inertia. I'm waiting for this one. Another claim you put forth, and now your burden of proof on that one as well. YOU put up or shut up. And I do hope you're going to be a bit more original than invoking Alcubierre.

and

Then I presume you can demonstrate for us technological principles which allow anybody to circumvent the laws of relativity and inertia to support your argument.

So you will first have to prove that my proposal violates the laws of relativity and inertia, I am afraid.

But if you insist, my evidence is simple: There is no provision of relativity that says "reserve fuel is an impossibility; one shall only carry enough fuel to get there and back, without a margin of error." Perhaps you have confused Tom Godwin's The Cold Equations with the Theory of Relativity?

Furthermore, there is no provision of inertia that says this either. Inertia does say that at relativistic velocities, changes in direction (or angular momentum) are far more difficult, because the mass of the object is greater. However: difficult is not a synonym of impossible, and neither relativity nor inertia says that starships must travel at more than nine-tenths of the speed of light, which is where relativistic inertia becomes a major problem.

Frankly, when I stated that your understanding of inertia and relativity was pathetic, I was being too kind. I now see that apparently you have confused relativity with a short story and inertia with... something. I can't really figure out what the hell you've confused inertia with, but all I know is that in the Encyclopedia Degannica, "difficult" means "impossible".