The alien invasion reasoning thread

[Eternal_Freedom]

Special Effects:

The alien version of Micheal Bay is making his latest film, set on a primitive world. To make the inevitbale over-done effects super-realistic, he wrecks Earth and films the results.

[Tasoth]

Um, hate to intrude, but your data is outdated. Growth of new neurons in adulthood is slow compared to other cell types (hence why it got overlooked until recently), but your brain is not fixed in childhood like scientists once thought. So... yeah, might want to re-evaluate your position just a tiny bit. You are, in fact, the Ship of Theseus.

Huh, that's a new one on me. I stand correct. So you happen to know where I could find info on the average life span on a neuron? Abyss' prior post made me feel as if he implied there is a rapid turn over of neurons as opposed to a long and slow process.

[Formless]

I'm afraid I don't know. For that matter, I'm not sure if there is definitive information on how long a neuron can live. Obviously its a damn long time considering all the data that lead to the conclusion that the brain is fixed in childhood.

Anyway, on topic, Von Neumann ecology. Space is full of a variety of self replicating probes left over from the various attempts at interstellar space exploration by dozens of different alien civilizations that slowly evolved via natural selection into a massive invisible ecosystem of competing machines. The invaders aren't the aliens that made these machines, just a colony of predatory replicators that decided to make the Solar System its new den. Other replicators may follow, making the entire solar system a new microcosm of robotic life while humanity struggles to make a place for itself on its own home turf.

[jollyreaper]

^That sounds like the basis for a pretty awesome story there.

It's actually been done a couple times -- it's an answer to the Fermi Paradox, why do we not see evidence of other intelligent life? Because something snuffs them out. Some stories end with humanity wiped out and others have the survivors bringing revenge to the attacking aliens.

[jollyreaper]

I think the "For Our Own Good" argument would yield the most potentially interesting battles. The first thought that struck me wasn't happy benign aliens giving us limited battles to feel better about ourselves, I'm thinking more along the lines of the Shadows from Babylon 5, tough love.

The alien goal isn't to present a threat to unify the planet against an external threat ala Ronald Reagan or the original Watchmen Ozzy plot, it's to spur human development to the post-human, more like an extra nasty version of the 2001 Monolith. The invaders (purpose-created by the hidden alien power) are placed a short step beyond our own ability and invade in a fashion we're equipped to fight. Which could only be intentional if you think about it. Why else would aliens come down to our planet and leave themselves open to getting shot at? Does the USAF tell their pilots to fly extra low and slow over the battlefield to give their third world adversaries a sporting chance? Hardly.

So the alien invasion comes in waves. The initial waves of invaders have tech a few decades beyond our own but inferior numbers. We can defeat them. Each subsequent wave is more advanced and we're desperately reverse-engineering the tech. By the end of the process we're creating the post-humans which is the whole point of the process in the first place. So it's up for the humans in the setting to realize what's going on and turn things to their own advantage.

The best part of this plot is that it explains how an alien invasion could occur in a fashion we could actually defeat and has the added bonus of our moral outrage to find out we're being fucked with. The whole war is social engineering. And the invasion techniques would actually be modeled on our own fiction for maximum effect. That's why the alien invaders will go for close combat with tentacle and claw, they'll use humans for food or breeding stock, all notions that would be ridiculous to imagine with real, naturally developed aliens but perfectly understandable when we realize these aliens are designed to conform to our own nightmares.

[Lusankya]

Terra Nullis: They don't recognise our property marking devices as proper land claims, and just decide to move in, seeing as nobody owns the place and all.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Revenge:

A passing survey ship picks up the transmission of the latest version of X Factor and comes to enact a bloody revenge for this crime.