THE aliens are out there and Earth had better watch out, at least according to Stephen Hawking. He has suggested that extraterrestrials are almost certain to exist — but that instead of seeking them out, humanity should be doing all it that can to avoid any contact. The suggestions come in a new documentary series in which Hawking, one of the world’s leading scientists, will set out his latest thinking on some of the universe’s greatest mysteries.
Alien life, he will suggest, is almost certain to exist in many other parts of the universe: not just in planets, but perhaps in the center of stars or even floating in interplanetary space. “To my mathematical brain, the numbers alone make thinking about aliens perfectly rational,” he said. “The real challenge is to work out what aliens might actually be like.”
The answer, he suggests, is that most of it will be the equivalent of microbes or simple animals — the sort of life that has dominated Earth for most of its history. One scene in his documentary for the Discovery Channel shows herds of two-legged herbivores browsing on an alien cliff-face where they are picked off by flying, yellow lizard-like predators. Another shows glowing fluorescent aquatic animals forming vast shoals in the oceans thought to underlie the thick ice coating Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter.
Such scenes are speculative, but Hawking uses them to lead on to a serious point: that a few life forms could be intelligent and pose a threat. Hawking believes that contact with such a species could be devastating for humanity. He suggests that aliens might simply raid Earth for its resources and then move on: “We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet. I imagine they might exist in massive ships, having used up all the resources from their home planet. Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonize whatever planets they can reach.”
I would advise the aliens to eat the Canadians first, they’re much leaner.
http://huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/25/stephen-hawking-aliens_n_551035.html
I thought Hawkings was an astro-physicist but it strikes me as school boy stupid to think we should start colonizing the universe. Has he no grasp at all of the time/distance/energy required to do anything???? I wonder what he really thinkgs as Charlie of course did not challenge him on anything.
Also believes global warming is a real challenge to us.
What a mix of expertise.
So Hawking gets another book deal (or media deal) out of this. What a surprise, he’s willing to bastardize pure science, for the money. The Discovery Channel being the tool of the Military Industrial Complex. And Hawking being the tool of whoever pays him enough. Is this his way of syncing up with ABC’s “V”? I refuse to watch that remake of what was a terrible TV series, back in the 80s. Back then it was the producer’s allegory of Nazism. Now, who knows what its new producer is trying to prove. And now Hawking is on-board with the paranoia. If intelligent life were out to get us. Whales and dolphins would have banned together to eat our lunch, centuries ago.
-I would have not ever thought Hawkin’s mind was so small (?)
Has nobody briefed him on current events?
-s
They are already here. Why do you think they only probe the asses of republican tea party types. Checking for the taste enhancing genomes to mature.
Some how these alien civilizations never developed any form or radio communications, that’s powerful enough to be detected as far away as we are. So either they went straight to lasers and fiber optics. Or radio signals simply can’t be detected above the noise of Star radiation. Or the aliens don’t exists, to build radios. In any case, we need not worry they’ll come after us, because of radio transmissions. What does Hawking want us to do? Return to the days of Morse code by wire?