I got what you meant. Thus the smiley face. I just couldn't resist commenting on what you actually said.

""Primitive" people that managed to survive to modern times are nothing like their ancestors."
Once they see animals and tools allowing one person to do the farming of ten people and how the other people can learn science to understand the world and make better tools, they usually don't want to live like their ancestors. I agree with you, though, those people want to keep their ancestral lives surviving by hunting and gathering with some farming without animals or tools don't have that option after contact. Their unique and special world is gone forever. If the aliens were reasonably benevolent, that would happen to Earth too.

To me, "wild eyed speculation" is the use of "science" to back up unscientific premises, using pseudo-science for political purposes, for example, such as global warming. I probably should have used a better descriptive phrase.

well, the monster dose of pain meds has it masked;;;
he is getting ready to crash tonight, with a far lower dose, and
we will seeeeeeeee. -- j
.

Hawking warned that superior species, friendly or not, cannot help but destroy us. Either through violence or culture shock. ("Primitive" people that managed to survive to modern times are nothing like their ancestors.)

He's only saying not to broadcast our existence into the void.
Look and listen and shut the hell up.
Sounds like sage advice to me.

That is fast. He is a couple of days post-op, then. Is his pain decreasing noticeably?

Jan

surgery completed Monday noon eastern, and they had him
walking to a recliner at 2:15 -- amazing!!! . this is our live-in
kinda-brother, who is now 70, and we brought him home
this past afternoon. . next, his left ankle will
be fused. . fun with surgery! -- j
.

I hope your friend's pain index drops pretty soon! How many days post-surgery is he?

Jan

I liked your deadpan reply...

Jan

xthinker, I screwed up the typing -- I have friends who are
triplet sisters, and the two who are identical are telepathic,
we are sure. . I, on the other hand, can't even type! -- j
.

sorry;;; I was trying to take care of a friend here who has been
taking twelve 7.5 hydrocodone tablets a day after his right hip joint
was replaced Monday ... I have friends who are triplet sisters,
and the two who are identical have a telepathic connection,
we are pretty damned sure. . the joke was me. -- j

p.s. but living in tennessee gives me a chance to see
some who might actually be dating their sisters.......
.

After I typed it, I thought, hmmm, I think everybody got the joke but me.....

The ability to obtain interstellar travel would suggest they also managed to keep affairs in order such as not running up a $19 trillion debt, idiots for leaders, endless wars and terror-mongering blood cult religions.That kind of stuff kinda bogs down progress.
As for primitive primate worlds such as ours, I would speculate such is out there. A second Earth like ours won't be coming to see us.
There might even be a post-apoplectic Mad Max: Fury Road planet out there. (Saw that on a rented DVD last night). .

Yesterday I was sitting with some office-mates at lunch discussing this. I made the point...What do you think more intelligent life would think of us if they have been watching us earthlings over the past several decades? I think they'd think we were a bunch of morons. I came to this conclusion based on a speech I recently attended by a retired astronaut. He is currently working on a globally-orchestrated effort to develop a method to deflect large (extinction-causing) asteroids. His biggest problem?...Getting the different nations to come together over this one issue. We simply can't do it. I'll not get into the more technical facets that really do require a multination agreement. Anyway...makes me chuckle...

Awww, Mamaemma. You are being so rational! Here I was all ready to imagine johnpe dating one of his triplet sisters...

I have seen some long-time married couples who did a pretty good job of subliminal communication too.

Jan

More likely the solution is that no solution is needed, and we are lucky not to be freezing (again.)

We've only just begun -- to quote the song. Most "science" prior to the mid 19th century is pretty much useless. Only in the last 100 to 150 years have we made any real scientific progress, and then only sticking our toes in the water's edge of a great ocean. If we remain a viable species, there is no limit to what we will discover, and I'd be willing to bet that includes everything deemed "impossible" today. While I don't accept wild-eyed speculation, I have no doubt the universe doesn't accept "I can't." By the way, as to Hawking's caution, I can only say that his attitude of not attracting attention to ourselves would keep us in caves without fire unless we found it through no efforts of our own.

What makes you think they'll be any better? Or even any different?

Given cheap space travel, that becomes easy. You put your polluting industry in the asteroid belt.

If there are aliens living there, I hope we're not in too big a hurry to tell them we're here. They might be hostile, and able to conquer or destroy us. Let's at least listen a while first.

He was a little confusing. He had friends who were triplet sisters, and he dated one of them; the non-telepathic one. :)

There is a very high correlation between breathing and eventual death. Do not underestimate the link there. :)

So you have triplet sisters and you dated one of them? Yuck! :)