We have a lot of these 'aliens invade earth' films with massive ships, impenetrable shields and death rays that incinerate everything in its path. Does it never occur that we could be those aliens in the future. Much like Columbus discovering America?
Any thoughts on humans being the genocidal aliens?
Here's why they would be more advanced than us:
The closest dwarf star galaxy is about 40,000 LIGHT YEARS away. If an alien race traveled from there at the speed of light, it would take them 40,000 years to arrive at earth. That means they would have achieved light speed, and left their home planet while we were still cavemen trying to figure out how to use fire.
Not only that, but they would have to have the technology required to survive space travel for such a length of time. Including, food and energy. Imagine the type of energy required to travel such a vast distance (read: unlimited energy).
Also, it means that their civilization would have to have been in existence MUCH longer than ours - for the same reason above.
We as a civilization are not even close to being able to do something like that. Our space shuttles travel approximately 4000 miles per hour. (Light speed is approx 183,000 miles per SECOND). If we wanted to fly to the nearest dwarf star it would take 7 BILLION years based on today's technology.
Don't even get me started on if the aliens could travel through space via wormholes or faster than light.
You see, the movies get it wrong. They create weaknesses in the aliens to create hope for the audience. If aliens were to really arrive here - we'd better pray that they're merciful and don't instantly destroy or enslave us. We would not stand a chance.
We would be like ants trying to fight gods.
@nineteeneleven
Good post. That is why this movie is much more realistic than most alien invasion movies.
"The closest dwarf star galaxy is about 40,000 LIGHT YEARS away."
So what? Proxima Centauri is the closest star at only 4 light years away.
"If an alien race traveled from there at the speed of light, it would take them 40,000 years to arrive at earth."
Or, only 4 years from Proxima Centauri.
"That means they would have achieved light speed, and left their home planet while we were still cavemen trying to figure out how to use fire."
Or, while Bush was president.
"Not only that, but they would have to have the technology required to survive space travel for such a length of time"
4 years?
"Imagine the type of energy required to travel such a vast distance (read: unlimited energy)."
The Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched on Sept. 5, 1977, is 11 billion miles away from the sun, and is using no energy at all, other than inertia ( read: no energy )
"Also, it means that their civilization would have to have been in existence MUCH longer than ours"
Well, at least 4 years longer.
"We as a civilization are not even close to being able to do something like that. Our space shuttles travel approximately 4000 miles per hour."
The Helios missions to the Sun both reached a velocity of 153,800 mph.
"Don't even get me started on if the aliens could travel through space via wormholes or faster than light."
Why not? I want to see some more wrong information from you.
"You see, the movies get it wrong. They create weaknesses in the aliens to create hope for the audience."
Destruction by the fusion reaction of a nuclear warhead is not a "created weakness". It's a fact.
"If aliens were to really arrive here - we'd better pray that they're merciful and don't instantly destroy or enslave us. We would not stand a chance."
Well, not unless we had nuclear warheads.
"We would be like ants trying to fight gods."
Thank god ants don't have nuclear weapons.
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Yeah, but kind of stupid too. Nineteeneleven's basic assertion is right; if we're visited by a race that's mastered interstellar travel you'd better hope they're friendly.
share> So what? Proxima Centauri is the closest star at only 4 light years away.
> Or, only 4 years from Proxima Centauri. [to travel to earth]
> Or, while Bush was president. [the time it would take to develop LS tech]
> Well, at least 4 years longer. [the age of this civilisation]
Fair enough assertions but does that star support life? Is that life of a level of civilisation and development sufficient enough to have discovered LS technology "white Bush was President"? Is that civilisation capable of applying that technology to a war effort against Earth, a planet they may not even be much aware of? Does that civilisation even have the resources or geopolitical factors required to create even a couple of LS craft appropriate for such a purpose? Additionally, there are more factors involved other than technology and will. Does this alien civilisation possess the cultural cohesiveness required to become first a Planetary civilisation, then a Solar one, and then beyond? We humans have not even truly become planetary, in the sense that by that definition we should have reached a level of unity, cohesiveness and technology which we do not yet possess. It is unlikely that we will leave our solar system in any meaningful way until we acheive that step first.
>The Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched on Sept. 5, 1977, is 11 billion miles away
>from the sun, and is using no energy at all, other than inertia ( read: no
>energy )
And unless it can exert the same energy against that intertia, it can't stop. The Voyager is also not a craft capable of transporting and supporting an invasion force. Besides, could an invasion force maintain lightspeed for 'at least four years' and all that that may require, without consuming a lot of energy resources of all kinds? How much energy is needed for just invading the next nation on Earth?
>The Helios missions to the Sun both reached a velocity of 153,800 mph
Which is not light speed, which is what the poster was clearly referring to. No matter how fast Helios was, it is not the speed of light and far from such technology. The poster's point was that we humans are far from the mark required to invade another solar system, let alone send people far into our own. Weren't you asserting that an alien invasion need only require a minimum of 4 years? Helios' speeds are therefore unimportant. Are we four years away from large scale LS travel?
> Why not? I want to see some more wrong information from you.
And are theories about worm-holes TRUE information? Such simplistic thinking is contrary to what science is all about. Only last week, NASA found new life that threw out a certain definition many poeple may have considered "true" and not "wrong".
> Destruction by the fusion reaction of a nuclear warhead is not a "created
> weakness". It's a fact.
Fair enough, but the poster was speaking in generalities towards the genre, not just this film. So, since you've taken your "hair-splitting" tact, thats "one down, several thousand to go" for you.
> Well, not unless we had nuclear warheads. [about aliens being no threat]
> Thank god ants don't have nuclear weapons.
You used the "why not?" argument above, so accept it here. If a race is capable of sending an invasion force at the speed of light to the Earth, especially after (this is your assertion) just inventing the technology recently; and if that society is advanced enough in all the other areas required for such a journey and pupose (and to enable it to happen in the first place) - WHY NOT allow them to have a means to repell most attacks, even nuclear warheads?
Your smartass retort got stupid when you tried to suggest an invasion force travelling light speed wouldn't need any more energy than a drifting satellite.
The WHOLE ISSUE is light speed energy. Voyager is a drifting can of metal.
That's like comparing the energy of a drifting newly hatched spiderling with our completion of the international space station, it's moronic. For an alien race to get here, even 1 light year away, it would take far superior technology than our own.
And your dumbass retort got retarded when you said something about spider babies.
Maybe you should go back to watching "Earnest Goes to..." movies.
Moron.
How sad that rather than address the factual rebuttals to your asinine post you chose instead to resort to school yard insults.
Prof. Farnsworth: Oh. A lesson in not changing history from Mr. I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!
So what? Proxima Centauri is the closest star at only 4 light years away.
Or, only 4 years from Proxima Centauri.
4 years?
The Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched on Sept. 5, 1977, is 11 billion miles away from the sun, and is using no energy at all, other than inertia ( read: no energy )
The Helios missions to the Sun both reached a velocity of 153,800 mph.
Who are you (or anyone) to tell them aliens what technology they can or cannot have? Just the fact we can't do these things doesn't mean nobody can.
I actually liked the fact nothing of this is being explained. It's like "we're here, deal with it."
I also likes the fact the aliens needed our brains to operate, though I am a bit stuck on how that works. Obviously a new brain is no biggie, just when Jarrod gets used, he's able to think for himself and in favour of his girl, in fact an enemy. Maybe because he had looked at them twice or something.
Actually, if they are able to fly at near the speed of light, they don't need to bring nearly 4 years of supplies to go 4 light years as measured at the home planet. True, 4 LY would pass at their home planet, but in their frame of reference, spacetime would be compressed.
No evidence (to date) that Proxima Centauri has gas giants (or terrestrial planets for that matter). It's possible, though not certain, that you need a gas giant in a solar system to evolve intelligent life if it is to evolve on a terrestrial planet otherwise the constant bombardment by debris will reset the evolutionary clock too often.
But, my gut feeling is that interstellar travel, if it is possible, will not be straight lines through spacetime as we currently concieve it, but some technology which we haven't even thought of that allows shortcuts. Whether you call that wormholes, or white holes or whatever. Sadly, none of us will be alive to ever find out.
I think you're uneducated. A light year is the DISTANCE light travels in one Earth year. Time isn't compressed?!?!?! 4 Lights years don't pass?!?!?! at their home planet? A ship travelling a DISTANCE of 4 light years at the speed of light takes 4 years.
Until a unified field theory is decided upon, not one with string theory or loop quantum gravity, we will never know how to overcome gravity.
Magnetism and Electricity are inexorably linked. Gravity and mass are linked by light which behaves both as waves and particles.
What is the mass of light if it travels at the speed of light? Ok so light from a 25watt light globe has how much energy?
It must be that one can travel at any speed without requiring infinite energy. We just don't understand gravity yet, or it's opposing force. It has to be there. We just can't see it.
This movie blows by the way. Utter crap, a waste of time watching it. I'm sure the directors think they're the Wachowski brothers with this crap. Oh look honey, they went for an open ended ending so they can have a sequel that nobody wants.
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Scientologists love Narnia, there's plenty of closet space.
God doesn't exist. Even ants would know that.
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Scientologists love Narnia, there's plenty of closet space.
At least in this movie, the aliens did not have super impenetrable shields. That cliche has been done since at least "Earth vs. the Flying Saucers". The makers of this movie got slightly more creative giving the aliens self repair abilities and overwhelming numbers. It was nice to see some of the alien drones get taken out during the battle, made it a little more exciting. Still a B-movie though.
shareThe way I see it; they're probably observing us from afar. If they have the technology to travel here; wouldn't it be safe to assume that they also possess the means to watch us? Besides; it would kinda stupid for them to travel all the way here to this planet with no clue as to what expect.
Either way; I still can't over the lack of creativity in this story.
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The movie has a plot hole?!?
EVERY FRIGGIN' MOVIE HAS A FRIGGIN' PLOT HOLE!!!!! (¬_¬)
How could they oberve us unless they have a kind of spy network already in place here, or have sent probes. Otherwise, they'd need some kind device capable of seeing Earth in sufficient detail from light years away. How would those probes or spys get the information back to the home planet? Physical transport could take years, even at the speed of light. A broadcast would require focus and power that could be easily percieved and intercepted by "Earthlings". Otherwise, a broadcast is also slow. If anything, such data could be years or even decades out of date, or more actually. Perhaps they have technology to bend space and time.
That these factors are overcome with ease, would be more of a stretch than lightspeed travel.
And for all we know, the ships were generation ships, travel sub-light speed, in search of a new home. In such a case they may have indeed set forth with little knowledge of where they may end up. That's what humans will do when we leave the solar system, and we have done it also in countless SF stories.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann_probe#Von_Neumann_probes
Prof. Farnsworth: Oh. A lesson in not changing history from Mr. I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!
As in "Avatar"? Bleh..!! -.-
And they are not always portrayed as being more advanced, many scripts have them being simply different in terms of tech.
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Because they made it here to begin with.
Also, there are plenty of movies/series where aliens are not more advanced technologically than humans:
-Star Trek
-Invasion of the Body Snatchers
-Avatar
-Starship Troopers
As evidenced by your list, technological advancement is not the only kind. In Star Trek we humans were actually far far behind the other races in terms of technology when first contact occurred with the Vulcans. In Invasion Of The Body Snatchers the aliens possessed superior methods of control due to their very nature. In Avatar the natural fauna (and, to some extent, the flora) of the planet gave the aliens an edge in the war. In Starship Troopers the aliens had evolved to develop a range of biological advancements over us from telepathy to colonisation and even ground-orbit artillery.
It really is difficult to come up with any film where aliens are less advanced than us if you don't only count the level of technology, but you're right, that is due to the fact that they managed to get here in the first place.
Try to come up with a coherent statement next time. This wasn't remotely funny or intelligent. Whatever you were attempting to do, you failed miserably.
I find it truly pathetic that the author of the original comment is whining about typical movies where the aliens have superior technology and others are talking about man's evil nature. Everyone pining for the 'noble savage' alien is pathetic. It is likely that any alien we do encounter that aggressively enters our solar system would be intent on wiping us out as quickly as possible. If they're carbon based, they would probably try to use our planetary resources. Our only chance would be much like The War of the Worlds and the Europeans first entries into the Americas... having microbes kill off the aliens because they don't have any resistances to our diseases. Anything else would just be wishful thinking.
Aliens won't use a Windows OS or Apple for the fanboys out there so no Independence Day scenarios. Sorry.
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[deleted]
Um, OP, that is the most shortsighted question I've read in a while. The fact that these aliens were able to traverse space from beyond our solar system, shows that they MUST be more advanced that us. We haven't even sent humans beyond the moon yet.
share[deleted]
Because if they were less advanced than us, they wouldn't have the technology to be able to travel the huge distances to get here.
I hate that that those movies. (Skyline, war of the worlds, independence day, district9) etc never explain from where those Aliens come from. I mean which star and which planet.
shareIf they're aliens and we know nothing about them how can anybody explain where they come from? In movie terms, it would have virtually no impact on the story and 99% of the time is actually doesn't. So what do we do, invite the aliens onto Good Morning America, David Letterman or Conan for a sit down before they annihilate use for the sake of knowing where they came from first? :)
On a side note, nobody's mentioned Battlefield Earth yet.
On a side note, nobody's mentioned Battlefield Earth yet.Ah yes the psychlo's. Also known as the stupidest godamn aliens that have ever hit the big screen.
I'll put all your answers to bed in fell swoop:
Because it's science FICTION ie it's all made up???