Guy Stewart's Blog, page 24

Creating Alien Aliens, Part 29B: Biaxially-Oriented Polyethylene Terephthalate Sapients, Emotions, and Feelings

Five decades ago, I started my college career with the intent of becoming a marine biologist. I found out I had to get a BS in biology before I could even begin work on MARINE biology; especially because there WEREN'T any marine biology programs in Minnesota.

Along the way, the science fiction stories I'd been writing since I was 13 began to grow more believable. With my BS in biology and a fascination with genetics, I started to use more science in my fiction.

After reading hard SF for the past 50 years, and writing hard SF successfully for the past 20, I've started to dig deeper into what it takes to create realistic alien life forms. In the following series, I'll be sharing some of what I've learned. I've had some of those stories published, some not...I teach a class to GT young people every summer called ALIEN WORLDS. I've learned a lot preparing for that class for the past 25 years...so...I have the opportunity to share with you what I've learned thus far. Take what you can use, leave the rest. Let me know what YOU'VE learned. Without further ado...


FEELINGS
Definition: “Feelings. Both emotional experiences and physical sensations — such as hunger or pain — bring about feelings…Feelings are a conscious experience, although not every conscious experience, such as seeing or believing, is a feeling...”

EMOTIONS:
Definition: “Emotions…“can only ever be felt…through the emotional experiences it gives rise to, even though it might be discovered through its associated thoughts, beliefs, desires, and actions. Emotions are not conscious [and] manifest in the unconscious mind. These emotions can be brought to the surface of the conscious state…”

From Sachchidanand R. Swami (Internationally Certified Facial Micro-Expression Detection Expert, Human Behavior Researcher, Analyst and Profiler), we have: “…if any biological species has evolved and survived in its local environment…then it must have…senses, reflexes, emotions, temperaments, traits and different kinds of defenses...if they want to survive, evolve, and expand their horizons then they would venture into the outer space. If any species wants to be more advanced, it has to be able to monitor emotions consciously and remain composed for most of time so that physical, psychological and mental efficiency and capacities could be enhanced…[and] controlling or dominating others technologically could be the sole purpose and goal.”

From Neil DeGrasse Tyson: He “responded to Demi Lovato’s claim that calling extraterrestrials ‘aliens’ is ‘derogatory’ by telling the singer that aliens ‘have no feelings.’” He added, ‘All the aliens that I’ve ever met…have no feelings.’ He did say that Lovato was just being “considerate,’ but he also wondered why they were ‘worried about offending them by calling them an alien.’ He insisted we don’t know what ‘is going on in the head of species of life from another planet.’ Tyson added: ‘When I refer to aliens — just to be specific — I always say ‘space aliens’. And then, what we used to call aliens on Earth — undocumented immigrants, that’s what the new term is for them, and I’m all in on that. … So what that means is — if we all do that — the only invocation of the word ‘alien’ is for creatures from outer space that want to kill us all.’”

So…there may or may NOT be a chance that there is alien life “out there. Some people seem certain; others skeptical. So, let me speculate.

Say we have a star with not much energy – called a Type M star. According to current classifications, two thirds of stars are in this category. The least common stars are the most energetic or Type O stars.

What would be the advantage of crystalline life evolving under each type of star? It seems likely that a crystalline life form would come into existence in order to gather enough energy for survival – in other words, to get smart, it would need to get more energy than any of the other competing lifeforms. Humans grew smart because having a big brain allowed them to gather more food than any other kind of life form – the smarter you are, the bigger the brain, the bigger the brain, the bigger the head, and the more you fed the brain, the more brilliant ideas it would have to keep the rest of the body alive. [This is HUGE over-simplification of how evolution works, but I’m going to keep it for now.]

So, we have some kind of crystalline intelligence developing in order to gather more light – and concentrate it better. Imagine a wide, metallic mirror – maybe aluminum. We’ll start with creatures called “amphipods” who concentrate aluminum and use it to strengthen their exoskeletons to better withstand the pressures of the deepest parts of the ocean. Under a Type M star, the oceans might be shallower – except for perhaps huge cracks in the planet’s crust, like the Earth’s Marianas Trench; where our aluminized aliens dwell.

They change over time – there’s lots of time with a class M star. They burn slowly and can last a long time. So, they begin to group together into colonies, rather like the Siphonophoria I started exploring here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2023/04/writing-advice-creating-alien-aliens.html

Only instead of long, thin tentacles, these form into sheets. Aluminized sheets, their skeletons strengthened. The wee beasties [Name for a story???] (“In the 17th century, Van Leeuwenhoek looked through a microscope at a drop of water and found it teeming with microscopic life. He was the first recorded person in history (that I know of) to see microbes. He called them “wee beasties”. The science has survived and thrived, sadly the quaint term hasn’t.”) grow in sheets. When peculiar currents well up from below, while the flat sheet is drifting one day, the uneven currents lift the edges but leave the center lower. The effect is startling – focused sunlight carries more energy and the “beasties” in the center are energized. The current persists, and the alteration allows for more emphatic breeding; the adaptation increases the survival rate of colonies that can concentrate sunlight…

OK – enough of life changing over time. Let’s get to the point of this exercise: what kinds of thoughts and emotions and feelings would a colony of aluminized wee beasties that looks suspiciously like a sheet of mylar. While the aspects of a living sheet of BoPET (biaxially oriented polyethylene terephthalate) is starting to interest me, I’ll yank myself back to the topic at hand…

So, based on the quotes above, emotions would come first. Postulate: a floating piece of BoPET would probably be excited the closer it got to the surface of the ocean it lives in. Firstly because it would be able to pull more and more energy from the sunlight as it got brighter and brighter. It would be more energetic. At first, this would just be more energy to reproduce. But as time passed, our BoPET bowl would discover that close enough to the surface and under certain conditions…I’m going to call the creatures Biaxteres…they might catch sight of things above the water. Floating things.

Again, time passes and the Biaxteres discover that they can flex their film bodies and see what the things are that pass overhead ARE. At this point, emotions might spill over into feelings. Probably what we would call curiosity would pop up. What are the things above their world might become a driver of curiosity.

At the same time, they would discover that the “bowling” faced downward might allow them to “see” things both smaller and larger – magnifying and telescoping through the water. They might discover that visible light isn’t the only part of the spectrum there is. And underwater sound might ALSO be magnified by the bowl-effect.

And now we have both emotions and feelings. Emotional “highs” we might call wonder, curiosity, desire…though NONE of these would be emotions and feelings as we would experience them. They also wouldn’t be about things we could see: the Biaxteres would see differently than we would, being creatures of the air, we wouldn’t perceive the flyers or the creatures of the deep as they would. For them, it might be more visceral. Certainly, the other life they experience in this ocean would be threatening in a way we wouldn’t be able to understand – life as aluminized film wouldn’t be the same as life as flesh and bone.

Would it even be comprehensible to us? Could a civilization develop on the Biaxtere’s world? What kind of a civilization would a lifeform that was (merely?) a thin, aluminized film of microscopic creatures? I’ll need to explore that.

For now, we might share excitement and curiosity with them. We might share a sense of exploration with them. HOWEVER, Biaxtere civilization might not be recognizable to us as such. While we may share some emotions and feelings – what else might we share and how might we communicate?

I’ll be thinking on this more in the future…

Source: https://counseling.online.wfu.edu/blog/difference-feelings-emotions/, http://www.nonverbal-world.com/2014/09/would-aliens-have-emotions.html, https://www.wired.co.uk/article/neil-degrasse-tyson-welcome-to-the-universe, https://medium.com/@leecadesky/wee-beasties-d303c7caf019, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BoPET
Image: https://image.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/alien-human-600w-136457129.jpg

Creating Alien Aliens, Part 29B: Emotions and Feelings and BoPET Beings...OH MY!

Five decades ago, I started my college career with the intent of becoming a marine biologist. I found out I had to get a BS in biology before I could even begin work on MARINE biology; especially because there WEREN'T any marine biology programs in Minnesota.

Along the way, the science fiction stories I'd been writing since I was 13 began to grow more believable. With my BS in biology and a fascination with genetics, I started to use more science in my fiction.

After reading hard SF for the past 50 years, and writing hard SF successfully for the past 20, I've started to dig deeper into what it takes to create realistic alien life forms. In the following series, I'll be sharing some of what I've learned. I've had some of those stories published, some not...I teach a class to GT young people every summer called ALIEN WORLDS. I've learned a lot preparing for that class for the past 25 years...so...I have the opportunity to share with you what I've learned thus far. Take what you can use, leave the rest. Let me know what YOU'VE learned. Without further ado...


FEELINGS
Definition: “Feelings. Both emotional experiences and physical sensations — such as hunger or pain — bring about feelings…Feelings are a conscious experience, although not every conscious experience, such as seeing or believing, is a feeling...”

EMOTIONS:
Definition: “Emotions…“can only ever be felt…through the emotional experiences it gives rise to, even though it might be discovered through its associated thoughts, beliefs, desires, and actions. Emotions are not conscious [and] manifest in the unconscious mind. These emotions can be brought to the surface of the conscious state…”

From Sachchidanand R. Swami (Internationally Certified Facial Micro-Expression Detection Expert, Human Behavior Researcher, Analyst and Profiler), we have: “…if any biological species has evolved and survived in its local environment…then it must have…senses, reflexes, emotions, temperaments, traits and different kinds of defenses...if they want to survive, evolve, and expand their horizons then they would venture into the outer space. If any species wants to be more advanced, it has to be able to monitor emotions consciously and remain composed for most of time so that physical, psychological and mental efficiency and capacities could be enhanced…[and] controlling or dominating others technologically could be the sole purpose and goal.”

From Neil DeGrasse Tyson: He “responded to Demi Lovato’s claim that calling extraterrestrials ‘aliens’ is ‘derogatory’ by telling the singer that aliens ‘have no feelings.’” He added, ‘All the aliens that I’ve ever met…have no feelings.’ He did say that Lovato was just being “considerate,’ but he also wondered why they were ‘worried about offending them by calling them an alien.’ He insisted we don’t know what ‘is going on in the head of species of life from another planet.’ Tyson added: ‘When I refer to aliens — just to be specific — I always say ‘space aliens’. And then, what we used to call aliens on Earth — undocumented immigrants, that’s what the new term is for them, and I’m all in on that. … So what that means is — if we all do that — the only invocation of the word ‘alien’ is for creatures from outer space that want to kill us all.’”

So…there may or may NOT be a chance that there is alien life “out there. Some people seem certain; others skeptical. So, let me speculate.

Say we have a star with not much energy – called a Type M star. According to current classifications, two thirds of stars are in this category. The least common stars are the most energetic or Type O stars.

What would be the advantage of crystalline life evolving under each type of star? It seems likely that a crystalline life form would come into existence in order to gather enough energy for survival – in other words, to get smart, it would need to get more energy than any of the other competing lifeforms. Humans grew smart because having a big brain allowed them to gather more food than any other kind of life form – the smarter you are, the bigger the brain, the bigger the brain, the bigger the head, and the more you fed the brain, the more brilliant ideas it would have to keep the rest of the body alive. [This is HUGE over-simplification of how evolution works, but I’m going to keep it for now.]

So, we have some kind of crystalline intelligence developing in order to gather more light – and concentrate it better. Imagine a wide, metallic mirror – maybe aluminum. We’ll start with creatures called “amphipods” who concentrate aluminum and use it to strengthen their exoskeletons to better withstand the pressures of the deepest parts of the ocean. Under a Type M star, the oceans might be shallower – except for perhaps huge cracks in the planet’s crust, like the Earth’s Marianas Trench; where our aluminized aliens dwell.

They change over time – there’s lots of time with a class M star. They burn slowly and can last a long time. So, they begin to group together into colonies, rather like the Siphonophoria I started exploring here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2023/04/writing-advice-creating-alien-aliens.html

Only instead of long, thin tentacles, these form into sheets. Aluminized sheets, their skeletons strengthened. The wee beasties [Name for a story???] (“In the 17th century, Van Leeuwenhoek looked through a microscope at a drop of water and found it teeming with microscopic life. He was the first recorded person in history (that I know of) to see microbes. He called them “wee beasties”. The science has survived and thrived, sadly the quaint term hasn’t.”) grow in sheets. When peculiar currents well up from below, while the flat sheet is drifting one day, the uneven currents lift the edges but leave the center lower. The effect is startling – focused sunlight carries more energy and the “beasties” in the center are energized. The current persists, and the alteration allows for more emphatic breeding; the adaptation increases the survival rate of colonies that can concentrate sunlight…

OK – enough of life changing over time. Let’s get to the point of this exercise: what kinds of thoughts and emotions and feelings would a colony of aluminized wee beasties that looks suspiciously like a sheet of mylar. While the aspects of a living sheet of BoPET (biaxially oriented polyethylene terephthalate) is starting to interest me, I’ll yank myself back to the topic at hand…

So, based on the quotes above, emotions would come first. Postulate: a floating piece of BoPET would probably be excited the closer it got to the surface of the ocean it lives in. Firstly because it would be able to pull more and more energy from the sunlight as it got brighter and brighter. It would be more energetic. At first, this would just be more energy to reproduce. But as time passed, our BoPET bowl would discover that close enough to the surface and under certain conditions…I’m going to call the creatures Biaxteres…they might catch sight of things above the water. Floating things.

Again, time passes and the Biaxteres discover that they can flex their film bodies and see what the things are that pass overhead ARE. At this point, emotions might spill over into feelings. Probably what we would call curiosity would pop up. What are the things above their world might become a driver of curiosity.

At the same time, they would discover that the “bowling” faced downward might allow them to “see” things both smaller and larger – magnifying and telescoping through the water. They might discover that visible light isn’t the only part of the spectrum there is. And underwater sound might ALSO be magnified by the bowl-effect.

And now we have both emotions and feelings. Emotional “highs” we might call wonder, curiosity, desire…though NONE of these would be emotions and feelings as we would experience them. They also wouldn’t be about things we could see: the Biaxteres would see differently than we would, being creatures of the air, we wouldn’t perceive the flyers or the creatures of the deep as they would. For them, it might be more visceral. Certainly, the other life they experience in this ocean would be threatening in a way we wouldn’t be able to understand – life as aluminized film wouldn’t be the same as life as flesh and bone.

Would it even be comprehensible to us? Could a civilization develop on the Biaxtere’s world? What kind of a civilization would a lifeform that was (merely?) a thin, aluminized film of microscopic creatures? I’ll need to explore that.

For now, we might share excitement and curiosity with them. We might share a sense of exploration with them. HOWEVER, Biaxtere civilization might not be recognizable to us as such. While we may share some emotions and feelings – what else might we share and how might we communicate?

I’ll be thinking on this more in the future…

Source: https://counseling.online.wfu.edu/blog/difference-feelings-emotions/, http://www.nonverbal-world.com/2014/09/would-aliens-have-emotions.html, https://www.wired.co.uk/article/neil-degrasse-tyson-welcome-to-the-universe, https://medium.com/@leecadesky/wee-beasties-d303c7caf019, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BoPET
Image: https://image.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/alien-human-600w-136457129.jpg

IDEAS ON TUESDAYS 601

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Regarding horror, I found this insight in line with WIRED FOR STORY: “ We seek out…stories which give us a place to put our fears…Stories that frighten us or unsettle us - not just horror stories, but ones that make us uncomfortable or that strike a chord somewhere deep inside - give us the means to explore the things that scare us…” – Lou Morgan (The Guardian)

H Trope: forbidden rooms
Current Event: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial and http://www.ipt-forensics.com/journal/volume7/j7_2_1_33.htm and http://www.sacbee.com/2011/07/21/3783838/mcmartin-preschool-fiasco-led.html

Thirty years after the infamous McMartin Preschool Incident, Tayna Hopewell’s parents buy the land the day care once stood on to build a golf equipment shop. Everything is past and even though she finds out about the lot’s history through a Google search, she doesn’t say anything.

They aren’t opening a day care!

Tanya who lives in Alondra and takes classes as a high school senior at El Camino College wants to be a forensic scientist after she graduates. Her parents are “golf semi-pros” and while she supports them now that she’s “grown up”, she loathes the sport and avoids it at every chance.

On the eve of a big semi-pro tourney at the nearby Alondra Golf Course, and shortly after the excavation began, Tanya NEEDS to escape her parents! They’re driving her CRAZY!

She lights off along Manhattan Beach Boulevard, jogging toward the beach and some much-needed alone time. When she reaches the excavation site, she sees that the gate is still standing open and she figures her parents own the land, so she has every right to check things out.

A warm breeze is wafting off shore a mile or so away and even though the sun is sinking toward the horizon, she’s comfortable poking around the site.

It’s not particularly interesting until she gets to the back of the lot. It’s been built over more than once – before the infamous daycare (demolished in 1985) it was a housing development, since then The Strand Cleaners which went out of business. Now her parents are building a two-story building; the ground floor will house Hopewell’s Pro Golf; the upper story was unrented yet, but there were plenty of people interested.
At the back of the property, Tanya nearly pitches into a narrow hole in the ground that runs under the fence to the property behind their land. As well, there’s evidence of the trenches running toward Manhattan Boulevard. Scowling, she looked into the hole, though she can’t see a thing. She takes out her cell, flips it to “flashlight mode” and aims it into the hole.

She still can’t see much more than the far side of it. Muttering, she unrolls her towel, lays it on the ground and lays down, scooting to the edge so she can see over it clearly.

She flicks on the flashlight, holding it ahead of her and pointing down and looks carefully.

At the bottom of the trench, at the edge of the cell phone’s light reach, she clearly sees a pile of bones.

Heart pounding, she remembers that there was a buried trash heap under the property that they’d found evidence of even during the trial in the olden days. It’s probably just animal bones.

That’s when she sees it. To one side, barely visible now, staring at her without eyes, is a small skull.

A small HUMAN skull…

Name: ♀ Russia
Image: https://cdn.britannica.com/40/11740-004-50816EB1/Boris-Karloff-Frankenstein-monster.jpg

POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY: Will All Intelligent Alien Civilizations Be Modeled On the Benevolent Government Democrats Are Striving For?

NOT using the panel discussions of the most recent World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose, CA in August 2018 (to which I be unable to go (until I retire from education)), I would jump off, jump on, rail against, and shamelessly agree with the BRIEF DESCRIPTION given in the pdf copy of the Program Guide. But not today. This explanation is reserved for when I dash “off topic”, sometimes reviewing movies, sometimes reviewing books, and other times taking up the spirit of a blog an old friend of mine used to keep called THE RANTING ROOM…
Question: Why do so many people who DON’T read science fiction widely, make the assumption that any Aliens we come into contact with who have starships, no war, unlimited wealth, with a unified, single party government, be ecologically-pre-civilization-static, single-class, benevolent, democratically elected, and all-inclusive civilization... possibly be REAL?

Do they have evidence that “U-SPG-EPCS-SC-B-DE-AI civilization” is the only way to govern well? (WE are evidence to the contrary. Our governments have always been fractured (check history books); but we use nuclear power, genetic engineering, and we travel in space – all of these achievements are limited and the majority of “doom-sayers” assume that we will destroy ourselves…but despite dire predictions, we haven’t as of this moment. We absolutely have wars, threats, and cruelty…yet seven billion of us persist at this time. Countless others have tantrums about how dumb the “others” are and that unless the entire world embraces their ideal of government, we will continue to be hanging by a thread? Maybe a spider silk thread…)

How did Gene Roddenberry’s dream up the idea of a United Earth and a United Federation of Planets? Except for hippies who were dreaming of yellow submarines and Woodstock, the rest of the world was in shell-shocked horror discovering that the SECOND War To End All Wars hadn’t performed as promised. Things were growing worse. How did Roddenberry get to Star Trek?

That’s easy enough to summarize from the article referenced below: “I really don’t consider myself a science-fiction writer, but I’m interested in what’s happening on this planet and what may happen…Intolerance in the 23rd century? Improbable!...If man survives that long, he will have learned to take a delight in the essential differences between men and between cultures…we couldn’t do a space show without at least one person on board who constantly reminded you that you are out in space and in a world of the future…A science-fiction buff since junior high school, he had the idea for a series that would mix…The Twilight Zone..The Outer Limits with a cast of continuing characters…[a]…space-adventure series [like] “Wagon Train to the Stars,” a nod to the westerns that were still the gold standard in popular TV drama in the 1960s…born in the midst of the turbulent 1960s…it…often reflected and commented on the issues of that divisive decade: the Vietnam War, civil rights, Cold War politics, the budding environmental movement. The show had an idealistic, ’60s counterculture mind-set, imagining a 23rd-century world in which humans had outgrown war and prejudice…[STAR TREK] proved that an outer-space action show could appeal to our intelligence, tackle serious issues—and, in a troubled time, offer some hope for the future.” He certainly didn’t base his enthusiastic hope for humanity on any kind of reality, making the assumption that we would reach a point of evenly distributed wealth and overcome all forms of prejudice to reach the

But…

In the STAR WARS Universe, an Evil Empire has overthrown by an UNQUESTIONABLY Good Republic (it’s “goodness” is an unargued given). But shortly after that happens, the New Republic was once again overthrown by an Imperial copycat of Darth Vader called the First Order which launches its takeover in THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015 – ironically, (hmmm or was it political commentary?) the same year Trump declared his presidential bid). On what basis is the Republic declared “good” and the Empire “bad”?

In Frank Herbert’s DUNE novels, his assumption is that humanity can only avoid the extinction of Humanity by creating an Omniscient God-Emperor to derail a religious High Priesthood of Bene Gesserit and capitalistic Traders. “ We've a three-point civilization: the Imperial Household balanced against the Federated Great Houses of the Landsraad through [CHOAM, the Directors of all wealth], and between them; the Spacers Guild with its damnable monopoly on interstellar transport. Reverend Mother Mohiam.” (Note she omits the hidden rule of the Bene Gesserit.” Paul Atreides (aka Paul Muad’dib institutes “…his Golden Path, [Frank Herbert’s]…argument of how to create a healthy society, avoiding despotism and hero worship, a trap in which social groups can be caught: ‘To make a world where human kind can make its own future from moment to moment, free from one man's vision. Free from the perversion of the [any?] prophet’s words. And free of future pre-determined...’” From universal foundation does Frank Herbert’s declaration of what humanity needs depend? On what foundation of human understanding does he make his postulation?

In TV’s extremely popular series, THE EXPANSE, the UN has seized power from most of the world’s governments because of nearly uncontrollable Climate Change – which they stop. They continue to rule Earth as well as colonies on the Moon, Mars, and in the asteroid belt as well as several other Jovian moons and a very few interstellar colonies until rogue Martian marines form their own government, conquer everyone, and call them all the Laconian Empire…[This is all from the resource below. I read the second book, CALIBAN’S WAR thinking it was the first and while I thought it was a great deal of fun, never went back to read the others. I also read A GAME OF THRONES and while it was also fun, (nowhere near as fun as his Haviland Tuf science fiction stories); I didn’t return to that series, either and never watched a single episode of the TV show…]

There are many futures for Humanity portrayed in science fiction literature. These four are currently best known because they were either visual presentations or MADE into visual presentations. Others await production and the passing of time to test their precepts.

Until then, we’re left with what we have here and now, and what we hope in the future – and our own hands to make it – though there are some who believe that we do not labor alone working for the better future or Humanity on Earth, now. [No, I DON’T mean Aliens Among Us!]
Finally, with the perspective added by a few more years, I wonder why so many people today assume that "all is lost" and there's no possible way we could survive to even THINK about a world like the one Roddenberry invented nearly six decades ago? Could it be the BBC's news coverage? Racial unrest (I live in the city and a few blocks from one of the places waves of civil unrest rolled over a bit over two and three years ago...)
Do I have hope for a STAR TREK future? Can we make it? With deep hope and belief, I STILL have to say, "Yes."
Sources: https://time.com/4406710/star-trek-history-excerpt/, https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Galactic_Empire, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organizations_of_the_Dune_universe, https://expanse.fandom.com/wiki/Laconia_system, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muad%27Dib

Image: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/d/d1/Star_Trek_Universe.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20200115144000&path-prefix=en

Will All Intelligent Alien Civilizations Be Modeled On the Benevolent Government Democrats Are Striving For?

NOT using the panel discussions of the most recent World Science Fiction Convention in San Jose, CA in August 2018 (to which I be unable to go (until I retire from education)), I would jump off, jump on, rail against, and shamelessly agree with the BRIEF DESCRIPTION given in the pdf copy of the Program Guide. But not today. This explanation is reserved for when I dash “off topic”, sometimes reviewing movies, sometimes reviewing books, and other times taking up the spirit of a blog an old friend of mine used to keep called THE RANTING ROOM…
Question: Why do so many people who DON’T read science fiction widely, make the assumption that any Aliens we come into contact with who have starships, no war, unlimited wealth, with a unified, single party government, be ecologically-pre-civilization-static, single-class, benevolent, democratically elected, and all-inclusive civilization... possibly be REAL?

Do they have evidence that “U-SPG-EPCS-SC-B-DE-AI civilization” is the only way to govern well? (WE are evidence to the contrary. Our governments have always been fractured (check history books); but we use nuclear power, genetic engineering, and we travel in space – all of these achievements are limited and the majority of “doom-sayers” assume that we will destroy ourselves…but despite dire predictions, we haven’t as of this moment. We absolutely have wars, threats, and cruelty…yet seven billion of us persist at this time. Countless others have tantrums about how dumb the “others” are and that unless the entire world embraces their ideal of government, we will continue to be hanging by a thread? Maybe a spider silk thread…)

How did Gene Roddenberry’s dream up the idea of a United Earth and a United Federation of Planets? Except for hippies who were dreaming of yellow submarines and Woodstock, the rest of the world was in shell-shocked horror discovering that the SECOND War To End All Wars hadn’t performed as promised. Things were growing worse. How did Roddenberry get to Star Trek?

That’s easy enough to summarize from the article referenced below: “I really don’t consider myself a science-fiction writer, but I’m interested in what’s happening on this planet and what may happen…Intolerance in the 23rd century? Improbable!...If man survives that long, he will have learned to take a delight in the essential differences between men and between cultures…we couldn’t do a space show without at least one person on board who constantly reminded you that you are out in space and in a world of the future…A science-fiction buff since junior high school, he had the idea for a series that would mix…The Twilight Zone..The Outer Limits with a cast of continuing characters…[a]…space-adventure series [like] “Wagon Train to the Stars,” a nod to the westerns that were still the gold standard in popular TV drama in the 1960s…born in the midst of the turbulent 1960s…it…often reflected and commented on the issues of that divisive decade: the Vietnam War, civil rights, Cold War politics, the budding environmental movement. The show had an idealistic, ’60s counterculture mind-set, imagining a 23rd-century world in which humans had outgrown war and prejudice…[STAR TREK] proved that an outer-space action show could appeal to our intelligence, tackle serious issues—and, in a troubled time, offer some hope for the future.” He certainly didn’t base his enthusiastic hope for humanity on any kind of reality, making the assumption that we would reach a point of evenly distributed wealth and overcome all forms of prejudice to reach the

But…

In the STAR WARS Universe, an Evil Empire has overthrown by an UNQUESTIONABLY Good Republic (it’s “goodness” is an unargued given). But shortly after that happens, the New Republic was once again overthrown by an Imperial copycat of Darth Vader called the First Order which launches its takeover in THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015 – ironically, (hmmm or was it political commentary?) the same year Trump declared his presidential bid). On what basis is the Republic declared “good” and the Empire “bad”?

In Frank Herbert’s DUNE novels, his assumption is that humanity can only avoid the extinction of Humanity by creating an Omniscient God-Emperor to derail a religious High Priesthood of Bene Gesserit and capitalistic Traders. “ We've a three-point civilization: the Imperial Household balanced against the Federated Great Houses of the Landsraad through [CHOAM, the Directors of all wealth], and between them; the Spacers Guild with its damnable monopoly on interstellar transport. Reverend Mother Mohiam.” (Note she omits the hidden rule of the Bene Gesserit.” Paul Atreides (aka Paul Muad’dib institutes “…his Golden Path, [Frank Herbert’s]…argument of how to create a healthy society, avoiding despotism and hero worship, a trap in which social groups can be caught: ‘To make a world where human kind can make its own future from moment to moment, free from one man's vision. Free from the perversion of the [any?] prophet’s words. And free of future pre-determined...’” From universal foundation does Frank Herbert’s declaration of what humanity needs depend? On what foundation of human understanding does he make his postulation?

In TV’s extremely popular series, THE EXPANSE, the UN has seized power from most of the world’s governments because of nearly uncontrollable Climate Change – which they stop. They continue to rule Earth as well as colonies on the Moon, Mars, and in the asteroid belt as well as several other Jovian moons and a very few interstellar colonies until rogue Martian marines form their own government, conquer everyone, and call them all the Laconian Empire…[This is all from the resource below. I read the second book, CALIBAN’S WAR thinking it was the first and while I thought it was a great deal of fun, never went back to read the others. I also read A GAME OF THRONES and while it was also fun, (nowhere near as fun as his Haviland Tuf science fiction stories); I didn’t return to that series, either and never watched a single episode of the TV show…]

There are many futures for Humanity portrayed in science fiction literature. These four are currently best known because they were either visual presentations or MADE into visual presentations. Others await production and the passing of time to test their precepts.

Until then, we’re left with what we have here and now, and what we hope in the future – and our own hands to make it – though there are some who believe that we do not labor alone working for the better future or Humanity on Earth, now. [No, I DON’T mean Aliens Among Us!]
Finally, with the perspective added by a few more years, I wonder why so many people today assume that "all is lost" and there's no possible way we could survive to even THINK about a world like the one Roddenberry invented nearly six decades ago? Could it be the BBC's news coverage? Racial unrest (I live in the city and a few blocks from one of the places waves of civil unrest rolled over a bit over two and three years ago...)
Do I have hope for a STAR TREK future? Can we make it? With deep hope and belief, I STILL have to say, "Yes."
Sources: https://time.com/4406710/star-trek-history-excerpt/, https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Galactic_Empire, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organizations_of_the_Dune_universe, https://expanse.fandom.com/wiki/Laconia_system, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muad%27Dib

Image: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/d/d1/Star_Trek_Universe.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20200115144000&path-prefix=en

IDEAS ON TUESDAYS 600

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Regarding Fantasy, this insight was startling: “I see the fantasy genre as an ever-shifting metaphor for life in this world, an innocuous medium that allows the author to examine difficult, even controversial, subjects with impunity. Honor, religion, politics, nobility, integrity, greed—we’ve an endless list of ideals to be dissected and explored. And maybe learned from.” – Melissa McPhail.

F Trope: Comic Fantasy
Current Event: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/So_You_Think_You_Can_Dance_(United_States)

Sein Ryoo held Yi Ling Guinto’s hand tightly as she spun out from him. The light panel, extremely sensitive to the magic generated by motion, glowed a cool, mint green.

They were both panting. Yi Ling bent over, planting her fists on her knees. A few minutes later, she said, “If we want to get on ‘You Think YOU Got Dance Magic?’, then we’re gonna have to turn that traffic light green – and just as intense.”

Trying to pretend there was no stitch in his side, Sein said, “We’ve been working all summer. Dance Magic’s gonna be here in forty-eight hours. What can we do in two days the we haven’t done in three months?”

With a flick of her finger, Yi Ling changed music tracks on her tablet computer from the sober beginning of the fandango to the wild exuberance of her current favorite metal band, Cursed For Cash. Sein whooped, grabbed her arms and they danced until the panel glowed like a magic spotlight. They collapsed into each other’s arms, laughing. She kissed Sein’s cheek and he pushed away, laughing as well. He said, “You know better than that!”

“I keep hoping,” she said, stepped forward and hugged him. “Let’s call it quits for today. I’ll see you tomorrow morning. Mom says to tell your dad that we’ll be there at five am.”

“Ugh!”

Yi Ling sniffed then said, “If we lived in a real city, we wouldn’t have to drive so far.” She sighed, for the thousandth time, wishing she lived somewhere other than Duluth, Minnesota. Hardly a hotbed of dance magic, she was glad she at least had Sein. She relented, “But then we would never have met.”

He hugged her back, “I’ve got no idea what I’d have done if you weren’t here.” He shook his head. “Not only would I NOT be heading to the Dance Magic tryouts and I would have failed pre-calculus and physics.”

“No,” said Yi Ling, “I would have failed.”

“No, I would have,” they headed home. As the magic faded from their practice room, the panel grew dark, only occasionally flickering as flocks of Canadian geese flew their ancient dance to the south, overhead and far away.


Sein’s dad shot over his shoulder, “Five more kilometers to Chicago!”

In the back, Sein and Yi Ling squirmed. The ceiling light flared for an instant as did the dash light. Yi Ling’s mom sighed as her tablet readers glared brightly for an instant. “Stop it back there!” If the two of you keep back-seat dancing, you’re going to short out every light from here to New York!”

Sein’s dad squealed with laughter and squirmed in his own seat. But no lights flickered. The illumination stayed the same. Sein blushed furiously, pale skin under red-dyed and permed hair. Leaning to Yi Ling, he whispered, “I hate it when he screams like a girl.”

She pushed him back, saying, “I don’t sound like that when...”

“That’s cause you hardly ever scream.”

Sein’s dad heard nothing as he exclaimed, “Chicago’s flashing like a lighthouse beacon!”

Looking between the front seat headrests, Sein and Yi Ling gasped as golden light pulsed from the Windy City – as if welcoming them home.

Names: ♀Singapore, Philippines ; ♂ Burma, South Korea
Image:
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/98/71/e5/9871e52bbc09c525af21b8f6471eab15.jpg

The Pretty-Much-Finished-Except-For-A-Few-Tweaks Cover Of My New Book

 

My OLD book:  (1998)

Sneak Peek At the ALMOST Ready COVER of EMERALD OF EARTH...PUBLICATION DATE TBD!

 

[image error]

Slice of PIE: What Do We Do When We Find “Them”?

Using the Program Guide of the 2018 WorldScience Fiction Convention in San Jose, CA, I read the notes and comments onthe subject. The link to the original post is below. (I originally posted thison July 21, 2019)

SETI: What Do We Do When We Find Them?
Scientists at SETI, and METI, and other organizations are actively searchingfor extraterrestrial intelligence. But what are we going to do when we makethat first contact?

Andrew Fraknoi: Director of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, author,Asteroid 4859 Asteroid Fraknoi…
Brother Guy J. Consolmagno, SJ: American research astronomer and Director ofthe Vatican Observatory
SB Divya: author, Nebula Award finalist, co-editor of Escape Pod, degree inComputational Neuroscience and Signal Processing, electrical engineer
Douglas Vakoch: PhD, President Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence, editor
Lonny Brooks: PhD, associate professor of communication at California StateUniversity

What to do, what to do?

I’m sure the “answer” was easy for this group and the people sitting in theroom. I wasn’t there, though I would have slipped unnoticed and unremarked intothe “people sitting in the room” demographic. ALL of us would haveintelligently discussed the pros and…well, pros.

I’m sure someone would have mentioned Hawking and Brin, and even though he waslisted among the Program Participants, he didn’t attend this particular sessionbecause his thoughts on phoning ET are pretty well known (though side-steppedhere by quoting the originator of the opinion he echoes at every opportunity):“Jared Diamond offers an essay on the risks of attempting to contact ETIs,based on the history of what happened on Earth whenever more advancedcivilizations encountered less advanced ones... or indeed, when the same thinghappens during contact between species that evolved in differing ecosystems.The results are often not good: in inter-human relations slavery, colonialism,etc. Among contacting species: extinction.”!

From the grave, Hawking’s opinion would have echoed from the 2016 documentaryStephen Hawking’s Favorite Places, “Such advanced aliens would perhaps becomenomads, looking to conquer and colonize whatever planets they could reach,” hesaid. ‘Who knows what the limits would be?’ And in the, Hawking reiterated hisviews: ‘Meeting an advanced civilization could be like Native Americansencountering Columbus. That didn’t turn out so well.’”!

These and other ET “deniers” couldn’t have been “shushed” (both of them carrythe status of Super Star, and who would stand against Hawking, whose mind isoften compared to Einstein, Newton, and ), but I’m sure their imprecationswould have fallen on mostly deaf ears. Certainly a reasonable number of SFwriters have a somewhat different view of what interactions between Earth andextraterrestrials would be like. Even in Brin’s UPLIFT UNIVERSE, Humans, whileunderdogs, were hardly slaughtered wholesale and enslaved (though severalintelligences, like the Gubru and the Soro, thought Humanity could use a bit of“finishing” followed by a thousand years of indenture.

No, rather than the faithful and the deniers, the Con should have invited the“person on the street”, the ones who number in the BILLIONS (seven billion tobe more accurate), and don’t really give much thought to the possibility ofFirst Contact. Yet, they would be the most profoundly affected by such anevent. HG Wells held out little hope for a calm response to First Contact:

“So you understand the roaring wave of fear that swept through the greatestcity in the world just as Monday was dawning—the stream of flight risingswiftly to a torrent, lashing in a foaming tumult round the railway stations,banked up into a horrible struggle about the shipping in the Thames, andhurrying by every available channel northward and eastward. By ten o’clock thepolice organisation, and by midday even the railway organisations, were losingcoherency, losing shape and efficiency, guttering, softening, running at lastin that swift liquefaction of the social body.” (XVI. THE EXODUS FROM LONDON. Paragraph1)

 

With wildly differing opinions amongthe faithful, what do you expect from commoners for whom the appearance ofreal-live aliens could range from outright, psychologically TRUE denial, toblithering panic, to catatonia.

While I’m sure the session was great fun, I’m pretty sure that theywouldn’t have any idea what a regular person’s real reaction to “when we findthem” would be…

Resource: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/36/36-h/36-h.htm#chap14,

http://www.davidbrin.com/nonfiction/shouldsetitransmit.html, https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/stephen-hawking-controversial-physics-black-holes-bets-science/, https://artscolumbia.org/literary-arts/prose/war-worlds-tell-us-human-nature-25393/
Program Book: https://www.worldcon76.org/images/publications/WC76_PocketProgram_2018_Final_WEB08152018.pdf
Image:  https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTyz5mfCZ4KlJUS-L_AF3evIqFEC0HTzIrhGg&usqp=CAU

IDEAS ON TUESDAY 599

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Octavia Butler said, “SF doesn’t really mean anything at all, except that if you use science, you should use it correctly, and if you use your imagination to extend it beyond what we already know, you should do that intelligently.”

SF Trope: “The Chronocops travel in time to catch a Bad Guy who escaped into some other era.”
Current Event: http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/13/opinion/opinion-time-travel-paul-davies/

Bolormaa Teuku scowled at her physics partner, “What do you mean when you ask, ‘Could we travel so fast that we’d start to slide back in time?’”

“We’re supposed to brainstorm, not beat up every idea someone throws out,” said Rayyan Batkhuyag. “The point is to ask questions that may not have immediate answers.”

“Yeah, but the questions have to make sense!”

Rayyan used the vernier jets on his EVA suit to gently turn until he faced the Sun. It loomed giant in space. In the previous century, he would never have been able to do anything like this. But his suit was unlike anything else in the Solar System – except for the rest of the team on the Gravity Well Mission. “You think floating around in mirror suits less than sixty million kilometers from the sun makes any sense?”

Bolormaa grunted as she turned in the same direction. “I see your point.”

“So then – my question: could acceleration reach a point where we would actually go back in time?”

“That’s so very…STAR TREK of you.”

“Right, right, I know. I don’t mean we fly some tiny tin can into the well then yank it out.”

“What do you mean?”

“Gravitational redshift follows on from the equivalence principle that underlies general relativity. The downward force felt by someone in a lift could be equally due to an upward acceleration of the lift or to gravity. Pulses of light sent upwards from a clock on the lift floor will be Doppler shifted, or redshifted, when the lift is accelerating upwards, meaning that this clock will appear to tick more slowly when its flashes are compared at the ceiling of the lift to another clock. Because there is no way to tell gravity and acceleration apart, the same will hold true in a gravitational field; in other words the greater the gravitational pull experienced by a clock, or the closer it is to a massive body, the more slowly it will tick.”

“So?”

“The Doppler effect goes both ways. We’ve been stuck on the red-shift end of the EM spectrum – the effect that stretches out time making it appear to slow down to everyone around it. But we’ve never really looked at time and gravity the other way...”

Bolormaa turned to face Rayyan even though they couldn’t see each other. She finally said, “When an ambulance with a blaring horn is coming toward you, the wavelengths are shortened and we hear a higher pitch – with light it means that the waves are shorter, which means they’re blue.”

“They move faster. So – if we move slow enough, will be go back in time?”

They had continued to roll in space and as they turned to face away from the Sun, there was a brilliant flash of blue light. An instant later, two silvered bubbles floated toward them from the center of the flash…

Names: ♀ Mongolia, Malaysia; ♂ Malaysia, Mongolia
Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e1/Falcon_9_Demo-2_Launching_6_%283%29.jpg/220px-Falcon_9_Demo-2_Launching_6_%283%29.jpg