this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2024
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Hard disagree. Yes, all the other crazy bullshit would continue, but aliens are here among us isn’t something that would just go away.
I'm with you. Yes, people acclimate to all kinds of things, but sentient aliens are going to take more than a few days.
Idk. A few years ago the US Government released videos of UFOs taken by US Fighter Pilots, and the conversation about the videos didn't even last a day.
The clue is in the name. The U stands for unidentified, which means you don't know what it is, which does not in turn mean that it's aliens. The only thing those videos proved was that someone's camera recorded something weird. Prove that those weird things were actually aliens and not some obscure sensor glitch or weather phenomenon or a secret government tech demo, then we'll freak out.
I remember watching them and the conversation about them. But that's different than proof and admission that sentient alien life exists. It's one thing to suspect while also having other possible explanations (could be secret tech that we or adversary nations developed, could be sensor errors or optical illusions) and another for the president to be like "I want you to meet ambassador Xlurg"
People will absolutely have a hard shit about it when it happens, but I think that, after so much sci-fi exposure in our culture, humanity (or, most of it) would be able to wrap their heads around the idea of extra-terrestrial aliens. Unfortunately, a lot would probably just see them the same way they see any other “aliens”, and be xenophobic (or exoxenophobic as the case may be) jerks about it.
We almost certainly will be meeting/interacting with alien tech if it ever happens. Living things just aren’t likely to be evolved to travel the vast distances between stars.
Gonna be AIs talking, if it ever happens.
There’s part of an episode in Orville about this very topic. I need to finish up that show.
Within a month, corporations would try to monetize the aliens somehow.
Oh, wow, you’re totally gonna love Star Trek when you finally see all 58 years of the shows and films. Then there’s Dr. Who and Star Wars…
Sci-fi has been a very profitable genre for at least 60 years. Arguably over 150. From Jules Verne to Gene Roddenberry to George Lucas and Russel T Davies, the imagination of humanity has been ignited— even stoked to wildfire - by these visionaries.
And they’ve existed and continued far beyond the realm of simple profit, as many times, they weren’t profitable. Yet they endure.
Ad astra per aspera— through adversity, we reach for the stars.
Yeah. It would trigger a shit storm in 10 years time we wouldn't spend all day every day talking about the day we found out aliens existed, we would be talking about the ongoing wars arising as a result of their tech or some other thing.
At some point it would. We still gotta go to work and no one has enough energy to even give a fuck about potential aliens around us.
Will I have to keep going to work? Then it doesn't change my linfe enough for me to care so much. I know it's a bad thought but life is hard for individuals and it's hard to care to for aliens if they are not helping feed the kids