Risa

What I don’t know is why the universal translators don’t work when they want the Klingon to speak Klingon. I figured the lip-sync is from the neural interface link that works like a tiktok filter.

But that’s a good question. How could we explain the embarrassing excess of hominids in science fiction?

Okay - my argument as to why it’s ridiculous hinges on what we’ve seen in earth evolution. Four limbs evolved (we think) exactly once. Hominids once. Human intelligence once. Compare that to things like eyes, flying, swimming, tapered bodies, and so on. I expect, were we ever to find alien life, they might well have some of those properties.

But — What if the scarcity of intelligent hominids on earth was just an artifact, and in fact developing four limbs, running around, and eventually getting a hands and standing up was like eyes on almost every other planet? Our evolutionary history made it, via bad luck, that it only evolved once here. Across every other life-bearing planet, though, it’s as eyes? All of the planets’ ecosystems are teeming with monkey-like creatures. Lizard monkeys. Amphibian monkeys. Spider monkeys. Wait - scratch that last one. Anyway, I’ll leave the explaining why we don’t see all those monkey-aliens to someone else.

For my second opinion, I offer the following filk song:

(Tune: Yellow Rose of Texas )

Well, that glob of nose latex-is The only way, you see To keep down on the budget On Ess Tee: Tee Enn Gee

We blew a million dollars On starship flats and sets So a small glob of latex-is As good as the ail-yuns gets.

CHORUS:

She's the sweetest little alien That Starfleet ever knew Her ears have rubber tips on Held on with Elmer's Glue

We're tops at doing phaser shots And spaceship warp effects But the al-yuns' look latex-is With some wattles on their necks.

INSTRUMENTAL BREAK

So a wad of brown latex-is On the brow of Mr. Worf Anything more complicated Make-up folks call it too torf

With a nose brow for Bajorans Bulgy head for Fer-en-gi A little wad of latex-is The only thing we'll see...