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Carl Sagan was wrong about one thing


ambelamba

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Being warlike doesn't equal being good at waging wars at all. Commencing a military operation demands a tremendous amount of organization skills, manpower management, resource allocations, leadership and whatnot.

In a word, if we face aliens with hostile actions on us...we are utterly screwed because chances are we will be dealing with some real professionals who believe that their actions are morally right.

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But if we face benevolent aliens, we should be good to go.

"Have a cuppa and a nice sandwich."

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Oh, and what did Sagan say about what you said? I missed that part.

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Yes, what was the Sagan quote, in context...

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Yes, what was the Sagan quote, in context...

Sagan was a scientist limited to orthodox principles and well out of his depth in terms of Ufology.

Horses for courses. You wouldn't ask a lumberjack to perform open heart surgery.

Think about it.

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To the Above Quote:

" In a word, if we face aliens with hostile actions on us...we are utterly screwed because chances are

we will be dealing with some real professionals who believe that their actions are morally right."

I would say:

'Well, if I were a Smart Alien, I would think twice of being hostile, or attacking a planet - that is stacked full with nuclear bombs, countless war planes, war ships and armies in every nation. And if they have studied us humans than they would know - that we have waged 'professional' wars on ourselves for thousands of years - to this very day. They would realise - that we are a pretty murderous, treacherous, violent, warlike species.

So - If I were a realy smart alien I would stay away from that EARTH Hornets Nest ! '
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@ambelamba

As your title is "Carl Sagan was wrong about one thing" please provide the direct quote you wish to discuss

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Sagan was a scientist limited to orthodox principles and well out of his depth in terms of Ufology.

Horses for courses. You wouldn't ask a lumberjack to perform open heart surgery.

Think about it.

I think its more a case of there being very little science in ufology unfortunately

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I think its more a case of there being very little science in ufology unfortunately

Very little of (primitive) modern science. Yes I agree.

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Being warlike doesn't equal being good at waging wars at all. Commencing a military operation demands a tremendous amount of organization skills, manpower management, resource allocations, leadership and whatnot.

In a word, if we face aliens with hostile actions on us...we are utterly screwed because chances are we will be dealing with some real professionals who believe that their actions are morally right.

Depends on the aliens, we may or may not be screwed. Just because they have the technology to make it to our home, doesn't mean they're smart enough to fight a war. The universe is too big of a place to think that every alien is exactly as you described.

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Being warlike doesn't equal being good at waging wars at all. Commencing a military operation demands a tremendous amount of organization skills, manpower management, resource allocations, leadership and whatnot.

In a word, if we face aliens with hostile actions on us...we are utterly screwed because chances are we will be dealing with some real professionals who believe that their actions are morally right.

If that's a Carl Sagan quote...I would have to agree with the late Carl Sagan on that one. Since so far...the otherworlder's have only peaceably invaded our Earth, any hostile invasion by them on our home planet, would probably be logical to assume that they would think "that their actions are morally right." Hopefully.... not that I would go down like a sheep going to slaughter.

Edited by Erno86
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Sagan was a scientist limited to orthodox principles and well out of his depth in terms of Ufology.

Horses for courses. You wouldn't ask a lumberjack to perform open heart surgery.

Think about it.

Yes, you're probably better off consulting someone like J.K. Rowling on the subject of ufos.

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Sagan was a scientist limited to orthodox principles and well out of his depth in terms of Ufology.

Horses for courses. You wouldn't ask a lumberjack to perform open heart surgery.

Think about it.

Yes, Zozer. Who would choose the tyranny of logic and reason over the freedom of fear and wild speculation? Why settle for the verifiable when you can just invent your own facts and shape them into whatever mythology you like? There is no telling how far humanity would have advanced if only scientists would have had the insight to place the fantastic on the same level as the mundane.

Edited by sinewave
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Well, that got derailed

Honestly, where was that really headed? People come here all of the time to express their fears of alien invasion in one way or another. This was just one of those threads.

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Yeah fair enough. These just seem to run off into people screaming insults at each other after the introduction of a specific X factor

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Oh, my bad. I thought that people in here know about what Sagan said. To paraphrase, he asserted that any warlike civilization will self-destruct before they attain inter-stellar travel capability. He implied that our first encounter will be with some really peaceful beings.

I kinda disagree. And one more thing, chances are our hypothetical alien invaders will know A LOT about us already. Back in the Gulf War, aka CNN Firecracker Show, The US military knew the locations of all the phone and electrical lines in Baghdad. Same thing about alien invasion. We can't rule out the possibility that they know so much about the inner workings of global politics already, knowing whom to convince to join them for proxies and servants.

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Oh, my bad. I thought that people in here know about what Sagan said. To paraphrase, he asserted that any warlike civilization will self-destruct before they attain inter-stellar travel capability. He implied that our first encounter will be with some really peaceful beings.

Hi, could you provide the original quote as a reference point, paraphrasing it kind of puts your own spin on it. Thanks

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Sagan believed that the Drake equation, on substitution of reasonable estimates, suggested that a large number of extraterrestrial civilizations would form, but that the lack of evidence of such civilizations highlighted by the Fermi paradox suggests technologicalcivilizations tend to self-destruct. This stimulated his interest in identifying and publicizing ways that humanity could destroy itself, with the hope of avoiding such a cataclysm and eventually becoming a spacefaring species.

A slight variation from wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Sagan But the core idea is same. I remember reading Cosmos and Sagan asserted in the book that spacefaring culture should be reasonably peaceful

I do not disagree with his notion that aliens visiting Earth are capable of being peaceful. Heck, we Americans are capable of being peaceful. We just don't try. Same with aliens. I bet they have their own politics and internal conflicts. There are doves and hawks everywhere you go.

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Oh, my bad. I thought that people in here know about what Sagan said. To paraphrase, he asserted that any warlike civilization will self-destruct before they attain inter-stellar travel capability. He implied that our first encounter will be with some really peaceful beings.

I kinda disagree. And one more thing, chances are our hypothetical alien invaders will know A LOT about us already. Back in the Gulf War, aka CNN Firecracker Show, The US military knew the locations of all the phone and electrical lines in Baghdad. Same thing about alien invasion. We can't rule out the possibility that they know so much about the inner workings of global politics already, knowing whom to convince to join them for proxies and servants.

Perhaps but there are still some small matters that this hypothesis overlooks. The first one being the time it would take to traverse the interstellar space between us and even our nearest neighbor. Yeah, I know - advanced technology. Heard it all before. There is still no evidence that greater-than-light speed is even possible. Secondly, we would have to be noticed. Other than being a water planet in the "habitable zone" of our star, there is not much about us or our planet that would attract attention let alone make some other civilization travel huge distances to gain intel much less stage an invasion.

Edited by sinewave
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Even if they weren't hostile, chances are that they'd wipe us out. Similar to europeans coming to america, new diseases, new technology beyond what had been.

It never ends well for the natives.

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Typical man, who thinks "hostile and attack" is the nature of everything.

Something advanced enough to find a way to travel the Universe and find its way to this planet with life on, I would hope has evolved into a species clever enough to know that killing and wars are primitive traits, something we still have, hence why we are no where near as advanced as they are, but so far, there has not been an encounter to establish who "they are", maybe we are not ready to meet anything more advanced than us, we need to evolve more, unless we kill ourselves 1st and just become another primitive species which once lived on this planet, like the dinosaurs (no disrepect to the dinosaurs).

Edited by freetoroam
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What makes killing and war primitive?

it's a tool like anything else, and the proper tactics of war can be very intricate. Now a blunt force war, sure I can see that being primitive, so if that's what you mean I apologize.

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Even if they weren't hostile, chances are that they'd wipe us out. Similar to europeans coming to america, new diseases, new technology beyond what had been.

It never ends well for the natives.

Exactly, we tend to project our tendencies onto our real and imagined enemies.

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Until were given evidence they act differently all we have to go on is the history of similar events.

Taking the human aspect out of it, when a superior creature is added to an ecosystem it can be disastorous

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