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Try to kill them
Or they try to kill us.
But also possibly convert us.
Then try to kill us.
If a civilization has the kind of power to reach us, we wouldn't pose any problem at all.
Doesn’t mean they wouldn’t try to kill us. Options include:
it’s possible they have cultural reasons (genocidal xenophobia, paranoia.
they find us annoying
we’re just in the way.
they don’t even notice us and they’re xenoforming Earth.
they’d rather hang with the whales
One thing is certain, though. The only thing special about earth is the life it holds. (Not that it has life, just that that life is unique.) so if they do show up it’s almost certainly not going to be covertly.
You clearly haven’t watched Star Trek. /s
The aliens could be coming here covertly to observe us like a nature documentary. They may even have non-interference rules for primitive cultures. Or maybe they’re just shy.
physics is a bitch.
Voyager 1 is likely going to be the first probe of human make to pass close to another star ("Close" means a closest approach of 1.7 lightyears, roughly), Voyager one is headed towards Glease 445. That journey will take roughly 40,000 years, and it won't have the power to slow down as would be needed. It would require considerably more fuel to make a helocentric insertion.
Sure, it's possible some more advanced probe is going to come along and 'get there' first. but whatever.
The kind of delta-v required for that would also be incredibly obvious. the platform coming from another star would be massive, and if the goal was to stick around, there is absolutely no place in space for it to hide. which means if they come, they're not coming quietly.
(fun fact, the IRL counterpart to Star Trek's warp drive is called the Alcubierre drive. It's just theoretically possible. But, it's not able to go FTL since it violates causality.)
(also fun fact... it's quite the opposite. I've watched far too much star trek. and star wars. and farscape. and babylon 5 and sg1 and, uhm. lots of trashy b-rated stuff we're not going to mention.)
The /s was to indicate sarcasm. You’re on Lemmy—you’ve definitely watched every episode of Star Trek. /s
I’m with you on the science, but I also leave a little room for the possibility that we don’t know what we don’t know. There is a lot of theory within our scientific cannon about multiple dimensions, folding space time, wormholes, etc, and we barely understand how any of it works. It’s perhaps unlikely, but possible that there is a level of scientific understanding which resolves these issues and makes long distance space travel doable.
The good news is there is almost certainly life out there.
Maybe even closer than we realize. (Potentially on Europa, for example.)