Discovery Gaming Community

' Wrote:Scenario:

Aliens have landed. Their ships hang in the skies over our cities. They're not friendly

Problem:

They're so technologically advanced, they make us look like cavemen.
Situation:

What would you SAY to convince the Aliens that we are better allies than enemies?

What do we know about them?

Their numbers, tech level? When did we notice them? When they entered Solar system, or when they got closer to the Earth, or they "uncloaked" over our cities in a blink of an eye? How much time passed since their arrival? That's important because it'll determine our state of "readiness" and a phase we'll be in when they issue their ultimatum.

How do we know they're hostile?

What are their reasons of exterminating us?


All of these questions are important, otherwise it's, as some people call it, "A spherical horse in the vacuum"

' Wrote:You, sir, do not read your own threads attentively before sumarizing them.

More shockingly, you don't even read back correctly before declaring something as not having been said by someone who just told you he said it.

I said the only hope was to do as Mc Hammer does: Pray. The link in my post just before you said nobody mentioned religion leads to Mc Hammer asking people to pray, not to internet porn.

you miss my point. you mentioned prayer as in 'appeal to the beard in the sky', rather than introducing the concept of religion to the aliens.
I kinda stopped reading your posts after you mentioned porn and McHammer, as it wasn't the level of debate that i was seeking. Sorry.

Quote:Wondering what could replace Nitrogene in our atmosphere, which is about the same density, is not lethal for humans, and they got it in such a quantity and quality, that they would be glad to trade.

you need an inert gas. our atmosphere is 80?% nitrogen, a rich source for an alien species who wanted it.

Quote:What do we know about them?

Their numbers, tech level? When did we notice them? When they entered Solar system, or when they got closer to the Earth, or they "uncloaked" over our cities in a blink of an eye? How much time passed since their arrival? That's important because it'll determine our state of "readiness" and a phase we'll be in when they issue their ultimatum.

How do we know they're hostile?

What are their reasons of exterminating us?


All of these questions are important, otherwise it's, as some people call it, "A spherical horse in the vacuum"

we know nothing about them, they just jumped right in, at the top of the atmosphere. I was more interested in other peep's opinion of our options, rather than a detailed tactical breakdown.

' Wrote:we know nothing about them, they just jumped right in, at the top of the atmosphere. I was more interested in other peep's opinion of our options, rather than a detailed tactical breakdown.

"Detailed tactical breakdown" is what will affect our options, and this is what our decision makers will be basing on. Because if we're in completely unreal scenario, or scenario when they have SO advanced tech that they've been able to move their motherships on top of our cities in the blink of an eye, literally teleporting there, and they have enough of them to fully cover all major cities.. something tells me that this number is an overkill for a nitrogen harvesting operation, even if it involves whole planet.


That also means that they've put alot of resources into that operation. And that means, that they're not planning to step back, and all the nuclear arsenal of earth (currently at 10k+, or so, including tactical and low yield ones) is not enough to prevent them from doing what they're going to do - in worst case they'll just teleport away during the initial attack like they teleported on top of our cities.

If we go by this logic, and assume that their consciousness operates on the same or similiar level (and it should, otherwise we would have big trouble communicating), then their decision makers are not eager to surrender to any nonsense/sentimental things we'll be trying to persuade them in, like peace, love, humanism etc. You do not cancel a planetary harvesting operation on the outskirts of galaxy that you spent THAT much resources on (since their ships are covering the skies over our cities, aren't they?) just because local aborigines will sing you a lovely song. Especially if you've planned that operation (and such things are not being done on the fly), you know at least something about your targeted planet, and you know what'll happen to local population.



All that means, that the most probable option is a "trade off" scenario, that will largely depend on our ability to prevent or harm their harvesting operations, thus increasing the total cost of the operation and reducing the amount of nitrogen harvested, and/or increasing the effort required to harvest it. If everything else fails, just detonate every single piece of nuclear armament in the silos (although, it'd be really better to throw those at them. But this is where we get into delivery systems vs their defense....)

They want nitrogen, we want to stay alive, but if we won't, they'll have problems with getting it as well.
This is where the trade starts, and that's what we'll be talking about.


Also, we can't simply exchange it for some other gas, because it's extremely important for our ecosystem.
http://www.windows2universe.org/earth/Life...ogen_cycle.html
It's same like they'd want to rip us off the oxygen or water or some other very important resource.

Quote:You do not cancel a planetary harvesting operation on the outskirts of galaxy that you spent THAT much resources on (since their ships are covering the skies over our cities, aren't they?) just because local aborigines will sing you a lovely song.

that made me laugh. however, this is a humanocentric argument, in that throughout our history, when a more technologically advanced civilisation has approached ones with lower tech but higher resources, it generally ends up with the little guy getting whacked.

if the aliens had the tech to teleport in over the cities, it might be because they had no inkling that sentient life existed here; but the existence of sentient life might be a factor in a persuasive argument, in the same way that we don't have a problem mining silicon, but would stop if the mountain we were mining suddenly started talking back.

my initial thoughts were along the lines of 'we're an aggressive species, and very resourceful, creative and adaptive; we can live in the hottest of deserts, the coldest of ice-scapes, and exist in outer space and under the oceans... you may consider us roaches now, but its better to make a deal with us when you're in a position of strength, rather than in a century's time when you're in a position of weakness' or something.

however, i also think that we could offer them something that they cannot manufacture or access by other means: our viewpoint. in any discussion, if all the members of the group are identical clones, then the group quickly reaches concensus. in a disparate group, the consensus is reached far less quickly, but it stands a greater chance of not being an erroneous conclusion. the phrase 'you cant see the wood for the trees' sums up what im trying to say here.