How easily would aliens occupy earth if they decided to invade?

[Maischou]

What kind of aliens? What kind of invasion?

If you look at the breadth of "invasion" or "conquering" in the litterature, it might not be that black and white. Consider the vast difference between Childhood's End (an almost inevitable conclusion) and The Black Cloud (not-really-but-completely-indefensible conquering).

Unless we intentionally shoehorn ourselves into a specific view of aliens in terms of looks and desires, we're not really in a position to discuss any type of "invasion".

[the game]

Posh? I'm being realistic. The primary materials that make up the Earth are the most abundant in the universe. As much as we might like to think we're really special the truth is we aren't. Judging by the number of exoplanets we've discovered already there are potentially tens of BILLIONS of Earth like worlds in our galaxy alone, why would any species invest that much effort to travel anywhere up to 100,000 light years within our galaxy for anything we might have? It makes absolutely no sense.

to enslave us.

[Venant]

Depends on their technology I guess but one thing I do know is all the progressives will still welcome them in

dude, #NotAllAlliens #TheHighCrusades

[Thoughtcrime]

Did you not read the lore of ancient gods? They are bored so they mess with lesser creatures to cure boredom. a kid kicks an anthill out of boredom. That would be our value.

I dunno, what do you think the chances are that a race millions to billions of years more advanced than us would act like human children?

[Shadowferal]

Then again, the alien could be related to some "Cthulhu" like being...then we're really fucked.

[Kokolums]

I dunno, what do you think the chances are that a race millions to billions of years more advanced than us would act like human children?

What are the odds that a race of humans that took billions of years to evolve would act that way?

[Thoughtcrime]

What are the odds that a race of humans that took billions of years to evolve would act that way?

Oh you're serious? Look, educated human adults don't act the way you described and humanity as a technological civilisation is barely a few thousand years old. An extraterrestrial species capable of interstellar travel is not just possibly, but likely, to be millions or even billions of years ahead of us in any way we can imagine. To anthropomorphise them is a mistake, to infantilise them is a farce.

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to enslave us.

As much as I'd welcome our alien overlords I dunno man! People don't really have much use for slaves, if the limits of automation are realised we won't have much productive use for people. I reckon they might be able to struggle by without us rowing their space ships and picking space cotton.

[Mihalik]

Lets face it guys. If an extraterrestrial species with the ability to travel the stars decided they wanted earth it's highly unlikely that we have anything that would be able to stop them. How long would it take them to conquer earth?

Following reply.

Any civilization capable of interstellar travel wouldn't need to invade another planet. We have absolutely nothing of value to such a species. Likewise if we were able to go to other stars.

The idea of alien invaders is infantile.

We might encounter an alien species that would be hostile on the principle of annihilating sentient life that could in a future reach a technological development level where they might pose a threat.

And while we wouldn't necessarily be able to stop them, we sure as fuck can make the conquest pointless by nuking everything and triggering an environmental collapse, as the only unique resource available on our planet is its biodiversity. Raw resources are much more abundantly available off-world.

[the game]

Oh you're serious? Look, educated human adults don't act the way you described and humanity as a technological civilisation is barely a few thousand years old. An extraterrestrial species capable of interstellar travel is not just possibly, but likely, to be millions or even billions of years ahead of us in any way we can imagine. To anthropomorphise them is a mistake, to infantilise them is a farce.

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As much as I'd welcome our alien overlords I dunno man! People don't really have much use for slaves, if the limits of automation are realised we won't have much productive use for people. I reckon they might be able to struggle by without us rowing their ships through space and picking space cotton.

ok. what if they want to eat us

[PACOX]

Occupy? If they can make it here then it shouldnt be too hard for them to occupy. To make humanity submit? Hard bad do they want the planet? We're assholes to our own neighbors, what makes you think Glorpagorc could kill an insurgency?

[khazlol]

create a super virus and spread it to all major cities from space. watch it kill everyone.

we would never see our invaders

[unbound]

Lets face it guys. If an extraterrestrial species with the ability to travel the stars decided they wanted earth it's highly unlikely that we have anything that would be able to stop them. How long would it take them to conquer earth?

So, imagine the US military with tanks, airplanes, drones, carriers, nuclear weapons, etc decided to take over Egypt circa 3,000 BC. Not only would it not be any contest, it would look to the ancient Egyptians like their gods really did come to Egypt using weapons that they couldn't hope to understand. People dying due to (from their perspective) a sharp bang far away. Or explosions beyond their wildest imaginations. Or birds of absolute terror raining fire.

If an intelligent life came to Earth, the odds that their technology is within 5,000 years of our technology is extremely remote. Their technology would likely be tens of thousands of years more advanced at a minimum. More likely to be hundreds of thousands or millions of years more advanced.

It wouldn't be a matter of being highly unlikely that we would have anything able to stop them. We would die without even understanding what was going on. It would be as if magic were real and lives were snuffed out for no apparent reason at all.

[Moozart]

Lets face it guys. If an extraterrestrial species with the ability to travel the stars decided they wanted earth it's highly unlikely that we have anything that would be able to stop them. How long would it take them to conquer earth?

ANY being that has enough Tech to get here would decimate us.. and fast. We know enough about our galaxy to know there is no real life within any distance any human could ever make it too. That alone means anything getting here is FAR beyond us.

[Thoughtcrime]

We might encounter an alien species that would be hostile on the principle of annihilating sentient life that could in a future reach a technological development level where they might pose a threat.

And while we wouldn't necessarily be able to stop them, we sure as fuck can make the conquest pointless by nuking everything and triggering an environmental collapse, as the only unique resource available on our planet is its biodiversity. Raw resources are much more abundantly available off-world.

Possibly, but they wouldn't be very intelligent. The likelihood of any technological gap ever being closed between 2 species is essentially zero due to the fact that the chances that their technology would be even remotely comparable to our own is also zero. We understand this, I think a sufficiently advanced species would as well.

On the subject of our biodiversity being unique, again it's definitely possible but the truth is that it's probably not that exceptional in a galaxy with over a hundred billion stars and at least as many planets.

In terms of using nuclear scorched earth to deny them, again; I think the technological gap makes that hard to say. It's possible we could destroy the world before they stopped us, but I doubt it.

We don't know if they have a way to shut down all of our technology world wide with a massive EM pulse? Maybe they can move through and manipulate a 4th spacial dimension and just 'take' all of our defenses as easy as you or I can pick up a cup? Maybe they release a swarm of nano machines that infiltrate our planet and only become hostile once a decisive strategic advantage is achieved and then instantly destroys all opposition at the press of a button? They may have such advanced technology that you or I couldn't even comprehend it, let alone combat it.

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ok. what if they want to eat us

I hear we taste like chicken! Can we not just give them chicken?

[Zan15]

they could easily make us kill our selves 10x over and then just walk in to their new planet.

if they wanted it clean they could just give apes some intel potions........

[Zomis]

Lets face it guys. If an extraterrestrial species with the ability to travel the stars decided they wanted earth it's highly unlikely that we have anything that would be able to stop them. How long would it take them to conquer earth?

They already invaded the US!

[Mormolyce]

You'd have to make a lot of assumptions about their technology level, invasion force size and objectives.

They could probably much more easily destroy any space installations we have by then and if desired, glass the planet.

Depends on their technology I guess but one thing I do know is all the progressives will still welcome them in

LOL, you're a real one-note kind of guy aren't you?

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They already invaded the US!

You mean the lizard people in Congress? I thought they were from a subterranean empire.

[kasuke06]

to enslave us.

Have you seen how rebellious and lazy(paradoxically.) humans are? If they wanted live capture then they'd go extinct long before we do.

[Lexia]

They would be like, "Damn, Earth go hard."

Srsly.

[Faesroll]

How long does it take you to trample an ant hill?

I'll probably trip while attempting, knock myself unconscious and get eaten alive