What worst and best of humans would you tell to a friendly extraterrestrial visitor?

[OnlineSamantha]

Well this thread shit the bed. Not surprising once politics started getting involved. I mean classifying either Trump or Biden as the worst of humanity just shows how small your perspective is.

[deathshere]

Question is, do you really think an alien race, that would most likely be far different in every which way to humans, would have any idea on how anything works down here as far as culture, politics, religion or any other thing that is a human construct?

Think of this, everything from various cultures to all the religions on the planet, to all political parties/governments, to money, to economies, even to types of languages we use, are all human constructs. All of it.

The Alphabet(or other human glyph depicting language in written form)? Human construct. Philosophy? Human construct. Various religions? Human constructs. Governments, laws, constitutions? Human constructs. All of it.

An alien race probably will not communicate in the same way humans do. They may communicate via scents, telepathy, infrasound or ultrasound or some other means that we cannot hear or perceive. An alien race may view us as more of a curiosity then an actual intelligent species. An alien race will not care in one bit about our governments, culture, way of life or any other thing that is a human construct other then to possibly learn about it.

BTW, if you really think the US is the most free country in the world, you really need to go read up on a lot of other places. Right to bear arms? Quite a few countries allows you to do that. Freedom of speech? Same. Right to not be searched randomly? Quite a few.

The US constitution doesn't spell out your freedoms. It spells out what the government can and cannot do as far as restricting things.

You obviously don't pay attention to whats been happening in the UFO / ALIEN field for the past 80 years or in recorded human history. Everything you've said about aliens is your own opinion on what you think aliens would be like or are like. If an alien race is smart enough to travel to another planet, im pretty sure they would have already figured out how to talk to the beings that they would come across on those planets. That is simple common sense. They would also have advanced technology far superior than what you have on this planet with technologies and energy means.

"An alien race will not care in one bit about our governments, culture, way of life or any other thing that is a human construct other then to possibly learn about it."

You are not a alien race, so you cannot speak about what they would and wouldn't care about. I've dealt with people who think like you, and you all always try to think for others. STOP DOING THAT.

"BTW, if you really think the US is the most free country in the world, you really need to go read up on a lot of other places. Right to bear arms? Quite a few countries allows you to do that. Freedom of speech? Same. Right to not be searched randomly? Quite a few."

Start naming them.

[Shadowferal]

Question is, do you really think an alien race, that would most likely be far different in every which way to humans, would have any idea on how anything works down here as far as culture, politics, religion or any other thing that is a human construct?
Think of this, everything from various cultures to all the religions on the planet, to all political parties/governments, to money, to economies, even to types of languages we use, are all human constructs. All of it.
The Alphabet(or other human glyph depicting language in written form)? Human construct. Philosophy? Human construct. Various religions? Human constructs. Governments, laws, constitutions? Human constructs. All of it.
An alien race probably will not communicate in the same way humans do. They may communicate via scents, telepathy, infrasound or ultrasound or some other means that we cannot hear or perceive. An alien race may view us as more of a curiosity then an actual intelligent species. An alien race will not care in one bit about our governments, culture, way of life or any other thing that is a human construct other then to possibly learn about it.
BTW, if you really think the US is the most free country in the world, you really need to go read up on a lot of other places. Right to bear arms? Quite a few countries allows you to do that. Freedom of speech? Same. Right to not be searched randomly? Quite a few.
The US constitution doesn't spell out your freedoms. It spells out what the government can and cannot do as far as restricting things.

*nods* When I was writing up stuff, I had a laundry list of things that needed to be checked against when involving an alien world and aliens. Having an understandable and comparable structure of morality and ethic was definitely on that list. (That such would have to be more or less positively aligned with our own goes without saying.)

[Dezerte]

Start naming them.

This is off-topic enough already, but there are several indexes that track freedom using different metrics here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_freedom_indices

[gondrin]

You obviously don't pay attention to whats been happening in the UFO / ALIEN field for the past 80 years or in recorded human history. Everything you've said about aliens is your own opinion on what you think aliens would be like or are like. If an alien race is smart enough to travel to another planet, im pretty sure they would have already figured out how to talk to the beings that they would come across on those planets. That is simple common sense. They would also have advanced technology far superior than what you have on this planet with technologies and energy means.

"An alien race will not care in one bit about our governments, culture, way of life or any other thing that is a human construct other then to possibly learn about it."

You are not a alien race, so you cannot speak about what they would and wouldn't care about. I've dealt with people who think like you, and you all always try to think for others. STOP DOING THAT.

"BTW, if you really think the US is the most free country in the world, you really need to go read up on a lot of other places. Right to bear arms? Quite a few countries allows you to do that. Freedom of speech? Same. Right to not be searched randomly? Quite a few."

Start naming them.

Ok, last reply as it is off topic and won't go any further.

I am not speaking nor will ever speak for any other aliens. I do not know what an alien race will be like in any way shape or form. Neither do you. Yet, you assume that they would care one bit about our government, culture, economy, religion or any other human construct. I assume nothing. An alien race will be so far removed from us that our concepts of how we deal with society(in all its forms) will be foreign to them. An alien race will not know our language in any way shape or form other then by transmission but if they cannot hear anything(not all forms of life have hearing) but perceive the world in a far different way, then communicating with them would be near impossible as we rely on our sight and ears to communicate.

You assume the human race is so self important other then to itself that an alien species would think of the human race other then a curiosity. I don't. Fun fact, anything outside of a 100 LY bubble, ANYTHING past that point will NOT know we are here. That is the furthest any transmission or signal that would show we were here.

However, Canada has all the same freedoms and rights Americans do. Every single one. Switzerland, Mexico, Japan, Israel, Germany and others have the exact same rights as the US does. Every single one. You made the claim that others do not. Prove any one of those do NOT have the same rights as the US.

Anyway, offtopic too much.

On topic. Best would be ingenuity. Worst would be the wanton destruction and segregation of their fellow humans based on superficial things.

[deathshere]

Best: The invention of instant ramen.

Worst: Our ability to come up with 50 different ways to mutilate someone with a kitchen knife.

i'd say cheese > ramen

[XDurionX]

This is off-topic enough already, but there are several indexes that track freedom using different metrics here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_freedom_indices

On topic and worth noting: The US isn't close to being #1 in any of them.

[deathshere]

Ok, last reply as it is off topic and won't go any further.

I am not speaking nor will ever speak for any other aliens. I do not know what an alien race will be like in any way shape or form. Neither do you. Yet, you assume that they would care one bit about our government, culture, economy, religion or any other human construct. I assume nothing. An alien race will be so far removed from us that our concepts of how we deal with society(in all its forms) will be foreign to them. An alien race will not know our language in any way shape or form other then by transmission but if they cannot hear anything(not all forms of life have hearing) but perceive the world in a far different way, then communicating with them would be near impossible as we rely on our sight and ears to communicate.

You assume the human race is so self important other then to itself that an alien species would think of the human race other then a curiosity. I don't. Fun fact, anything outside of a 100 LY bubble, ANYTHING past that point will NOT know we are here. That is the furthest any transmission or signal that would show we were here.

However, Canada has all the same freedoms and rights Americans do. Every single one. Switzerland, Mexico, Japan, Israel, Germany and others have the exact same rights as the US does. Every single one. You made the claim that others do not. Prove any one of those do NOT have the same rights as the US.

Anyway, offtopic too much.

On topic. Best would be ingenuity. Worst would be the wanton destruction and segregation of their fellow humans based on superficial things.

Canadians do not have the right to bear arms.

"I am not speaking nor will ever speak for any other aliens."
Thats exactly what you're doing you are assuming they wouldn't care. >> "An alien race will not care in one bit about our governments, culture, way of life or any other thing that is a human construct other then to possibly learn about it."

just like you assume anything out of a 100 LY bubble wouldn't know we are here. You are putting your own limitations on "aliens" that you know nothing about. How do you not see this? Your mind is stuck thinking that aliens would only have or be able to detect human forms of transmission. You have not thought of " what if, aliens have a far superior method of detection and communication than humans on earth have? You are doing the same thing everyone else has ever done. Putting a human perspective, with human limitations, and applying it to the rest of the known AND UNKNOWN UNIVERSE Technology only goes forward and beings create technology to do something they cannot do. Aliens could have cloaked ships completely undiscoverable to any current forms of detection, in space or even on earth hundreds of miles under the surface of the earth, and you wouldn't know anything about it.

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On topic and worth noting: The US isn't close to being #1 in any of them.

hong kong is #1 on one of the lists lol ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

but anyways back to the topic

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

There is one thing about asking, but once you start DEMANDING that someone speaks to you some type of way or FORCE them to call you by pronouns, that thats where i draw the line, and if they don't do it you start screeching like some untrained wild animal.

Truly, so much worse than slavery is to be FORCED to call someone by their preferred pronouns. Absolutely the worst thing about humanity is to DEMAND to be treated with respect.

[Nihilist74]

I would tell them that humans are sentient but we still have animal instincts and those animal instincts get the best of us often.

[Shadowferal]

That our country isn't the best, but it used to be.

[PC2]

The best thing about humanity is our infinite capacity to improve in every possible way.

The worst of humanity is our irrational bias in favor of pessimism. Pessimists are the worst... Those same people probably think aliens would genocide us too, even though there's no good reason for that to happen.

[Powerogue]

Best of humanity: Cat videos. Sorry humanity, you've really lowered my expectations the last few years, but cat videos are eternal.

Worst of humanity: Our myriad of cognitives biases that make our "higher intellect" full of holes and yet simultaneously almost impossible to convince people they've been wrong about something, leading people to double and triple down on terrible ideas that have indirectly caused most of the world's wars and destruction.

[HansOlo]

Say a friendly extraterrestrial visitor came and approached you, personally. It then asked you:

"What is the best of humanity?"

and

"What is the worst of humanity?"


What would you tell this visitor about us?

Best:
Innocence of a baby.

Worst:
Innocence of an adult.

[Logwyn]

Worst: Our ability to come up with 50 different ways to mutilate someone with a kitchen knife.

There are only 50?

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Do you want an honest answer... or the answer I would give to this type of question in a job interview?

You've had a job interview where they asked this?

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Say a friendly extraterrestrial visitor came and approached you, personally. It then asked you:

"What is the best of humanity?"

and

"What is the worst of humanity?"


What would you tell this visitor about us?

I would return their questions with a question. That question is, "Why do you ask?"

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

You've had a job interview where they asked this?

I'm referring to the "What's your biggest flaw?" question employers sometimes ask...where you give off a bullshit answer like "Well, I guess the worse thing about myself is that I work too hard" or something along those lines rather than answer honestly.

[Logwyn]

I'm referring to the "What's your biggest flaw?" question employers sometimes ask...where you give off a bullshit answer like "Well, I guess the worse thing about myself is that I work too hard" or something along those lines rather than answer honestly.

I got ya!! Thanks for sharing!

[Biglog]

Best: Love, which notably AI often point out as the best human trait. Love is something we see in the animal world sometimes also, but at it's best the human capacity to love is evolved.

Worst: War, hate, selfishness, cruelty.

That said, and advanced civilization capable of interstellar travel would probably not need to ask this question. A species even 1% more advanced than ourselves would be almost incomprehensibly ahead in technology and intelligence. We do not need to understand the language of animals in a zoo to understand their behavior, some observation for a fairly short time tells us that. And aliens would likely do the same, observing without our knowledge or intervention like we're animals behind pane of glass at a zoo. Humans can essentially do that today to each other with stealthy spy aircraft, drones, and satellites, so it would be fairly trivial for an advanced interstellar species to observe us without our knowledge. And there have been more than a few credible UFO sightings that make you wonder.

[Forogil]

I'm referring to the "What's your biggest flaw?" question employers sometimes ask...where you give off a bullshit answer like "Well, I guess the worse thing about myself is that I work too hard" or something along those lines rather than answer honestly.

That brought back memory of a specific Dilbert strip.
https://dilbert.com/strip/1995-04-16

[Kumorii]

Best: Ingenuity and teamwork

Worst: Arrogance and being a flock species.