Re:Why do we assume extraterrestrials might want to visit us?
by soufron on Thursday January 21, 2021 @02:35PM
(#25863106)
"If we ever invent a time machine I doubt we'd learn much from humans of 10,000 years ago. There would be some surprises for historians and archaeologists, but we certainly wouldn't treat them as cultural or technological equals."
That's only your opinion, and it's most probably wrong. These guys were capable of feats you can only dream of. And you could be very surprised at their level of sophistication, which might appear higher than us on many levels - if not on all levels.
Re:Why do we assume extraterrestrials might want to visit us?
by OnlyMortal on Thursday January 21, 2021 @03:10PM
(#25863567)
Quite. It’s an insult to our ancestors to dismiss their ability to use their technology.
The ruins we find around the world from previous civilisations tell us they were very smart.
Re:Why do we assume extraterrestrials might want to visit us?
by at-fates-hands on Thursday January 21, 2021 @03:09PM
(#25863560)
> There would be some surprises for historians and archaeologists, but we certainly wouldn't treat them as cultural or technological equals.
Generally speaking, about once a year, archeologists find something that completely challenges their theories on human evolution.
https://www.livescience.com/biggest-archaeology-discoveries-...
Just the amount of engineering the Egyptians did is enough to warrant our continued fascination with their culture, some 5,000 years later.
Or even a million years ago.
If we ever invent a time machine I doubt we'd learn much from humans of 10,000 years ago. There would be some surprises for historians and archaeologists, but we certainly wouldn't treat them as cultural or technological equals.
So the horizon of interest where an encounter would be fascinating and worth the time and effort but not devastatingly disruptive to either side is probably only a few millennia.
But let's call it +/- 10k years, to be generous.
Compare with the age of the universe, or even of the galaxy. It's really not a big proportion of the available time.