Quote:
Originally Posted by bojan
I must strongly disagree with this statement.
The evolution in general prefers aggressive species - they have advantage over other, less aggressive and capable to protect or claim their living space and territory.
As a result, humans are what they are, aggressive and seeking control even over other, human "tribes" (read: nations cultures etc).
To me it is quite obvious that evolution on other inhabited planets will result in very similar (if not much worse) behaviour of successful species.
So, I fully agree with Dr. Hawking opinion on the issue. Better be safe than sorry.
|
Hmm .. I think the process of Natural Selection results in the selection for those traits which result in the survival of a species for the ultimate purpose of achieving propagation through reproduction.
Aggression may be one such trait in a specific resource constricted, over-populated and thus, competitive environment, but there could easily be other environments and behaviours, which provide no dominance for aggressive species (eg: symbiosis, etc).
Also, certain traits detached from their native environments can quickly result in any competitive advantage completely disappearing, thereby resulting in the demise of that species. The encounter between an alien species and an Earth-originating species could go either way as far as I can imagine .. and then it depends on what environment the encounter occurs in. Neither humans nor aliens might survive.
In an inconceivably large universe (with similarly large starting conditions/permutations), Evolution itself, may also look chaotic and thus unpredictable.
Interesting.
Cheers