So They Showed Up In Orbit - What Do We Do Now?

So let us picture it: some amateur astronomers with some pretty good telescope set ups are asteroid / comet hunting, scanning the night skies with images they've taken with their digital cameras attached to their telescopes (trust me, no one does asteroid / comet hunting with just their eyes looking in an eye piece anymore, not when a digital camera can pick up such faint objects easier).

Looking through their images, they see the movement of a faint object. Success! They've found something that doesn't match anything else that is known, so there's a good chance to have the object named after them!

They go to the IAU (the International Astronomical Union) and report their findings. Professional astronomers take a look, and indeed, it's something new. They begin to keep an eye on it so they can predict it's orbit in our solar system. After many observations, it looks like it has a very hyperbolic orbit, seeming to have originated from well outside the Kuiper Belt area, and it's orbital path is going to bring it quite close to Earth. In fact....close enough to cause worry.

As the weeks past and the object get's closer......much larger telescopes show it to be a very irregular shape, and it's orbit will come within several hundred miles of the Earth....a potentially colliding orbit......except when it gets close enough, something happens......it's forward motion begins to slow, as though something is slowing it down for orbital insertion..........and when it gets close enough to be seen clearly:



There is now some sort of extraterrestrial craft parked in orbit above us........

What do we do now?



The above that I typed just maybe how first contact with an alien civilization might happen. I thought it would be kind of interesting to get all of your opinions and thoughts about what you think would happen next, based upon a few different scenarios.

Let's list the different ones here. Comment on the ones you have ideas on or all of them if you have ideas on all of them. One thing I know for sure from my time here on ATS: all of you have some of the most interesting ideas and imaginations. I may not agree with you all the time, but I sure do love reading what you think.

Scenario One: It's a probe!



For this scenario, the spacecraft is some unmanned (unaliened?) probe, sent out for research. It could be something that came here from a nearby star system, still fully operational, or it could be non-functioning, something that was made millions of years ago, adrift in space, with just enough functionality to obtain orbit about the Earth.

Scenario Two: It's manned. They are explorers or scouts



These are beings who are exploring. They search systems looking for life, maybe they even picked up transmissions from Earth. They are here to make contact. Are they friendly? Are they so advanced in technology that they don't care about us or anything we have to offer? What happens next?

Scenario Three: It's a colony ship



Uh oh......turns out this is a huge colony ship. This trip was a one way ticket for them. They were looking for a new home. Possibly thousands to hundreds of thousands of them on board.

What do we do? Do we invite them to stay? Can they integrate into human society?

Scenario Four: Say Hello To Our Overlords



So it turns out that these are now the new bad guys. They are always in a bad mood, xenophobic and really have decided to go around space invading new worlds.

What would happen to us? Can we stop them with a computer virus? Will throwing water on them melt them? Will playing a yodeling recording cause their brains to explode? Will the common cold wipe them out?

Or....in my opinion....will they simply blink and we are no more?





So, let me and others hear your thoughts. Give us your ideas, even if it's nothing more than pure speculation (that's why I put it here in Skunk Works).

Advanced societies tend to enslave/eliminate more primitive societies.

If advanced aliens show up... pray that you are cute enough to be a pet...

S&F for the Mars Attacks reference...

I don't know, but my thoughts lead to if they have all this technology and the brains or whatever to use it. That perhaps they are not interested is crushing life form all over the galaxy

I was and have been toying with a whacky what if.

They come here for resources and things of value.

None of our most brilliant will be of immediate worth. What would our technology, science, and math mean to them? They've already gone far beyond.

But ... those who are artists and artisans who produce the unique produce of our planet and its cultures. They have the skills that take lifetimes to learn and hone and cannot be so easily absorbed. The humble potter, the grandmother knitting, the ballerina, etc. - these are suddenly people of worth because they have skills and techniques to produce objects unique to the universe.

a reply to: WUNK22

That could be true.

But remember: they are alien. The way they think and act will be the product of their own environment. Just like we are.

Not to get too silly but: What if they are some sort of mineral based life. Rock Aliens so to speak. They may not think biological life is "life as they know it".

Or they do but.......they flew over a rock quarry and saw us crushing rock into gravel.......

I tend to wiggle, gleefully, when I get belly rubs... (write this down, alien dudes)... I am mostly housebroken as well...

a reply to: eriktheawful

I'd go to work.

Honestly.

What else could I do?

I suppose there will be widespread panic.

I'd hope like hell that "they" wouldn't kill me or mine. But with the idiots running the world?

We'd more than likely be toast.


all hail our alien overlords

a reply to: eriktheawful

From one of my books

I continued, “I have checked the information systems of Ressalon and no one in all of recorded history has ever disabled a Demon with the ease that you guys managed to do. No one has ever thought of firing microwaves as you did. In fact, no one has tried to use micro-waves before for any purpose that I could find.

I checked with the Ressalon Builders and they also have never considered microwaves to be anything other than an annoyance to be shielded against. Any questions now?”

Q4 had a question, “How come?”

I smiled and answered, “Earth has gone down a certain path. You discovered electricity and have developed it to an unusual level. Other races can go down many different paths. Ressalon computers use light and crystalline structures to do what you do with electricity and silicon wafers. On many worlds plasma energy runs in conduits in much the same way as you run electricity in wires.

There are races that have conquered FTL without having as much as an electronic calculator. What you would call magic others see as a science of extreme complexity. It is all so variable. One single discovery can lead a whole planet on a particular path that can be so very different to another planet. There are endless possibilities.”

Thus, any visitors may have some better tech than we have, but some of ours will be unknown to them.

Energy weapons are fine, but missiles are homing! They may take one look at an atomic warhead and poo their pants ... assuming they have pants and in fact poop ... which they may not.

It is all so variable. What would we do? Well in the first setup, we would grab the probe to learn its secrets.

P

a reply to: DBCowboy

Hahaha!


"I'd go to work like normal"

You have me a flash back to "Shaun Of The Dead"

I would think rational people would start asking questions and attempting some sort of communication regime. Meanwhile I'm sure a variation of weapons would be manned and intel gathering would be of the utmost importance. The media would all be on the same talking points and nothing would detract from whatever the narrative may be.

Myself on the other hand:

a reply to: eriktheawful

Imagine for an instant a race so different from our own that they are trillions of years more advanced. Now using common sense, do you think it would be possible for them to examine us without coming into our sights?

Part of me would be worried as hell: our own history shows that when more advanced civilizations come into contact with less advanced ones, it never goes well for the less advanced ones.

I think if it was just a probe, or the small explorer ship, I'd be beside myself in wonder and curiosity. I'd be bursting with questions.

As for the "they are here to take our resources", I've never bought that idea. Every thing here on Earth can be found in much more abundance out in space, and with technology that allows them to cross the vastness of interstellar travel, they'd certainly have the tech to mine it and / or make anything from base elements.

Brilliant!! I love the rock crushing twist! Totally plausible, I've thought about mineral based life forms before. This is why I love ATS our people think waaaayyyyyy outside the box! Cheers a reply to: eriktheawful

a reply to: antar

Stargate: ascended beings.

Any species that far down the evolutionary ladder, I'd have a hard time believing they'd even bother to notice us.

They can't be trillions of years ahead of us as the universe isn't that old yet, but they certainly could be several billion years ahead of us, which in itself is very hard to imagine. That's like comparing us to single celled organisms, as that's all that existed here on Earth billions of years ago.

originally posted by: eriktheawful
Part of me would be worried as hell: our own history shows that when more advanced civilizations come into contact with less advanced ones, it never goes well for the less advanced ones.

I think if it was just a probe, or the small explorer ship, I'd be beside myself in wonder and curiosity. I'd be bursting with questions.

As for the "they are here to take our resources", I've never bought that idea. Every thing here on Earth can be found in much more abundance out in space, and with technology that allows them to cross the vastness of interstellar travel, they'd certainly have the tech to mine it and / or make anything from base elements.

Yup. Just as I described.

We have a plan here. IF advanced aliens show up, well... we have several dozen ducks.

We will worship the ducks; convince the aliens that ducks are the master species on this planet.

After the ducks bite the crap out of them (our ducks are biters)... the aliens should leave.

Unless Jack O'Neill shows up with a better plan, of course...

originally posted by: madmac5150

originally posted by: eriktheawful
Part of me would be worried as hell: our own history shows that when more advanced civilizations come into contact with less advanced ones, it never goes well for the less advanced ones.

I think if it was just a probe, or the small explorer ship, I'd be beside myself in wonder and curiosity. I'd be bursting with questions.

As for the "they are here to take our resources", I've never bought that idea. Every thing here on Earth can be found in much more abundance out in space, and with technology that allows them to cross the vastness of interstellar travel, they'd certainly have the tech to mine it and / or make anything from base elements.

Yup. Just as I described.

We have a plan here. IF advanced aliens show up, well... we have several dozen ducks.

We will worship the ducks; convince the aliens that ducks are the master species on this planet.

After the ducks bite the crap out of them (our ducks are biters)... the aliens should leave.

Unless Jack O'Neill shows up with a better plan, of course...

So no matter how hard i pull on the leash, he leads, and I pick up his piles

Between that and the interstate system, they should all pass Go/$200 Willy

It's the same channel

a reply to: eriktheawful


I thought hard on this and my first thought was I would switch from beer to liquor. But I would bet we would end up with cult like groups wanting to welcome them, and the rest of us would most likely try to remain living a normal life, but most likely the paranoia would set in. Anyone remember the television series "V"?


So for me? Considering I am single?

originally posted by: iWontGiveUP

originally posted by: madmac5150

originally posted by: eriktheawful
Part of me would be worried as hell: our own history shows that when more advanced civilizations come into contact with less advanced ones, it never goes well for the less advanced ones.

I think if it was just a probe, or the small explorer ship, I'd be beside myself in wonder and curiosity. I'd be bursting with questions.

As for the "they are here to take our resources", I've never bought that idea. Every thing here on Earth can be found in much more abundance out in space, and with technology that allows them to cross the vastness of interstellar travel, they'd certainly have the tech to mine it and / or make anything from base elements.

Yup. Just as I described.

We have a plan here. IF advanced aliens show up, well... we have several dozen ducks.

We will worship the ducks; convince the aliens that ducks are the master species on this planet.

After the ducks bite the crap out of them (our ducks are biters)... the aliens should leave.

Unless Jack O'Neill shows up with a better plan, of course...

So no matter how hard i pull on the leash, he leads, and I pick up his piles

Between that and the interstate system, they should all pass Go/$200 Willy

It's the same channel

I am not sure what you are getting at, or if your Fentanyl prescription was just refilled...

I can also assume that you have never dealt with broody ducks.

Blood will certainly be drawn... the aliens will retreat.

They (my ducks) only ask for stale bread in return...

The only thing we can do at the moment is try to communicate. Radio transmission.. lasers.. what else?

Mankind would feel so helpless. I think the overwhelming fear would unite us at first. Then CNN would do what it does best, by whipping up fear that escalates to total global riots, rapes, murders, suicides...anarchy.

It would be sad if all that occurred over a 1970's probe that somehow wandered back to Earth.

a reply to: eriktheawful

There is now some sort of extraterrestrial craft parked in orbit above us........ What do we do now?

There is no "we". Humans have no common language, and our international alliances don't mean much of anything, especially when we have leaders who want to defund them. So at best, we'd work through the UN to come up with some common response. But most likely, every powerful country will play lip service to a joint international response while actually trying to get that craft for itself.

Scenario One: It's a probe!

I fully expect that every country with a space program would try to send some craft to go collect this probe in secret. But publicly, the UN Security Council would probably order various "monitoring" programs to see what this craft was capable of (while giving their member countries with space programs the time to try to collect it). Whichever country got it would probably try to test & then reverse engineer it, while others would use their special ops to either try to steal the probe or steal the data about it. At worst, the most powerful countries would work on backroom deals to share info that was recovered.

Scenario Two: It's manned. They are explorers or scouts

LOL Most likely, some of our xenophobic national leaders (and generals) would instantly see them as threats and try to have the manned craft destroyed. They don't even want human foreigners in their country, so why would they want galactic foreigners here? In all seriousness, that's what I'd expect from some national politicians and the MIC.

But I think a nice twist would be if the manned craft quickly lands in a country that isn't a global power, like Namibia or Peru. If the ET's chose some of these countries as their official check-in stations, things would get really interesting. On one hand, I'd expect the global powers to try coercing the Namibians/Peruvians into doing things their way. On the other hand, the Namibians/Peruvians wouldn't need to listen to the current global powers if the space tourists shared enough powerful technology with them (or set up outposts in their countries for "protection").

I could also see the global powers wanting to keep the ET's in those countries in case they turned hostile, had major infectious diseases, etc (as in, I'd expect them to use the Namibians/Peruvians as a quarantined testing ground). Either way, I'd still expect intelligence agencies and/or special ops to try to steal any data from the situation.

Scenario Three: It's a colony ship

I fully expect war here. Like I said in the previous scenario, a lot of xenophobes and warmongers don't even want human immigrants. So why would we expect them to accept these galactic immigrants?

But once again, I think it would be incredibly interesting if they chose either a country like Namibia or Peru (like in the last example) or if they chose a barren area like Antarctica or the ocean floor. I'd still expect a lot of fearmongering about "Earth is being invaded!!! Oh noez!". And I'd still expect a war. But it would be far more interesting.

Another possibility is if the ET's were very physically similar to random animals on earth, like penguins, whales, or octopus. If they were & still chose to settle in the oceans and/or a place like Antarctica, I doubt it would matter as much. There would still be war, but that would probably be because human industries like large scale fishing operations would complain. Then again, if they tasted good, we might just start eating them lol. It would also be interesting if they were large scale burrowers, but I'd imagine the mining and petroleum/natural gas industries would lobby for war in that scenario (to protect their resources in the ground).

Scenario Four: Say Hello To Our Overlords

War. But this time we'd be instantly obliterated. If they had the technology to travel across the galaxy or to a separate galaxy altogether, then our technology would be practically stone age tech to them. It would be like a bunch of furious frogs trying to stop an invasion of one of our powerful militaries: a completely one sided beatdown.

There are always some people who'd be willing to sell out the rest of us in order to either continue living or gain favor with the ET's. So they may survive for a while. But most of us would probably die. Hopefully, they'd avoid destroying the countries that aren't global powers, because I'd be heading to one of those "underdeveloped" places.