Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!bellcore!decvax!ittatc!dcdwest!sdcsvax!ucbvax!brahms!desj
From: desj@brahms.BERKELEY.EDU (David desJardins)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: Scuttle the Space Program? (Actually Alien Intelligence)
Message-ID: <12330@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Tue, 11-Mar-86 05:07:45 EST
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.12330
Posted: Tue Mar 11 05:07:45 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 13-Mar-86 07:44:01 EST
References: <860305153340.481402@HIS-BILLERICA-MULTICS.ARPA>
Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: desj@brahms.UUCP (David desJardins)
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Lines: 19

In article <860305153340.481402@HIS-BILLERICA-MULTICS.ARPA>
Jong@HIS-BILLERICA-MULTICS.ARPA writes:
>
>Of course, if we encounter another civilization out there, the
>odds are it won't be anywhere near the level we're at.  Most
>likely, we would encounter an unimaginably more advanced
>civilization.

   I see this kind of statement a lot, and it really seems pretty
silly to me.  It is both anthropomorphic (assuming that all alien
races would behave in the same way people do) and egocentric (in
its implicit assumption that we know everything about the universe
and how it is put together).
   And besides how can you expect the unimaginable?

   Why not just say, "If we were to encounter an much more advanced
alien civilization...," and avoid all of my flaming.

   -- David desJardins