I mentioned the fact that in my mind there was an article about this film (only the first of the series, the rest is crap and adds nothing to the idea), so now I write it. The point I want to make is that this movie starts from the most interesting hypothesis I have ever seen regarding the visit of aliens.

First of all, the idea stands out from the rest of the scifi, in the sense that in the rest of the Scifi films the aliens always come here for more or less hostile reasons. Only in Star Trek do they come here because they notice (by accident) that someone has broken the speed of light barrier, but other than that the rest is boring. I admit that the Vulcans who are the traffic policemen of the space could be interesting as an idea: however, it is not possible to think that every alien civilization is the equivalent of a Victorian colonial empire.

And no, it is not really possible to think so: because it is completely to be excluded.

To understand this, we can reduce two very complex calculations to spannometry. Which means one thing: it's just a divertissement , so don't shit your ***.

First of all, since the universe is relativistic but the human mind perceives time in an extremely local way, a local definition of space travel is needed.

Let's say then that our "spaceship" can go up to Alpha Centauri in an hour, if it can go and return (without stopping) on ​​earth when two hours have passed on earth .

Then of course, for astronauts time would behave in an abstruse way (we are doing 4.6 light years per hour, honestly we are in the field of complexes because we imply an imaginary mass to make up the accounts, so sarcastic how time would behave ), so let's keep our definition for simplicity.

But now let's go and see (spannometrically), how much energy it takes. You will tell me it depends on the technology we use, but you are forgetting the pain in the ass that thermodynamics is.

Let's take an example: we calculate the entropy based on the probability of state, according to Boltzmann. If we take an adiabatic tube, vertical, on the earth's surface, and put a ball in it, the ball falls. This means that the probability of the state of a ball at the bottom of the container is better than that of the ball remaining at the top. We could also calculate that, calculate the transition probabilities and we will discover that, in Joules, the difference between the two state probabilities for constants, i.e. the difference in entropy, is precisely the energy we need to bring back to high the ball.

Good. Now let's extend the tube to alpha centauri, make sure it's adiabatic, put our spaceship on the bottom, and calculate the state's probability of seeing it lazily in the same place in an hour. Then we calculate the state probability of seeing her on Alpha Centauri. No matter what technology we are using, the question is how high is the probability of transition from the first state (the one with the spaceship in Casalecchio di Reno (known as spaceport), and the one with the ship on Alpha Centauri?

Here, then the problem does not depend on the technology you use: in statistical terms, you are trying to do something that can happen, but you need a quantity of energy that (if it were heuristically calculable as in the example) has terrifying orders of magnitude.

The point is that there is a statistical relationship between the probability that something "happens" and the energy it takes to make it happen , this crap of sending a ship to alpha centauri in an hour … cost AT LEAST a minimum amount of energy . However. No matter how cool the system you use, thermodynamics are no joke.

The orders of magnitude are immense: let's say you need a PeraJoule.

I don't think there are metric prefixes for these quantities: since we are dreaming we could use the “PeraJoule”, where “Pera” derives from the slang for heroin injection. And since the new Dune is about to come out, using drugs to imagine space travel is all there is to it.

So, if we think of a race moving in interstellar space, we must think of a race that has solved every possible energy production problem, and has PeraJoule of energy available whenever it wants.

Good.

Now let's talk about material resources. In a demented film from the 80s, “Visitors”, the aliens came here and… they scrubbed the water. I honestly don't think that if you know how to produce PeraJoule of energy, you lose the time to lift water from a gravity well. Water is extremely common in the universe. There are entire planets composed only of water. Nebulae have been discovered with quantities of water such as Pear Tons, again to indicate extravagant quantities. But even without interstellar flight, there are comets, asteroids, and probably entire satellites of Jupiter made of water. Interplanetary flight is enough.

The problem is that this reasoning applies to EVERYTHING. If you have PeraJoules of energy and can use them to go to interstellar space, you have NO resource problems. Nobody. Any element in the Mendelev table you have it. You have planets with such extravagant environmental conditions that you can make the most absurd molecules without even having to build a plant. In fact, you don't even have to do them: they're probably already there. Whole planets of diamonds. Around the supernovae you can come across blocks of gold, or any metal you consider precious, larger than planet earth.

And let's be clear, if it is true that these are raw materials, you must not forget that you have PeraJoules of energy so versatile that they can be sent around on a spaceship. You can build literally EVERYTHING at home: sure, it would take an obscene number of chemical steps to build a complete DNA, but the cost of all this is energy, and you have energy in PeraJoule. You have to suck.

So no, if anyone is under the illusion that an alien would waste time coming here lifting ANY material from a gravity well when they could find it alike in interstellar space, they are thinking of a race of idiots. But if you build power plants from a PeraJoule, you are not idiots. I would rule it out.

After all, if you fly at certain speeds, your materials science has solved impact problems with any material that you impact in space, which means you are VERY, VERY good at building DVRI materials. But SOOOOO DVRI. Otherwise you arrive on the other side riddled with all kinds of dust, pebbles and cigarette butts from Betelgeuse, which at relativistic speeds impact you "quite hard". And on Betelgeuse they smoke A LOT.

So yes:

a species that travels in interstellar space does NOT need the resources that are on planet Earth because it has an abundance of them in space, and is smart enough to understand that lifting from the surface of a planet stuff that is in space is stupid.

So, you say, why do they come here?

Here, the Predator movie introduces a new motivation: they come here to have fun .

Of course, in their case the fun lies in the hobby of hunting. But it must be recognized that the hobby of carpentry would have taken a lot out of the film. Of course the forest was full of trees and so it was there, but “Arnold vs Aldebaran XVI's carpenter making a bedside table” would not have found much consensus among film producers.

The film would speak, rather than hunting (in the sense of taking animals to eat them), of a safari that is mainly used to have trophies. Later in the franchise they put a kind of pseudo-agoge hump on the passage ritual, but IMHO it's pure crap.

But even if you have to kill Marzullo and three thousand light years away to prove to the other males (?) That your pea is ready for the female (?), It is still an activity that falls into "stupid things. men that you could avoid if you convinced yourself once and for all that to have a pea you just need a pea ". I honestly have no proof that the Predator was a male, so maybe it was a female and the whole theory doesn't work. In nature it often happens that the strongest, most violent and badass are the females, after all. And sarcastic why the females of that place come here to hunt for trophies: however it is always better than sticking plastic balls under the skin of the chest, or having Botox injected in the face, and this proves that it is still a race very advanced.

But the point is, it looks like a damn safari, and that brings it all back to the point of the fascinating hypothesis.

We never thought about aliens coming here for fun.

We have thought of everything: invasions to take away any X, with X resources at will, invasions for the purpose of military strategy (empires & co), invasions in order to force us to respect the environment, in short, any kind of invasion possible . But never to aliens who come here for fun.

Imagine you go to a place, like in the neighboring province, and stop for a picnic. There is a nice view and you want to enjoy your picnic. And a strange guy approaches you, starts saying things like "long life and prosperity", or "your arrival is a historical turning point, which is a prelude to a cultural exchange never seen before", "greetings on behalf of the people of Molise, cosmic brothers from other regions ". Aha.

I mean, there is the possibility that one day all the authorities of the earth will gather around an alien spaceship, stand in front of the aliens that have just landed, make all their political speeches, and they answer that I know "sorry, would you take a picture of us in front of this panorama, of me and my girlfriend? " to the UN Secretary in person.

And it is not a remote possibility: there are people who go to Australia to see the wombats. The Vombatiiiihhh . And if you think about how many trips are made (or were made) for purely recreational purposes, we can imagine aliens who come here for every kind of fun possible.

I don't know what's funny for an alien: maybe they'll come here and stand all the time photographing the industrial warehouses of Vimercate and completely snob the Taj Mahal. Ah! The art!. Or maybe they come here for the kitchen, and the first thing they'll say is I know "sorry, are you taking your credit card?". And then they'll start eating the road signs. But only the Scottish one, which prohibits parking as they do there, not even on Orion.

Of course these are anthropomorphic hypotheses, but all the others were too. The assumptions of invasion to find resources mimic the European colonial period, the assumptions of occupation for military strategy purposes derive from human history, while no one notes that since prosperity arrived, leisure travel has become almost prevalent in transport. plane.

So, behind this idea there is an underlying problem: that their idea of ​​fun is to go on a safari, to play chess, to admire the asphalt in Jamaica, the point is that it would be RATIONAL to think of aliens that they come here for fun purposes only. (for now let's leave out the sex tourism, which by now I've seen so many films that start like this).

And when it comes to interestellari encounters with aliens, I always have the impression that this hypothesis is being forgotten. We are scanning space for alien signals believing they would be things like “greetings, peoples of the earth! May our meeting be propitious for every XYZ! ”, And maybe it will be like“ we would like to book two tables of four for next Thursday, do you also have the menu for those intolerant to molybdenum? ”.

Seriously, well, I wanted to point out how this film, apparently of the B series, contains a fascinating hypothesis, which in my opinion has not been explored much, both in scifi films and by ethics scholars.

For a B-movie, then, it contained at least a VERY interesting idea.