It's a jungle out there
in Philosophy ·
Mark Torres14 said:Let’s say humanity runs into an alien intelligence in the near future—something that evolved completely separately from us. That reality would absolutely wreck the scientific establishment. We'd be forced to tear up almost everything we think we know and rebuild our entire worldview from scratch.
The real question is: in this hypothetical scenario, which philosophical stances, theories, and methods become totally obsolete?
For instance, the idea that "man is the measure of all things" would become just as useless as claiming the Earth is a flat disc.
Most likely, we'd see a scenario straight out of Ursula K. LeGuin's "The Word for World is Forest." They’d either act superior—or, if their intelligence actually outmatches our own in terms of raw "power," they’ll start looking for ways to "surpass that power."
And really, which alien race would you even encounter? In a sense, we’re all aliens just wearing a "human" skin, though we haven't realized it yet. 😉 We have folks from Orion, the Pleiades, Lyra... some look like butterflies, others like reptiles, insects, dragons, fairies, or trolls. Man, if only we could see what we actually look like under this skin. 🙂 😉