/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.1536862]

So i hear a lot of people hating on science fiction movies and games, saying that the aliens they portray are too human. Their facial structure is too humanoid, or that bipeds are too humanoid and unrealistic.

I ask, why would you think this?

Two eyes provide depth perception. Having them higher up on your body makes controlling balance easier, not to mention you get a better view of your surroundings, so theres the evolutionary value right there. The ability to see what you smell and eat is also beneficial, hence why the face is in the order that is on virtually every animal with a "face" that we've discovered on the planet. Bipeds show great endurance and can survive leg injuries that would cripple or even kill quadrupeds. Almost every organism with legs has arms, and these arms are always significantly above the hips. Standing upright allows an animal to gain a greater view of its surroundings. The human form seems very evolutionary impressive, and I don't think its too unrealistic to think that it would appear on other lifeforms on other worlds.

Your thoughts, /sci/?

[Anonymous No.1536881]

apologize for my terrible grammar, english is not my first language

[Anonymous No.1536894]

bump

[Anonymous No.1536911]

Since we are created in God's image, intelligent alien life should be humanoid too.

[Anonymous No.1536909]

bamp want to hear your opinion

[Anonymous No.1536924]

>>1536911
that is not a good reason

[moron No.1536936]

"It's one thing to be amazed by a griffin or a dragon, things that look like they exist but don't; it's quite another thing to be amazed by a rhino or a giraffe, things that seem as if they don't exist but do."

I'm misquoting Chesterton here.

[Anonymous No.1536952]

-Verteberates generally agreed upon the whole two-eyes thing long ago, but other kinds of organisms (spiders, for example) found advantages in having more, or less, than two.

-Faces are fine, but what's special about the primate face layout? Why is the nose under the eyes, for example? You could have a multitude of possible face organizations that would work.

-Bipeds do pretty well, but it's not without cost. If it was so much better to be bipedal, there wouldn't be as many quadrupeds as there are.

-"Almost every" organism with legs has arms? Among arthropods, for example, the only ones I would count as having "arms" would be mantises and crabs, neither of whom can finely manipulate objects.

For my two cents, it seems like the two main things you'd need to become a technology-bearing species are complex social activity and a dexterous manipulator. It's unimaginative to suppose that those things were accomplished in an identical way on a distant planet.

[Anonymous No.1536956]

>>1536936
i feel like there is some significance to OPs post. could you elaborate?

[Anonymous No.1536967]

>>1536952
how would you imagine it happening then?
what would you see sentient life looking like?

also, i think the nose is under the eyes for the same reason the mouth is: so you can see what youre tasting/smelling

[Anonymous No.1536969]

Assume a/0 = b for finite real number a, b
Obtain contradiction

[Anonymous No.1536972]

Almost all known (read KNOWN) life is some variation on the single head, single spine, four limbs formula. This is because evolution is simply a series of small mutations.
In a gross simplification, all life can be traced back to a time when a little cell decided that one head, one spine, and four limbs was how things were going to be.
Of course, this only applies on Earth.

On a different planet, this cell could've decided that any bizarre combination of heads, limbs, and spines was the best way to go about things.

The reason why our system seems so great, is because it has been adapted for our specific planet.
What works here may not be all that great on a different planet.

TL;DR We wouldn't be able to relate to aliens that didn't have humanoid features, so suck it up.

[Anonymous No.1536976]

>>1536862
mostly agreed, though the standard "rubber forehead" alien is still lazy.
Even with the basic biped layout there is still a large amount of room for variation that hasn't been used.
I think most of the problem is that almost all alien worlds are modeled like earth with just different names.

[Anonymous No.1536979]

>>1536911
Yeay for mormons.

[Anonymous No.1536982]

I think the main thing is there are too many other similarly likely possibilities that would provide survival advantages close to those of humanoids.

[Anonymous No.1537001]

Zomg. You know for a fact that no girls are on hte internet, much less 4chan. I'ts scientifically proven faxt.

[moron No.1537004]

>>1536956

It relates, I think, but not too much to the question, just the overall theme.

We're interested in things that are completely unique-looking and bizarre but they seem to be more of a fad that rise and fall with the next change of scenery. What really captures our attention though are things that we are familiar with but are bizarre in their own right. A rhino is not bizarre to our day-to-day thoughts, we all know them, but really thinking about this armored, four-legged thing with a giant horn? That's amazing! Ever watch the Herculoids? There was a rhino on there as well.

In sci-fi, aliens generally look like us or are based off of animals we know for two reasons. (1) It's hard to imagine something completely unique. If we ever find intelligent life, their appearance will most likely be something we never thought of simply because we're biased by our own normal findings. (2) We like things that are familiar. Take Cameron's Avatar, obviously alien but also very familiar. Predator? Two-legged, head on top of shoulders, abs, etc.

Even the Twilight series, miserable as they are, demonstrate this. Just make him pale and say he's different and he can be essentially a guy with makeup and he's "alien".

[Anonymous No.1537011]

Is it just me, or am I the only one who thinks the world getting so populated could be a good thing?
I mean, once we start getting genetically modified crops to these people, I could see civiliaztion emerging in plaecs we thought it never could and humanity using technology to let 9 billion people live on this Earth.
inb4 slippery slope
Recaptcha: workingclass tripling

[Anonymous No.1537018]

How is Halifax this time of year?

[Anonymous No.1537017]

>>1536982
like what?

>>1536976
yea thats one of the few things i really, REALLY hate about star trek

>>1536952
you're point is true, although i meant vertebrates, not crabs or insects or anything

[Anonymous No.1537030]

>>1536862
op here, in addition to my question, what do you /sci/entists think of my picture? it took me an hour or two to draw an lightly shade

/ic/ is stupid as fuck

[Anonymous No.1537035]

>>1536972
this is patently false.
Show me the head and four limbs on a mushroom, nematode, tricoplax, sponge, coral, sea pen, etc etc...

[Anonymous No.1537052]

>>1536862
That's because all the animals on Earth share a common ancestry and more importantly, environment. Alien life could have evolved under completely different conditions. Ex: would beings from a planet with little or no natural light have eyes?

If you assume that alien life evolved on an Earth-like planet, then no, they're not as ridiculous

[Anonymous No.1537056]

>>1537017
I'm pretty sure one would need an incredibly large amount of information to accurately calculate all possible likely body configurations for organisms that we would consider "intelligent extraterrestrial life". You would need to know the average conditions of planets, the likelihood of certain evolutionary actions taking place, etc. I'm certainly not qualified to answer and I don't think you are qualified to say that a humanoid shape is the most likely for intelligent life either.

[Anonymous No.1537067]

>>1536952
>Why is the nose under the eyes, for example

To avoid the dreaded snot-eye. Nose above mouth as a poison detector.

[Anonymous No.1537068]

>>1537035
this thread is about larger animals, primarily with some sort of face

[Anonymous No.1537071]

>>1537017
Vertebrates are just one of the many body plans used by living things in this world. There's nothing inherently more "complex" or "advanced" about vertebrates. Intelligent aliens could potentially have a nervous system and skeleton design similar to vertebrates, but sci-fi usually takes it for granted that they do.

[Anonymous No.1537083]

>>1536982
Like what?

Challenge to everyone who thinks other intelligent life would be so bizarrely different:

Start with a human. Now take one thing away and add another that you think would be evolutionary advantageous. Do this until you have something you think we would all consider completely non-human.

[Anonymous No.1537073]

I had pondered taht too, OP.

[Anonymous No.1537084]

>>1537068

Then you shouldn't say things like:

>>Almost all known (read KNOWN) life is some variation on the single head, single spine, four limbs formula.

[Anonymous No.1537086]

>>1537030
They probably bitched about the proportions, especially the neck. Though, if it's not supposed to be fully human, those arguments are pretty retarded.

The arm is pretty badass though. Tits are a bit weird, but If that body suit thing acts like a corset... almost plausible.

[rollfag No.1537093]

>>1537083
I'm regular stormy

[Anonymous No.1537099]

Pterosaurs aren't dinosaurs. They're veolutionarily distinct.

[Anonymous No.1537110]

>>1537035
I'm sorry, I meant mammalian life.

I think the rest of the post is still valid.

[Anonymous No.1537120]

[Anonymous No.1537114]

>>1537056
its not a matter of qualification, just logical deduction and reasoning session where we argue which features would be evolutionarily advantageous.

the "primate face" that is a running concept in this thread makes sense as you can see what you eat and smell, you can smell what you eat, and you can have depth perception and a comfortable view of where you are going. all of these allow you to better control your environment and matter intake.

having a nose above the eyes removes the ability to smell what youre immediately eating, and having the nose near the eyes can be dangerous if you have to sneeze or have some illness that causes a very runny nose.

[Anonymous No.1537124]

Because giving writers free-reign over evolution is a bad idea. Thankfully, they're pretty lazy.

[Anonymous No.1537125]

PO is a fag.

[Anonymous No.1537130]

>>1537086
yea the tits are kinda weird. and yes, the suit is near-skin tight, and slightly tighter around the waist and chest

[Anonymous No.1537140]

It makes better space opera if the "aliens" are like fantasy races. Hell, the females are usually more attractive on average than human females -- to human males. What sense does that make?

There's nothing wrong with space fantasy, but don't pretend for a minute that it makes "perfect sense" for everybody to have a two-legged, two-armed, internal-skeletoned, closed circulatory system, breathing-through-the-mouth, fucking wannabe human body. It makes just as much sense Martians having nice racks.

[Anonymous No.1537141]

>>1537084
This post was not me>>1537068

[Anonymous No.1537149]

>>1537114
>>implicit assumption: all creatures from all worlds get runny noses.
Why not just smell through your skin, like octopus do?

[Anonymous No.1537148]

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

[Anonymous No.1537157]

>>1537140
Same reason white women are more attractive to black men then black women and asian women are more attractive to white men than white women.

Part imperative for genetic variety, part exoticism in culture.

Those were examples, not facts. Don't you faggots dare derail on my account.

[Anonymous No.1537161]

>The Grinning Man

[Anonymous No.1537164]

>>1537149
>all creatures from all worlds get runny noses.

i never said nor implied this
also, Octopus' dont have nasal orifices, sot he example obviously wouldn't apply to them. If an organism had a nasal orifice above its eyes, then the same issues would still be a problem.

[Anonymous No.1537165]

>>1537149
If you have a nose with sinuses and gravity, it's going to happen eventually.

[moron No.1537173]

And here I went and wrote this big to-do.

[снайпер No.1537175]

HERE IS ALIEN

YOU LIKE

MANY SEXY TIMES

[Anonymous No.1537176]

>>1537157
do you have a 4chan gold account like me?

[снайпер No.1537188]

>>1537176
bitch I got a platinum account

[sheep No.1537182]

I think its due to lack of imagination and because anything unhumanoid looks stupid and childish

also on things like star treek its much moredifficult to make weird creatures than to just humans but with pointy ears so that the actors dont have to wear all kinds of expensive make up and extra arms and shit

[Anonymous No.1537185]

>>1537175
looks very delicate. also how the fuck would it reproduce? must have one hell of a penis

[Anonymous No.1537190]

>>1537157
>>Humans are especially attracted to different-looking humans
>>By analogy, humans are attracted to kangaroos

[Anonymous No.1537200]

you still wouldn't have dealt with the main problem, which is the massive loss of blood.

notice in your ownex ample, the patient dind't die because of his brain, but simply because he didnt have enough blood left in his system for anything, most importantly his heart, to work.

if you've got an asystole, you dont have any of that problem, you still hvae all the blood in the system, it is just the pump that has given out.

during an asystole you can at least keep the circulation going, even it is just by cpr, but you still have a blood flow. wih tan poen aorta, you've got none of that and that makes the window of opportunity (to hook your patient up to a cbs) tiny compared to an asystole.
circle of willis is not even the main problem with brain circulation as the the spnie and the cerebellum are no tsupported by the a. carotis interna.
clmaping of the subclavic artery would probaby be an option, since you would have to open the chest anyway.


don't know how effective dailysis would be, since you would deal with heavy sespis and acute immuno-reactions (altough qiuck look at some books say this would definitel ybe an indication, but it' snot a100% sure method)

you would still deal with multi-organ failure because of ischemia (first you've got ischemia due to shock from the chest trauma/ismple absolteu hypovolemic shock and later on...well...basically the same thing - no circulation or only very low circulation due to lack of a working aorta).
you still would get no blood-flow to your spine, which in itsel fwould be potentiallyd eadly.

itc ould eb questione dwhether the guy would hav esurvived his chest-trauma thisw ay or another, unless they'd have enough bloodo n reserve.
Comment too long. Click heer to view the full text.

[снайпер No.1537201]

>>1537185
I don't know. Here have another

[Anonymous No.1537205]

>>1537114
You're assuming that extraterrestrial intelligent life would eat, smell, see, etc, in the sense we are familiar with. Do you have any reason to believe that other configurations for senses and whatnot are any less possible or applicable for doing many of the things we would thing of intelligent life as doing?

[снайпер No.1537209]

More

[снайпер No.1537216]

two legged version

[снайпер No.1537220]

intelligent version

[Anonymous No.1537231]

Fuck you снайпер

I blame the new captcha-free HTA spam on you!! ITS YOUR FAULT, NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER

[Anonymous No.1537262]

I'll just leave this here

h p://robinhanson.typepad.com/files/three-worlds-collide.pdf

[Anonymous No.1537263]

an engineer could just as easily go back to school and become a 'scientist' so fuck off with the intelligence bullshit troll

[Anonymous No.1537265]

also /x/'s smarter trollsk now more science than /sci/, so it's the best place to go for a good rational debunking.

[Anonymous No.1537270]

[Anonymous No.1537292]

yes

[Anonymous No.1537313]

So what you're telling em is that these extremely sophisticated spaceships have such a primitive control scheme that they completely ignorea major human sense?

Considering that eharing is the only direction-finding sense that can pick up on things that aren't straight ahead, I woul ddesign my captain's chair to have surround sound linked to the collision radar. Because a suond indicating a distnat thing offy onder is ab etter alert than words.

[Anonymous No.1537324]

This could work, couldn't?

[Anonymous No.1537364]

>>1537220

Source?

[Anonymous No.1537430]

>>1537364
alex r