Stephen Hawking Is Terrified Of An Alien Invasion, And The Reason Makes Nothing But Sense

[Scootaloo]

5. Actually it's nonsense from Hawking.

A society advaced enough for massive interstellar travel, is a society that has a near-infinite amount of resources at its fingertips. It would have to b, just to achieve that level of technology, and to maintain it. In addition there would be the plethora of worlds they have access to.

nearly every conflict between humans has been one of resources. Now the funny thing is, for most of human history, the planet has had more than enough to go around for the whole of the population, and the only limit has been access, really. In theory, arrangements could be made to bring plenty and prosperity to every human on the planet.

Now, imagine we had a second planet. Or even a third! Imagine having these worlds, with the distribution avenues open. It's taken humans a long-assed time to get to our current population levels on earth, it would take us a long time to fill up another world as well.

With our world-traveling technology, we find ourselves able to exploit uninhabitable worlds, as well. Scouring "iceball" worlds for water and hydrocarbons, perhaps, or rocky worlds for minerals. Gas giants would probably be beyond our reach, because even though gravity is a really weak force, it is implacable.

Basically, if we have the technology to extend our hands into the rest of our own solar system, we would have more resources at hand than humanity could use for hundreds of thousands of years.

Now? Imagine we add another solar system to that. or a third/ see how this is going?

Any starfaring civilization is so inordinately wealthy and well-off that it really has no conceivable reason to be interested in earth, than perhaps scientific curiosity. Coming to conquer us would be about as stupid as if you saw that worm on the sidewalk, and then hired an earth-mover to dig up all the dirt on the block in order to show the worm who's boss.

In fact now that i think about it? The vast amount of resources available within single solar systems kind of makes interstellar travel a senseless option. Really, once you've got the ability to take on your own star's neighborhood, you're set for the whole of your existence. of course there's the curiosity angle, bu sightseers don't have conquest on the mind either.