"Would we do it?" Topic

If an alien race gave us a choice between 1) complete and savage anhiliation and 2) providing them 10% of our population for food (harvesting us every time they visit, every 20-25 years), which would we choose?

Depends on who gets to make the choice. Probably 10% THIS time and watch out when they come back

You found out about "the secret". You're moving up on the list..

Depending on the political party in power at the time, I'm sure the aliens would be given MORE than the 10% they are demanding….

I'd go for option #1 myself. If they were stupid enough to wipe us out, then they'd deserve to starve….

Sounds eerily like this:

link
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CC

Don't go! Don't go! It's a cookbook! A cookbook!

Can I pick the 10%?

Dear Alien Leader:

We have selected option B, and have made provisions to aid your selection process of those volunteering to be in the 10%. An announcement has been published in a Danish newspaper; volunteers who respond will gather in streets around the world, waving signs, throwing rocks and igniting fires. Enjoy your dinner.

;-)

For dessert we will tell them 'it' can be found in underground bunkers in most capital cities in the world. The food will tell the aliens that they govern the various countries but they shouldn't be believed.
What goes around…………

I think the current estimate is that there'd be 9 billion of us in 2050.

Therefore, 10% every 25 years or so seems a tad low to control the overpopulation issue.

(Incidentally, I just finished reading The Mote In God's Eye, which features an alien race with _extreme_ overpopulation issues.)

Just wondering if that's 10% per capita or by weight?
The world obescity problem could easily be helped if it's by weight, plus fewer casualties that way as you'd need to take less actual people.

Hmmmmmm….Well, we've had the movies/series 'V'….and 'Earth:Final Conflict'…'LifeForce'…Aliens, Predator….AvsP, War of the Worlds…(various incarnations)…'To Serve Man'…and many, MANY others. Who's to say it isn't already 'happening'…(with all the homeless/runaways/missing teens/children????) vs the 'white slavery/teen porn/child porn etc??? (as disgusting as all that is in any case)…
Personally, I would have to 'echo' Mr. Heston's NRA comments…'From my cold, stiff, dead hands…' They WANT me…they're gonna have to TAKE me…and I plan to pull a Tom Cruise with a bandolier of grenades! (I loved that scene in WOTW!!!).

But, knowing 'gov't the way I do…I'm sure WE won't get to make such an 'important' decision…that they'll hold a lottery/draft?…(or maybe empty out the asylums, veteran's hospitals, psych wards, hospices/AIDS clinics…in hopes we'd 'poison the well'??? (didn't they try something like that on Stargate Atlantis….with an 'innoculation' that would KILL the 'wraiths'…but also had a 50%+ mortality rate among those that took it????).

'Survival at any cost'??? Didn't we already sorta deal with that during the 'Cold War/H-bomb' days of the 50-70's?? Better to go out fighting as a species…than watch families 'decide'/have decided for them??? by those who are 'too valuable' to risk??? IF they come for me, I want those tennis shoes with LIGHTABLE laces…..

Eat THIS 'sucker'…KA-BOOM!

Lt DWW (smoke 'em if ya got em)…

Darnit, it's absolutely impossible for me to answer this without dropping it into CA Board territory! 8)=

Dances with Words… what sort of Dance was THAT? A skiffle crossed with Breakdancing and a Rumba? While drunk?

Take the 10% and would you like fries with that? would be my response.

Pat

We'd say option 2 but meanwhile plot to destroy them when they arrive to collect.

Not sure if we would be digestible to any species that did not originate on this planet. Now if they just wanted a selection of us for gladiatorial games in an area of Gallifrey known as the Death Zone, or Thralls on the planet Gamma 2 for the betting amusement of the Gamesters, then that's another story.

We should have been shipping people offworld years ago. Hell, we went to the moon in the sixties. Its been what almost 50 years now and no colony. Thats like coming to America in the renaissance and going "Eh whats so special".

Let 'em eat tofu, says I!

Assuming there is no possible way to resist them mankind would probably settle for option #2. I can see this manifesting itself in a variety of ways.

We could take the cold and cruel method of screening everyone for intelligence or physical attributes and sending off the worst of the bunch.

There could be a worldwide lottery to select the required number of people when the time comes.

When people reach a certain age they could be selected to go (ala Logans Run).

Of course wealthy and inluencial people would find ways to become exempt from any of of these methods of selection.

@Sane Max…don't you mean, (in best hindi dialect)…do you want chilli-cheese fries wid dat??? NOT!

I'm sort of seeing it happen what Holden88 says…as IF we have NO Choice..I'm sure it will be 'survival of the RICHEST/most powerful/most cut-throat/not necessarily the 'smartest'…but look at the way things worked out between the 'Eloi and the Morlocks'…the Eloi weren't the 'brightest candles' on the table????

IF another species (dare I say 'intelligent/sapient/has a soul?')…did find us 'consumeable'…(or maybe just as 'fertilizer' like the Tom Cruise WOTW aliens were using humans for…then how could they in 'good conscience' actually EAT another 'intelligent' being? While some humans have done that to each other in primative cultures or dire circumstances…they are basically considered 'barbaric' or shunned…

So IF some big green blob with hyperdrive, mile-long spaceships with photon torps wants to eat my sorry old carcass…they they are going to have to fight ME for it. And IF my 'government' pulls the 'needs of the many outweight the needs of the few or the one' on me…and it's MY 'bacon' on the line…they better plan on fighting me for it as well…

It's one thing to 'volunteer' for military service…where you're armed and trained and work with others for a 'higher cause'…'pledging your lives, your fortunes, your sacred honor' to defend and protect the Constitution, etc…

It is a TOTALLY different thing to walk 'meekly' into a 'slaughterhouse' because I 'lost' a lottery and become a sausage or hot lunch for SOMEONE else? This is NOT 'Soylent Green' and I'm not a cheeseburger…

I know this is only an 'excercise in imagination'…but in a sense….it hits 'home' to me as a disabled vet…(who is still 'fighting' some of the old battles)…as to how 'disposable' some folks consider different members of our population…like the old, the sick, the weak, the criminal, the poor or the STUPID….

IF some other species wants 'lunch on us'…then it's time to start using every NASTY trick in the book, in our arsenals and cheap, backstabbing, trojan horse, sneak attack that would make them think TWICE about ever looking our way again.

Unless of course you're talking about the lizard-chicks from 'V'…she was hot…but does having sex with her before she had you 'butchered' in the laser grid constitute 'playing with your food'???? 8-/

Not drunk enough….not by a long shot…(I don't drink…alchohol..)
Lt DWW

Given only those two option, I would go for a third option and destroy our world in a nuclear war. There by spareing millions from a savagely slow annihilation at the hands of alien that would want us to suffer. And in turn robbing them of the massive food supplies they were in search of in the first place.

Tabletop Miniatures did an extensive range, probably still available. They even have a guillotine.

Seems that someone deleted my rather lengthy reply about how there would be better ways of feeding the aliens, and how it could be the best thing that could happen to the planet…

I know that I did NOT write that little blurb about Tabletop miniatures…

Anyway, There are a LOT of people who could be given to the aliens: People who are very near death, people who have been condemned to death, those who have incurable illnesses, Those who are a complete liability to society who are not able to contribute at all, and so on…

I think that Politicians would become hard pressed to substatiate their existence and necessity…

Consider the following:

If the aliens are powerful enough to impose a total destruction upon the planet; they would be better off setting up the planet as a ranch for anthropomorphic food stocks. Then, they should just do what any good rancher would do: Find the best food stock and begin breeding them, culling the "Herd" of the lame sick and genetically inferior (This is NOT a racist thing, it is not about race it is about the general health of ALL people)….

They should establish a society in which we are all well cared for, fed, clothed and housed, and even educated and provided for in all areas of our lives… After all, happy cows produce better meat and milk…

With such a society established it would not be a big leap to provide cloning technology to allow the aliens to clone their favorite stock; thus freeing the majority of the population (That was left) from becoming food for the aliens…

All in all; such an incident, if the product of intelligent aliens (Intelligent does not necessarily mean that they have the same morals, so do not confuse the two) could wind up being the best thing that could happen to us…

I'm floored,and you all act like you don't understand how genesides happen.For crying out loud can't you folks find something better to muse about?And by the way,I wouldn't feed the lowest rung or any other member of humanity to an alien or anything else for that matter.Screw your heads back on straight ,will you?

I think a better deal would be to have them take 90% all at once.

That's just a matter of perspective…

I WOULD feed the lowest members of humanity to aliens…

I have met some truely EVIL!!! People in my day. One of them was when I was in a psychiatric Hospital. He was part of an experimental program that was trying to help sexual "Predators" (The "Clinical" way of saying "Rapists") "recover" (to not feel that they need to go rape people). Nine out of ten of the guys said that they would probably rape someone again (Ten out of ten did it turns out), and half that number said that the only way to keep them from doing so was to either kill them or lock them up forever. They did NOT want to "get better" (To stop raping people) even though they knew that it was wrong and was very harmful to those who were raped. A couple would not even admit that. They claimed "The women want it… They just pretend after the fact that they didn't want it to screw with us" (This was from a guy who killed two out of the five people he had raped – he was going to die anyway, so I am not sure what his deal was)…

I would thrown EVERY one of them to an alien looking for food without a second thought.

There are plenty of people who are "Homeless" in SF that I would feed to an alien without a second thought. I spent six months struggling on the streets in SF trying to get off of them, being nearly murdered and worse by some of these monsters. Even though I know that many of them are victims themselves of circumstance; NONE of them seem to grasp the difference between RIGHT and WRONG (Even in situations where it can be VERY difficult to know one from the other)…I saw them take opportunities that would have allowed me to get the hell out of that condition, and throw those opportunities right back in the face of the provider; because "It weren't enough for them"… Or they would bring up some BS about how that kind of work was "Disrespectin' Them" (Whatever the that means)

There is a LOT of human trash on this planet. I wouldn't weep a tear to see it fed to aliens who wanted to have a Human-ranch. I would even suggest ways that they could go about rounding up and keeping their herd well maintained, fed and housed…

Maybe the rest of the population could then get on with living without having to fear the real monsters: Humans who prey on other humans out of a sense of being owed something that they themselves feel they deserve, but have done absolutely NOTHING to make themselves deserving of it.

I should point out that the Criminal element that I was speaking of came mostly from the upper classes. The most evil people I have ever met were people with money. The guy I mentioned who had killed two of the five people he raped came from a VERY upscale family, and the guy had NO sense of what he had done was wrong. he acted like he owned the freaking world and that nothing he did could be judged by anyone, as no one was his equal…

So, trash does not necessarily mean people who have nothing, but just people who have no sense of humanity…

Is there a single situation in all of life YOU personally have not experenced and or mastered? We should all be as lucky to be able to take the sactamonious high ground in ALL sujects as you do. Sorry I don't buy it anymore.

I apoligize to everyone else for my tone,I do enjoy good conversation ,but enough is enough.I got a little heated and it shows in my spelling of "sanctimonious" and" subjects".I'm all better now, really we are erm….I mean ..I :}

Well right and wrong are relative terms. And in some situations being a sociopath would be a positive survival trait. (Let's just hope none of those situations arrive in our lifetimes.)

But my point is that there are just too many people – most of whom lead pretty miserable live anyway. Buy I would think that 10% of the current world's population could keep the best elements of our technology going – but only if they worked together and jettisoned a lot of the preconceptions of late capitalism.

I dont know about the WE bit, but I'm sure THEY would do it in a heartbeat. THEY always do stuff like that. THEY are awful naughty.

Saladin… I am VERY aware of social relativism and how survival is often the goal in such behavior…

But, in the cases I am referring to, their behavior went WAY beyond just what was necessary for survival… Their behavior was just animalistic and predatory; using others to do what they themselves should have been doing in order to survive, and then once they had taken from that "other" whom they forced into situations that no human should have to endure, they would just thow the other person away…

Another point that you have made: There are just too many people.

This is of course pretty much the basis of much of this behavior. Populations that grow beyond their ability to care for themselves create problems so numberous and tragic that it is difficult to untangle the causes and effects of the mass of troubles that result…

In the event that an alien armada arrives to demand 10% of the population, I will at once be the first to make myself NOT one of those given to them, suggest who they might take, and be looking for a way to get rid of them (Fighting if need be)…It is called "Pragmatism"…

You think we'll give you a choice??

Absolutely, considering that you have NO idea of knowing what status I currently hold, who my relatives are, or any other pertinent information… Add that to other factors (That I could quickly become important to some fields that I have studied in the past for instance)… and I rapidly become someone who would have a choice.

Most people who post in these forums would fall into that sort of category.

If you are posting here it means that you have some connection to technological proficiency, that there is probably some investment in education, probably combined with a natural or innante intelligence, and everyone on these boards would be considered pretty safe from being fed to the "monsters" from outer-space (That is unless there are people posting to these boards from insane assylums, death row penitents, or homeless drug addicts who are posting from coffee shops…)

So, yes… I think that I would have a rather broad choice of options…

You aren't going to get 10% just by rounding up tramps and clearing out lunatic asylums or even prisons. If you're going for the surrender route then you need to face it that innocent people are going to be shipped off as alien food.

I'm not sure about the intelligence screening idea. I mean, what about the Page 3 models?!

This topic has become really 'disturbing' to me…and I'm still not sure why? Part of it may be that I'm already considered 'expendable' by my government/society at large as I'm a 'disabled vet' and other than voting and paying taxes on everything I buy, I'm NOT 'contributing' THAT much to society in general…so I'd probably be one of the 10% considered 'alien-chow' material?

Second…I'm reminded of a biblical thing…where the 'devil led them carefully down to hell…' and I think of how the Nazi movement got started…or any of a half-dozen other 'horrendous' things…(Jonestown/KKK/Spanish Inquisition/McCarthy Commie hearings)…and how EASILY 'drumhead justice' can become 'acceptible'…(wasn't INCOME TAX once a 'temporary measure' by FDR???)

We could get into Capital punishment, abortion and a lot of other CA topics along with this 'fictional' IF aliens want lunch and OFFERED us the choice of the menu…thing…but I think it would 'boil down' to WHETHER we really HAD a choice or not.

UNLESS you are REALLY in that position…(think Tom Cruise vs Tim Robbins in WOTW…where a 'normal' blue-collar chap HAD to decide between his children???) who can say what they'd REALLY do. I'd like to think the BEST of 'humanity' would come out, not JUST the worst…but I imagine it would.

Even 'rapists' and the 'scum' of the earth (humanity-wise)…should NOT be 'sacrificed' for the sake of survival/convenience…or MORALLY, we are lowering ALL of ourselves in the process. That sounds very 'high and proper'…

But I fear it would not be 'so' in reality…that given half a chance, my next-door neighbor, (who has a wife and two kids), would NOT HESITATE to throw my butt into the alien's lunchbox vs losing one of his kids or wife…(and he's a decent chap!).

We've seen things like 9-11 bring out the best AND the worst in folks…and I suspect such a 'threat' would do the same…all over. While I don't think it would be 'realistic' to expect humanity to ever face such a threat or be given a 'choice' in the matter IF it happened, (ala' WOTW)…it is the stuff of which nightmares ((and good horror films/books) are made.

But what would we REALLY do…as a race or individuals when/if that time came??? I don't honestly know…I would like to think I'd personally make them PAY 'dearly' for the chance to munch my scragly, world-worn carcass…but I might not get that 'choice'. I sure as heck know I wouldn't go 'quietly into that good night' IF I have anything to say about it…nor would I advocate/'accept' others doing the same FOR me or because of me.

Someone has to draw the line…somewhere…or we lose our 'humanity' and just become soul-less animals…and I think THAT would be a far worse fate than dying as a species to preserve what we are. But, like elbows…everybody's got more than one opinion…

'I'm neither for or against…apathy'….
(epitath for humanity???)
Lt DWW

There are other reasons to play miniature games than just "the spectacle." That's a perfectly acceptable reason to play the, but not the only. Computer games and board games play differently than miniature games, for reasons other than just the miniatures. They're structured differently. They play differently.

I play miniature games because of how they play. I went out and bought figures to play Seekrieg with, not because I wanted the spectacle (although, I do like the way they look), but because they are, in some ways, more practical than counters or cardboard standups.

The original poster asked if playing with unpainted figures was bad for the hobby. Having been on the receiving end of such elitist snobbery, I have to say I think the attitude that unpainted figures are unacceptable or should be penalized is just as bad if not worse.

Note: The previous post is completely and utterly wrong —that's someone else's text obviously written for another thread….what I did write was…

Hmmmm….Soylent Green is made out of people….

How about hoarding the deceased, processing the remains and shipping THAT offworld….?

Why don't we turn it around. What if you were in charge of the 'superior' race issuing the ultimatum? How would you go about 'herding' the 10%? Assume that it's a must have for your race's survival, you have a basic level of communication (i.e. "we want to eat you", "yes", and "no"), and you're completely ignorant of the 'inferior' race's social/economic/historical/religious backgrounds.

Sure. Go ahead and give the aliens your 'dregs of society'. Then watch the aliens train, arm, and turn them loose to round up the other 90% of the population. (There's an idea for a sci-fi novel in that somewhere…. ;)

Being that there is no other sentient beings that we have encountered thus far in our existance, there isn't much precident for this sort of thing.

If someone came down from the stars to tell me I wasn't the top of the food chain, cosmicly speaking, I'd tackle him to the ground, bite one of his distgusting mandibles off, poke him in his third eye and send him packing back to the arse end of the universe from which he came. Yee HAWWWWWWWW!

Dances With Words said:

"Part of it may be that I'm already considered 'expendable' by my government/society at large as I'm a 'disabled vet' and other than voting and paying taxes on everything I buy, I'm NOT 'contributing' THAT much to society in general…so I'd probably be one of the 10% considered 'alien-chow' material?"

I don't know you personally but from what you've written in the above passage, it seem that you ARE contributing. As well as making thought provoking argument, a comment, an idea, a theory… Everything counts in the scheme of things. No one has the right to place a value on the life of a human being. No one has the answer to "life, the universe and everything". There aren't any rules in terms of how vaild a person is in comparison to another.

Having said that, you're probably over 50 and a bit on the chewy side! :)

@Sentient Bean….thanks for the 'vote of confidence'…yes, I'm 'over 50 and VERY chewy', stringy and a 'tough old bird'…but maybe the aliens need 'chew toys' for their pets too? 8-/

Point is…that nobody is 'expendable'. It is considered my MOST of society to be morally/spiritually 'wrong' to take your own life, EVEN when in extreme pain/terminal situations…so HOW could humanity accept giving up ANYONE even 'deceased bodies' to feed 'hungry aliens'…?

I would think that IF they needed 'protein' that bad…we could find a way to round up rats/cockroaches from major cities EASIER and faster and process them into 'raw protein' and then subsidize all the farmers to start raising soybeans etc…on fallow land to produce SOY products, etc….Heck, we might even be able to feed all of HUMANITY too in the process….(what a concept)..without sacrificing a single human life???

IF an alien race had managed to somehow harness the power for interstellar travel…I bet their technology could help us HELP them and ourselves at the same time….by terraforming deserts on earth, underground caverns or even the moon, Mars and other planetary bodies? Imagine what we could do if we had access to the ethane and other chemicals on TITAN as far as industry, etc????

We could trade FOOD for clean, cheap energy and not trash the earth in the process….and with enough FUSION technology/power…we could even 'transmute' hazardous waste and 'trash' into basic elements that could be recycled and re-used positively.

Nope…I think if we encounter aliens that 'hunt' us or INSIST on 'live food'…(ala' V the series)…it is not because they are 'just hungry'…not when there are other 'alternatives'….and then, 'all bets are off' and they are going to get the 'short end of the stick' if I have anything to say/do about it….

Carpe' WITH my shield or ON it'um,
Lt DWW

DWW, don't worry about your age. It just means that you're more suitable for soup or stew than as a roaster!

But dude…what if they want 10% of EVERYBODY….

Hmmmmmmm…..why does this remind me of…'Stone Soup'? Maybe the human fascination with Jacuzzi's/hot-tubs is an 'alien plot'? Perhaps they secretly drain off all the hottub water/jacuzzi runoff and…..ewwwwwww!

As for 10% of 'everybody'…I think we could handle that….just everybody eat a box of XLAX first!!!

I'll PERSONALLY give them MORE than 10%!!! (or better yet, redirect the sewer system out of D.C. as we know more **it comes out of there than anyplace else!!!! Hey, it works for Chimps at the zoo who fling 'poo'!!! Let them eat…CAKE…er' yeah…'cake' works….

C'mon folks…think 'creatively' here….our fec…'SPECIES' is at STEAK!!!!

Dr. STRANGE-GLOVE…or how I learned to love the Proctologist….

8-D

Hey,

We DO have a real problem with overpopulation. Something MUST be done about it.

Aliens zoom in and offer to help out. And we turn them down because their solution is icky?

No matter how you cut it, a lot of people have to die to bring population down to sustainable levels. It is not enough to just freeze population at the current 6 billion+ level — and we can't manage even that by ourselves.

Is it somehow more etchical or humane to let people die of hunger and in petty bush wars? Or is it just more okay because it's happening over there and not here?

At the top of the food chain, population is controlled by availability of food. And that is exactly what's happening to us.

Not one.
Not even one criminal, rapist or child molester.
Not even one cockaroach.

Tell them to do their worst.

I am reminded of the ancient Spartans who, when the Great King of Persia sent a demand for the tokens of submission of Earth and Water, the Spartans tossed them into a well and let them die with the words "here you can find all the earth and water you wish."

The Aliens will find we are not so easy to kill.

Bombot – we'll just give them the page 3 models that have silicon enhancements, hopefully the silicon will poison them – and we're left with the 'real' women ;-p

One Jordan Bomb should do the trick!