I doubt we'd handle meeting aliens this well

[jackulator]

http://www.trueactivist.com/gab_gallery/tribe-meets-white-man-for-the-first-time-emotional-video/

[Uncle Bingo]

I imagine meeting an alien humanoid would actually be a similar experience, as the only reason it seems for blowing the mind of a little world like this is would be because you think the creature of a different cultural intelligence is cute. I dunno, maybe you're right though, and it'd be for us meeting aliens more like it would be if these tribesmen had encountered instead a white woman for the first time. She'd be showing them technology the likes of which they've never dreamed of, meanwhile they're looking down her shirt the whole time. At least that's what I'd be doing provided the alien is not flat-chested. I know there's a big Big BIG jumbo universe out there with lots of round things bouncing around and naturally I want to understand it just as much as the next guy. To any higher intelligence that might be reading this now, I have one important question to ask on behalf of my kind, and that's what are you wearing?

[marleycake]

this got me thinking, isn't their such a thing as universal language that's innate in all modern humans, like facial expressions, smiling, laughing, nodding, the hand shake, this is exactly what it would of been like say 200,000 years ago. this is spectacular! i like how those tribesmen just start rubbing his skin like he's an alien or a ghost 

if we're going to be ready for an alien encounter we'd need to kill off superstition, diseases like cancer, religion, pseudoscience, racism and all that jazz that's just holding us back.

who know what aliens would do though, maybe they'll only show us what we are capable of knowing or hold back some technology or ideas for our safety, meeting the alien really isn't meeting the alien, we might not even know what encountering an alien is even like. i think back in the day when cultures would meet with language barriers was very psychedelic  you can just feel the excitement and fear and joy in the video. thanks 4 the share

[jackulator]

this video just made me sad for humanity -- the idea that under the right circumstances, with the right kind of leaders preaching the right kind of nonsense, within a generation or two we could revert back to the status of 'animal'.

so to see a first contact like this is bittersweet.

protect the flame at all costs brothers.

[CallMeBronco]

I like to think positively. I don't worry about our civilization collapsing or atomic war. Things tend to work themselves out. It might take a lifetime, but they do, often without any direct influence from man. I'm reminded of Micheal Chrichton again on global warming and Fossil fuels; he pointed out how we've been moving from more carbon to less over the past hundred or so years. Long before people even heard of global warming.
I was reading in a book about how just 100 or so years ago it wasn't uncommon for people to treat animals, even pets barbarically. Things will keep getting better guys.
I don't know how I got talking about this.

oh yeah heh, aliens... those things are weird.  ... 

I will protect the flame!!! I will rub my nipples in alcohol and run down the streets of San Antonio shouting: IT'S FUN TO STAY AT THE YMCA

[jackulator]

bronco I'm not really that worried about it as long as there are books around. because even if there was some kind of horrific event like a giant asteroid or something, any species with thumbs would (after a few hundred thousand years or so) just pick up where we left off as soon as they figured out how to translate our books. I got the emphasis wrong in my post. I started out with one thought and had another one while writing and what came out ended up being my thoughts about my second thought...

so I agree marley -- it is a very uplifting video -- just struck me though -- how despite all our gadgets and fancy ideas and art and whatnot, we're so new and fragile in the face of a giant imposing universe full of lamb cutlets. if we're still at the stage where meeting people (of our own goddamn race) with different color skin is terrifying we've got a long-ass way to go before we're hobnobbing around with the more advanced aliens in the galaxy... maybe we should just chill for a while and stop trying to grow up so fast. tell the scientists -- work on world hunger. work on ways to make sure nobody has to get sick. work on ways to sustain our lives without having to decimate the resources of the biosphere... hell, maybe it's that step right there that allows a race to progress more than anything. we're still playing around with fire -- deciding what and/or who to burn with it... and a few super-geniuses are handing us more and more powerful fire to play with... not a good situation.

meanwhile all bingo can think about is galactic tits tits tits tits TITS! haha