Why do people assume aliens are smarter than us? Maybe they are dumber than us. What do you think?

Answer 1

It's a human bias. And a very prevalent one. Just look at the previous answers.

If WE were to cross vast interstellar distances, we would need some kind of massive technology to do so. A huge energy supply to provide motive force, probably some kind of medical technology to be able to survive in such a hostile environment so long or to produce the things we needed, and so on. We certainly can't do that now, and humans believe that most such inventions come from particularly smart people.

So the chain of logic is clear: we need technology, smart people make technology, therefore anyone who visits us must have that technology and therefore very smart people.

Hopefully, I've made the flaw in that argument also painfully clear. -WE- need technology, but who is to say that an alien does?

Perhaps there are aliens out there who can survive in vacuum. Who can sail through the void of space as easily as fish travel through our oceans. Or perhaps such a creature naturally lives among them that they can travel with. It is not inconcievable that it is completely natural for an alien race to hop from star to star.

Likewise, many of our greatest discoveries were not found by an act of genius, but by circumstance. The process for making rubber was a laboratory accident, just to name one example. A species of very lucky idiots might stumble across all the technology they need. If their civilization started a billion years before ours, they might even have plenty of time for it. It could even be argued that any group foolish enough to waste the resources necessary to cross space just to say 'hi' would almost HAVE to be idiotic.

I think the best thing that can be said about aliens is that they are probably ALIEN. There is no reason that they must think like us, react as we do, or have even vaguely similar value systems. To expect certain patterns based on what WE do is perhaps an (understandable, I suppose) kind of arrogance.

So it goes.

Answer 2

Those aliens which most people think about are a biased subset of the whole of alien-kind.
Those aliens that come anywhere near earth (in fiction or otherwise) are capable of interstellar transportation. We're not, so these aliens are quite possibly smarter than us, or at least have a head start.
It's impossible to calculate from a grand total of no information how many alien species are about, but given that those with interstellar flight must be very few, a normal distribution would suggest that, on average, aliens are somewhat less advanced than that.

Answer 3

Well people assume aliens are smarter than us because they wouldnt be able assume a situation where we visit alien becuase they know we dont have the technology to, so in order for them to imagine an ecounter where the aliens visit them so they need to imagine them with superior technology and intelligence. People are also indoctrinated into this way of thinkin by TV.
They could be less advanced... why not?

Answer 4

We only presume aliens that have the technology to travel the vast distances of space to be more intelligent than us because we have yet to discover that technology. Considering life on this planet as been without technology for over 3 billion years then there are probably billions of planets with just plant and animal life, although the type of technology needed to travel between star systems would be so far advanced of us in every way that we may presume higher intelligence it could also mean that they are around the same the level of intelligence but have discovered more advanced technology's. Either way, wouldn't like to pit ourselves against such beings.

Answer 5

If we are talking about aliens that will be able to come to Earth from their world, then they would be technologically much more advanced that humans. That does not mean that they will be smarter in other senses.
But it must also be a tendency among people to look for a higher intelligence, someone better that humans that will come and intervene in our history either for better or for worse. After all this talk about aliens it would be a disappopintment to find some dumb creatures worse than humans.

Answer 6

First off, let me say I like the perspective you are looking from. A very different angle than most people. Which form of live is smarter can only be answered when we see who visits who first. If we can come up with the technology before they do (of which i doubt) then that proves a slight increased intelligence. If they beat us to it, then they are considered smarter than us.

Answer 7

I think that people assume that aliens who have traveled here from distant universes must be more technologically advanced than our species is, because we do not have the technology to travel beyond our immediate vicinity in outer space

whether or not a being from another solar system is more technologically advanced would be smarter (and therefore potentially benevolent,) or more stupid, (and therefore potentially belligerent) than we are, has been the theme of countless sci-fi stories

Answer 8

They must be. They have the possibility to travel between solar systems and we don't. If we travel beyond our own solar system and find a planet on which there are intelligent beings nor capable of flying that far, then we're the aliens... And we're the smartest ones.

Answer 9

Good question huh!I guess r smarter cos they don't live on this earth.They r nt here but still they r updated about latest trends of here.But we r still on the hunt for even there one proof of existense.I got latest news from my secret resources tht sum aliens r on earth .Lol! =D.

Answer 10

You'll have to admit that it takes one smart cookie to travel the vast distances of space to get here in the first place!

In all, it seems a reasonable assumption that they might be "smarter" than us...