User blog:Mr.Robbo/Human Chauvinism 3

Human Chauvinism

Human Chauvinism 2

If you don't know what I'm going on about, check the links. Basically, I'm listing human characteristics which may not be the same in extraterrestrials. Since such concepts as alien logical systems take quite a while to get across and explore, and therefore take up a lot of space, this edition of 'Human Chauvinism' will not discuss three different subjects as usual.

Aristotelian Logic
This is kind of an extension of 'Human Psychology' in 'Human Chauvinism 2', which was getting a bit long. However, while considering how alien psychology is different from human psychology is uncommon, considering how alien logic might be different from human logic is almost completely unknown of (as far as I know). Consider the following: "The statement that 'all crows are black' is true. Therefore, the statement that 'this crow is not black' is false." Duh! That's obvious! Well, it may be obvious to humans, but extraterrestrials may find such thinking a little harder to grasp. Human brains are designed for a system often referred to as 'Aristotelian logic', extraterrestrial brains may not be.

I realise this is hard to grasp, because we're hard-wired for Aristotelian logic, so any other ways of thinking about things just doesn't seem to make sense. But consider the following... It is situations such as these that seem to go against Aristotelian logic. However, alien mind may find some of these statements as trivial as the one about the crows I mentioned first. What does this mean for alien cultures and civilizations?*
 * People who work 70 hours per week are generally less productive, per week, than people who work 40 hours per week.
 * Mixing 1 litre of water with 1 litre of ethyl alcohol results in 1.93 litres solution. No chemical reaction takes place.
 * Reducing the number of roads in a transport system has been found to reduce congestion.
 * Warm water can freeze faster than cold water in the same environment.
 * Nought-point-nine recurring equals 1.
 * If you travel at 90% the speed of light alongside a light beam in space, the light beam will still appear to be travelling at 100% the speed of light.
 * Quantum physics. Enough said.

First, there could be a big difference between the scientific developments of different alien civilizations. Scientific conundrums and new technologies that take millennia for one civilization's experts to work out could be trivially simple to solve and develop by another alien culture. Think of the Ancient Greeks discovering Relativity. I remember a science fiction story in which it turns out that FTL is childishly simple for the majority of alien cultures, but, because of how our brains work, is thought to be impossible by most human scientists. When humanity finally discovers FTL, they break out into the galaxy with all of their advanced technology (because most aliens find it so easy to develop, most newly FTL-capable civilizations in the galaxy are relatively low-tech). Naturally, humanity forges an interstellar empire with their (relatively) advanced weapons which, naturally, most other alien civilizations find difficult to even comprehend (because their brains work differently). Anyway, you get the idea. If only I can remember what the books is...

Second, communication between alien civilizations would be a lot more difficult if they followed different logical systems. Extraterrestrials may have ways of thinking and logical concepts that just make no sense to us, and can't even be translated into an equivalent in human languages. Suppose for a moment that I had a computerised translator to help me communicate with some extraterrestrial. I am confused when, though my translator is doing it's best, every now and again it comes out with a phrase or sentence that makes no sense, and when the aliens say some words, the translator promptly blurts out "UNTRANSLATABLE CONCEPT!", then the CPU overheats and catches fire. Eugh! Not again! The poor aliens would have similar problems with their own translator, unable to translate simple human concepts into terms that they can understand.

However, I'm sure most of the time, this won't be a problem, because I think that most simple concepts such as 'I'm hungry' and 'Do you need help?' should be fairly universal. Nevertheless, I;ve been wrong before. All of this confused-translator business kind of reminds me of an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation called Darmok, in which the characters struggle to understand some wierd alien race, even with their fancy (impossible) 'universal translators'.

Third, galactic diplomacy is now even more difficult! At least with Earth politics our diplomats can understand the political motivation behind the moves of foreign governments most of the time. In galactic diplomacy, civilizations may not have that luxury, constantly trying to understand the apparently inexplicable actions of alien civilizations. I find it likely that civilizations that use similar logical systems to each other will band together in alliances, because at least aliens following the same logical system as you will make sense! Bring on the Alliance of Aristolelian Logical Systems! (That's us! Woo!)


 * By the way, if you're still not convinced that aliens could use completely different systems of logic to us, look up Godel's Incompleteness Theorems. They basically prove that no logical system is complete, and all logical systems have holes and flaws. Other systems of logic may not have these flaws, but they themselves will have their own flaws in different places.