Alien Brains, Alien Thoughts
After a lively set of comments on the last post about human reactions to a supposed “alien” presence, I wondered about one of my main points, which most seem to have missed (or I didn’t express it properly.) The idea was that any supposed non-humans interacting with us may have developed or evolved in a completely different way than we would expect or even imagine.
On a promotional tour for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (which he directed) Leonard Nimoy was asked if he thought that whales were more intelligent than humans. (The plot of the film involved communication with humpback whales.) After a moment, Nimoy asked the press people to consider the concept that whales may not have evolved “ahead of” or “behind” us, but, as he put it, “off to the side.”
This point is well-taken. Many other intelligent species on Earth seem to have adapted to their environments and physical structure with just what they need to get along. Whales need to survive in a liquid environment, and propagate their species. They also seem to have a great capacity for learning new concepts to adapt to changing conditions. Their communications with each other are complicated and subtle, and have been proven to change over relatively short periods. The aesthetic value of the sounds is an untestable question in scientific terms. Since they have no real way to permanently manipulate their surroundings, the whales’ purpose seems to be to live in relative harmony with their environment. They have adapted to their particular circumstances with supreme efficiency.
Their evolutionary path is different than ours, but it is probably debatable whether they are more or less advanced than us. It certainly depends on how the terms are defined. Things might have turned out differently if they had developed hands! For all we know, they may be arguing about the meaning of life with their complicated noises, in addition to mating calls, feeding calls, etc.
From a human point of view, the life of a whale seems like it could get pretty boring, but most animals never seem to be bored. Domestic pets might get restless, but that’s because they have come to rely on their owners for stimulation, since most of their other needs are taken care of.
Insects have been found to have a rudimentary capacity for learning, even if the higher centers of their brains are rendered inoperative, so the ability to store and retrieve information exists in other forms of life as well. Who knows what evolutionary paths other animals may have taken? Given a billion more years, some species of bugs might be driving cars and building monoliths, but what will their motivations be? How could we even guess at their thoughts? For that matter, how do we know what other animals are thinking? Why does my cat freak out and run around the house every once in awhile? She may have a very good reason that would make no sense to me at all.
Given our propensity for building machines, some have hypothesized that we may eventually become more machine-like. Some of our behaviors have already adapted to accommodate to the devices that we invented to make our lives easier or more efficient. In his 1998 book Darwin Among The Machines, George Dyson wrote, “Everything that human beings are doing to make it easier to operate computer networks is at the same time, but for different reasons, making it easier for computer networks to operate human beings…. Darwinian evolution, in one of those paradoxes with which life abounds, may be a victim of its own success, unable to keep up with non-Darwinian processes that it has spawned.â€
Were these non-humans of ours taken over by their own technology, or did they never develop any? What factors caused them to develop into what they are? Many reports say they have hands, or claws, or something that would enable tool use. Is this because we are seeing what we expect through the lens of our expectations? Taken as a whole, reports of non-human contact seem to make no sense, unless we buy into the “genetic manipulation” theory of abduction researchers. I have come to think that if the aliens had problems with their genetics, they would know enough about it to have no need for humans, or cows for that matter.
Once again, we are laying our motivations and ideas onto the question. A shaman from the Amazon looking at a baseball game would likely have no idea what was going on, and perhaps more importantly, why, but it’s still interesting to many. There is no real purpose for it. Our survival does not depend on it. So why do it?
The motivations for any supposed non-human race may be inscrutable beyond what we can even imagine. If we cannot meet them on any common cultural or philosophical grounds, their activities and very existence will remain a mystery.
These ideas are assumptions based on reports of something that as a race we cannot agree is really happening, but something has been causing people to report encounters with things that are not recognizable as human for thousands of years. How much of this is coming from our brains and how much is externally generated is, I think, subject to debate and lively speculation. New questions may push research in new directions.
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Sep 24 2009 
September 25th, 2009 at 3:13 am
Greg
A stimulating post, which may have further extensions.
Language itself may be an interim evolutionary adaptation based on biology ( moving atmospheric waves by wagging a muscle) that others do not require.
Yet, at the same time a transposition of non verbal thought in a visual language as received by a human being in the form of complex images, and\or metaphors may be a a carrier of non human concepts, a interpretation we superimpose on the basis of “the next closest thing”. Think of a Google search.
I suppose the point of all this is that experiential cognizance precedes communication…no experience.. no concept…in terms of our experiential cognizance versus an advanced non human variant, our place markers (language)may be like taking ourselves as a five pound bag and trying to stuff “their” several tons into it.
Best
Bruce D
http://materialintangible.blogspot.com/2009/07/human-mediumship-of-ufo-phenomenon.html
September 25th, 2009 at 4:47 am
Certainly it’s possible that aliens, should they exist, are so incongruous with us that we couldn’t possibly comprehend them no matter how much we studied them. And vice versa.
In my comments on your last post I didn’t intend to imply that aliens would necessarily be more advanced than us, only to point out that they could be advanced enough not to notice us, however beautiful and remarkable we think our thoughts are.
In fact I’m intrigued with the notion of hypothetical alien visitors in substantial ways less technologically sophisticated than us.
Perhaps the greatest service you perform for the UFOlogical community is your dogged insistence that there are many possible scenarios and models worth considering. And, in the spirit of Keel, that there may be multiple unconventional phenomena in play.
My own expectation is that we will indeed learn more of the truth over time, and that everybody will be greatly surprised by at least a part of it.
September 25th, 2009 at 4:50 am
Bruce,
As always, you are more eloquent than I!
I have said that looking at the UFO subject as an “art project” may bear more fruit than trying to analyze soil samples or removing “implants” from abductees. The whole thing seems like it may be an attempt to communicate by “transposition of non verbal thought in a visual language as received by a human being in the form of complex images,” as you put it.
Visual art is just that–an attempt to communicate in non-verbal terms something that may be impossible to describe in language, just as poetry tries to describe that which cannot be described.
I am always reminded of a quote from an interview I conducted with Dean Radin in the mid-1990s. He said that the experimental methods of his research in parapsychology was like “trying to kill a fly with a sledgehammer.” In other words, the subtle effects and their signatures and our attempts to tease them out into a place where they could be studied was not easy with the (present) tools of science.
I tend to think that this may be where we stand with an explanation for the UFO phenomenon: Our minds are not subtle enough to look between the reported physical events and grasp the concepts that we need to get a handle on what may be causing it.
September 25th, 2009 at 5:09 am
Victor,
Thanks for your thoughts. Yes, I guess I am a “cheerleader,” and have mentioned that angle on occasion.
Funny that you bring up the “less advanced” angle. I thought about that when writing this post. Perhaps the message is that we rely on technology too much, and whatever is interacting with us is more conversant with mental/psychological technology than physical.
September 25th, 2009 at 11:12 am
Greg you mention “race” in regards to potential aliens, etc. “supposed non-human race” and as humans “as a race.” Again I have to comment because I read recently elsewhere — oh it was a C2C guest who used the same “race” reference to non-humans (versus aliens as another race potentially?).
I just learned from the amazing Sean Connell book on Evo Devo — “Endless Forms Most BeautifuL” that what humans think of as a “race” is really a PROTEIN mutation — not necessarily a genetic mutation. This is why pigmentation happens so quickly in adaptation to environment — it’s one of the few “real time evolution” events in science, with the moth pigmentation from pollution as the prominent case study.
But what triggers the protein mutation is a hormonal response due to temperature/seasonal adaptation and it’s been recently argued that the “white” race is from farming causing Vitamin D deficiency around 5300 BC. Before that northern Europeans were a “black” race relying on fish for food (high in vitamin D).
Anyway it’s obviously a very touchy subject as some African-Americans promote eating more sardines, for example, when living in a northern climate, to offset the vitamin d defiency which has hormonal effects. Another “race” scandal I discovered — with psychotropic results — is that whites lack neuromelanin in the inner ear and therefore have less tolerance for sound amplitude (volume).
The inner ear is crucial to the UFO humming noise — the buzz emphasized by Jenny Randles. It’s when sound turns electromagnetic in the brain — even Daniel Levitin, the “sound evolution” expert refused to acknowledge this inner ear sound transduction when we had an email exchange. You’ve acknowledged this Jenny Randle UFO alien “humming” before I think — the “Oz Effect” I think. Anyway sorry to bring this stuff up based on one word repeated in your post — but I really do appreciate the “wide angle” lense of this blog from both you and Nick.
September 25th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
Greg
I agree. The field is mostly a cultural cartoon based on television. If you leave this field, the powers that be will have a hard time finding someone as adept in wielding a hoe. The damn weeds are gaining again..the cartoon experts are painting in primary colors for imbeciles.Write more.
Thank God I have something to read. Thank you.
Best
Bruce.
September 26th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Excellent post!
September 26th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
I think I’d characterize you more as “eloquent advocate” than cheerleader.” Still…
September 26th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
I’m not going to go into detail about this, as this has been discussed in detail elsewhere, but it has been established that there are three requirements for high IQs and sapience to be able to develop:
1) Grasping hands with opposable thumbs,
2) Medium sized bodies,
3) Curiosity, and
4) Large brain-to-body weight ratio
Why? Because…
1) Grasping hands are *essential* for the delicate development of tools and the subsequent use of those tools,
2) Delicate hands imply a delicate creature that is neither too big (and clumsy) or so small that its body cannot support a large enough brain,
3) A keen since of curiosity will encourage the development of more intelligence since observation is one of the first steps of learning, and
4) Brains are metabolically very expensive, therefore they are not naturally selected unless there is specific need for a high IQ in order to adapt to imposed environmental demands that requires high IQ.
There has been only one environment that has ever stimulated the evolution of all four requirements above and that is a forested environment on the edge of a Savannah. Tree climbing animals there will evolve grasping hands because that is the only environment that encourages that. Tree climbing animals would naturally be medium sized since that is the optimum size considering the size of a typical tree. And curiosity would be more likely to develop in a tree climbing animal because it can see for great distances in a tall tree and observe things like the hunting patterns of lions or when a lion had made a kill and abandoned it or it could see bad weather approaching long before it reached their “camp” and so on.
That is why whales can only demonstrate the intelligence of a two year old child. My bird demonstrates the intelligence of a five year old. Chimpanzees demonstrate the intelligence of an eight year old. This is not a coincidence. Reading, writing, arithmetic, and having a fully developed language (as opposed to primitive speech) are absolutely essential for developing advanced technology and scientific advances. Without hands, these things are impossible and therefore not having hands will limit the maximum IQ these animals could ever develop (except for the chimpanzee). Humans didn’t develop a fully developed language until their average IQ reached 70. Writing took an even higher intelligence. No animal is even close to humans in terms of intelligence and that is why only humans are sapient. The IQs of these other animals is perfect for the environment they are in, and there is nothing in their environment that will stimulate them to have progressively higher and higher IQ levels. Large brains are metabolically very expensive, therefore if the environment we are in does not continue to stimulate us to higher IQs, our IQs will either remain as they are or they will degenerate.
See http://www.wspublishers.com/uhh.pdf
September 26th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
I think that every person that ponders upon this subject has to make himself a question —which may sound stupid, but i believe is paramount:
The question is: Are UFOs and their occupants knowable?
Yes, it may very well be that aliens are so different from us that their motives and intentions could be completely unscrutable and incomprehensible.
But think of it this way: if we decide that aliens cannot be comprehended then… what’s the point?
The basis of science is the acknowledgement that there are certain patterns in Nature regular enough that can be quantified and modeled. There wouldn’t be any Astronomy if people like Kepler and Copernicus had decided that the movement of planets were beyond the comprehension of mere mortals.
So; what I’m saying is this: maybe it doesn’t matter that aliens and UFOs are beyond human comprehension. Since they’re already here, we cannot afford NOT to try to understand as much as we can about them.
September 27th, 2009 at 9:43 pm
If I may corner this single part of the conversation…
I had this discussion somewhere before… though I do not recall exactly where or with whom. My opposite argued that humans were not unique in the application of tools. Some species of apes as well as some birds are known to pick up a stick or a rock to apply for a specific purpose that would be otherwise undoable.
My reply was that there is a difference between the use of tools and the building of machines. Tools are most often single-item implements, where as machines are built from many parts to work in unison towards producing an effect that no one, single device could achieve.
I think that machines represent the human desire to mimic our archetypical creator. This is not to preach a gospel of creationism or the existence of deity but rather, to expose humanity’s long held belief that such entity or entities exist and because of that, we worked to become creators ourselves.
One example would be the wheel. Used for forming clay tablets or cheese, it is a tool. But when combined with an axel or complimented with gears and an external source of energy, like a horse, mule or oxen, it becomes a single cog in a larger machine to grind grains or transport materials more efficiently. We become creators of things that do not otherwise exist… much like a god is said to have created man from dust.
We had/have a role model to follow.
Finally, if we have any single commonality with an alien species, it may well be our desire to invent, or create. In fact, if we ever do meet ET, it will almost certainly be the result of some device that didn’t otherwise exist.
…
September 28th, 2009 at 2:01 am
“Yes, it may very well be that aliens are so different from us that their motives and intentions could be completely unscrutable and incomprehensible”
…as we would also appear to them. If you have ever observed retards, sometimes they can do the stupidest things that make no sense to anyone but them.
September 28th, 2009 at 2:04 am
“Some species of apes as well as some birds are known to pick up a stick or a rock to apply for a specific purpose that would be otherwise undoable”
…but none of them can create tools from scratch, they can only use what is already available in their environment, as is. To create tools, like a spearhead from a rock, requires hands and sufficient intelligence.
September 28th, 2009 at 2:06 am
“…as we would also appear to them. If you have ever observed retards, sometimes they can do the stupidest things that make no sense to anyone but them.”
I have that exact same feeling whenever I’m around young suits discussing Golf
September 28th, 2009 at 7:16 am
ecks,
Thanks!
September 28th, 2009 at 7:16 am
Victor,
I’ll probably start using that phrase from now on…
September 28th, 2009 at 7:18 am
Sage,
A good analysis.
I tried not to qualify this hypothetical non-human intelligence as more or less advanced, just different, using well-understood examples.
September 28th, 2009 at 7:22 am
RPJ,
I hope that i didn’t give the impression that we should stop trying to figure out the problem, only that it may be more subtle than we have imagined so far.
September 28th, 2009 at 7:40 am
Mike,
I think this is your first comment. Welcome to the site!
I would ask where humans came up with the idea that a creator was making tools that were more than the sum of their parts, unless there is some communication with the creator envisioned by a particular culture. In other words, do we create our own future by seeing into it on some way, using the model of some being or intelligent force? Interesting idea.
As for your comment about some new invention that will allow us some interaction with a non-human race, I tend to think any revelations will be as a result of a change in our view of reality, rather than any technological developments. Perhaps the new sort of thought required for the device may engender the change. Who knows?
September 29th, 2009 at 9:38 am
Has anyone wondered where evolution is leading us?
I have, and having observed where humans have come from, conquering fire, various sciences including the atom and genetics, humans will inevitably conquer more obstacles like space travel, up until the point where, if we don’t destroy ourselves first, we will achieve mastery over what we perceive as “reality”.
Mastery of reality means we will be able to do absolutely anything.
Now imagine how boring our lives would become.
The only way to stop this would be to press the universe’s reset button.
Maybe that’s what the Big Bang was…
And here we are once again, probably in an evolutionary race with many other unknown civilizations, racing towards the mastery of everything.
October 5th, 2009 at 6:45 am
At Harvard those associated with the John Mack Institute use cognitive linguistic analysis to sudy disclosures of conactees & channelers etc. TEXT CONTENT from alleged aliens is studied hrough lexigraphic computer programs (I’m familiar with the one at Princeton)to “grade” features of syntax rules, grammatical constructions, etc. I also illustrated Cosmic Trigger long ago.
October 5th, 2009 at 6:58 am
As you know language communication is not restricted to the vocal chords. As one speaks the alignment of saccadic eye patters, hand gestures, and body language add to content. As “higher intelligence” manifests in a playful sense of humor, profound loving kindness, and telapathic “abstract reasoning” certainly exceeds an earthly score of 180 IQ in these areas. Lower IQ channelers/contactees use primitive syntax rules, vague unsubstantiated references,psycological quirks,and some times delusionary uses of key verb phrases as saccadics infer problems to any MRI researcher of heat/mind electro magnetic signal frequencies. Authentic “alien” TEXT CONTENT is truely awe inspiring and the teachings are compliant with the latest quantum mechanics, that are found in some ancient texts that cite “angels” or celestial spirits etc.
October 5th, 2009 at 7:10 am
John,
Goading me to post to a round number?
Have you read my posts on “alien writing?”
I did not know that there was any academic inquiry into non-vocal/written communication, especially from possible non-human sources.