Barry: Why can't aliens be friendly?
Derek: There's no glowing fingers on these bastards — we've got a bunch of extraterrestrial psychopaths on our hands, like a visit from a planet full of Charles Mansons.
Derek: There's no glowing fingers on these bastards — we've got a bunch of extraterrestrial psychopaths on our hands, like a visit from a planet full of Charles Mansons.
This is gonna change science fiction forever. There's not gonna be any more E.T. or My Favorite Martian. People won't understand. E.T. won't be phoning home. He'll be waiting for you in a dark tunnel, ready to strangle you while he literally eats you alive. If you're lucky, he'll snap your neck first. People of the future will understand that.
— Gordon Freeman, Freeman's Mind 2
1. THEIR SURVIVAL WILL BE MORE IMPORTANT THAN OUR SURVIVAL. If an alien species has to choose between them and us, they won't choose us. It is difficult to imagine a contrary case; species don't survive by being self-sacrificing.
2. WIMPS DON'T BECOME TOP DOGS. No species makes it to the top by being passive. The species in charge of any given planet will be highly intelligent, alert, aggressive, and ruthless when necessary.
3. THEY WILL ASSUME THAT THE FIRST TWO LAWS APPLY TO US.
2. WIMPS DON'T BECOME TOP DOGS. No species makes it to the top by being passive. The species in charge of any given planet will be highly intelligent, alert, aggressive, and ruthless when necessary.
3. THEY WILL ASSUME THAT THE FIRST TWO LAWS APPLY TO US.
— Richard Tuna, The Killing Star
On Earth, humankind can step onto another continent, and without a thought, destroy the kindred civilizations found there through warfare and disease. But when they gaze up at the stars, they turn sentimental and believe that if extraterrestrial intelligences exist, they must be civilizations bound by universal, noble, moral constraints, as if cherishing and loving different forms of life are parts of a self-evident universal code of conduct. I think it should be precisely the opposite: Let's turn the kindness we show toward the stars to members of the human race on Earth.
— Cixin Liu, The Three-Body Problem
The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care. The hunter has to be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him. If he finds other life — another hunter, an angel or a demon, a delicate infant or a tottering old man, a fairy or a demigod — there's only one thing he can do: open fire and eliminate them. In this forest, hell is other people. An eternal threat that any life that exposes its own existence will be swiftly wiped out. This is the picture of cosmic civilization. It's the explanation for the Fermi Paradox.
— Cixin Liu, The Dark Forest
Extraterrestrial, running over pedestrians
In a spaceship while they screamin' at me, "Let's just be friends!"
In a spaceship while they screamin' at me, "Let's just be friends!"
— Eminem, "My Name Is" (The censored version, at least)
There is no end to the abomination of the alien. Do not allow any guise of sentience to stay your hand – there can be no hesitation when the survival of humanity as a species is at stake.
— Inquisitor Kartize, Warhammer 40,000
"He who allows the alien to live shares its crime of existence."
