I represent an interstellar civilization, What does Earth offer for export?

[nhnifong]

This could actually be something humanity can provide in abundance, if they are not too different from us. Suddenly all those with a major in arts would be rich and the engineers would work at starbucks

Ha! If engineers had to work at starbucks we'd be automating that place in a hurry.

[Nuke]

Or cat food...

or perhaps cats

[Holo]

Slaves, oppression, fear, and violence. It's what we do best.

Maybe what you do best, but I, and many others, don't do any of that.

[YX33A]

We have idiots willing to do stupid/suicidal tasks that your people know better then to do. We can offer a different PoV on things, and we would make great space war cannon fodder. We have our own culture(well, a bunch of them), weird stories, odd music, and bizarre forms of art.

We also make our own types of food here, and that might interest people.

[Godot]

Well, in old Dr. Who / Torchwood tradition, we offer you a couple of our children every year, for use as drugs

[Schitzree]

Maple Syrup

[jfull]

Not sure if this has been said already, but I'm sure there's many reasons they'd be interested obtaining specimens of Earth's life forms.

Whether for biochemical science, behavioral study, or simply novelty's sake.

However, they may not view mankind as having any claim of "ownership" over Earth's life forms, and not see any reason to compensate us for specimens.

[1of6Billion]

All we can offer is a way to satisfy your curiosity towards us. We are most certainly interested in you

[nhnifong]

However, they may not view mankind as having any claim of "ownership" over Earth's life forms, and not see any reason to compensate us for specimens.

We may not own them, but we have extensive knowledge of how to find specimens and capture them alive. We can also create artificial habitats for most animals and plants.

[Nibb31]

The only alternative would be a level of communalism that would make our worlds most dedicated communist governments seem positively mercantile in comparison.

I don't see why it wouldn't work. The only reason communism can't work on Earth is because humans are humans. In an ideal organization, with ideally motivated individuals, it's probably the most efficient system. See Star Trek.

I think it's actually more probable that space-faring species, with a civilization that spans thousands of years and advanced technology, must have streamlined itself into a highly efficient and rational society that puts the common interest of the group before concepts like personal greed and private property.

[jwenting]

the most (and probably only) valuable thing we have is slave labour, and that means human beings.

[Halsfury]

This may sound lame but believe it or not the one thing which would be the most useful to both species is economic knowledge.

Groups developing in isolation have very different ideas, frankly I think the one thing which we would both want more than anything is simply economic innovations. i.e. ideas about how to bank, lend, buy and sell to increase GDP.

Now that would be something which everybody would need, no interstellar civilization could get by without giving loans or doing something to make more money than there apparently is and if the interstellar species has something more efficient than Keynesian economics then that's a huge win in terms of instantly accelerating development across the globe.

And maybe our humble economics could allow them to branch out and perform trades once thought impossible.

This is the true wealth of any civilization since without $$$ there are no houses, no toilets and definitely no starships.

Think about it, in ancient Rome you couldn't get a loan and technology crawled along as a result, and in the 15th century the Medici family opened the first world bank in Florence and all of a sudden we went from knights and castles to the Saturn V in just 500 years! Imagine if we could get another innovation as impactful now as the Medici bank was then.

Edited December 12, 2013 by Halsfury

[MC.STEEL]

PICTURES OF CATS!!!!

nuff sayd.

[Deadpangod3]

PICTURES OF CATS!!!!

nuff sayd.

KITTEH!!!!

(Tenchar)

[tetryds]

The only thing we have that can be of interest to a civilization advanced enough to reach us is our DNA.

We would act agressively on their presence and force them to fight us.

So it would be worth for such advanced civilization to study our planet and lifeforms without being noticed.

[Seret]

We would act agressively on their presence and force them to fight us.

That would be stupendously unwise of us. Personally I find it pretty unlikely that our first contact with aliens would be a physical encounter, but if they were capable of bridging interstellar distances and we weren't then it's pretty likely that (should they want to) they could slap us about as much as they liked without us being able to a damn thing about it.

First rule of combat: don't fight what you can't beat.

I don't know why they'd bother though, they'd have no need to fight us. A starfaring civilisation could probably just take anything they wanted without too much trouble.

Edited December 12, 2013 by Seret

[tetryds]

That would be stupendously unwise of us. Personally I find it pretty unlikely that our first contact with aliens would be a physical encounter, but if they were capable of bridging interstellar distances and we weren't then it's pretty likely that (should they want to) they could slap us about as much as they liked without us being able to a damn thing about it.

First rule of combat: don't fight what you can't beat.

I don't know why they'd bother though, they'd have no need to fight us. A starfaring civilisation could probably just take anything they wanted without too much trouble.

The humans act agressively at anything that seems like a threat to them.

It's not about "don't fight what you can't beat", but "fight against anything you not sure about".

We don't have that poor weaponary, nuclear missles are at least a pain in the arse to contain.

I would even say that our weaponary is ahead of the technology we currently have at hand.

[Charzy]

Think about it, in ancient Rome you couldn't get a loan and technology crawled along as a result, and in the 15th century the Medici family opened the first world bank in Florence and all of a sudden we went from knights and castles to the Saturn V in just 500 years! Imagine if we could get another innovation as impactful now as the Medici bank was then.

Think about it, in the Industrial Era you couldn't crash the HMS Curacoa and the RMS Queen Mary into eachother and technology crawled along as a result, and on October 2nd 1942 the captain of the HMS Curacoa crashed the HMS Curacoa into the RMS Queen Mary and all of a sudden we went from having nothing in space to having an object in space in just one day! Imagine if we could get another innovation as impactful now as that collision was then.

[Seret]

The humans act agressively at anything that seems like a threat to them.

It's not about "don't fight what you can't beat", but "fight against anything you not sure about".

Well, I don't think we're that stupid or violent. In the early 1900s it was assumed that there was an active alien civilisation on Mars, people just accepted it without any major calls for biffo. I think we'd be a lot more mellow about confirmation of aliens than you're suggesting. We're pretty open to the idea, really.

We don't have that poor weaponary, nuclear missles are at least a pain in the arse to contain.

If we encountered a civilisation capable of travelling interstellar distances it would be (to quote the book above) bows and arrows against the lightning. Our nuclear missiles are ballistic weapons designed for use against ground targets, I suspect a vehicle with enough energy to move between the stars could step out of their range with laughable ease. We can barely shoot down our own satellites in the lowest of orbits, we have nothing with which to fight a casually spacefaring visitor. It would be like a man in a rowboat thinking himself a threat to a battleship. There just wouldn't be any fight. Sorry!

[TerrificToby]

If you are willing to not kill us, we can offer art, our DNA and the DNA of any species on the planet. But we are going to want something in return. Namely, resources and terraforming technology, we need more space to keep our population, maybe terraforming mars would be an option.

[EvilotionCR2]

We could become a RL equivalent of Risa,so, a planet which is famous for great holidays. And also some pets.

[Chrisd857]

What does Earth offer for export?

Fish, all of it. The dolphins were very appreciative before they left.

[Halsfury]

Think about it, in the Industrial Era you couldn't crash the HMS Curacoa and the RMS Queen Mary into eachother and technology crawled along as a result, and on October 2nd 1942 the captain of the HMS Curacoa crashed the HMS Curacoa into the RMS Queen Mary and all of a sudden we went from having nothing in space to having an object in space in just one day! Imagine if we could get another innovation as impactful now as that collision was then.

First off, how puerile, second off explosions don't send anything into space not even atomics, and thirdly you can't compare a disaster to an innovation, just because you and your soviet mentality say that banking is no good, how about you go enjoy living in a squalid hut without the computer which you used to disseminate this crud! Cause that's life without banking!

[Panzerbeard]

What does Earth offer for export?

Fish, all of it. The dolphins were very appreciative before they left.

We are also the sole producer of tea in the galaxy, I'm sure that they'll want that.

We should probably keep them away from sports, though. We have Cricket, and I think that'd probably be in poor taste.

[YX33A]

Amen on that. The tea bit, I mean. Tea is good. Damn good.