Most sci-fi movies are lazy when it comes to the aliens. After billions of years of evolution on a planet different from Earth, it's unlikely that they'd have two arms and legs and a face, let alone do things like laugh or sneeze, amirite?

+218 Most sci-fi movies are lazy when it comes to the aliens. After billions of years of evolution on a planet different from Earth, it's unlikely that they'd have two arms and legs and a face, let alone do things like laugh or sneeze, amirite?

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Coevolution.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

...

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Wrong term, right train of though.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

not necessarily? I would agree. unlikely? kind of a stretch

by Anonymous 12 years ago

I would stand by unlikely. Keep in mind that starting on a new world is like starting from scratch. If you asked two people in separate rooms to draw a random picture of anything they wanted, how similar so you think they would be? Different planets have different gravities, different temperatures, different composition, different gasses in their atmospheres, etc. That's a lot of differences for evolution to contend with.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

You really don't think it's more accurate to say "not necessarily" instead of "unlikely"?

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Yes I do. Aren't all of the points I listed above reason enough? If we ever do find intelligent alien life, I think it's unlikely to be humanoid.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Or even similar to any Earth lifeform, probably.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Have you ever heard of analogies (In a biological sense)?

by Anonymous 12 years ago

No, but I would guess that it's something like separately evolved things that perform the same task.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Yeah, like because a bat and a bird both needed to fly, they separately developed similar wings, despite the fact that they are unrelated

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Have you ever read the book by Michael Crichton called "Sphere"? It gives a similar idea.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

convergent evolution, those writers may not be lazy - they just think that humans have the best biological design

by Anonymous 12 years ago

But think about it. In the whole universe there has to be another planet that's similar enough to earth that a human could go there and feel as if they were on earth. More than one, even. So what if life evolved on that planet? It would be pretty similar to life on earth. And the alien race from that planet was exploring the cosmos, scanning planets, and they find a planet that is very similar to their own. So they go there, and find lifeforms that are similar to themself.

by Anonymous 12 years ago