What if we WERE alone?

[Michael Hopcroft]

Imagine makind built start\ships to seek out new life and new civilizations,e tc. -- and didn;t find any?

 

Carl Sagan theorized that is possible that all civilizations that reach a certain stage of tehcnological development inevitably destory themselves. For example, any civilzation that develops atomic power would inevitably obliterate itself in a nuclear war. If Earth were to beat those odds, but every other civilization that reached the Atomic Age wnet up in a string of mushroom clouds, than we would indeed be alone in the universe.

 

What kind of starfaring camapign would emerge if this were the case? Many of the most theortically desirable worlds to colonize would be radioactive slag. The other worlds would be untouched by civilization, with only wild animals and such to encounter. Would Man split up into a lot of different empires and kingdonms out of lack of desire to live under one interstellar regime?

[Guest Kolava]

Well, the anime "Cowboy Bebop" gives a pretty good idea of what space is like with no aliens. The series only takes place in our solar system, but it can serve as a base (there is plenty of drama to be had in space, even without aliens).

[Hermit]

Are you also taking genetic splicing and clones into account? If human beings underwent some sort of inheritable bio-engineering for different planets, you might have a darn good substitute for varying races after some generations passed.

[Michael Hopcroft]

Originally posted by Kolava

Well, the anime "Cowboy Bebop" gives a pretty good idea of what space is like with no aliens. The series only takes place in our solar system, but it can serve as a base (there is plenty of drama to be had in space, even without aliens).

 

I don;t know about that -- I've always wondered if Ed was really a Rubber Girl in disguise....

[Ron]

Asimov's Foundation triology (do yourself a favor and don't read the follow ups written in the 80s and 90s) is pretty much about that. It appears that his editor, John Campbell, was not thrilled with the idea of aliens, so Asimov done a galactic empire spread over all Via Lactea without a single sentient species aside humanity.

[McCoy]

Originally posted by Ron

Asimov's Foundation triology (do yourself a favor and don't read the follow ups written in the 80s and 90s) is pretty much about that. It appears that his editor, John Campbell, was not thrilled with the idea of aliens, so Asimov done a galactic empire spread over all Via Lactea without a single sentient species aside humanity.

 

You haven't read much Campbell, have you? His classic challenge to writers was "Give me an alien that thinks as well as a man, but not like a man." One sucessful example was Stranger in a Strange Land.

 

Asimov was the one who decided not to use aliens in his Foundation series. Would have distracted from the main story line, humanity going through another Dark Age.

 

Lois McMaster Bujold (the only living author with three Hugo winning novels) has the Vorkosegan saga, another example of a well thought out Universe with no known nonhuman intelligences. Wish she would stop writing fantasy and get back to it.

[BlackSword]

Weber's Honor Harrington series deals solely with humans in space. Some of Heinlein's novels are solely human based (Citizen of the Galaxy is one I can think of off the top of my head). Dune (at least the first few novels), was soley human, though the navigators were mutated by the spice. I think there are a lot of novels available with solely human characters. All of there provide examples and seeds for campaigns. For the most part it seems that if there is an alien race(s) then humanity is united against it, if not then humans go back to killing each other. Most alien races seem to be based upon exaggerating certain human qualities or externalizing parts of humanity we disagree with to make it easier to war against. Klingons were of course a representation of the USSR, but made more brutal, hateful and violent so killing them wasn't so bad.

[Supreme]

Re: What if we WERE alone?

 

Originally posted by Michael Hopcroft

Imagine makind built start\ships to seek out new life and new civilizations,e tc. -- and didn;t find any?

 

Carl Sagan theorized that is possible that all civilizations that reach a certain stage of tehcnological development inevitably destory themselves. For example, any civilzation that develops atomic power would inevitably obliterate itself in a nuclear war. If Earth were to beat those odds, but every other civilization that reached the Atomic Age wnet up in a string of mushroom clouds, than we would indeed be alone in the universe.

 

What kind of starfaring camapign would emerge if this were the case? Many of the most theortically desirable worlds to colonize would be radioactive slag. The other worlds would be untouched by civilization, with only wild animals and such to encounter. Would Man split up into a lot of different empires and kingdonms out of lack of desire to live under one interstellar regime?

To your last question: definitely. Heck, spread out over just a 8000 mile-wide planet we've balkanized into hundreds of countries. I think also we might become more capricious with warfare and genocide. After all, who cares about using nuclear weapons (or worse) on some planet light-years away?

 

About finding nuclear slag: not probably. We'd only find planets that were still irradiated if we showed up within 50,000 years or so of the end of the fighting. In a universe that's 15-20 billion years old, that's not necessarily likely. Also, many theorize that to destroy a civilization, all you need to do is destroy the sources of power. You don't need to destroy every living thing. So we could also find planets full of regressed primitives.

[Nightshade]

BattleTech actually did this in a wargame. There were no aliens at all, and the galaxy was fractured based upon many ruling lines. The game was okay, but the concepts were pretty good.

 

Nightshade

[Mordacius]

What kind of starfaring camapign would emerge if this were the case?

If I were going to run a game like this, I'd actually steal heavily from the Night's Dawn trilogy - just throwing out the Kiint and the Tyrathca. They had two things that I'd want in a campaign like this:

 

1) There was some debate over when a person was opting out of the human race via technology. Some groups embraced enhancement, others drew arbitrary (religious) lines, and some people just wanted to go back to The Good Old Days. I'd want to play that up, in a world with no aliens. (Modified humans can be creepier anyway. Frankly, I grok Klingons considerably better than Edenists.)

 

2) Humans didn't know *why* alien civilizations blew themselves up. It was a matter of considerable scientific research, rather than being something as obvious (and hokey) as inevitable nuclear war. I would so rip that off in a game like you're talking about.

[Chuk]

GURPS Transhuman Space is humans (and human-built AIs, and genemod creatures) only. No aliens, no FTL, no psionics.

[McCoy]

Originally posted by BlackSword

Weber's Honor Harrington series deals solely with humans in space. Some of Heinlein's novels are solely human based (Citizen of the Galaxy is one I can think of off the top of my head). Dune (at least the first few novels), was soley human, though the navigators were mutated by the spice. I think there are a lot of novels available with solely human characters. All of there provide examples and seeds for campaigns. For the most part it seems that if there is an alien race(s) then humanity is united against it, if not then humans go back to killing each other. Most alien races seem to be based upon exaggerating certain human qualities or externalizing parts of humanity we disagree with to make it easier to war against. Klingons were of course a representation of the USSR, but made more brutal, hateful and violent so killing them wasn't so bad.

Been a while since I read Citizen of the Galaxy, but IIRC there were non-humans in that. I seem to recall the better part of a chapted being spend on a planet where they traded with the (non-human) natives by barter, because there was no common language (and the natives may not even have had language). The traders ended up exchanging brightly colored magazine pages for brightly colored gemstones.

[Old Man]

GDW's 2300AD setting was more or less like this. Hard SF with patches of space broken up by nationality--the French arm, etc.

[DigitalGolem]

Originally posted by Old Man

GDW's 2300AD setting was more or less like this. Hard SF with patches of space broken up by nationality--the French arm, etc.

 

That's right, 2300AD had absolutely no aliens...

 

...except for the Ebers, Pentapods, Sung, Klaxun, Kafers, Ylii, and a couple of others I've forgotten. (Xiang, maybe?)

 

But otherwise, no aliens at all. Really.

 

Okay, sarcasm aside, 2300AD could actually be run quite well without the aliens, and I know some of the game's fans preferred it that way, for various reasons.

 

DGv3.0

[Armitage]

Originally posted by BlackSword

Weber's Honor Harrington series deals solely with humans in space.

 

Except for the Treecats, of course.

Especially since they've decided that it's time to begin actively colonizing other worlds. Although only a few humans are aware of the decision.

And I'm sure it's just a coincidence that major VIPs keep getting Bonded to treecats, including every Manticoran monarch for the last couple centuries.

The real power behind the Star Kingdom...

[Angry Gumby]

I'm actually running a Star Hero campaign without any alien species right now. I've explored some of the same questions, looking at how human culture develops in absence of other intelligent alien species. The campaign basically hypothesizes that, with humanity's uniqueness in the universe being confirmed by a lack of contact with other sentient races, human culture would develop around basic principles like:

 

1. Embrace your humanity: with no other races showing up, humanity is increasingly celebrated as something special and unique in the universe. "Human-ness" is elevated and idealized. Technology is designed to integrate as seamlessly and invisibly as possible; cybernetics, AIs, and the like are seen as an undesirable diluting of that which makes humanity unique. However, technologies that blend with humanity more naturally (biological modifications and so on) are much mroe accepted.

 

2. Work hard, play harder: Humanity's undisputed dominance (and implicit arrogance) has resulted in an increased emphasis on recreation and fun. Humanity is a great thing, and you can't exactly celebrate humanity by working your entire life away. It's not total hedonism, but work and play are seen as equally important parts of life.

 

3. Live in the now: Since humanity is the ultimate form of life in the universe, why dwell on the many imperfections, growing pains, and stumbling blocks of its development? Being wracked with guilt over the past, or cripplingly worried about the future, doesn't do much to celebrate our essential humanity. Again, this doesn't mean total hedonism, but rather an increased appreciation for spontaneity, impulsiveness, and fun.

 

4. Accentuate the positive: Sure, humanity has done some stupid things, but why dwell on it? Humans are as good as it gets, and there's really nothing else to look up to, so its better to stay positive and focus on the good things in life. Droning on and on about this or that injustice begins to feel increasingly preachy to people -- after all, we're *humans.* There's no doubt we'll move past all that in time.

 

5. You Deserve It: Why feel guilty? Humanity may use up a lot of resources, but there's nobody else out there who needs them. Ultimately, the more unique humans are, the more they percieve a have a right to enjoy themselves regardless of the consequences. Whatever consequences human actions have are for humans to deal with, so why feel bad about it?

 

There's probably more, but this post is getting ridiculous.

[BlackSword]

Originally posted by McCoy

Been a while since I read Citizen of the Galaxy, but IIRC there were non-humans in that. I seem to recall the better part of a chapted being spend on a planet where they traded with the (non-human) natives by barter, because there was no common language (and the natives may not even have had language). The traders ended up exchanging brightly colored magazine pages for brightly colored gemstones.

As I said its been a while for me too. I know I own the book, but I don't remember the last time I cracked it open.

 

Except for the Treecats, of course.

Especially since they've decided that it's time to begin actively colonizing other worlds. Although only a few humans are aware of the decision. And I'm sure it's just a coincidence that major VIPs keep getting Bonded to treecats, including every Manticoran monarch for the last couple centuries.The real power behind the Star Kingdom...

True, I hadn't thought to mention them, but they are not a starfareing race. Who knows, maybe in the end we will find out that Harrington's success is solely due to treecat meddling.

 

However, for both those books, the central conflict is between humans. In Citizen of the Galaxy I don't particularly remember (its vague now that McCoy has jogged my memory) the trading scene, but I do remember the battles between the protagonists and pirates and slavers (both humans IIRC). The Harrington series revolves around war between two warring human 'empires.' Reading the review on Amazon it appears that aliens may have been more involved than I had thought, guess I have to put it on my pile to reread.

 

Since most stories are based on conflict, in an all human setting the conflict will most likely between two (or more) human factions. Heinlein had another story,

[Blue Jogger]

Originally posted by Angry Gumby

I'm actually running a Star Hero campaign without any alien species right now. I've explored some of the same questions, looking at how human culture develops in absence of other intelligent alien species. The campaign basically hypothesizes that, with humanity's uniqueness in the universe being confirmed by a lack of contact with other sentient races, human culture would develop around basic principles like:

 

I could just see the chaos that develops when an alien (or perceived alien) species is found.

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

This kinda reminds me of the fantasy/sci-fi/sorta-post-apocalypse campaign I started work on (but never finished...)

 

Magic was hyper-advanced technology, and the non-human races were modified humans (they wanted to separate themselves from the other human races), that tended to be xenophobic.

 

IIRC:

 

'Elves': A group that had intended to flee earth for space; designed for low/no G living. Reside in a 'Spaceship' type super city with an AI that they essentially worship.

 

'Dwarves': A group that intended to use Earth as efficently as possible. To that end, they shrunk their descendants. The human equivalent of locusts,

 

'Halflings': Same idea, but less 'ruthless efficency', more 'maximise pleasures'. Literally incapable of feeling pain.

 

'Orcs': Not modified, but mutated by the apocalypse. All up, superior to the other races due to intensity of natural selection. But ugly.

 

Humans: Those who chose to remain 'natural'.

 

Hybrids: 'Temples of Transformation': Vast complexes made to allow the combination of two beings to enable tailoring in the future; this group saw what the apocalypse would do.

 

 

Why do I post all that detail? Because.

[Kevin Scrivner]

The original GDW Traveller game was a humans-only environment. GDW gradually tacked on various alien races in an attempt to spice things up, but the Imperium was large enough that you could easily run an entire campaign without encountering them. Because of this, it did a pretty good job of exploring variant human cultures. You had the Imperial main culture, the Solomani (militant Earthlings), the Zhodanti (a whole culture built on mental powers), as well as many smaller "empires" and culture groups.

[Starwolf]

How about BIO of a Space Tyrant by Piers Anthony...Good gritty sci-fi with no aliens, just losts of action, pirates, tragedy and triumph.

 

Another good one was the Voyage of the Starwolf Trilogy. The alien protagonists aren't really aliens they are a race created by humanity using genetic engineering, by mixing human DNA with the great cats. They became stronger, faster, smarter, larger, and more aggressive than their human creators. They then left earth and setup their own star empire. Then they came back......to hunt humanity.

[assault]

I'm actually surprised that anyone is asking this question.

 

Human beings have been "alone" ever since the Neanderthals died out.

 

The effect of discovering that there is no other intelligent life in this galaxy, or whatever chunk of it humanity actually explores would be: zero.

 

IMHO, of course.

 

As for extinct civilisations: well, they would be really really interesting, but their actual significance would be fairly minor. Unless, of course, they left behind some McGuffins.

 

I have a problem with their worlds being prime real estate, however. This is only true if you make the standard space opera assumptions about the unproblematic habitability of "earthlike" worlds.

 

In fact, an "earthlike" world would be completely unsuitable for human habitation, unless it had become "earthlike" through a process of terraforming. But as I said, this is ignored as part of space opera genre conventions. If it wasn't, incidentally, human interactions with aliens of any sort - intelligent or otherwise - would be strictly constrained.

 

Alan

[zakueins]

Re: What if we WERE alone?

 

Don't forget, there might be worlds where life never made it to the point of genreating a sapient species. Humans are pretty damn unique as a species and it was probably luck as much as anything else that got us there.

 

I've also always held the opinion that we don't need aliens for major drama-humans can do that ourselves, easily.

 

For a "no ETs" game, there's some additional questions to be asked-

*What's the state of genetic engineering? Perfect humans, bioroids, various forms of genetic "uplifted" beings could easily fill the role of aliens in such a game.

*What's the poltical structure of the universe?

 

 

Originally posted by Michael Hopcroft

Imagine makind built start\ships to seek out new life and new civilizations,e tc. -- and didn;t find any?

 

Carl Sagan theorized that is possible that all civilizations that reach a certain stage of tehcnological development inevitably destory themselves. For example, any civilzation that develops atomic power would inevitably obliterate itself in a nuclear war. If Earth were to beat those odds, but every other civilization that reached the Atomic Age wnet up in a string of mushroom clouds, than we would indeed be alone in the universe.

 

What kind of starfaring camapign would emerge if this were the case? Many of the most theortically desirable worlds to colonize would be radioactive slag. The other worlds would be untouched by civilization, with only wild animals and such to encounter. Would Man split up into a lot of different empires and kingdonms out of lack of desire to live under one interstellar regime?

[danbuter]

Originally posted by Chuk

GURPS Transhuman Space is humans (and human-built AIs, and genemod creatures) only. No aliens, no FTL, no psionics.

 

Hey! That's what I was gonna say. Anyways, I'd recommend TS to everyone who has any interest in SF.

[Adventus]

I am surprised nobody mentioned Gordon R. Dickson's Dorsai series. This entire series takes place accross several worlds and there are noaliens around, just humans with special abilities or skills.