The Cage Opens

[Clonus]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

As the posters so far have shown' date=' there can be a lot of depth to non violence and a lot of possilities for the PC's (to save the unvierse).[/quote']

 

 

Yeah. I must have missed that. The suggestions mostly invalidate the premise from the start turning it into "They claim to be nonviolent but aren't". Which describes us just as well.

[Xavier Onassiss]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

Yeah. I must have missed that. The suggestions mostly invalidate the premise from the start turning it into "They claim to be nonviolent but aren't". Which describes us just as well.

 

Yes, it does. Except they've taken it to an extreme by basing an entire galactic civilization on the charade. This is a literary device used in many science fiction stories: holding a mirror up to human nature by portraying aliens with very human flaws, which allows them to be examined from an unusual perspective. This doesn't invalidate the premise -- it's the whole point of the premise.

 

This concludes today's session of "SF Literary Theory Corner" with Prof. Xavier Onassiss.

[Clonus]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

Yes, it does. Except they've taken it to an extreme by basing an entire galactic civilization on the charade. This is a literary device used in many science fiction stories: holding a mirror up to human nature by portraying aliens with very human flaws, which allows them to be examined from an unusual perspective. This doesn't invalidate the premise -- it's the whole point of the premise.

 

This concludes today's session of "SF Literary Theory Corner" with Prof. Xavier Onassiss.

 

Yeah, yeah, but what do the PCs do? I mean the reasonable result of annoying a whole galaxy full of more advanced aliens is "Humanity gets slapped around and can't do much about it." Quite apart from that I was addressing the premise as written, not as rejected. Now, yes, I've seen a couple of versions of the "Humanity is one of the only two species in the galaxy who can engage in violence and must fight their war for them". They annoy me. After all if you can engage in war-by-proxy (using humans to fight your war for you) then obviously you can engage in war-by-proxy (using drones and robots to fight your war for you).

 

I did in fact once do a game where humanity was in a sparsely populated galaxy where the only known advanced species were nonviolent psionics who generally quickly vacated any vicinity where people where dying and only during the course of the game did they discover more violent species, though. But they did of course discover more violent species.

[McCoy]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

Nonviolent doesn't necessarily mean defenseless. Sure the aliens will be taken off-guard at first, but then they would finds ways to de-fang humanity. I see a couple possibilities.

 

First, they could offer economic/diplomatic perks to humans that agreed to join their peaceful society. Lots of people would likely jump at the chance, not just for prosperity but because peace is an ideal much of humanity strives for even today.

 

Second, they could make humans peaceful. This might be through some sort of mind control (mental, technological, or medical) or done by unleashing a wildly contagious retrovirus that would literally change humanity into another peaceful society.

Not to mention after getting over their initial surprise, adapting "humane" methods of controlling non-sentient animals into non-violent less-lethal weapons.

 

IIRC there was an SF novel where the most potent weapon available in the universe was the STOP THAT ray.

[Xavier Onassiss]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

Not to mention after getting over their initial surprise, adapting "humane" methods of controlling non-sentient animals into non-violent less-lethal weapons.

 

IIRC there was an SF novel where the most potent weapon available in the universe was the STOP THAT ray.

 

Yes! Illegal Aliens, by Nick Pollatta, illustrated by Phil Foglio

 

I read that one in college, and it's still one of my all-time favorite SF comedies.

[FrankL]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

Something I see possible is that the aliens have become stagnant and don't want the apple cart upset in the least. In that case, humanity has a severe edge through intuition and thinking outside the box.

 

A book I highly enjoy that explores something like this is The Excalibur Alternative by David Weber. You can read it free at here. It's based in the same universe that David Drake created for Ranks of Bronze (which I also enjoyed).

[Major Tom 2009]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

Another one of Weber's books that's worth taking a look at is Out of the Dark. In this book,

there's a multi-species alliance whose members (with one notable exception) are certified

pacifists for whom the idea of violent behavior is out of the question (this is apparently be-

cause except for this one canine-like species, every member race of the alliance is herbiv-

orous). In the story, an observation team from one of the alliance worlds came to Earth in

centuries past to study humanity to see what it was like. Unfortunately, they came upon

the Battle of Agincourt and, from that single incident, decided that humanity was too dan-

gerous to let into space (once its technology advanced to the point where it could travel

beyond the solar system).

 

Fast-forward to the present day, at which point Earth is invaded by the canine aliens (I

forget what their race name was), who in turn were more or less pointed at the planet

by one of the representatives of the alliance in the hope that the canines would do their

dirty work -- the extermination of the human race -- for them. Unfortunately for both

the canines and the pacifists, humanity has two things going for it: the Demon Murphy

(to use one of Weber's favorite expressions) and the Law of Unintended Consequences.

They also have help from a decidedly...unexpected...source.

 

EDIT: The name of the canine race is the Shongairi; I found it on the David Weber

forums.

 

 

 

Major Tom 2009

[SteveZilla]

Re: The Cage Opens

 

That's one possible option. There could be gene-altering methods to remove violence, but maybe humanity has a genetic quirk that frustrates it.

 

I agree with other posters that there are alternatives to "knee to the gut" violence, but the idea of a pacifist galactic society dealing with humanity as it currently exists is intriguing. Setting aside the violence issue, I'm thinking the idea of post-scarcity might have a bigger impact. Any human could leave earth and experience abundance akin to Eden, free for the asking.

 

(Emphasis added)

 

Because of this, I belive a very large portion of the human population would leave Earth and settle elsewhere, mostly peaceably due to the removal of pressures caused by limited supply and limited space. There will still be the occasional violence from unstable people and the occasional flights of jealosy/rage. IMO the most likely (most prevalent after The Cage) to cause violence would be those who hold fanatical beliefs (see unstable people, above), and those who have a psychological *need* to exert dominion over others (again, see unstable people, above).