ALIENS? I doubt that what they call themselves!

[chaos1]

Why do we call them aliens or extraterrestials? I'm not going to debate their existance, but if they did exist wouldn't coining that term also have the same meaning on us to them?

It kinda reminds me of when columbus named the native americans "indians" when they were nowhere near india. (accually this anology isn't that great but you understand right?)

 

[Oxygen]

It's all relative, man. It's alllllll relative. For a good example of how a non-human yet developed culture might view us, I recommend reading the first eight volumes of Elfquest, by Wendy and Richard Pini. To the reader, the various human tribes look like average neolithic humans. But as the story dwells more and more on the elves' viewpoint, humans are seen as too large, very clumsy, speaking a guttural language (as compared to the elves' soft, musical speech), and possessing of too many fingers (when Skywise cuts off a human's ever-so -valuable thumb). While the first humans in the story are presented in a negative light, representing all that is selfish and destructive in the human race, the later humans have evolved somewhat and, although still coarse and clumsy by elfin standards, the race shows promise, especially the first time the elves (who are something just shy of immortal) encounter a medieval wood-cutter who puts out a small offering of food and asks:

Shy and secret forest folk, teach me as I sleep
Which trees next day are mine to cut and which are yours to keep.

That last scene takes place much further in the storyline than the first eight volumes cover, but it's a great story about the evolution of civlization and the meeting of two simultaneously similar and different cultures, summed up when an human warrior's son meets his first elf and says:

I do not think they are spirits. I think they are just people with very large eyes.

See if you can find the story. You might enjoy it in spite of your apparent self.

 

[Chaos]

double post... sorry

[This message has been edited by Chaos (edited July 23, 2000).]

 

[Chaos]

Hey oxygen, you did a good job of confusing me with that post. I couldn't even remember what the topic was about... lol

okay the aliens probably call themselves

Vumans or Tumans or Mumans or Zumans... we happen to be Humans

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Who owns the words www.chaos.com? I do!

 

[Oxygen]

I took your post to refer what various civilizations call themselves and how they appear to outsiders, i.e., "aliens". I chose Elfquest as my example because the reader spends so much time in the elfin culture, and the writing is so good, that it's easy to forget that you're human. It's a rare look at ourselves from outside of ourselves.

I guess we call them "aliens" because that's what they are to us; alien. My hope is that if they are out there we can someday call them "friend". If they prove to be hostile, then I hope we can someday called them "the race that used to inhabit (insert planet here)..."

 

[Peter Dolan]

The term "alien" is an appropriate term since it is describing an outsider/foreigner to the area in question i.e. Earth. Of course, the term alien is also used to describe all foreigners to any area/country that is not their original homeland e.g. Mexicans swimming the Rio Grande to get into the US are illegal aliens. "Extraterrestrial" is also an appropriate term since it describes albeit assumes that these beings are coming from outside our terrestrial world. I guess if we lived on a gaseous planet like Jupiter, we'd call such beings "extragaseousrials" or such. It is all relative to the viewpoint of the observer and the observed.

 

[Gaston]

I think that of course they would look to us as strange as we look to them;so whatever the term we use for them they will rightfully use for us.God(luck)help us all...