Jim_Smith
New
That's super interesting and useful and valid and reasonable.
But I disagree their are major technological breakthroughs from reverse engineering ufos or whatever. If we handed Newton a microwave oven, could he build one if he had a billion dollars and a thousand assistants?
Why pre-specify the aliens are close technologically to us if newton likely could not understand? We can learn a lot from them. We can see what is possible.
I am not pre-specifying they are close to us technologically. That is a restriction you think is necessary for reverse engineering. I don't think it is.
You wrote "We can learn a lot from them, We can see what is possible." That is part of reverse engineering (I used to work as an engineer.) If you saw a new technology you might try to guess how it works and maybe it would give you new ideas on what you can do with your own existing technology. You don't even need an actual sample to examine to reverse engineer. Just the knowledge that something is definitely possible is huge advantage in developing something yourself.
The analogy to Newton is a reasonable opinion but it is not proof of anything. I have different opinions, they are also not proof, just opinions ....
Not all of the technology we use today would be incomprehensible to Newton. He could probably figure out how a lawn mower engine works. Even if he couldn't understand how pulling the cord produced a spark, he might come up with a way to start his version with a spark from a flint and steel instead of a spark from generator. Maybe some things aliens have don't need super advanced tech and are comprehensible to human scientists.
Some forms of technology are understandable based on analogy. Blood vessels, neurons, wires, and fiber optics are all analogous. If scientists found a new kind of "wiring" they could guess its function and study the materials it was made from. They might not be able to use it to build a time machine but maybe they could build a faster computer with it.
Newton's biggest obstacle was that he didn't know about elements and the periodic table. Modern scientists can take any form of matter and identify the chemical elements and compounds that are in it. They understand something about how each element behaves and how they might behave in combination. (The question of whether humans have samples of alien technology is a different subject I am not addressing now.)
Maybe 20th century scientists could figure out how alien technology worked. Maybe they couldn't figure out everything but maybe they could figure out something. Maybe they could see the principles behind it and develop existing human technology based on the principles. And if the breakaway half had advanced human technology they were keeping from the other half, they would be closer to the aliens than we know. And maybe they didn't reverse engineer it, maybe aliens gave it to them.
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