Social Question
Would it be in the interest of beings from an advanced alien civilization to save us from ourselves? Or would this "leg up" deprive us of crucial lessons we need in order to become truly civilized?
Given the ease with which people who possess advanced technology can destroy themselves, we can expect a civilization sufficiently advanced to master space travel will have survived the predictable cultural bottlenecks that threaten our own culture with extinction—the problems endemic short-sightedness, ignorance and selfishness; placing partisan interest ahead of the common good; religious and cultural warfare; and divisive cultural practices, such creating a disadvantaged, exploited, subordinate class in order to support a privileged class.
One would expect that an advanced civilization would not only be technologically advanced but spiritually advanced as well, in the sense that they have a highly developed sense of unity, morale, and common purpose. One can also expect them to have a highly developed sense of morality; a consensus amongst themselves about what makes life worth living; and a solid understanding what the individual owes to others and society, and vice versa.
Members of an advanced civilization are likely to be highly self-actualized, cooperative, and scrupulously respectful of the rights and dignity of others—and they are likely to foster, things like kindness, generosity, non-violence, compassion— things that would strike us as saintly goodness. They will very likely have subtle but effective ways of ensuring that people consistently act in good faith, and enlightened ways of correcting those who err or transgress.
One can expect them to have healed their culture’s historical grievances, such those which arise out of racism, sexism, and the like. And, as a consequence, one can expect them to be mindful of the impact that they have on the cultures they contact. Being wiser, more moral, and more spiritually advanced than we are, they would necessarily have an enormous impact on our culture. It could easily cause a spiritual crisis, as religious verities and moral assumptions are called into question, shattering our civilization much the same way that our civilization has shattered indigenous peoples with whom we have had first contact.
It may well be that most nascent civilizations never make it to space-faring because they either blow themselves up first, or because they fail to pull together to save their planet from their own pollution. It might therefore be in an advanced civilization’s interest to let a semi-barbarous civilization like our own fail, so that we don’t exporting our barbarism and dysfunction to the rest of the galaxy.
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