What do you think intelligent alien life would make of us?

I'm a big scifi reader, and I've read countless stories about this question. Seems to me most of the time, writers posit one of two things. Either they would be highly advanced, ethically and morally speaking, because that is a prerequisite to achieving the technology of space travel; or they would be totally predatory, and treat us as we treat "lower" forms of life on this planet. Personally, I'm not excited about the idea that intelligent life would come by for a visit. I'm too embarrassed by our own primitive natures to want to have to explain it to the Vulcans.

This is science fiction thread, so none of that downer stuff about how interstellar travel is impossible or how if other intelligent life is out there we'd have heard it by now. According to this NASA guy, the aliens are already here, btw.

[Just cross-posted to Kos. How about a recommendation? And welcome, Eschatonians, Paul Krugman, Digby, Andrew Tobias, and Sadly, No readers. And Avedon, you know I do.]

[And readers, if you want others to read this post, you can use the Digg or Reddit buttons below to recommend it.]

ONE CURRENT PERMATHREAD on Big Orange is that Krugman and Obama are feuding or having a vendetta. Which, when you take a step back, is bizarre. That movement conservatives and Villagers like stone Bush enabler William Kristol, like David Brooks, Broderella, and Andrew Sullivan are all good with Obama isn't even mentioned in passing by Obama's fan base. And yet those same enthusiasts spend inordinate amounts of time vilifying Paul Krugman, a true progressive who was there for us from the earliest dark days of the Bush regime.

Curious. What's really happening?  Read more…

Via The Gazeteer:

For the fourth consecutive year, NSIDC and NASA scientists using satellite data have tracked a stunning reduction in arctic sea ice at the end of the northern summer. The persistence of near-record low extents leads the group to conclude that Arctic sea ice is likely on an accelerating, long-term decline.NSDIC, NASA, University of Washington