From: rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu (Jeff Bytof)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies
Subject: Re: Do the Aliens come from EARTH?
Date: 20 Aug 92 17:54:46 GMT
Organization: sio
NNTP-Posting-Host: lutherlab.ucsd.edu



>From article <rabjab.14.0@golem.ucsd.edu>, by rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu (Jeff Bytof):
>>>> I think a good case can be made that long before the crew of 
>>>> the Nostrono made contact with the derelict ship on LV-426, the 
>>>> Company developed the Alien species and infected another civilization's 
>>>> home planet.  

>Why?

Simple answer: to kill off a competitor.  It's done all the time.

>To be able to do that with any kind of effectiveness, the Company
>would need a complete fleet of it's own, which means that this
>argument does not fit - they couldn't keep that secret.

The infecting of the home planet and colonies of the race of the
Elephant (i.e. the pilot of the Flying-U) could have been done
quickly, silently and secretly with unmanned craft.  Look at AIDS:
it all started with one mutated virus.  Just think what would
happen if it mutated again and became easily communicable, like
a cold.  What if we didn't realize that until half of the Earth's
population were infected?  I propose that the Alien could start out as 
a viral form that infects the reproductive system and leads to 
Alien offspring from hosts in that manner.
  
>> I would have thought that the discovery of an intelligent life 
>> form broadcasting anything - even a warning -
>> would have been extensively publicized - that a SETI program 
>> of sorts would have been contacted.  Instead the Company decides to keep
>> the whole matter a total secret from science.

>Money is the reason.  No more, no less.  They see it as an opportunity
>to get a headstart in research.  It explains, and it does not open the
>hundreds of holes that your explanation does.

I agree that money is the reason.

>> My belief is that even the explaination we are given - getting the 
>> Alien for the bioweapons division - is part truth: they are 
>> retrieving the weapon to examine it.

>Then the only sensible course of action would have been for Ash to
>tell the others about the meaning of the signal, so they could collect
>the eggs safely.  But he did not know what they were up against in
>detail.  Since he was the Company's operator on the Nostromo, assigned
>to guaranteeing the success of the mission, this does make no sense at
>all.

Ash may not have been told the true nature of the Alien.  He was put
on the Nostromo because he had a better chance of surviving.

>> Because the Company had done the dirty deed, they could not visit the
>> actual scene of the crime (the home planet of the other race) for
>> a long time.

>Why?  This leads back to the assumption that the Company would make
>war against that civilization in the first case (which I consider
>horseshit, but let's leave that aside for now).  In any case, they
>could only do it if nobody knew about it.  That means they absolutely
>HAVE to go back, make sure they were completely successful and do the
>mopping up, before eventual survivors get back on their feet.

How many terrorists showed up at Lockerbee after the Pan-Am crash?

>Actually, trying to eradicate a spacefaring race with carnivorous
>parasites is one of the more stupid things to do. 

My guess is that's exactly going to happen to Earth in Alien^4,
God forbid.   

>You are also conveniently ignoring another gaping hole - the
>supposedly great age of the alien derelict.

The age of the derelict was never scientifically determined

Jeff Bytof
rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu


>-- 
>Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
>University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
>Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
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