Stephen Hawking: Intergalactically Antisocial

In honor of RvD shows past and future, I present to you this article about Stephen Hawking and alien visitors.


For over a century, the human mind has been fascinated with the possibility of alien life on a distant planet: specifically whether or not we should fear them (a la Independence Day) or try to have sex with them (that new Star Trek with the hot green alien chick in her underwear).

Our own Chris Othic clearly sides in the sex camp, as evidenced by this dissertation on Alien attractiveness.

Well, count Stephen Hawking in the ‘fear them’ camp, seen here destroying one of the moons of Jupiter with his mind.

In a new documentary series (tentatively titles “In Which Stephen Hawking Targets Ridiculous Subjects with His Massive Mental Powers for Sport), Hawking suggests that alien life forms might be very very bad for us. “We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet. I imagine they might exist in massive ships, having used up all the resources from their home planet. Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonise whatever planets they can reach.”

If this postulation sounds familiar to you, that’s because it is literally the premise of Independence Day. Like, almost word for word. Stephen Hawking has just ripped off a Will Smith movie.

Hawking recommends that we not seek out intelligent life forms and attempt to make contact as that might lead to the White House being destroyed by a gigantic ship. After all, Bill Pullman might not be there for us to be our President and lead us through the ensuing war.

That’s all speculation. One thing is for certain, though: Stephen Hawking is not the most social lifeform in the galaxy. The following was edited out of the documentary’s narrative, presumably for time.

STEPHEN HAWKING (in Speak and Spell voice)

“Contact with Alien Life Forms is to be avoided at all cost. This includes, if need be, snubbing them at shared social gatherings. There’s nothing worse than being shown up in front of your fellow partiers by an advanced life form claiming to know more about ‘The History of Time’ than one with my enormous intellect could ever conceive of. First, such statements are rude even if they are true. Second, I have a hard enough time meeting girls as it is without being cock blocked by some green tenticled asshole from Alpha Centauri. I mean, screw that guy.”