Stephen Hawking Warns Against “Independence Day”

Stephen Hawking, one of the world’s smartest human beings, has contemplated the structure and fabric of space, time, and the Universe itself. In a new documentary, he turns his staggering intelligence to the concept of extraterrestrial life and humanity’s interaction with it. His keen analytical mind has resulted in the following conclusions:

“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 aliens ever visit us, I think the outcome would be much as when Christopher Columbus first landed in America, which didn’t turn out very well for the Native Americans.”

Sound familiar? In other words, we’re looking at Independence Day. I don’t know if Hawking just thought that was a good movie or if he came up with the premise on his own. Either way, it casts that movie in a new light. We all laughed at the ridiculous and cheesy plot of Independence Day, but it turns out that it was actually a scientifically accurate depiction of our future. Next, Hawking will be saying that the best way to defeat attacking aliens will be to hack into their computer systems with a Macintosh. Apple’s stock would skyrocket. And if an alien spaceship crashes in front of us, the best way to deal with it is to punch it in the face and say, “Welcome to Earth.”
Is Stephen Hawking right? Is Independence Day really the future of human-alien contact?