Timeline for Do characters in Star Wars address how odd it is the universe is filled with humanoids?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
21 events
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| Apr 13, 2017 at 12:43 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
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| Jun 20, 2016 at 0:38 | comment | added | Rogue Jedi | Is there anyway I can improve my question? | |
| Jan 18, 2016 at 17:10 | comment | added | ThePopMachine | @onewho: Certianly there is room for intepretation, but I don't think most people would consider your example to be humanoid. If it is, then so are koalas, pandas, bears, apes and maybe even dogs. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 19:32 | comment | added | ThePopMachine | ... (cont'd) people who try to argue similar chemistries and convergent evolution and not really serious and are more likely trying to come up with an 'explanation' for the prevalence of 'humanoids' in popular culture, not a serious scientific belief that an alien lifeform in the actual universe is likely. TL;DR: scientific story behind 'humanoids' = wish to justify the SF properties we love. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 19:30 | comment | added | ThePopMachine | @thegreatjedi: Sorry, no. In the most polite way possible, you don't know what you're talking about. Scientists might generally be looking for 'habitable planets' which generally means planets with a similar temperature to Earth and the presence of liquid water as a solvent. But this is eons away from the idea that there would be humanoids all over the place. Even looking at the history and diversity of life of Earth, you can see that there are no other humanoids or the sort generally considered to be "humanoid" in the Star Wars or Star Trek sense. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 19:08 | comment | added | thegreatjedi | Sentient life in Star Wars would fit such a model. Most species aren't actually human but categorised as human-like, although there are enough species out there that look completely different from humans but still a recognisable form of life - Hutts, for example. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 19:06 | comment | added | thegreatjedi | At the least, they expect alien life to not be so outlandish as to possess two heads or any anatomical configurations we haven't already seen. Note, however, that the Cambrian explosion at the start of multicellular life on Earth saw many now-extinct genuses that popular culture today would consider truly alien-looking, but they did exist once. Given the right differences from Earth, it is still possible for another planet to evolve differently enough for a very alien-looking lifeform to exist, but it's not expected to be a general expectation of other life-bearing worlds. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 19:02 | comment | added | thegreatjedi | @ThePopMachine They do. Carbon-based life is the only known form of life as we know it, but nitrogen is chemically similar enough to carbon that they believe it is possible to be the other candidate besides carbon for forming life in other worlds. Putting nitrogen aside, however, life is expected to occur at similar Earth-like planets. Given the general similarity of planetary circumstances, life is expected to evolve similarly, with slight variants in adaptations based on localised planetary parameters. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 18:58 | comment | added | ThePopMachine | @thegreatjedi, I don't think scientists generally believe that at all. | |
| Jan 17, 2016 at 18:54 | comment | added | thegreatjedi | I won't give a formal answer since I can't cite the necessary sources, but I expect the in-universe answer (and perhaps the answer for the Star Trek version too) to be similar to what Earth scientists believe about potential extra-terrestrial life today: Life anywhere wouldn't differ by too much because we're all built from the same building blocks. Because we're all carbon-based life, the chemical makeup that influences so much of evolutionary directions is the same. Nitrogen-based life is the only other possibility, and so would be expected to evolve down a markedly different path | |
| Sep 29, 2015 at 20:46 | comment | added | ThePopMachine | @MrLister: There is another question, for Star Trek. In fact, I split them out because it's too broad if you include multiple universes. | |
| Sep 29, 2015 at 20:38 | comment | added | Ghostship | I remember people being upset when SWTOR came out because all the playable races where extremely human like. | |
| Sep 29, 2015 at 20:34 | comment | added | onewho | "Humanoid" is somewhat of a broad term. All humanoid really means is that the creature somewhat resembles that of a human (typicall 2 arms, 2 legs, head sitting above the torso), so even things like Ithorians are considered humanoid, but aren't simply a human with facial make-up. | |
| Sep 29, 2015 at 20:26 | answer | added | Rogue Jedi | timeline score: 4 | |
| Sep 19, 2015 at 17:52 | comment | added | Mr Lister | Why are you singling out Star Wars for this question? | |
| Sep 19, 2015 at 4:26 | comment | added | Hypnosifl | In the EU, humans could produce hybrids with members of some other humanoid species...just a speculation, but maybe species that could hybridize this way actually evolved from a common ancestor at some point in the past? Also see this question. | |
| Sep 19, 2015 at 4:07 | comment | added | ThePopMachine | @RogueJedi, hey, I just migrated the question. I supposed it's still valid if you ignore the hyperbolic 'basically everyone' | |
| Sep 19, 2015 at 4:04 | comment | added | Rogue Jedi | "Basically everyone" isn't really true. There are many sentient species that aren't human shaped and/or sized. | |
| Sep 19, 2015 at 3:46 | review | Close votes | |||
| Sep 19, 2015 at 3:53 | |||||
| Sep 19, 2015 at 3:24 | comment | added | Wad Cheber | Related: scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/85602/… | |
| Sep 19, 2015 at 3:12 | history | asked | ThePopMachine | CC BY-SA 3.0 |