Imagine there was another Earthlike planet in our system

[I'm A Banana]

Why trade, when we can conquer and destroy, then take their stuff? If we have merchant ships flying back and forth, you can damn well better bet we'd have a space navy of some kind. Then some Hawk politician (or whoever actually gives the orders) would want to use them, even if it meant fabricating an incident to use as an excuse. (Because we're good at that.) I would love to believe that the human race would opt for trade and peace. I just don't believe it is up to the challenge.

See, I'm not quite on board with this.

Trading is the logical recourse, and arguably the one that nets the most benefit for the most people over time. Why trade instead of conquering? Because lots of happy people will give you more money over the long haul than a few terrified ones. The most sensible power is a subtle one, one that people exert on themselves without even noticing it (Max Weber, your Protestant Ethic keeps explaining so much), one that keeps people working together to do awesome things that nobody could do by themselves.

Trade is the BEST option!

But the people who wield power in our world are not necessarily the most logical. Indeed, wanting to wield power is itself a little illogical, so it sort of selects for those with an inflated sense of self-importance and a propensity for charismatic personality traits (in both the charm sense and in the cult/sociopath sense).

So I don't think it's a matter of humanity being good or bad as a whole per se. I think it's a matter of biology, sociology, design, and instinct. Someone somewhere with some power would do something stupid sooner or later. The real tell would be how we (and the aliens) react to that stupidity.

Given that the aliens have technology (and thus presumably have a roughly comparable society to humans), they're not likely to react any smarter than we would, and they're not likely to avoid being stupid, either.

I imagine we'd have a big philosophically awesome organization that is all about peace harmony cooperation love and free trade between the planets, and we'd have them able to do exactly jack nothing about all the goofuses on the ground who see the fear in peoples' eyes and use it to earn their trust, empower themselves, and do something dumb once they're in control of a few nuclear warheads. Governments don't act any more rationally than the people who make them up, really. They're mostly just an amplifier, for the best and the worst of us.

 

[Derren]

See, I'm not quite on board with this.

Trading is the logical recourse, and arguably the one that nets the most benefit for the most people over time.

Only if there is anything to trade which I think is rather unlikely because of differences and distance.

Why trade instead of conquering? Because lots of happy people will give you more money over the long haul than a few terrified ones.

If they have money...

 

[sabrinathecat]

See, I'm not quite on board with this.

Trading is the logical recourse, and arguably the one that nets the most benefit for the most people over time. Why trade instead of conquering? Because lots of happy people will give you more money over the long haul than a few terrified ones. The most sensible power is a subtle one, one that people exert on themselves without even noticing it (Max Weber, your Protestant Ethic keeps explaining so much), one that keeps people working together to do awesome things that nobody could do by themselves.

Trade is the BEST option!

But the people who wield power in our world are not necessarily the most logical. Indeed, wanting to wield power is itself a little illogical, so it sort of selects for those with an inflated sense of self-importance and a propensity for charismatic personality traits (in both the charm sense and in the cult/sociopath sense).

So I don't think it's a matter of humanity being good or bad as a whole per se. I think it's a matter of biology, sociology, design, and instinct. Someone somewhere with some power would do something stupid sooner or later. The real tell would be how we (and the aliens) react to that stupidity.

Given that the aliens have technology (and thus presumably have a roughly comparable society to humans), they're not likely to react any smarter than we would, and they're not likely to avoid being stupid, either.

I imagine we'd have a big philosophically awesome organization that is all about peace harmony cooperation love and free trade between the planets, and we'd have them able to do exactly jack nothing about all the goofuses on the ground who see the fear in peoples' eyes and use it to earn their trust, empower themselves, and do something dumb once they're in control of a few nuclear warheads. Governments don't act any more rationally than the people who make them up, really. They're mostly just an amplifier, for the best and the worst of us.

The key here, is "Over Time." Over Time, trade IS the best option. But humans (the ones that crave power enough to play politics and put up with the incredibly boring meetings) are stupid, short-sighted, and greedy.
If the BEST of humanity is in charge, we might have something like what you suggest. But it isn't. The mediocre to worst of humanity rises to the top, and we have Parliament and Congress and... and all the other politicians, party chairmen, and other assorted riff-raff and flotsam.
We are increasingly less likely to have the Star Trek Federation, and more likely to have the Blake's7 Federation.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Only if there is anything to trade which I think is rather unlikely because of differences and distance.

Why would this be unlikely?

At the very least, being an Earth-like planet, they have earth-like metals and minerals (used in the construction of their analgous technology). Additionally, as makers of technology, they have some sort of specialization that produces specialized instruments, and those instruments themselves would be valuable, not to mention the extensive labor force that enables the production of that specialization (and the technologies that multiply the efforts of that labor force).

This isn't even to mention the unique products and ideas that they could have that are subtly different than ours. Arts, crafts, cultural artifacts, etc.

If they have money...

They've likely at least got minerals or natural resources we find valuable, and the technology required to mine them out or "develop" them. And given that they have a comparable level of technology, there's a very good chance that they've got a lot of other cultural accouterments -- they're clearly novelty-seeking creatures, with a high level of economic specialization (and the corresponding methods to quantify labor and effort), or else they wouldn't have technology comparable to ours in the first place.

 

[Grumpy RPG Reviews]

Because lots of happy people will give you more money over the long haul...

But we rarely think about the long haul and we do not feel the long haul, we feel quick gratification. We are mean, lazy and hungry. We want stuff now, we don't want others to succeed and violence is cool because it makes us feel important.

 

[Stormonu]

Just throwing in my two cents:

Early on, people were latching onto believing since we had radio in the 20's, that's when we'd make contact. Personally, I don't think that'd be likely. I have trouble getting reception from a modern radio station less than a hundred miles away; with 20's technology, power and land-based radio stations, I don't think we'd likely have contact until we had developed directional, high-powered radio sender/receivers. Definitely not until we had the technology to send/track radio waves with the likes of the Voyager satellites.

Once we made contact though, what would follow would be based on the society(s) of the Martians as well as our own. I think there's a lot of assumption that the societies would be American-like, wanting progressive and open relations - which would more than likely not be the case. I think it'd more likely to be with one or more Martian regimes that would be seeking to exploit or ignore Earthlings. I think it would be far more likely that we'd run into martian nation states of the likes of Japan, North Korea or cold-war Soviet Union than we'd be likely to run into something like the US, Great Britain or the like.

As far as colonization, I don't doubt that it would have been attempted by now - by one or more individuals who saw Mars as "the greener grass". It would have likely been Mayflower-like attempts, one way trips funded by billionaires with more curiosity than brains. I'd suspect the number of successful launches could be counted on two hands or less and probably less than a dozen individuals would have made the trip successfully. The converse could be true as well, a handful of Martians who left behind their world for a "new and better life" on Earth, and harrowing tales of "thousands" who left their oppressive world to die in ill-fated trips to Earth (whereas the actual number might be only 2-3 times the number who actually made it). With enough desperation, there could even be a minor colony - something along the lines of District 9 (likely out in the South Pacific, Africa or perhaps South America on our Earth).

In regards to war, I'm sure there would be all kinds of worst-case scenarios drawn up, and feasibility studies would have sunk billions into plans that never materialized. I could see a handful of ICBM's modified to make a long trip as a "last-strike counter-attack" if something were to ever happen, but nothing really in place as a first or per-emptive strike ability. Conspiracy groups would have a field day with things like the meteor over Russia, with photoshopped images of martians driving or hauling the asteroid into the atmosphere and "anti-martian rockets" shooting it out of the sky. Imagine what Roswell would be like!

If Martians did turn out to be friendly towards us, there'd probably be very tightly controlled transfer of technology, and possibly media (such as movies) going on. Corporations would have special Martian patents allowing them special privileges to disseminate and recreate martian technology on Earth and possibly vice-versa. Trade would likely only have recently increased as credit and electronic money transfers came into vogue; prior to that, trade would likely have been limited to -for-tat exchanges - trading knowledge that resulted in profits on the receiving world for equally valuable knowledge on the sending planet.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

-for-tat exchanges

Quoted for my personal amusement.

 

[jmucchiello]

There's on assumption here that is being taken too literally. Just because the scenario states "of about equal technological advancement" does not mean the people making first contact can assume such. The people making first contact will probably worry that the martians might already have stealth satellites in orbit around Earth and plan to unleash their orbital mind control lasers on our unsuspecting planet unless WE STOP THEM!!!! Paranoia in the early years would be rampant. Having a top of the food chain species popup suddenly in your neighborhood will do that.

Likewise as pointed out above, the knowledge that they are out there would likely take a decade or two after the early 20s because the radio systems would likely be incompatible and perhaps only appear as noise initially. It could be another decade after that before a common "language" was worked out where time delayed communication was even possible. (If like from the sun reaches earth in 8+ minutes, when the planets are furthest apart, communication delays can exceed 15 minutes. Even: "Earth here. Come in Mars." "Mars here. Go ahead Earth" could take half an hour.) So WWII is still likely in that time frame.

I think the real question is what impact this has on Earth. Does the United Nations become a strong world influencing (and respected quickly) body through which we communicate with Mars? Or do the soviets and the US (and a bunch of other self-important states) make Earth sound like it is run by 100 different mad men who don't talk to one another?

 

[Grumpy RPG Reviews]

Paranoia in the early years would be rampant. (snip) Or do the soviets and the US (and a bunch of other self-important states) make Earth sound like it is run by 100 different mad men who don't talk to one another?

Which adds weight to the "interplanetary war of genocide" argument.

 

[Umbran]

Early on, people were latching onto believing since we had radio in the 20's, that's when we'd make contact. Personally, I don't think that'd be likely. I have trouble getting reception from a modern radio station less than a hundred miles away;

As well you should, seeing as a transmitter on top of a 100 foot tower has a direct line of sight to receivers perhaps 12 miles away - beyond that you're reaching over the horizon, and then you're talking about transmitting through rock, refracting through, or reflecting off the atmosphere, which gets kind of iffy. Power isn't the largest issue there.

I don't think we'd likely have contact until we had developed directional, high-powered radio sender/receivers. Definitely not until we had the technology to send/track radio waves with the likes of the Voyager satellites.

The first antenna used to detect radio from an astronomical source was built in 1931. The first parabolic dish radio telescope was built in 1937. I don't see any reason to think we needed to wait for Voyager-era technology. The Voyager probes didn't have much power (470 Watts when launched), and needed to be received from much farther away than mere Mars. Land-based transmitters have *lots* more power to work with.