Truly "alien" aliens - idea resources?

[Nosforontu]

Ian Douglass in his 9 book star marine series has aliens that we are in a genocidal warfare with that might not even be aware that we exist for the first thousand years or so of the war, and don't initiate an actual counter attack for close to 2,00 years or so. Though he doens't really get into what we believe to be the alien perspective of our opponents till late in the series.

The various Cthullu Mythos books tends to at least try at creating mind bending other intelligence's which shatter human sanity trying to understand them.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Life is barbaric by necessity. Fully pacifistic people are fighting some pretty hard wired natures. It can be done, I think, but only with strongly enforced culture. I read the first book, and found it a bit silly.

First one needs a caste of "attack dogs". Then one must assure that they don't bite the owners. Humans manage the first all the time, but somehow the attack dogs tend to end up as the owners rather then the owned.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Nosforontu

Ian Douglass in his 9 book star marine series has aliens that we are in a genocidal warfare with that might not even be aware that we exist for the first thousand years or so of the war, and don't initiate an actual counter attack for close to 2,00 years or so. Though he doens't really get into what we believe to be the alien perspective of our opponents till late in the series.

The various Cthullu Mythos books tends to at least try at creating mind bending other intelligence's which shatter human sanity trying to understand them.

Bah. The most alien intelligences in the mythos are the supposed humans.

[SciFiNut]

Some of H. P. Lovecraft's creations are very alien. For example, the "Great Race of Yith" in "The Shadow out of Time", which was supposed to have dwelt on Earth billions of years ago.

The "Uplift" Trilogy by David Brin also features lots of strange aliens - some similar to creatures on Earth, others very different indeed.

Larry Niven's "Puppeteers" is another classic alien race from science fiction.

[Johnny1A.2]

Originally Posted by SciFiNut

Larry Niven's "Puppeteers" is another classic alien race from science fiction.

And one that makes a certain amount of sense (other than its much-debated reproductive cycles). They act like one might imagine a herd sapient might act.

OTOH, most of Niven's aliens are rubber-suit humans, such as Kzinti. (Who happens to be humanoid cats, which makes me wonder if they aren't Martian Tigermen by proxy.)

[Johnny1A.2]

Originally Posted by ericthered

I find people are typically looking for very different things when they talk about "truly alien aliens". Some of these things overlap, but others don't.

One element that is constantly in contention is how "unrealistic" the aliens can be. Often, the more alien something is, the less plausible, at least to us.

This^^^^^.

It's all very well to talk about 'life as we don't know it' and 'alien mentalities', but past a certain point one reaches a stage where you have to ask if it's meaningful to keep calling the entities 'alive' and 'intelligent'. The category can't be universally encompassing without becoming null.

This is part of why it's so very, very hard to tell good stories with a genuinely alien alien as the key viewpoint character, or at least as the protagonist. The ability of human readers/viewers to empathize with the non-human has limits.

For ex, one of the better alien-makers of SF was Doc Smith. For all the jokes about his characterizations and space opera settings, he created some aliens that really are alien (the Palainians, the Ploorans, the Rigellians, the Eich, the Llurdi, etc). Alien in body, alien in mind. But he almost never used one as a key protagonist or viewpoint character.

The closest exceptions would be Nadreck of Palain VII, and Worsel of Velantia. But note that he made Worsel much more human in mind than the others to use him that way. He uses Nadreck occasionally as a temporary viewpoint character, but never for long, and only under special circumstances. Trying to write an entire book about Nadreck, with him as protagonist using his alien morality and alien priorities, almost certainly just would not work.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Johnny1A.2

And one that makes a certain amount of sense (other than its much-debated reproductive cycles). They act like one might imagine a herd sapient might act.

The gw'oth are a nice example of alien in mind and body. Literal starfish aliens, as it were. I'd tone down their intelligence if I were to use them though.

I thought niven straitened out the puppeteer genders by saying puppeteers are really just males and females, but they use a host species that is eaten alive, and translate the term as "female" in order to hide the fact from humans.

[Johnny1A.2]

Originally Posted by ericthered

The gw'oth are a nice example of alien in mind and body. Literal starfish aliens, as it were. I'd tone down their intelligence if I were to use them though.

I thought niven straitened out the puppeteer genders by saying puppeteers are really just males and females, but they use a host species that is eaten alive, and translate the term as "female" in order to hide the fact from humans.

Did he? I know Louis Wu concluded that this was what Nessus meant, back in Ringworld, but that scene always looked to me like Louis leaping to a conclusion based on insufficient data. Has Niven confirmed Louis' speculation?

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Johnny1A.2

Did he? I know Louis Wu concluded that this was what Nessus meant, back in Ringworld, but that scene always looked to me like Louis leaping to a conclusion based on insufficient data. Has Niven confirmed Louis' speculation?

Its confirmed in the "fleet of worlds" series, which is cowritten, and centered around puppeteer's homeworlds. He actually writes puppeteer viewpoints in these books, and we get to see the "companions".

Niven is fond of retconning his own cannon, but I can't see him going back on this one.

[Earther]

Two Andrey Tarkovskiy films:

Solaris
Stalker