I touched on this in another thread, but I think its important enough to warrant it's own discussion.

I find a lot of science fiction using different species of aliens to represent different races/viewpoints/aspects of human kind. This seems to me to be tacitly supporting the notion of biological determinism, a pseudo-scientific notion that character can be determined entirely by genetics.

Consider the episode of Deep Space Nine where a young Jem'Hadar is raised by humans, yet they ultimately have to let him go because - despite being a fully sentient and rational creature - his 'nature' makes him incapable of living in civilised society. The Star Trek franchise isn't by a long stretch the only culprit of this - it tends to occur in pretty much any character-driven sci-fi featuring aliens.

__________________
"I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudo-science and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive." - Carl Sagan, 1995

It's not so much a tacit support, as a convenient storytelling device. Trying to come up with aliens who are as varied in personality and culture as humans, and yet all totally different from humans, would be a massive amount of work. Even the best alien-making science fiction writers tend to make their aliens a bit monotone in culture and personality, or else so alien that thay can't really be seen as characters. There are a rare few exceptions, but they're, well, exceptional.

Star Trek wasn't going for realism. It wasn't their goal. The same is often true of "bumpy-head" aliens; they're not meant to be truly alien, just "alien enough".

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

I understand its use as an easy storytelling device, but I think writers could do with being aware of the message they may unintentionally or subconsciously be putting out.

The episode of DS9 I mentioned, had a theme to it I found horrifying - that there are different 'sorts' of people and you couldn't change them so don't try. I doubt the writers were going for racist subtext, but you must be able to see how it is, probably unintentionally, there?

Such thinking isn't associated only with racism. Its linked to the view that criminals can't be rehabilitated, so they should be hanged/castrated/locked up forever. It tends to form the basis of all social Darwinism, as you can't argue that position at all unless you assume that inherited characteristics are the primary influence on peoples character.

Like I said, I doubt many writers think of this intentionally, but I see it nevertheless and it concerns me.

__________________
"I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudo-science and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive." - Carl Sagan, 1995

The way that intelligent aliens think, the shape of their consciousness so speak, could be very different from the shape of human consciousness. And much of that shape will be dictated by genetics. We would probably have a different shape of consciousness to a species of intelligent alien descended from lizards, or from spiders, or from ants or octopuses; aliens would be stranger still.

This would be at least an order of magnitude of strangeness above the realms of (for example) 'logical Vulcans' and 'warrior klingons' that some, but not all sci-fi writers imagine.

Yet there would probably, hopefully, be enough variation in the alien mindset for their intelligence to be as independent of their genetics as ours is; and hopefully we could find common ground somewhere.

__________________
Orion's Arm . The Starlark . Voices: Future Tense . OA Flickr set

The Lion King has the same message; "You're the King, it's your destiny, you were born to rule because of who your your family is, you can't escape it and no one else can take your place." Scary stuff to teach impressionable children.

I can think of an even worse example from Star Trek, using actual humans. A TNG episode called Journey's End; the one with the Politically Correct Fake Indian Tribe Made Up By White Men. In that episode, they imply-- actually, they don't just imply, they say straight out-- that Picard has something to "atone" for because of something his ancestors did hundreds of years before he was born. A horrible denial of individual rights.

Another moral stinkbomb was Voyager's Nothing Human, they didn't want to save B'elanna using information gained from a Cardassian war criminal who did Mengele-type experiments on prisoners. As if the information was tainted because someone did something bad to get it. They even had the cop-out of having the "logical" Vulcan disapprove of using it for wholely illogical reasons (because it might "encourage others" to torture innocents to gain knowledge!) And in the end, of course, they save her anyway with that eeeeevil doctor's knowledge, and then hypocritically erase it so no other lives can be saved by that dirty, dirty information. Bah! A rousing victory for the forces of ignorance and predjudice!

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

By the by, since this is a question about fiction, shouldn't it be under SMAL?

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

Hmmm.
Our intelligence is independent from our genetics? Is it, really??

I remember reading a sci-fi book that had a sort of complement situation to this one. It had a plot sort of as follows:

There was a human colony on another planet that also had it's own indigenous intelligent race. For whatever (stupid, IMO) reason, the human nation had a treaty with them, which subjected the human colonists to their byzantine laws whenever they interacted with them. The usual penalty for any number of trivial "offenses" was for them to take custody of your children.

After that, they'd force-fit the human children into their culture, even going so far as to re-work their appearance and senses. The result were twisted psychological wrecks whenever they were outside the conformative pressures of the alien culture. Lesson: humans were never psychologically built to be faceless, nameless, perfectly interchangeable units who would never dare to call attention to themselves as individuals.

And maybe humans are psychologically adaptable enough to be force-fit to such a situation and still manage some sort of survival. But it usually takes guns, barbed wire, and trauma to do it, so maybe it isn't the best idea.
--------------------------------

It may not necessarily be racist if you really are talking about a different species (and one that has less in common with you than a mutant sea anemone at that). Maybe intelligence is more general than the biology that gives rise to it. But it's possible that even intelligent personalities take a lot of their driving forces from genetics, and can't be pushed indefinitely outside their nominal operating parameters, and thus aliens would have cause to be somewhat alien.

In addition, some people, for reasons that have nothing to do with their race, have a certain specific personality that can't be permanently altered to any arbitrary degree.

__________________
http://amssolarempire.blogspot.com

Different species do have different behavior because of different genetics. Some species (such as ants) have very little scope for learned behavior, so their behavior is largely determined by genetics. Other species have more room for learned behavior, but genetics plays a significant factor for all.

I don't see any problem with the rather obvious point that genetics affects behavior. However, I'd certainly like to see better attempts at portrayal of truly alien behavior (even in written stories, many writers have mostly human aliens).

Are you suggesting that it is impossible that an alien species might be incapable of living in human society?

__________________
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

Keep in mind that in the case of the Jem'Hadar, "nature" had nothing to do with it. They didn't evolve naturally. They were designed to be genetically limited in behavior and independent thought. It's literally programmed into their genes by the Dominion to be the way they are. Just as certain breeds of dongs are bred for aggression or loyalty. That's part of what made the Dominion the Bad Guys, that they did stuff like that to sentient beings. (plus the drug excuse me "isogenic enzyme" addiction they gave them all.)

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

But this wasn't a human, so there is no racist subtext. The more troubling issue with that story is that the Changelings had modified the Jem'Hadar (along with the Vorta) to suit them.

Your mistake is assuming that the story must be about humans, no matter what. Yes, there is very little genetic variation within the human species, and no, behavior isn't entirely determined by genetics. However, there are significant differences in the behavior of different species due to genetics, even with relatively closely related species (and these aren't from our planet or even this part of the galaxy!).

__________________
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

I know what you're getting at, but it's a double edged sword. If the behaviour is truly alien, how will the reader be able to relate to it? A little bit of alieness I think works better than something completely unfathomable. Science fiction isn't really about aliens, it's about humans with current cultural values projected into an unfamiliar setting with the aim of exploring the human condition.

Not all of it, no. There is a vast range of science fiction, and some of it does explore alienness. Just not the stuff that gets made into TV shows.

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

We've had plenty of examples of non-humans being raised by humans. The moral is, unless it's been genetically modified, such as a dog or horse, or too small to kill us, such as a domestic cat, you need generally need a female or a casterated male to have prolonged sucess in even partially intergrating the non-human into human society. This certainly applies to kangaroos where males will start to fight for territory once they mature. But it also applies to much smarter and closely related animals such as chimpanzees.

Among most Earth mammals, yes. Aliens might work totally differently.

Reminds me of one of the Enterprise episodes, I forget which, but Dr. Phlox said his species' males got violent and competitive during mating season. He himself was not shown to act abnormally during this time, probably because he was isolated from the pheromones of females in estrus.

__________________
"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

You might be right for humanoids (which are what you usually see in SF).

But I suspect that real aliens will be very different and that their "personalities" and viewpoints will be very much shaped by their biology.

One obvious example to me are herbivores, versus omnivores, versus carnivores (assuming such categories even apply to alien species). I have to suspect that hunters have a different outlook on the universe than grazers. I think Larry Niven has touched on this in his science ficition. Similarly, are the beings decended from herd animals, pack animals, or solitary creastures.

I also have to think that a being's sensory system may have influences on their perspectives. If you "see" the world with sonar, rather than reflected light, do "see" the world differently (so to speak)?

Someone mentioned ants and I have to believe a hive mind, even if intelligent, would be very different than us. Their ideas of "self" and "physical being" would have to be different.

__________________
At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

vs photosynthesizing creatures, vs intelligent parasites, vs computers/engineered creatures whose devices sustain them vs ....

__________________
http://amssolarempire.blogspot.com

To further complicate Damburger's argument, Odo wasn't human at all. He was a Changeling with no experience in child-rearing. And the adolescent Jem-Hadar was there only for a few days, if I recall. A week isn't much time to learn about parenting a child from your OWN species. The Jem-Hadar were biological weapons, essentially. They displayed no interest in anything beyond warfare, because that's how the Founders made them.

I hardly see racist overtones in this.

__________________
Angel of the Abyss
-------------
"I am Ripper...Tearer...Slasher...Gouger. I am the Teeth in the Darkness, the Talons in the Night. Mine is Strength...and Lust...and Power! I AM BEOWULF!"