Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

People Debate Which 'Normal' Human Things Would Seem Bizarre To Aliens

man in green mask inside car
Brooke Denevan on Unsplash

Reddit user 2drums1cymbal asked: 'What are some “normal” things humans do that an intelligent alien species might find weird, gross or confusing?'

Make us preferred on Google

Are we alone in the universe? It's highly unlikely given the number of stars and potential planets.

But are we actively encountering extraterrestrial life? That ones a little harder to discern.


And what do/would they think if they are visiting us? Are we a fascinating primitive culture? Or are we more "lock the doors, roll up the windows, we're in the bad part of the galaxy" neighborhood?

Admittedly, we are kind of strange.

Reddit user 2drums1cymbal asked:

"What are some 'normal' things humans do that an intelligent alien species might find weird, gross or confusing?"

Substances

"Intentionally poisoning ourselves to make our tedious lives more bearable."

"Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, marijuana, Ecstasy, alcohol, etc..."

~ Snark_Life

"And many other mind-altering substances, like caffeine, and things that evolved to be unpleasant or unpalatable, like capsaicin."

~ -King_Slacker

Mini-Humans Are Useless

"Human babies are useless because hip bone sizes limit how much they can develop before birth. That's why a calf or foal can walk in hours, but a human baby takes a year."

"If aliens reproduce differently enough, they might be confused both as to why our offspring are messy little blobs and as to why we're all so comparatively clingy—because if they don't rely on their parents for survival as much their social structure would probably be wildly different."

~ shyishguyish

Likes

"Exchanging saliva because we like someone."

"Slapping our hands together rapidly because we like something."

"Keep animals captive because we like them."

~ _forum_mod

Taste Is Subjective

"We will put each other's genitalia in our mouth, but we won't eat the overripe black part on the banana."

~ Snoo_63187

Close Shave

"Do we really let someone pass the sharpest blade our species could create near our largest artery only to remove our head/neck hair?"

~ tbfoot

Lacto Tolerance

"'You do WHAT with the lactic fluids of animals? Wait, wait, wait, you're saying you don't just drink it, but you also carefully rot it until it congeals into fatty, solid blocks and then you eat THAT too‽‽'."

"I love cheese, don't get me wrong, but it's hard to think about sometimes."

~ Chairboy

Carne Humana

"We're all made of meat!"

~ imn0tafurry

O Tannenbaum

"Decorate the corpse of a conifer every winter solstice."

~ Mumbles_Stiltskin

Bless You v. Excuse Me

"Others call on the intercession of a deity when someone else expels from the nose, but the bodily function wielder begs for forgiveness when expelling gas from the anus or mouth."

~ prodigy1367

Sports

"Bowling. I always thought an alien or very different culture would be shocked by how many people around me are surprisingly good at accurately rolling a heavy ball 30 feet."

~ NigilQuid

"Some games we play, like bowling, golf, do look a little pointless to an outsider."

~ GaiaSagrada909

Face Leakage

"Crying. Shedding tears as a response to emotions might be confusing or seen as a bizarre leakage of body fluids if emotional expressions manifest differently for them."

~ Fit_Journalist_533

Reproduction

"Having hot sweaty smelly messy sex instead of neatly depositing eggs in a proper incubator and neatly fertilizing them."

"If it's good enough for the salmons, it's good enough for our new fishy masters."

~ fogobum

"Take it a step further. What if they don't reproduce sexually at all?"

"That'd be a huge divide to overcome."

~ 250HardKnocksCaps

"Mitosis is indeed a huge divide."

~ PirateNinjasReddit

Efficiency Ick

"That our reproductive system and waste disposal system are interconnected with each other."

~ soccerdevil22

"Hell, the reproductive, food intake, and waste disposal systems of some invertebrates are all interconnected and enter/exit from the same hole."

~ Peptuck

💩🚽

"Pooping in water."

"With water being one of the most fundamental resources to human life and health I feel like an alien species would question why we just expel waste into it and flush it away."

~ CaptainCreepwork

What would you add to the list?

More from News/science

Screenshots from @meitham's TikTok
@meitham/TikTok

Teen Sparks Debate With Viral Video Listing The Rules Her 'Strict Parents' Have Enforced That Have Made Her An 'Avid Liar'

By now, we've all heard the saying that overly strict parents create sneaky kids, and more and more evidence of this being true is appearing on TikTok.

TikToker Mei, or @meitham, opened up on the platform while doing her makeup for school, claiming that she became a "very avid liar" because of her strict parents.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshots from @taylaajacksonn's TikTok
@taylaajacksonn/TikTok

UK Man Goes Viral With His Shock Over All Of The Bizarre And 'Supersized' Things Walmart Sells—And We're Cackling

Every culture is different, so when two people are internationally dating, they're not just dealing with the physical distance of the long-distance relationship—they have to take in other cultural factors as well.

Sometimes that can be difficult, but sometimes it's really hilarious.,

Keep ReadingShow less
Nathan Fielder; Elizabeth Holmes
A24

Bizarre Clip Of Disgraced Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes From Surprise New Documentary Sparks Hilarious Memes

In a time where every day is more bizarre than the last, it takes a lot to make something that truly knocks people off-balance. But Canadian filmmaker, actor, and comedian Nathan Fielder has done just that.

Fielder dropped a clip from his next project, which he somehow managed to keep so secret nobody knew anything about it for three years: a documentary about infamous Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes called You Can See Everything.

Keep ReadingShow less
screenshot of Jacob Coxon on Anderson Cooper 360
Anderson Cooper 360/CNN

Anthropic Researcher Abruptly Resigns Before Warning That AI 'Could Kill Us All By The End Of The Decade' In Alarming Rant

Anthropic is an American artificial intelligence (AI) safety and research company whose website says it develops "reliable, interpretable, and steerable AI systems." It was founded in 2021 by former OpenAI researchers and organized as a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC) to prioritize "long-term safety, ethics, and a positive public impact alongside business goals."

Their flagship product is a family of large language models (LLMs) used for "complex reasoning, coding, and conversational assistance" that the company named "Claude."

Keep ReadingShow less
child holding box of school supplies and screenshot of tweet
vejaa/Getty Images; @mattvanswol/X

MAGA Christian's Viral Post About Learning Donated School Supplies Will Go To Spanish-Speaking Kids Has Everyone Making The Same Point

A self-described devout Christian—the White nationalist part is silent on his bio, but loud in his social media posts, which constantly vilify BIPOC and non-White immigrants and spread White nationalist propaganda and rhetoric—recently posted his moral dilemma on X seeking feedback from his fellow MAGA minions.

Matt Van Swol wrote:

Keep ReadingShow less