Win.
I suppose humanity has the potential to become a threat, or at least a nuissance, to other planets someday. The proactive thing to do might be to visit and put the planet in check somehow. Also, we might have some rare resource, but I don’t know what we have that wouldn’t be easily had by somebody with the resources who can travel across the galaxy. It could be that Earth is interesting from an academic perspective. Or we could in some way be cute or amusing. Mostly, though, I like the idea of us being a threat to the interstellar community, kind of like a rodent colony might be a threat to my backyard. Let’s just get rid of them before they become a gigantic pain in the neck.
They might just think Earth is pretty.
To serve us.
Connie Willis did this too, in her short story “And Come From Miles Around”.
It’s a cookbook! It’s a cookbook!
For the Reece’s Pieces.
If they are travelling, then their minds are likely at least a little like ours, and they might be curious about us and our culture.
If they are really alien aliens we probably wouldn’t be able to understand their reasons. If they are more like us but still very different, their reason may seem stupid to us. Suppose, for example, their version of the Bible said they should make it their goal to visit a specific star and it happened to be ours?
Earth’s such a tourist trap.
To spread the divine and Holy Truth of G’Narrrr-Pwutq! The two legged infidels of the small blue planet must be converted to the one and only truth! Or they shall be put to the Zh-aazaat-bucher!
They’re probably already here on this planet, esp. LA & NYC. They go out at night, eatin’ cars – Cadillacs, Lincolns too, Mercurys and Subarus. And they don’t stop…
All hail G’Narrrr-Pwutq! (what can I say, I’m an early adopter)
Dunno. If they’re sentient and tool using (i.e. they’re not visiting as spores or seeds or some such), then I’d say there’s a reasonable chance we’d have some motives in common, what with the general principle of natural selection, and (I presume) the visitors having had to climb to a position of planetary dominance back home.