*Man has just reached Jupiter, when a ship suddenly appears, clearly from another solar system.
Aliens fly the ship to Earth, and disembark at Moscow, granting humanity the ablity to fly FTL.
Fastforward 50 years later, and man is part of an inter-planet federation.
Two other species, the Grokkers and the Blastofids are capable of breeding with humans successfully. The Grokkers are almost human in appearance, but have an extra liver, better eyesight etc, while the Blastofids look nothing like humans and are mostly regarded as monstrosities, except by people with an unusual fetish.
Interrspecies relationships are becoming common, but a movement is afoot, within all species, to preserve their natural and unique gene pool, by banning interspecies marriages.*
So, would you support such moves? Is there something intrinsically worth saving about humanity, or should different (sentient) species just breed at will?
Would it matter if there was no longer such a thing as the human species?
Imagine the other races outnumbered the human race by a margin of 100:1 - would you worry about humans being bred out?
Your OP seems to assume that these species are capable of interbreeding and that their children will also be fertile. Depending on which definition of “species” you use, that would make them all the same species.
If there is no possibility for interbreeding or if the children are infertile, that’s a different situation, one in which the issue would not be “genetic purity” but “is it bestiality when both parties are intelligent and able to consent?”
As I’ve said in a few fantasy creature threads, as long as they’re sapient and intelligent enough to give informed consent, go ahead.
I don’t see the human race being bred out as any great concern: it’s the individuals that make up the human race and not the species itself that are important.
Fourthed. It’s not my business who fools around with who.
As for humanity, I regard it as deeply flawed and as something that should be replaced anyway. Preferably, in the “changed into something better” style of replacement, and not the “bombed itself to extinction and was replaced by mutant rats” version. The species isn’t worth preserving.
Not a problem for me, excepting the whole DNA/Species thing where such a likelyhood is just this side of impossible.
But just as many people have pulled the “God separated the races (sic) on purpose, so we (race) should never be marrying those (insert racial insult)” for a very long time, they’re likely to come back with “If God wanted us to marry Iridianians from beyond Betelguese, he wouldn’t have put us on different planets!”
And if Scifi movies have taught us anything, we should know that Human/Alien Hybrids will only grow rapidly and feed on Humans. Right?
For me, it’s the usual dichotomy. Is loyalty to my race more important than protecting freedom of choice? Put me down for “Not interested personally, but against any public policy in this matter.”
You can’t handwave it away, because any species that humans could interbreed with would have to share a recent common ancestor with humans. That means the “aliens” can’t really be aliens, they have to be transplanted hominids.
If they evolved independently on another planet, you’d be more likely to breed with the proverbial ear of corn than with one of the aliens.
What difference does that make? It’s a hypothetical. Considering that one species is sufficiently alien looking to us that we don’t recognize ourselves in them, does their recent biological ancestry mean anything?
But the point is, if the species is a close enough relative that we could interbreed with it, it couldn’t look radically alien, it would look at least as human as a chimpanzee.
It’s certainly possible that this hominid species would have species-specific displays that would make them look really weird to us–odd hair arrangements, colored skin patches, and so on. Closely related monkey species often have very different mustaches and such to make interspecific breeding less likely. Often these are secondary sexual characteristics.
But these sorts of species markers evolve when closely related species come in contact with each other. So if these “aliens” are species that lived on earth and were in contact with the ancestors of humans before the Ancients transplanted them, they might have evolved these markers to make them look less like humans, and we might have evolved markers to make us look less like them.
But the main point is that if we are capable of interbreeding with them, they aren’t really aliens, they’re just a different kind of human.
So long as they’re consenting adults, I have no problem with it. And if we further stipulate that they’re somehow magically interfertile with us, then I also wouldn’t have any objection to entering into such a relationship myself.
