One of my favorite SF stories flips this premise: What if human beings were the wise, moral, responsible galactic elders? And we discovered low-tech aliens who observed:
- "Humans have such good self-control! They can resist cannibalism and murder so easily!"
- "Humans live for more than two years!"
- "Humans have time to learn more than a thousand words!"
- "But when you get right down to it, humans are remarkably dumb and unmotivated, compared to us."
…and most importantly:
- "Hey, can we get some life extension technology? If we lived longer, we could totally have an engineering degree by age 6."
- "Humans have such good self-control! They can resist cannibalism and murder so easily!" - "Humans live for more than two years!" - "Humans have time to learn more than a thousand words!" - "But when you get right down to it, humans are remarkably dumb and unmotivated, compared to us."
…and most importantly:
- "Hey, can we get some life extension technology? If we lived longer, we could totally have an engineering degree by age 6."
Vernor Vinge, "Original Sin." http://www.amazon.com/Collected-Stories-Vernor-Vinge/dp/0312...