I’d prefer humanity choose to cooperate with aliens if we are in the stronger position. But I agree that we shouldn’t expect them to do the same, and that this does argue for generic importance of developing technology faster. (On the other hand, intelligent life seems to be really rare, so trying to outrace others might be a bad idea if there isn’t much else, or if the reason there’s so little is because of some future filtration event.)
I’d prefer humanity choose to cooperate with aliens if we are in the stronger position. But I agree that we shouldn’t expect them to do the same, and that this does argue for generic importance of developing technology faster. (On the other hand, intelligent life seems to be really rare, so trying to outrace others might be a bad idea if there isn’t much else, or if the reason there’s so little is because of some future filtration event.)