Kardashev scale of alien civilization in Independence Day?
The Kardashev scale is a way of measuring a hypothetical civilization's ability to harness energy.
This scale has always made me think about the movie Independence Day (1996), my favorite example of a villainous alien civilization. Dr. Okun claims their technology is far more advanced than ours, and the evidence bears that out. From what I can tell, the aliens own significant advances in weaponry and transportation, to name just a few areas (yet were somehow completely undone by a few lines of code and a lowly nuke? But I digress...)
Anyways, given what we know about this species and their technology, is there in-universe evidence to suggest if this species might be categorized as Type II or Type III (or higher?) on the Kardashev scale?
Best Answer
The harvesters are probably a Type 1 civilization
from the scene where the president interacts with the captured alien:
PRESIDENT He wanted me to understand. He communicated with me. (turning to Grey) They're like locusts. They travel from planet to planet, their whole civilization. After they've consumed every natural resource they move on. And we're next.
From this description of their behavior they must have reached the level of type 1
A Type I civilization, also called a planetary civilization—can use and store all of the energy available on its planet.
There is no evidence of them attempting to harness the energy output of the sun, instead they find another planet to consume.
With no way to know the energy output required for their shields or interstellar travel we can't really judge how far along they are in type 1
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