If Intelligent Life Exsists In Our Galaxy Then........

I have a different take on existence. I believe the energy that keeps our hearts beating, our souls, are passed on from one planet to the next. After all that energy is used here it all moves onto another planet in a Goldilocks zone and begins again... Repeating everything in a perpetual loop. The meek will inherit the earth is testament to this philosophy... Many quotes in old script support this perpetual loop. Yes, other civilizations exist however in respect to space and time ... In the vastness of space and the vastness of time ... The next civilizations exist once ours is long gone. Life is recycled atoms, constantly breaking apart and connecting together, only to break apart yet again.

It has all been done before and it will all be done again, we are simply actors, however without actors is there even a play? Without a composition... Was there ever a composer?

What's your take on the possibility of them sending probes or AI out into the cosmos reaching our star system?

originally posted by: yourmaker
What's your take on the possibility of them sending probes or AI out into the cosmos reaching our star system?

they don't need to... They can observe us from their homestead

Part of the Drake Equation is the average detectable lifetime of a civilization. Note Detectable. This factor is partially limited by our detection technologies, but also may reflect the lifetime of the civilization. Until very recently, our detection efforts have been focused on radio waves pretty much exclusively. We ourselves became detectable this way with the advent of radio, and more so with high powered TV transmissions.

However, looking at the trend in our communication technologies, it's easy to see that we are moving away from those more detectable transmissions and towards, cable, fiber optics and low powered, distributive transmissions. It's not hard to imagine that in a hundred years, we may be giving off no emissions that would have been detectable by a civilization with technology similar to our late 20th century tech.

Of course, there is also the possibility that the detectable window could be cut short by the fall or destruction of a civilization. We have no data that allows us to even guess as to the actual life span of a technological civilization. We can look at our own civilization and see a reasonable danger that we might wipe ourselves out with in a century or two of developing nuclear weapons, or as a result of unbridled environmental destruction and overpopulation. However, it's very egotistical to imagine that we are typical in our capacity for self destructive behaviors.

As our detection capabilities grow, so do the results of the Drake Equation, which, after all, is still just an estimate of detectable civilizations in our Galaxy.

originally posted by: Totemic
Part of the Drake Equation is the average detectable lifetime of a civilization. Note Detectable. This factor is partially limited by our detection technologies, but also may reflect the lifetime of the civilization. Until very recently, our detection efforts have been focused on radio waves pretty much exclusively. We ourselves became detectable this way with the advent of radio, and more so with high powered TV transmissions.

However, looking at the trend in our communication technologies, it's easy to see that we are moving away from those more detectable transmissions and towards, cable, fiber optics and low powered, distributive transmissions. It's not hard to imagine that in a hundred years, we may be giving off no emissions that would have been detectable by a civilization with technology similar to our late 20th century tech.

Of course, there is also the possibility that the detectable window could be cut short by the fall or destruction of a civilization. We have no data that allows us to even guess as to the actual life span of a technological civilization. We can look at our own civilization and see a reasonable danger that we might wipe ourselves out with in a century or two of developing nuclear weapons, or as a result of unbridled environmental destruction and overpopulation. However, it's very egotistical to imagine that we are typical in our capacity for self destructive behaviors.

As our detection capabilities grow, so do the results of the Drake Equation, which, after all, is still just an estimate of detectable civilizations in our Galaxy.

Great post! S+F

You do however realize detectable does not just mean communications technologies right? It means ANY manifestation of technology which is detectable. While at the time the Drake Equation was devised it was specifically talking about radio communication, the amount of things we've learned are or may be detectable at interstellar distances has grown far beyond that.

Some examples of things that would be detectable at interstellar distance which have nothing to do with communications:

PRESENT ERA:

Planetary Radar to Image Asteroids
City Lights on Planet Nightside
Waste Heat Due to Technology
Polarized Light from polished metal structures
Presence of CFC molecules in Earth's Atmosphere


NEAR FUTURE:

Directed Energy Propulsion Stations (Laser or Microwave)
Solar Power Satellite Microwave Beams
Fusion Pulse Engine Ionization (if built big enough).


FAR FUTURE:

Ringworld?
Dyson Sphere/Dyson Shell
Sun's Gravitational Lens to communicate with interstellar probes


So you see, just as the spark plug in a nearby car is detectable on an AM radio so to may our technology which has nothing to do with communications be detectable at interstellar distances.

And that's just talking about technology. Our Earth's forests have been detectable for billions of years.

originally posted by: MikhailBakunin

originally posted by: yourmaker
What's your take on the possibility of them sending probes or AI out into the cosmos reaching our star system?

they don't need to... They can observe us from their homestead

This is true for the most part.

However there are physical limits to what can be done optics so planets which are especially interesting might get a closer look with a probe.

Check out this article:

To Build the Ultimate Telescope - Centauri Dreams

excerpt from Seth Shostak....

At 100 light-years, something the size of a Honda Accord — which I propose as a standard imaging test object — subtends an angle of a half-trillionth of a second of arc. In case that number doesn’t speak to you, it’s roughly the apparent size of a cell nucleus on Pluto, as viewed from Earth.

You will not be stunned to hear that resolving something that minuscule requires a telescope with a honking size. At ordinary optical wavelengths, “honking” works out to a mirror 100 million miles across. You could nicely fit a reflector that large between the orbits of Mercury and Mars. Big, yes, but it would permit you to examine exoplanets in incredible detail.

originally posted by: yourmaker
What's your take on the possibility of them sending probes or AI out into the cosmos reaching our star system?

Why not?

We've done it...even with our limited slingshot-esque technology.

a reply to: alldaylong

The only thing is, why would you think another planet in the galaxy would have physical traits anywhere close to earth?

The whole density, atmosphere, and even elements can all be entirely different.

If you have an extra element, or different elements, there are endless possibilities to what is created on the planet and how fast it evolves, and what it evolves into. For instance, I doubt nuts and bolts were ever in the aliens history of manufacturing, they probably were never introduced to any of our methods in anything at any time in their existence.

So much speculations
right and left...
What if is a nice thing to have as an argument...

What if there are 2% of all the "civilisations" in OUR galaxy
that is AT our timelime in evolution OR just SLIGHTLY beyond...
Lets say 500-1000 years....
In a thousand years alone we went from "Only birds can fly" to
moonlandings and probes to mars...

Now "what if" there are 0.001% of all the civilisations,
that are maybe 5-10000 years ahead... Thats STILL verry
young compared to the age of the galaxy....

Oh there is life out there .. probably more than we can imagine .. but here is the thing that nobody realizes... there is no reason to come here! If life has taught us one thing than it is that life always needs resources to exist and it chooses the easiest path to get to these resources.

Now let's look where we are located within the Milky Way - and the end of a freaking spiral arm with no other star systems around that might have resources. If you are a commander of an advanced race, what would you choose: 1) Go to that blue planet where I need to fight my way in to get to the resources, or 2) just go close to the inner galaxy's core to harvest resources since the assumption is that they are far more raw materials than anywhere else in the galaxy.

Obviously you are advance for a reason which brings us back to another issue which is that this advanced race actually knows about us and there is not a lot of evidence from us in space "yet" other than some weak radio signals which probably just appear as background noise after a couple light years thanks to the inverse square law.

Now here is the next problem: Let's pretend that we have a lot of luck and the next star system (Alpha Centauri) actually has intelligent life and they are in a similar maybe more advanced stage - even colonized some of their planets already .. who knows - they are facing the same issues that we have! They can't just leave their solar system and come over for a BBQ... and even they sent a space probe to us, it may not have arrived or arrived long time ago and has vanished or even mistakenly identified as human-made. See where the speculation goes ...

I think we can nail this down to one big conclusion: Our planet is not interesting for anyone to come here other than for novelty or a nomadic race that goes from planet to planet and plunder resources.

flyandi,

You are pretty negative about coming here. Yes, I have an earthling perspective. But, the characteristics for becoming interstellar are likely going to be driven by the quest for knowledge, scientific development, relationship development and species survival. The cost to become interstellar is likely staggering unless there are enormous scientific energy breakthroughs. I somehow doubt that the technology will ever exist to transport the entire planet's population to another planet. Obviously a limited view, but...there are limits to everything even though many on here don't accept that.

So far our exoplanet search has turned up very few planets that appear to be able to support advanced life forms as we know them. I would expect the technology of an advanced civilization to be such that over some period of time they could identify every planet in the galaxy that could support life or has shown signs that life exists there. The only issue then would be choosing the planets to go to based on what was trying to be accomplished.

The reasons to come here are that intelligent life is likely quite rare. Even if a race is more advanced than us, making acquaintance with us can still enhance their development help quench curiousity or further future objectives of both worlds. If we found a planet that had humanoids on it at the level of cavemen, I am sure we would be interested in going there. I am not too concerned about being taken over. While perfect habitable planets may be rare, I would think they are more plentiful than planets inhabited by intelligent species. Therefore, I would think furthering species survival would likely entail colonizing worlds that did not have intelligent life.

I doubt intergalactic travel is ever possible. The distances are so great. Therefore, we are likely going to be confined to the possibility of finding intelligent life in our galaxy which means probably not more than a 1,000 or so chances at the most. Given the number of starts in our galaxy, the odds are only going to be overcome when the science evolves to detect life on other worlds from extreme distances. I am guessing humans could become interstellar within 200 years.

The biggest obstacle I see is if artificial intelligence takes over societies at some point and AI has no need for any of the drivers to find other worlds. If AI is ultimately required to develop the technology to become interstellar, i.e. the human brains can't do it or our bodies can't survive it, but AI diminishes the desire to become interstellar, that is a plausible explanation of the Fermi Paradox. As much as I want to believe we have been contacted, I don't believe we are.

In a universe of infinite possibilities I highly doubt we are alone. I agree that intelligent life is rare in comparison to non intelligent life but it would still be out there in abundance. And probably a lot of civilisations have beat the odds and survived for billions of years.

If there are intelligent ET, a few things are going on. Either they are hiding from us for some reason "Prime Directive?". There is no quick way to travel and communicate long distances in space? Lastly, intelligence is just now happening in the galaxy and none of us have learned how to travel fast or communicate light year distances in space.

The other possibility is there is life out there but it has taken the entire life span of our galaxy to produce one intelligent life form. Maybe even we are the only one yet in the universe.

Most likely more intelligent life will spring up given enough time, if not already but only one here on earth so... it is rare.

Intelligent life is rare. I think we can consider that the reality for now.
Deep space travel may be impossible or require generations of life forms traveling as colonies to move through the galaxy.

Evidence available is telling us we are alone, at least for several thousand light years away.
Evidence also suggest faster than light travel may not be possible, even with exotic ideas like worm holes.

Evidence can change but that's what we got right now. We should act on that and begin moving off earth to preserve humanity. I honestly hope an asteroid with our name on it that would be impossible to stop is discovered soon enough so that we have time to get everyone off the planet and move us out there and then only after colonizing our solar system we figure out a way to stop the Asteroid. I say this because it is obvious we wont do it soon without somethinng serious motivating us to use resources to do it.

a reply to: alldaylong

So you are saying that life can be only on one planet of the same galaxy at a time, and in such case humanity has never been visited. And if life exists in another galaxy? After all most of the claims of visitation are for beings from other realms or galaxies. So I don't see how your logic negates the visitation by any beings.

a reply to: alldaylong

Actually the odds that life is out there concurrently with us is very high. The odds that the life is intelligent, has mastered space travel, has located us in the cosmos, and has been able to travel here, is what is incredibly low.

Who's to say their isn't a way to travel faster than the speed of light. Although another theory if wormholes exist then intergalactic travel if a very plausible reality.

There are 300 billion stars in the milky way.

originally posted by: alldaylong
It may not or never be on our own timeline.

The age of Planet Earth is around 4.5 billion years.

Humans have only been on Earth for the past 2.5 million years. That is just a blink of an eye compared to the age of Earth. That's over 4 billion years without human intelligent life on Earth. And we cannot even leave our own Solar System at this time.

Likewise the same timeline could possibly exist on other Planets in The Milky Way. Some Planets are much older and some younger that Earth. Therefore if the same rules exist on life being formed on those Planets, then it leaves us to being " all out of sync".

Younger Planets may not evolve life for billions of years in the future. Older Planets may have had life billions of years in the past and has since died out.

Therefore i think for there to be life at the same time on even two Planets in The Milky Way ( i.e Earth and a an other ) is very slim. That's why i don't believe we are being visited from E.T.

You may or may not agree.

a reply to: alldaylong

Call me naive or just secular. I am contributing something to ats tonight, I am being lazy drinking a beer, and doing my best to communicate to the world. My disclaimer is this after years of ats, if you don't understand what I am saying or cannot debate with me or question me like for instance phage, then don't bother with me..

I think we are alone..

as far as life in our sense, I do also think their is another kind of life, or something that exists that we cannot perceive yet we know it exist, and at times we see evidence of them in our skies etc.

I tend to think the older I get most stories of alien abductions to be more fiction then fact... Has it happens I am sure, but if such a superior species existed than their would be no need for abduction, we would be specimens..

I think we have a creator and in some strange landscape I gaze upon, I think we have done this before..

All in all thou, at my age I have learned it does not matter what we think, because we will never know...

The simplest answer is this we are alone... Yet I think the reality we exist in, the technology we exist in, the universe is alive somehow and is conscious and if we focus hard enough on it we can comprehend its existence yet that is the extent of our understanding of what is above our sky..

Also of course we have no idea what life exists within the depth of our oceans..

Not to mention we do not understand the nature of our planet either..

Man in many ways does not understand himself..

Most men just know they must procreate, and are led by that stimulation in life..

They will fight and die to do it..

until we as a whole think without primitive deviance,

we will not be any closer to understanding..

We do not understand anything important in this reality, we are subjected to the distractions we create, to make ourselves feel like we are important, yet all in all, that is just a survival mechanism. If their is any truth to what we are suppose to do, it is to survive, everything else, is meaningless really...

We are alone..

I think this reality is to complex to support other life, we cannot even fathom what we exist in.

originally posted by: duaneology
Do you believe in mathematics?
Do you believe in the science of probability?
If so then it would be impossible to accept that life isn't abundant in the universe.

Okay, then let's do the math.

The math says that the more abundant intelligent life is, the more blatantly obvious it should be.

In couple billion years, even traveling at far below light speed, a single intelligence could spread through most of the galaxy with Von Neumann machines, leaving their mark pretty much everywhere. Multiply that by a couple billion and their absence becomes even more noticeable. Even if a few of them agree on some kind of Prime Directive, they certainly are not all going to agree on it. They're afraid of us because we're so hostile? Puh-leese. But those are all non-mathematical rationalizations. The math is clear. The more aliens, the easier we should find them.

So if you're right, and the universe is just crawling with all kinds of intelligent life, you need to come up with all kinds of non-mathematical reasons to explain why we can't just look up into the sky and see evidence of them.

originally posted by: Blue Shift

originally posted by: alldaylong
If E.T. did exist in The Galaxy, it would be pure luck they came toward Earth, when there are so many other directions they could head for.

Here's something to consider as well... No matter which direction an alien went from their home planet, unless they headed dead straight for us, in an expanding universe they would always be going rapidly away from us. If they started on a less-than-straight line from their planet to ours, even going at the speed of light, because of the expansion of the universe they would be traveling on a parabolic course farther and farther away from us as time went on. And the farther they are from us when they start, the farther away from us they would go.

So they better have either pretty good aim or a LOT of power to make continuous course changes if they're going to hit our bullseye.

This is only true for aliens coming from a different galaxy, and even then it would have to be a galaxy outside the local group and extremely far away for expansion to have any such effect.

Local (and the local group isn't called that for nothing) gravity trumps the universal expansion. It's why we can be here at all.

Harte