Why Alien Life Would Be Our Doom - The Great Filter

a reply to: intrptr

Well, I live in an area that should be good for spotting just about anything in the sky. Plenty of remote wilderness and stars as far as the eye can see. Still haven't seen anything like aliens (or bigfoot for that matter) running around. I thought I saw something over my house the night my mother died but couldn't tell you for sure. It was gone in an instant. Maybe because I wasn't barking at the moon?

www.zmescience.com... GN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_3b5aad2288-ff34f4d953-242744109&goal=0_3b5aad2288-ff34f4d953-242744109


"esearchers from the Vienna University of Technology (VUT) have put a brain on a circuit board — specifically, the brain of the nematode C. elegans. They are now training it to perform tasks without a single line of human-written code.C. elegans isn’t much to look at. Growing to just under one millimeter in length, it’s not just tiny, it’s also a very, very simple organism. But in one respect, this little nematode is unique and uniquely valuable for science — it’s the only living being whose neural system has been fully analyzed and mapped. In other words, its brain can be recreated as a circuit — either onto a circuit board or one simulated with software — without losing any of its function.

This has allowed researchers at the VUT to ‘copy-paste’ its brain into a computer, creating a virtual copy of the organism that reacts to stimuli the same way as the real thing. The researchers are now hard at work training this digi-worm to perform simple tasks, and it has already mastered the standard computer science trial of balancing a pole.

Worm in the software


So are your brains at risk of spontaneous copyfication? No. Researchers have been able to map C. elegans‘ neural systems precisely because it’s quite dumb — it can only draw on 300 neurons worth of processing power. However, that’s enough gray matter to allow the worm to navigate its environment, catch bacteria for dinner, and react to certain external stimuli — such as a touch on its body, which triggers a reflexive squirming-away.

This behavior is encoded in the worm’s nerve cells, and governed by the strength of the connections between these neurons. When recreated on a computer, this simple reflex pathway works the same way as its biological counterpart — not because it’s been programmed to do so, but because this behavior arises from the structure itself.

“This reflexive response of such a neural circuit, is very similar to the reaction of a control agent balancing a pole,” says co-author Ramin Hasani.

Pole balancing is actually a typical control trial in computer science. It involves a pole, fixed on its lower end on a moving object, which the device has to keep in a vertical position. It does this by moving the object slightly whenever the pole starts tilting, in a bid to keep it from tipping over.

Worm test pole.The worm’s natural behavior is very similar to that required in this test.
Image credits TU Wien.
Standard controllers don’t have much trouble passing this test. The trial is functionally similar to the processes the nematode’s neural system has to handle in the wild — move when a stimulus is registered. So, the team wanted to see if it could solve the problem without adding any extra code or neurons, just by tuning the strength of connections between cells. They chose this final parameter based on the fact that shifting synaptic strength is the characteristic feature of any natural learning process.

After some tweaking, the network managed to easily pass the pole trial.



“With the help of reinforcement learning, a method also known as ‘learning based on experiment and reward’, the artificial reflex network was trained and optimized on the computer,” explains first author Mathias Lechner.

“The result is a controller, which can solve a standard technology problem — stabilizing a pole, balanced on its tip. But no human being has written even one line of code for this controller, it just emerged by training a biological nerve system,” says co-author Radu Grosu.After establishing that the method works, the team plans to probe the capabilities of similar circuits further. Still, the research does raise some very impactful questions — are machine learning and our brain processes fundamentally the same? If so, is silicone intelligence any less valuable or ‘alive’ than biological intelligences?

For now, however, we simply don’t know — C. elegans doesn’t know or care whether it lives as a worm in the ground or as a virtual collection of 1’s and 0’s on a computer in Vienna.

The paper “Worm-level Control through Search-based Reinforcement” has been published in the preprint server arXiv.

"

a reply to: Blue_Jay33


The only problem...is that we are not alone in our Galaxy, and the otherworlders have obviously visited our planet numerous times in the past, and will probably visit us more so in the near future; because we are so close to total mass destruction of our own planet, due to climate change and nuclear Armageddon.

originally posted by: Erno86
The only problem...is that we are not alone in our Galaxy, and the otherworlders have obviously visited our planet numerous times in the past, and will probably visit us more so in the near future; because we are so close to total mass destruction of our own planet, due to climate change and nuclear Armageddon.

Well, that's like, your opinion, man.

a reply to: HummaKavula

My own take is that these events are rare, once in a lifetime kind of thing. You happen to be there in just the right spot , at the right time.

Anyway thats how it happened, for me.

What do you 'think' you saw the night your mom passed?.

a reply to: intrptr

That sounds about right. Like I said, I have always wanted to see something, maybe that's why I haven't.

I'm not really sure to he honest. I was outside sitting by the pool. It was in June and about 11:00 or so at night. I just felt some reason to look up and just over the roof of my house it was completely black, no stars (it was a clear night). My roof is black and this was darker then the roof. Anyway, by the time I realized what my eyes saw it disappeared. I had chills but shrugged it off as just my imagination. I tried to remember the shape. What I remember is it felt like it was enormous and I was only "seeing" part of it. The part I "saw" was pointed. Not sure if it was a triangle or square (or rectangle) and I was only seeing the corner.

My mother had passed a few hours earlier and over 1800 miles away (if that matters).

a reply to: HummaKavula

About that night and your moms passing, thanks for sharing.

When you see something from other worlds you will know it. They have this way of convincing you.

Not a maybe, what was that briefness. Be patient, life is life long.

I'm an old man, the thingy i witnessed was a life time of 40 years ago.

originally posted by: HummaKavula
What if we ARE the advanced civilization in the universe? What if other life is out there waiting on us to come visit them?

This is exactly what I have been thinking recently !

Why must the "aliens" be so advanced? Perhaps we are at the top of the pyramid, so to speak.
All the unexplained things we see and hear about is most likely our own advanced tech.

I really do believe (or rather have a strong hope) that there are other planets with life (not advanced, but not just a bacteria) out there, and maybe someday long after my time we can visit, or at least contact them. But as far as being visited ourselves, i doubt it.

Who knows, perhaps us and them are exactly as far along technologically?

a reply to: HummaKavula

I got a scary idea for you.

We are the least evolved planet in our solar system.

Each other planet has civilizations far in advance of us.

Earth is their bait planet. They want Earth to be able to be seen by other star systems, but they don't want us so advanced as to scare would-be invaders away.

They engineered everything about our society, to be exactly as it is... To make the perfect bait planet, so that they can obtain or destroy those who come in having a look around.

They do this somewhat often, we have historical records of these wars happening in the skies.

When they were still advancing, they used Earth as a scarecrow. They filled it with giant behemoth monsters and dinosaurs, so any civilization that could see it, would steer clear of our solar system. Once they were confident that their weaponry could handle anything in space time, they developed and engineered our modern Earth, and modern society.

Pretty simple explanation, that grants explanations for many phenomena observed in the past and present.

a reply to: Blue Shift

I would not be mad about that type of filter.

If we can just create worlds as realistic and interesting as ones we can find... Why find them? If there is definitive risk with one scenario, but no risk with the other...

The risk-less scenario is the smart choice by nature. It's the choice that mitochondria made. Wow... We made the choice before we even had intelligence.

Blue Shift, considering how these ideas work out in nature... Your idea may really be the actual great filter.

Stars and flags and what-not. I think you've got it mate. I have heard this idea before, but the way you worded it here, made it easy to understand.

originally posted by: HummaKavula

originally posted by: intrptr
a reply to: HummaKavula

The Plutonians got one such visit from us. It was only a fly by but imagine if you were there looking up at the right time / place and saw New Horizons streak by. What would you think?

I would think that was pretty cool! I have always believed that we are not alone in this universe. Again, I can't link any proof, just a feeling. I have looked for and hoped for a sighting of some sort since I was a little kid. I have not been visited, nor have I ever seen anything I could consider a UFO. Wish it would happen some day though.

Dude, I wouldn't hold too close to this wish of yours. It isn't always a pleasant experience.
Some describe it as the most frightening moment of their lives. I've seen it both ways. If the cool kind happens, nice. If the bad kind happens, I fear FOR you. There is a large differentiation between those two types of incidents.

Let's say you had a bad encounter experience, with some being of seemingly omnipotent technology. A being so far in advance of you, you can't even fully comprehend it's actions, nor it's technology.
After your encounter, can you ever really be sure that you are you? Can you be sure that you were not changed? Altered? Killed and replaced? Cloned? Had your brain carved out and put into a Matrix-esque or brain in a vat scenario?

You would live your life in fear of every Sci-Fi concept's most frightening designs being real.

Could a positive encounter enrich you enough, to make that risk worth it?

a reply to: fritzM

I am sort of the same way. I hope there is no other life in the Universe, or at least if there was, that we never run into them. Either they destroy us or we destroy them, that is the only way it can go. We cannot even keep peace on our own planet.

a reply to: Blue_Jay33
Ignorant technologist morons have no place speaking for humanity. None. None at all. They come from a tradition of criminality, planned mass murder, global thermonuclear warfare, and deliberate deception. Engineers are the most unemotional, easily manipulated douche-bags around.

a reply to: Archivalist

I grew up in fear of my life nearly every day. The abuse was terrifying from my earliest memories until I was old enough to fight back. I no longer live in fear. Life is far too short to not be happy. I see the glass half full because I choose to. IF an ETI decided to visit me, I would welcome the visit. If it turns out that they were not as nice as I hoped, then I would deal with it. I would not go around thinking that I had been killed, cloned or replaced.

I also strongly believe that there is a hell of a lot of Alien life out there and some have already / are visiting Earth.

originally posted by: visitedbythem
They are here already.

You want to be visitedbythem?

Have you posted your encounter somewhere? If so, could you guide me to it? I would love to read it and see what you experienced.

originally posted by: Maverick7

There is a very vast difference between "life" and being a robust space faring sentient race. Nature or evolution has not been shown to select for intelligence over size and teeth.

The 'odds' are we are, right now, the only sentient species in the Galaxy, and we are unlikely to ever be 'space faring'.

Care to explain your thought process behind the section I highlighted to me? If Nature chooses size and teeth over intelligence, how do you explain our existence? We are neither the largest creature on this planet nor do we have the biggest/sharpest teeth. We became the dominant species because of our intelligence. It's what puts us a rung up on most other life on this planet, at least as far as survivability goes anyway.

Also what 'odds' are you using to determine that we are alone and never to meet anyone?

a reply to: looneylupinsrevenge

We're outliers. There is nothing else remotely close to us.

Outside of us, size and teeth rules. You only need to think about it.

a reply to: HummaKavula

What if we ARE the advanced civilization in the universe? What if other life is out there waiting on us to come visit them?

That is a depressing and horrifying thought.