Aliens Exist, but Cannot Travel to Earth: A Loss for the Believer's Community?

Originally posted by WitnessFromAfar
Frankly we're all pretty sure that the chances of intelligent life arising are not trillions and trillions to 1...

No, we aren't. We do not know what the chances are, at all. Drake's equation is not law; it is just a thought experiment.

Originally posted by SaviorComplex

Originally posted by WitnessFromAfar
Frankly we're all pretty sure that the chances of intelligent life arising are not trillions and trillions to 1...

No, we aren't. We do not know what the chances are, at all. Drake's equation is not law; it is just a thought experiment.

With due respect Savior, the mainstream scientific community here on Earth is fairly SURE that the chances of intelligent life arising are not trillions and trillions to 1.

Even Sagan would agree. There is just to damned much real estate out there for it all to be empty.

I would agree with your statement if you limited it at 'We do not know there is life out there for sure". That's a true statement. But what you said was,
'We do not know what the chances are, at all." and that's just not true.

Drake's equation doesn't have to be a law to make predictions, and I'm fully in agreement that it's a thought experiment. Specifically, it's THE thought experiment that allows us to KNOW the chances...

Also, you didn't post my whole sentence, you cut it off in the middle. Here it is in context:
"Frankly we're all pretty sure that the chances of intelligent life arising are not trillions and trillions to 1, because we're able to do conservative estimates using observed evidence, and apply critical thinking to the problem."

Hope that makes sense, sorry for the discrepancy.

-WFA

[edit on 12-3-2009 by WitnessFromAfar]

Originally posted by DaMod

Wow where do I begin... First of all light travel isn't impossible.

[edit on 12-3-2009 by DaMod]

I never said it wasnt possible. yes, dophins are smart, they dont need blackberries to talk to each other over great distances. but they suck at fixing my carburetor.

However, you also will never find a dolphin dumping trash on the side of the road. You can TRAIN ANY animal to do almost ANY TASK, but until they understand the "Why" behind it, then its just memorized patterns. Your right, I cant think like a dolphin because this isnt Seaquest. I would like to see one send a signal to another planet though.

Originally posted by SLAYER69

Originally posted by Elepheagle
I state it to point out the we need something BIG. The reality of it all needs to become as clear and visible as the Sun.

Illuminati (plural of Latin illuminatus, "enlightened")
How do we know that hasn't already happened both in ancient times and recently but has been covered up by the powers that be?

I digress but it is applicable to the topic.

Slayer-

No worries, isn't really a digression. I know what you're asking, and yes, more speculation. Too many questions here that start with "How would we know if...".

It does move things into another messy area; if it's happened, fine. If it's been covered up, grr....then let's have another one. A new one.

[edit on 12-3-2009 by Elepheagle]

There is no way possible we can know if other species can travel here. We are infants, technology-wise. There are developed systems I'm sure, who have had thousands or even hundreds of thousands or millions more years to advance.

Considering what we've learned and how far we've advanced in a mere 200 years, why is it so hard for folks to grasp that a race 5000+ years up on us technology-wise, couldn't easily have found a way to travel across vast spaces in a fraction of the time of even FTL travel.

I've always found it curious that Sagan was of the mind it wouldn't be possible. Perhaps he operated from defined range of beliefs, based only on what we know, not on what we might learn in the future. Other than being an agent of disinformation himself, I can't think of any other reason he'd make such ludicrous comments as it wouldn't be possible for any other races to travel across the vast expanses between suns or systems.

reply to post by WitnessFromAfar


and if kepler returns a null result. where does that leave the number of civs in our galaxy?

and how do you know the odds of life starting on a planet never mind producing intelligence?

Rare earthers like peter ward put the number of earth like planets at a handfull in the entire galaxy. And they build a pretty good case in their book. I hope thats not the case but i still think tech intelligence will be extremely rare.


[edit on 12-3-2009 by yeti101]

reply to post by yeti101


I was wondering when someone would bring up the Keplar. I wait with great anticipation to see the returns.

Taken from NASA's Keplar page.

"If they [inhabitable, Earth-like planets] are rare, then one needs to look at many thousands to find even a few. Kepler looks at 100,000 stars so that if Earths are rare, a null or near null result would still be significant. If Earth-size planets are common then Kepler should detect hundreds of them.

Considering that we want to find planets in the habitable zone, the time between transits is about one year. To reliably detect a sequence one needs four transits. Hence, the mission duration needs to be at least three and one half years."

So that means it will be fall of 2012 before they're able to divulge any significant result?

Originally posted by yeti101
reply to post by WitnessFromAfar

 

and if kepler returns a null result. where does that leave the number of civs in our galaxy?

Let's not get ahead of the data. And let's be HONEST about what mainstream science EXPECTS to find out there. Because you and I both know that expectation IS a part of the Scientific Method, and predictions ARE relevent Scientific tools.

Originally posted by yeti101
and how do you know the odds of life starting on a planet never mind producing intelligence?

I would start with the factors Frank Drake laid out, and add newly discovered data until I found a solution. Pretty much what we're doing here...

It's really about habitable zones around other stars in my view, and rocky planets existing within them. Frankly, from radio telescope observations, we already KNOW these planets exist. We simply have yet to directly image them. That's what Keplar is for.

Originally posted by yeti101
Rare earthers like peter ward put the number of earth like planets at a handfull in the entire galaxy. And they build a pretty good case in their book. I hope thats not the case but i still think tech intelligence will be extremely rare.

Now COME ON! This is more intellectual dishonesty Yeti.
Rare Earth Theory was popular when we thought that the majority of stars out there were not capable of supporting life.

We know better than that, and have for a while now. Other Sunlike stars exist, and we've determined that there are habitable zones around non Sunlike stars. That's just talking about Earthlike like, let alone some silicon based organism, etc. that has zero in common with Earthlife at all.

Seriously, giving equal credence to the rare earth theory is in my view, ignoring the available evidence.

-WFA

reply to post by franspeakfree


I read somewhere that the Drake equations indicate that there could be a Billion civilizations in the universe.

Of course, I have read about Fermi Paradox, which states that if there are a Billion civilizations, then why haven't we picked up any radio signals!

[advert link removed]

[edit on 12-3-2009 by 12m8keall2c]

Originally posted by Elepheagle
Now to the heart of it all: many scientists and astronomers agree, citing the Drake equation, that the probability of intelligent life existing elsewhere is extremely high.

Anybody who really knows the Drake Equation should understand that it offers a probability of alien existence that is anywhere from zero to billions, with zero being just as probable as billions. All it takes is for one of the variables to be zero, and the meta-probability of that is actually relatively high.

Many, if not most, scientists want there to be aliens out there, and believe without proof that there are aliens out there. They're free to believe whatever they want, but that doesn't make it true.

P.S. -- The existence of alien life or intelligence is one of those things that is either proven or not. There's not much of a middle ground, and mathematical speculation isn't proof.

[edit on 12-3-2009 by Nohup]

Evolution continually processes good and bad mutations. Normally bad mutations die off and good ones continue forward, but not all bad mutations die off quickly. The reason is because their affects may not manifest until certain conditions happen. We saw this for many species during the last ice age, and most likely one branch of the human line. It looks as if the Cro-Magnon died off due to not being hunter gathers as the Neanderthals were, and so did not migrate south as the ice age continued.

Saying this above, we do not know if intelligence is a good or bad evolutionary event. It makes us physically weaker as we rely more and more on it, and most importantly it provides many ways to create self extinction. So, where is the proof that intelligence doesn’t follow a destructive path and resets? We know that the more complicated life seems to get the greater chance it doesn’t last.

Hawking has discussed how every 70 million years is the average time between an asteroid resetting life on a planet. When dinosaurs were the more advance life they were forced into extinction and only the simpler life forms of reptiles and mammals were capable to continue on.

When we talk about intelligence that is also only 50% of the equation, for physical ability is required too. So what makes us better than dolphins, out intelligence or our ability to use our thumbs?

I think many who think there are space fairing aliens assume too much, and that leads to the third disadvantage for this to happen. The shear distances we are talking about in itself provides a huge barrier. Even when traveling at the speed of light there is a unsurpassable barrier, and that is to say if it is possible for flesh like creatures to physically reach speeds anywhere close to this.

We can "what if" this all day, but "what ifs" are our only proof that we are not alone and or unreachable.



[edit on 12-3-2009 by Xtrozero]

Originally posted by yeti101
and how do you know the odds of life starting on a planet never mind producing intelligence?

Quite so. We have no idea how a bunch of chemicals clump together such that one day they wake up and start observing their environment as a living thing. It might be so incredibly rare that it only happened once.

Other than that, however, I wonder if maybe people looking for ET civilizations have their concepts and assumptions wrong, beginning with a misconception of the way space/time works and the way our consciousnesses interact with it. And that we're already constantly in contact with "alien" intelligences, just not alien in the way they choose to define it.

Just trying to think outside the box a little here.

Originally posted by WitnessFromAfar
I would agree with your statement if you limited it at 'We do not know there is life out there for sure". That's a true statement. But what you said was,
'We do not know what the chances are, at all." and that's just not true.

That makes no sense.

None at all.

Originally posted by drsmooth23

Originally posted by DaMod

Wow where do I begin... First of all light travel isn't impossible.

[edit on 12-3-2009 by DaMod]

I never said it wasnt possible. yes, dophins are smart, they dont need blackberries to talk to each other over great distances. but they suck at fixing my carburetor.

However, you also will never find a dolphin dumping trash on the side of the road. You can TRAIN ANY animal to do almost ANY TASK, but until they understand the "Why" behind it, then its just memorized patterns. Your right, I cant think like a dolphin because this isnt Seaquest. I would like to see one send a signal to another planet though.

All I'm saying is that we aren't the most intelligent species on this planet. Sure they don't understand what we do but all I'm trying to say is that there is a good possibility that a creature can exist that is both smart enough and understands the why. How did we come to understand the why? My point exactly. Besides how do you know an animal doesn't have a why in mind when they perform the tasks previously stated. It might not be the same why but there is still a why. The grey parrot for instance has the mentality of a 4 year old. How can you tell me with any sort of certainty what is going through that bird's head when they learn to identify human items. Why can the chimp do math? I saw a dog on Letterman last night that could identify a number and then count it out with barks. That displays a level of problem solving does it not? At one point the dog had to figure out hey this number is a number... woa ok I'll bark count it. Heck my tarantula can identify my hand from others (trust me its funny to watch someone else try to pick her up. She gets mean!) You can't make any sort of statement considering an outside intelligence because frankly we just don't know. To end this I would like to say that an earthworm's brain is faster than the fastest super computer in existence.. Something to think about.

reply to post by Elepheagle


If I traveled back to 1492, and told Chris Columbus that one day a person would be able to get into a machine and fly to the moon, would they have believed me?

I ask this because we are dealing with the possibility of aliens who are millions, if not billions of years ahead of us. We are only beginning to study wormholes and other phenomena, and faster than light is being theorized. In a thousand years, what would we be able to do? I do not leave out the possibility of faster than light travel, because a scientist he lived nearly a century ago said it was not possible.

Originally posted by Xtrozero
Evolution continually processes good and bad mutations. Normally bad mutations die off and good ones continue forward, but not all bad mutations die off quickly. The reason is because their affects may not manifest until certain conditions happen. We saw this for many species during the last ice age, and most likely one branch of the human line. It looks as if the Cro-Magnon died off due to not being hunter gathers as the Neanderthals were, and so did not migrate south as the ice age continued.

Saying this above, we do not know if intelligence is a good or bad evolutionary event. It makes us physically weaker as we rely more and more on it, and most importantly it provides many ways to create self extinction. So, where is the proof that intelligence doesn’t follow a destructive path and resets? We know that the more complicated life seems to get the greater chance it doesn’t last.

Hawking has discussed how every 70 million years is the average time between an asteroid resetting life on a planet. When dinosaurs were the more advance life they were forced into extinction and only the simpler life forms of reptiles and mammals were capable to continue on.

When we talk about intelligence that is also only 50% of the equation, for physical ability is required too. So what makes us better than dolphins, out intelligence or our ability to use our thumbs?

I think many who think there are space fairing aliens assume too much, and that leads to the third disadvantage for this to happen. The shear distances we are talking about in itself provides a huge barrier. Even when traveling at the speed of light there is a unsurpassable barrier, and that is to say if it is possible for flesh like creatures to physically reach speeds anywhere close to this.

We can "what if" this all day, but "what ifs" are our only proof that we are not alone and or unreachable.



[edit on 12-3-2009 by Xtrozero]

What about say a solar system without an asteroid belt? How about one that has a much much longer cycle of global extinction? What about a species that for one reason or another was never forced into extinction? There is no way of telling what is out there where they are what conditions they are under and even if the planet has ever undergone any sort of E.L.E. at all. There are too many variables to make any kind of assumption especially if your opinion is restricted to our own solar system (which it undoubtedly is). Not every system planet and life is the same. Who is to say the most complex creature on another world is not the fittest? Or an intelligent species cannot take measures to prevent their extinction (both of them and their way of life). You cannot compare it to earth because earth is just one planet and one set of ecosystems in one kind of solar system orbiting one kind of star. We have no way of knowing what conditions are where when in this massive galaxy inside this massive universe. Besides we are a fairly young species. What if a species had say a million years longer to develop tech, what would they be capable of?

If it's not possible to break light speed (though I think it is possible), then there are still travel options. It is in no way impossible, just not easy. Or at least it doesn't seem easy to us.

Cryogenics, cyborgs, sentient AI, advanced medical techniques

Cryogenics would allow "sleeper ships" of people in suspended animation. Cyborgs could be organic-electronic beings with longer lifespans (either created or aliens modifying their own bodies.) Sentient AI would be one of the best options. Lifespans of such sentient robots or computers would be indefinite, plus they don't need food or water. Advanced medical technologies could allow a lifespan to be doubled, tripled, or even more... but food and other basic needs would still be required. So sentient AI/probes/robots are the best bet.

[edit on 12-3-2009 by GrayFox]

[edit on 12-3-2009 by GrayFox]

Originally posted by kidflash2008
If I traveled back to 1492, and told Chris Columbus that one day a person would be able to get into a machine and fly to the moon, would they have believed me?

Quite right-good point.

We've gone from this..
symonsez.files.wordpress.com...

to this..
timm84.files.wordpress.com...

in 100 years.


Imagine 10,000.


I suppose it would like being to explain Quantum Holography to a Neanderthal but given enough time I think conscious,sentient beings
could be capable of anything -even things we deem completely impossible or miraculous these days.

You could even make a ship 'out' of light - now that would be cool

[edit on 02/10/08 by karl 12]

Originally posted by SaviorComplex

Originally posted by WitnessFromAfar
I would agree with your statement if you limited it at 'We do not know there is life out there for sure". That's a true statement. But what you said was,
'We do not know what the chances are, at all." and that's just not true.

That makes no sense.

None at all.

There is a subtle difference. I'll break it down.

Statement 1) 'We do not know there is life out there for sure'

Statement 2) 'We do not know what the chances are, at all'

Statement one is true, we yet to have physical evidence of life outside of Earth that is accepted by mainstream science.

Statement two is false, we do know a lot about the chances for life existing outside of Earth. Most educated on the subject agree that the chances are pretty darned good, yourself included if I'm not mistaken...

Sorry if I didn't explain that well the first time through. I re-read my post and it was a bit sloppy.

-WFA

Originally posted by DaMod
reply to post by drsmooth23

 

Wow where do I begin... First of all light travel isn't impossible. Its possible to accelerate to the speed of light without breaking the laws of physics. Well there is one way, but I'm not going to go into that because it is irrelevant to the following. We on earth already know you can bend space/time to travel (even though we can't do it yet). Why couldn't an older more intelligent race master this. BTW we are not the most intelligent species on this planet, Dolphins are. Half your assumptions where based on pure conjecture. How could you possibly know about the evolutionary path of a creature that has had much more time than us to evolve. Sure intelligent life may not be common but I doubt for a second that we are the most advanced (especially since we are discovering more in the last 20 years than we have in the last 2000 years). Most scientists will even tell you we have not begun to scratch the surface.

Link Explaining E=MC2

Once again, here is someone declaring an absolute based on mankind's limited knowledge and declares thats all there is.

Sheer ignorance to actually stick to that train of thought friend.

As I stated earlier in this thread, mankind has only existed for a tiny micro-fraction of time, and to think our level of knowledge and our existance is all there is..is in of itself being quite naieve and quite ignorant.

The entire history of the universe and all that is within cannot be compressed down into our own tiny micro-fraction of understanding and limitation. We simply do not know what was before, and until we go out there to find out, to quote Robert Zubrin..."If we do not go...we will not know".



Cheers!!!!

[edit on 12-3-2009 by RFBurns]