Do You Believe in Aliens?

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OldBob53

OldBob53

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Is Man supreme in all the universe or might there be higher beings out there?
 

I believe in math therefore I believe in the Drake Equation therefore I believe in intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe.
 

It’s not just a matter of space, it’s a matter of time.

Even 3000 years is nothing, barely a blink of the eye, in geological time. But that’s enough time for humans to have gone from the days of Jesus to having complete technological mastery and have learned practically everything there is to learn, then killed themselves.

My point is, there could’ve been 20 different advanced, interstellar civilizations that have completely come and gone in the time it has taken us to evolve to this point on Earth. They would’ve been fun to meet, but they’re all gone now.

Sure, somewhere way on the other side of the Milky Way, at least one other advanced civilization is alive simultaneously with us. But it takes a photon 100,000 years to get there. We sure as heck aren’t going to see them in our lives.
 

Considering the size of the universe, it's all but guaranteed that intelligent life has developed somewhere. Considering the nature of a planet like this in the Goldilocks zone, it's almost hard to PREVENT evolutionary life from occurring.
 

Is there intelligent life on gopherhole? :unsure:
 


There are probably millions (billions?) of planets with intelligent life, so yes.
 


Bad Gopher said:
Considering the size of the universe, it's all but guaranteed that intelligent life has developed somewhere. Considering the nature of a planet like this in the Goldilocks zone, it's almost hard to PREVENT evolutionary life from occurring.
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Careful. Gym Jordan and co. might see this as a challenge.
 






My thoughts: astronomers have now identified literally thousands of planets in our corner of the Milky Way galaxy using space borne telescopes and some appear to be potentially hospitable to life. This has happened in the last 10 or 15 years.

There are more than 100 billion stars in our galaxy and more than 100 billion galaxies in the universe, so if we are the only intelligent life in the universe, we are very, very special indeed. Every time human belief systems declared Man or the Earth unique on a cosmic scale, they've been proven wrong, e.g., we now know the Earth is not the center of the universe, but little more than a dust mote in a universe stretching billions of light years.

So Its seems very, very likely that we are Not very, very special.
 

OldBob53 said:
My thoughts: astronomers have now identified literally thousands of planets in our corner of the Milky Way galaxy using space borne telescopes and some appear to be potentially hospitable to life. This has happened in the last 10 or 15 years.

There are more than 100 billion stars in our galaxy and more than 100 billion galaxies in the universe, so if we are the only intelligent life in the universe, we are very, very special indeed. Every time human belief systems declared Man or the Earth unique on a cosmic scale, they've been proven wrong, e.g., we now know the Earth is not the center of the universe, but little more than a dust mote in a universe stretching billions of light years.

So Its seems very, very likely that we are Not very, very special.
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Sure ... but that's only interesting if other advanced, interstellar lifeforms exist now. That is much less certain.
 




MnplsGopher said:
Sure ... but that's only interesting if other advanced, interstellar lifeforms exist now. That is much less certain.
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But consider the implications if some intelligent beings survived for billions of years After reaching human levels of cognition. They'd still be out there and billions of years advanced beyond us. They would be as Gods to us. And they might be totally disinterested in us because our level of intelligence is unremarkable, being quite common in the universe.
 

OldBob53 said:
But consider the implications if some intelligent beings survived for billions of years After reaching human levels of cognition. Then they'd still be out there and billions of years advanced beyond us. They would be as Gods to us. And they might be totally disinterested in us because our level of intelligence is quite common in the universe and so unremarkable.
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I see more of a recession to the mean in humans. What's to say other intelligent life continues to advance and doesn't stall out before the level you are describing?
 

OldBob53 said:
But consider the implications if some intelligent beings survived for billions of years After reaching human levels of cognition. They'd still be out there and billions of years advanced beyond us. They would be as Gods to us. And they might be totally disinterested in us because our level of intelligence is unremarkable, being quite common in the universe.
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Bass has a point. The computational power of biology is finite. Once you’ve amassed enough brain to survive at a high rate, there isn’t much evolutionary pressure to keep evolving towards having more brain.
 

OldBob53 said:
But consider the implications if some intelligent beings survived for billions of years After reaching human levels of cognition. They'd still be out there and billions of years advanced beyond us. They would be as Gods to us. And they might be totally disinterested in us because our level of intelligence is unremarkable, being quite common in the universe.
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Yes! And our entire solar system could be but a single atom comprising the thumbnail of another being.
 

justthefacts said:
I believe in math therefore I believe in the Drake Equation therefore I believe in intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe.
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There's another equation, I think it's called Rare Earth, that suggest the likely number is much lower than the Drake Equation. Yes, there are billions of potential habitable planets, but the unique characteristics and circumstances of Earth make it uniquely rare. Take temperature for example. Earth exists in a narrow band of temperatures between inhabitable extremes. If Earth's orbit took it slightly farther from the sun, it'd be too cold for part of the year for life to survive. Other things like the Moon, titled axis, and larger neighbors all contribute to sustained life and compound it's uniqueness.

Also, while life on Earth has existed in the blink of an eye compared to the rest of the galaxy, it may actually be new. I recall reading somewhere that life developed on Earth relatively early in a planet's lifecycle and that our solar system/galaxy is relatively young (still expanding). So if you consider the time it takes for galaxies, solar systems, stars, and planets to develop and stabilize, we may actually be one of the first civilizations.

So while I agree, there's probably something out there, we may actually be more unique than you think.
 

OldBob53 said:
But consider the implications if some intelligent beings survived for billions of years After reaching human levels of cognition. They'd still be out there and billions of years advanced beyond us. They would be as Gods to us. And they might be totally disinterested in us because our level of intelligence is unremarkable, being quite common in the universe.
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Good point. If I've learned anything from science fiction and our own world history, "visiting" or "discovering" less-developed societies doesn't usually end well. Civilizations capable of inter-stellar travel have probably evolved enough to know that it's best not to intervene.
 

bottlebass said:
I see more of a recession to the mean in humans. What's to say other intelligent life continues to advance and doesn't stall out before the level you are describing?
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Also a good point. I've read some theories as to why civilizations might "plateau". Entertainment is one of them. As entertain becomes more advanced and engrossing, the drive for discovery decreases. I think we're seeing that in our own society. Everything revolves around entertainment nowadays.
 

bottlebass said:
I see more of a recession to the mean in humans. What's to say other intelligent life continues to advance and doesn't stall out before the level you are describing?
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Excellent point. Did they vote for Democrats? If so, Idiocracy.
 



Nokomis said:
There's another equation, I think it's called Rare Earth, that suggest the likely number is much lower than the Drake Equation.
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These guys knew..
 

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Section2 said:
Excellent point. Did they vote for Democrats? If so, Idiocracy.
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it was an obvious joke. our politics work or don't work based on human nature. Presumable, alien nature would be different.
 

Nokomis said:
Good point. If I've learned anything from science fiction and our own world history, "visiting" or "discovering" less-developed societies doesn't usually end well. Civilizations capable of inter-stellar travel have probably evolved enough to know that it's best not to intervene.
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The Prime Directive was usually more of a guideline, even in the Picard years.
 

Nokomis said:
Also a good point. I've read some theories as to why civilizations might "plateau". Entertainment is one of them. As entertain becomes more advanced and engrossing, the drive for discovery decreases. I think we're seeing that in our own society. Everything revolves around entertainment nowadays.
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People have speculated whether man(humanoid)-made environmental catastrophe is something that every civilization deals with at some point of their development and that some races survive that and others don't. It would be a true test of a species' worthiness to perpetuate.
 

Our oversized moon, the location of Jupiter, our Iron core, a cataclysmic impact that devastated rival life, etc. A lot had to happen just so, for us to be. I would be surprised at a lot of intelligent life, but don’t fret there probably alien life in our solar system ie Europa, Titian.
 

Bad Gopher said:
People have speculated whether man(humanoid)-made environmental catastrophe is something that every civilization deals with at some point of their development and that some races survive that and others don't. It would be a true test of a species' worthiness to perpetuate.
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There’s a good podcast called The end of the world that covers a bunch of existential threats we may face. It’s pretty interesting.
 

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