Any Aliens out there? Hello...

[Guest *Ste***cque**]

Stephen Hawking is going to be listening for signals of life in the Universe. What do you think? Are we alone? That would be more remarkable than intelligent life existing elsewhere in the Universe, in my opinion.

 

Could extra-terrestrial intelligence have visited Earth already? Remember, they aren't necessarily hindered by our limited knowledge of physics. Would they be benign(gentle)? Or might they be as nasty as humans?

 

It's private money but even if it wasn't, I still think it's a worthwhile endeavour on several levels.

 

So, are we alone?

[MightyPen 67414]

So, are we alone?

The only answer, of course, is "we don't know."

 

There's no reason to imagine we're the only life that's arisen in the universe, or even just our galaxy. The buildings blocks are everywhere, and there's nothing unique about our sun or our planet.

 

So, are there other civilizations in the universe? I just about guarantee it.

 

But are there any in our galaxy? Hard to say. The Fermi paradox is all about "given all the time and space that's been available, there should be lots of alien civilizations around us; but we should also be hearing from them, and we're not."

 

The spans of distance, and of time, between the stars are so huge that it wouldn't surprise me if that meant no two civilizations capable of communication would ever overlap.

 

Maybe we're the only extant civilization in our galaxy; there could have been others before but they've since died out, and others will arise but only after we're extinct. Little blossoms of civilization, popping up all over the galaxy... but never two at the same time.

 

It's a good argument to eventually set up automated beacons somewhere like Pluto, designed to keep broadcasting out into space in every direction for a billion years. Maybe that way, long from now, someone will come and lay a few flowers at our civilization's tomb.

[Brad 49548]

Given the staggering number of possible planets out there (so many that's it almost impossible to wrap one's head around the number), statistically speaking I'd be shocked if there wasn't other life somewhere.

 

I'd be equally shocked, however, to learn that it had actually visited earth. So my guess is aliens...sure...but aliens with the technology and desire to travel all the way to earth to see what they can learn from anal probing...I'm thinking no.

[oldblueeyez 15475]

Of course there are aliens. I don't know much, but I know enough that our puny ape minds cannot comprehend what is out there. We may be sharing our world with aliens, in fact; we may simply not have the senses to be aware of them. So we have five sense, whoop dee doo, there may be 10 senses, 20 senses, countless senses available to other beings.

[nntsci 11076]

almost certainly... but most likely not advanced civilization. I've have doubts if its possible for any animal like species to survive its own technology... greed got us to where we are today... evolution... but once one reaches the point at which one can destroy their own planet... then tend to do that.

[slacker 1290]

I'd be equally shocked, however, to learn that it had actually visited earth. So my guess is aliens...sure...but aliens with the technology and desire to travel all the way to earth to see what they can learn from anal probing...I'm thinking no.

 

Have you ever read Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky brothers? I could believe the idea that aliens may have visited but they were so far advanced that we could never understand them or their technology. They would have zero interest in the puny but horny bipeds.

[oldblueeyez 15475]

Have you ever read Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky brothers? I could believe the idea that aliens may have visited but they were so far advanced that we could never understand them or their technology. They would have zero interest in the puny but horny bipeds.

 

They may have visited and thought, "Shit, these aggressive bastards will destroy themselves attempting to fight us off with nukes...let these idiots be."

 

Or maybe we're an arcade game where an alien inserts a quarter and plays 'being human'.

 

Or maybe we're just a garden for aliens who feed upon our souls. Maybe there's an alien 'auction', where the highest bids are paid for those human souls who've lived the most interesting lives, and then they plug into our experiences like we watch a movie. Maybe we're alien 'porn'.

[Guest *Ste***cque**]

Good points all. Lol at anal probing, Brad. Maybe Aliens are trying to see who's a bigger asshole? Obviously they haven't probed Oldblueeyez yet. Just teasing. Honest.:)

 

The trouble with understanding extra-terrestrial intelligence is our tendency to view it in anthropocentric or human perspective. Surely they are carbon based, subject to laws of physics(as we understand them), 3 dimensional and so on. Maybe they exist in or control higher dimensions, energy based... nothing like us?

 

If I were an advanced intelligence, would I concern myself with us? What would motivate them to explore, or fertilize the universe. Have they overcome their more primitive impulses of survival, procreation, emotions, etc.? What does that leave for a purpose?

 

I suspect our listening search won't yield anything as we are looking for us! Intelligence similar to us are not likely able to broadcast too far, something other than us might though. We just need to know what to look for and assume someone wants us to find it. What then? What would be the ramifications of finding intelligent life elsewhere?

 

My head hurts.

[Mikeyboy 27133]

The problem is that we still don't fully understand what caused life to occur here. Was it some random fluke that was so unlikely that it could never possibly happen again? Possible, although given the shear number of possible planets in our own galaxy, let alone the entire universe, that even the most remote possibility of it happening means it has likely happened again. That's the way statistics work.

 

Assuming life has happened elsewhere though, what are the odds that a species on that planet will have evolved in a manner similar to us, favouring brain size and the ability to use tools? Remember that life has existed for billions of years on our own planet. We are the exception to how life tends to evolve. In most cases, it is far better to be fast and have big teeth than to have a big brain from an evolutionary perspective.

 

Assuming it has happened though, what is the likelihood that it has happened close enough that we will ever discover them or vice versa? As good as our science has gotten, the universe is a staggeringly large place, the size of which is hardly conceivable to our brains. Picture 2 minnows randomly dropped in the ocean. What are the odds they will run into each other, even if they are looking? Now make the ocean a hundred billion times bigger.

 

And then there is the final question. If there is another species out there who has technology advanced enough to visit us, do we even want them to know we are here? Lets look at our own history, when a more advanced culture has discovered a land peopled with less advanced civilizations. Did we offer to freely share our technologies and become their new bff? Or did we simply treat them as an inconvenient obstacle to helping ourselves to their natural resources?

 

I think that it is lucky for us that we are unlikely to every run into whatever life may be out there in my opinion.

[CasinoMing 1967]

To quote Fox Mulder, "I want to believe".

 

With the vastness of our own known galaxy, let alone the rest of the universe, the odds are in favour of other intelligent life out there.

 

If an alien species did visit Earth, I guess my question would be why. Our longest manned spaceflight was to the moon and that was over 40 years ago. Since then, mankind has been limited to earth orbit. We do not have the technology yet to explore our own solar system with manned spacecraft, let alone explore other neighbourhoods. While we might marvel at our own technology advances, I suspect alien technology would be vastly ahead of ours. Aside from "assimilation" a la Star Trek's Borg, we (humankind) isn't interesting enough to visit... yet anyway.

 

CM

[Phaedrus 209521]

The problem is that we still don't fully understand what caused life to occur here.

 

Well, if you subscribe to the panspermia theory, that answers the original question too :)

[conquistador 18487]

A new earth-sized planet found - http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/23/us/feat-nasa-kepler-planet-discovery/index.html

[MightyPen 67414]

panspermia

This has always been, hands-down my favourite ever theory name. SO much fun to say out loud at any opportunity. :)

[Guest *Ste***cque**]

Maybe they should listen for life in the same area as the Kepler mission is looking?

 

If life exists elsewhere, it could range from microbe type life, through carbon based bipeds all the way to life so advanced as to be unrecognizable. That newly discovered, larger Earth like planet Kepler discovered is approx. 1.5 Billion years older than Earth. What would intelligent life on our planet look like in 1.5 Billion years?

 

Maybe by the time intelligent life is capable of stepping quite a bit outside it's own neighborhood, it has enough sense to be discreet?

[Guest s******ecan****]

Hi yourself!

 

..oops...damn blew my cover.

 

Forget I said that, nope.. no aliens here, just a normal earth born human replying to a technology enabled recreational-reproduction social forum.

[VedaSloan 119179]

Obviously there are aliens. OBVIOUSLY YOU GUYS.

 

I had nightmares about being abducted by aliens as a child. I blame Unsolved Mysteries.

 

But on a serious note, yes, I think it would be naive to assume we're it in the vast expanse of space.

[MightyPen 67414]

Maybe Jack Burton said it best, speaking from the cab of the Pork Chop Express:

 

[Guest *Ste***cque**]

Oh trust me, I've been probed. Apparently us old farts need a good anal probing once a year. Could be worse...I hear some urinologists "milk the prostate". Sweet Jesus, can't I just pay some hottie to milk me and take the results in to my Doc?!

 

Now this is my kind of alien.

 

 

Additional Comments:

 

 

The trouble with understanding extra-terrestrial intelligence is that we're not extra-terrestrial. Duh. I don't care how smart anybody pretends to be, nobody's got a fucking clue as to what's out there. What's more apparent to us aged than the younged is that we'll all find out soon enough.

 

My biggest question is, "Do aliens squirt?"

 

And good for Stephen Hawking. About all he can do now is listen anyway.

 

Are there no limits to what you will say? LOL

[backrubman 64800]

The people celebrating are descended from the immigrants, not the folks who were wiped out.

 

Actually it was their ancestors that were wiped out.

 

The Spaniards, who first arrived in the Bahamas, Cuba, and Hispaniola in 1492, and later in Puerto Rico, did not bring women in the first expeditions. They took Taíno women for their common-law wives, resulting in mestizo children.

Sexual violence in Haiti with the Taíno women by the Spanish was also common. Scholars suggest there was substantial mestizaje (racial and cultural mixing) in Cuba, as well, and several Indian pueblos survived into the 19th century.

 

The Taíno became extinct as a culture following settlement by Spanish colonists.

[castle 38816]

Obviously there are aliens. OBVIOUSLY YOU GUYS.

 

I had nightmares about being abducted by aliens as a child. I blame Unsolved Mysteries.

 

But on a serious note, yes, I think it would be naive to assume we're it in the vast expanse of space.

 

My thoughts exactly. I don't pretend to know if we've ever actually been visited or not, but there is no way we are the only intelligent civilization in the universe. It seems kind of egotistical to assume that our little speck of dust is that special. Not to mention depressing...on the whole our species is pretty much ready for the short bus.....so if we're all there is....man, that's one discouraging thought right there.

 

The term "Alien civilizations" always seems to imply beings who are far more advanced than we are, but that's a notion created by science fiction...which is why I'm not convinced that we've ever been visited. But I am convinced that there are other planets out there with people not unlike ourselves probably wondering the same things we are.

[roamingguy 300292]

Well of course there are. I mean if former Defence Minister Paul Hellyer says there are it must be true

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3051151/Governments-HIDING-aliens-claims-former-defence-minister-Paul-Hellyer-urges-world-leaders-reveal-secret-files.html

 

RG