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| There are alien life forms in the universe |
| I dont know .. but im going with yes |
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80% |
[ 46 ] |
| well cant be sure. but im saying no.. |
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19% |
[ 11 ] |
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| Total Votes : 57 |
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twg
Joined: 02 Nov 2006
Location: Getting some fresh air...
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 Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2008 9:37 am Post subject: |
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| beast wrote: |
| Did anyone see the Mexican Air Force videos from a few years ago? For a full three or four minutes, military video recorders on board Mexican fighter jets taped eleven unidentified flying, rotating objects moving in a horizontal pattern across the sky. The Mexican minister of defense announced publicly that they were UFO's. It was aired on FOX, NBC, CNN, CBS, ABC news reports. The U.S. military had no comment at the time. I know that there are a lot of hoaxes out there, but this is as credible as it gets. Watch it on YouTube. |
As a refresher for everyone: U.F.O. means Unidentified Flying Object. U.F.O. does not mean "E.T. buzzing around Tijuana in their magic spaceships after crossing the universe for the hell of it."
Fermi's Paradox is also pretty simple: The universe is too big.
We don't hear them because radio waves lose power extremely quickly unless they're directed. And even then, they get garbled at they meet with interference like say, a solar flare.
So no one is going to hear our jazz music or see Hitler at the Olympics over the cosmic buzz, even if they are in a civilization nearby. And assuming the universe is littered with ETs, they would have the same problem getting us to hear their radio shows.
Unless they had magic radios to go with their magic spaceships that help them cross space quickly. But since none of us have a magic radio, we'll never hear that either.
And if they do a direct beamed message, like we have done, they would have billions of stars to choose from and the likeliness of them not only chosing our direction, but aiming it precisely enough for us to get it... ON TOP of us happening to have something sensitive enough like a radio telescope looking in that direction...
http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=219
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All these factors aside, there is one additional daunting obstacle which complicates any effort to tune in to intergalactic radio. Even if the universe is thick with signal-slinging civilizations, including some old enough that their indiscriminate electromagnetism has had sufficient time to reach Earth, not even the most massive and sensitive equipment of science is currently capable of plucking the signal from the static. When any non-focused electromagnetic signal is generated� such as a television broadcast or a cell phone conversation� the energy propagates as a spherical wavefront at the speed of light. When a sphere is doubled in diameter, its surface area increases by a factor of four; but in a spherical wave the "surface area" is the energy itself. This means the signal's energy is spread over four times more area at twice the distance, resulting in a 75% loss in intensity. To put it another way, in order for a broadcasting tower to double its effective range for a given receiver, it must quadruple its transmitting power.
To demonstrate the degrading effect of distance on an everyday omnidirectional signal, one might imagine a spacecraft equipped with an Arecibo-style radio receiver directed towards the Earth. If this hypothetical spacecraft were to set out for the interstellar medium, its massive 305-meter wide dish would lose its tenuous grip on AM radio before reaching Mars. Somewhere en route to Jupiter, the UHF television receivers would spew nothing but static. Before passing Saturn, the last of the FM radio stations would fade away, leaving all of Earth's electromagnetic chatter behind well before leaving our own solar system. If a range-finding radar beam from Earth happened to intersect the ship's path, it would be observable from a much greater distance; though its short duration and smooth, Gaussian meaninglessness would make it an inconclusive detection� much like the Wow! signal and Radio Source SHGb02+14a. A highly focused beam such as that used to communicate with space probes would also remain detectable for some distance beyond the edge of the solar system. |
Unless they have magic spaceships and magic radios like UFO nuts believe they do... and why are we limiting ET to magic spaceships since it's much more fun, and just as likely, that they flew to Earth riding pink unicorns... The odds of us hearing from them are next to none.
And the odds of them coming here to see the hookers in Tijuana are even slimmer. |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2008 4:08 pm Post subject: |
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I used to be skeptical about alien visitors partially based on the "how would they find us?" Yeah, our radio waves go out in all directions. It's not a tight beam transmission. There's pretty much now way you could construct a receiver that could reconstitute our radio/tv broadcasts.
However, there are other ways to detect life from a vast distance. The most interesting is using telescopes. Yeah. Stay with me. I've read one could use the gravity lensing of the moon to create a telescope. Or even just build a large telescope on the "dark" side of the moon. Anyway, it's possible to build telescopes large enough to find earth sized planets. As long as one can capture the refracted light from the planet, one can figure out the atmosphere. At a certain point a civilization will start dumping chemicals in its atmosphere, ie pollution. Based on certain chemicals in an atmosphere one could reasonably conclude they only got there via industry and that planet would be a prime candidate for exploration. |
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beast
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2008 6:28 pm Post subject: |
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| I know that UFO does not mean it is ET flying around out there. To have the Mexican minister of defense go on record however, saying that they have no idea what those things are, is pretty amazing. That is the body of government in charge of protecting it's citizens and it is claiming that there are things flying around out there in a pattern and he doesn't know what they are. Were they birds, meteors, kites, frisbees? Look at it for yourself. It's pretty remote that an actual military recording was faked. The things were rotating in the sky, flying in a horizontal pattern, and had lights on them. What's your best guess as to what they were?[/quote] |
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twg
Joined: 02 Nov 2006
Location: Getting some fresh air...
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| Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2008 6:57 pm Post subject: |
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Well, I've kept this under wraps for too long... Here's my grainy, hard to see, UFO photo:
| beast wrote: |
| What's your best guess as to what they were? |
Where are they looking? Up? Down? Over the horizon? Where was the sun? What angle were they looking at? Where were they in relationship to the lights? Were the objects close and moving or were the clouds moving and the objects stationary?
Given the lack of information and details, it's just as likely that they recorded a Jeju octopus fleet as they did ETs or secret American military stuff.
| mindmetoo wrote: |
I used to be skeptical about alien visitors partially based on the "how would they find us?" Yeah, our radio waves go out in all directions. It's not a tight beam transmission. There's pretty much now way you could construct a receiver that could reconstitute our radio/tv broadcasts.
However, there are other ways to detect life from a vast distance. The most interesting is using telescopes. Yeah. Stay with me. I've read one could use the gravity lensing of the moon to create a telescope. Or even just build a large telescope on the "dark" side of the moon. Anyway, it's possible to build telescopes large enough to find earth sized planets. As long as one can capture the refracted light from the planet, one can figure out the atmosphere. At a certain point a civilization will start dumping chemicals in its atmosphere, ie pollution. Based on certain chemicals in an atmosphere one could reasonably conclude they only got there via industry and that planet would be a prime candidate for exploration. |
So they build a giant space telescope with the intent of finding life. And after a very long time, they point their moon telescope in our direction, and discover that there's a civilization here.
How far away are they? They would have to be close to see us in the present time. And even if they were, they still face all of the limitations outlined above.
Unless, as the UFOlogists claim, they're able to mount their magical space unicorns, and get here just to fly over and leave. |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2008 10:36 pm Post subject: |
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| twg wrote: |
| So they build a giant space telescope with the intent of finding life. And after a very long time, they point their moon telescope in our direction, and discover that there's a civilization here. |
Indeed. But then we are talking about a civilization that can cross light years with warp drive. So maybe they've seeded such moonscopes around parts of the galaxy that might have the best chance at life (out in the edge of the galaxy, away from globular clusters, stars that might emit deadly gamma ray bursts, etc.).
I'm just saying based on recent evidence, my skepticism about the impossibility of finding evidence of civilizations in the sea of stars that comprises even our part of the local galaxy has moderated. |
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twg
Joined: 02 Nov 2006
Location: Getting some fresh air...
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| Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 7:02 am Post subject: |
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| mindmetoo wrote: |
| But then we are talking about a civilization that can cross light years with warp drive. |
Why not talk about elves with +2 swords while we're at it? |
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Biblethumper
Joined: 15 Dec 2007
Location: Busan, Korea
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| Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 2:41 pm Post subject: |
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The poll does not even offer the correct choice: it is absolutely certain that intelligent life is only on Earth or in heaven. There are no space aliens, because God created man alone in his image, male and female, in his likeness in knowledge, righteousness and holiness with dominion over the other creatures. Angels and demons are spiritual beings, not space aliens.
Last edited by Biblethumper on Sat Mar 01, 2008 1:03 am; edited 1 time in total |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 4:34 pm Post subject: |
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| twg wrote: |
| mindmetoo wrote: |
| But then we are talking about a civilization that can cross light years with warp drive. |
Why not talk about elves with +2 swords while we're at it? |
Indeed. I'm merely saying there are realistic ways beyond radio emissions that a civilization can use to find good evidence of another civilization. If the UFO nut is claiming the light barrier has been broken, I can't counter argue they have to fly their UFOs in a needle in a hay stack search of the millions of stars to find earth. There is a way they can narrow the search and automate it. |
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OneWayTraffic
Joined: 14 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Sat Mar 01, 2008 7:32 am Post subject: |
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| Justin Hale wrote: |
| OneWayTraffic wrote: |
| Justin Hale wrote: |
| Easter Clark wrote: |
| So you guys are arguing the probability of a possibility? Isn't that a little redundant? |
The possibility of a manifest certainty.
Possibility: alien visits
Manifest certainty: alien civilizations' existence
Alien civilizations are extremely likely in our (and our neighbors', Andomeda) galaxies alone, let alone in a universe with at least 125,000,000,000 of such galaxies in the observable universe and the "observable" universe likely a fraction of the whole. |
Unfortunately, the existence of (inteligent life) on other planets can not be considered a manifest certainty. According to our developing knowledge of Drake's equation it certainly seems probable, but still some data points(the chances that intelligent life will arise for example) are simply unknown. And then there's Fermi's paradox to deal with. So either we are alone, or something prevents other civilizations from contacting us, or intelligent life tends to destroy itself. I find the last possibility most likely- given the only hard data that we have-us. I believe the wikipedia article on Fermi's paradox runs through all the logical possibilities and what it means. |
Straightforwardly in my view, the chances of Earth containing the sole civilization - and 'civilization' must be interpreted roughly, since this planet 5 million years ago would certainly qualify as a civilization yet one undetectable because they were non-technological - are 0%
I suggest a metaphor. Sperm are between 20 million and 600 million in number upon ejaculation, but only one can make it. Insert trillions of trillions for an analogy with stars, planets and satelites. Can only one make it? Seems unlikely, surely? Stars and their families of planets and planets' families of satelites (clearly more likely to be more numerous than planets, since Jupiter and Saturn combined have over 120 in a system containing 8 planets) are a similar phenomena. Extra-solar planets are far more common than previously thought, and I suspect it's only a matter of how many Earth-like bodies there are containing creatures.
Given the observed universe is likely a fraction of the whole (possibly within an infinite multiverse), and given there are 125,000 million galaxies containing from 10 million to 1 trillion stars, the likelihood of at least one other planet with creatures is 100%
Alien civilizations - correct me if I'm wrong - is the sole example of when it is irrational to disbelieve on the basis of absence of evidence. Disbeleiving requires faith, since the awesome scale of the cosmos is the evidence and unbelievers presumably reject that evidence and subsequent likelihood. Our own galaxy is 100,000 light years in diameter, so I submit these distances are the obstacle to our contact with other species on other planets. |
Well your argument is well made, but it's only a probabilistic argument. Basically I'd agree with you: Yes the universe is a big place, and yes it seems likely that intelligent life exists on other systems, but we just can't know for an absolute certainty. I'd agree with you on not disbelieving, but this is not the same thing as withholding judgement. Until we've explored more of the universe, we just won't have enough hard data. And scientists are supposed to make judgments on hard data.
Fermi's paradox is quite valid for our galaxy. Considering the age of the galaxy, and subtracting a few billion years for the first 2 or 3 generations of short lived massive stars to generate heavier elements, there's still enough time for just one sucessful species to spread across the galaxy, or create self replicating robots to do so.
Anyway if I had to put my money on an answer, I'd say that there are alien civilisations, and most of them self destructed, or were killed by outside influences. A gamma ray burst anywhere near our region of space would fry us all nicely. Any alien species that managed to fully survive such things, may have gotten to the state where, even if they were here looking at us, we would never know about it. |
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OneWayTraffic
Joined: 14 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Sat Mar 01, 2008 7:39 am Post subject: |
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| Biblethumper wrote: |
| The poll does not even offer the correct choice: it is absolutely certain that intelligent life is only on Earth or in heaven. There are no space aliens, because God created man alone in his image, male and female, in his likeness in knowledge, righteousness and holiness with dominion over the other creatures. Angels and demons are spiritual beings, not space aliens. |
Here's a link of what Earth looks like from Voyager.
http://obs.nineplanets.org/psc/pbd.html
I don't see any angels or demons there. I do see a planet so much smaller than the whole universe that it's unreal. Was God just showing off when he made all that, or was he so incompetent that the best he could manage was a universe over 99.999% hostile to life?
| Quote: |
| There are no space aliens, because God created man alone in his image, male and female, in his likeness in knowledge, righteousness and holiness with dominion over the other creatures. |
That explains a lot. God is just as righteous, knowledgable and as holy as the average fundy. I wouldn't be looking forward to that afterlife so much if I was you. |
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Biblethumper
Joined: 15 Dec 2007
Location: Busan, Korea
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| Posted: Sat Mar 01, 2008 5:11 pm Post subject: |
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The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament sheweth his handiwork.
What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?
Yes, the earth is small and man is smaller. That is one of the marvels of God's mercy, that he cares for his elect out of all his vast universe. |
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ED209
Joined: 17 Oct 2006
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| Posted: Sat Mar 01, 2008 10:35 pm Post subject: |
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| Biblethumper wrote: |
Yes, the earth is small and man is smaller. |
Good so far.
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| That is one of the marvels of God's mercy, that he cares for his elect out of all his vast universe. |
Define 'care for' without using your Shakespearian spell checker. |
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Biblethumper
Joined: 15 Dec 2007
Location: Busan, Korea
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| Posted: Sun Mar 02, 2008 4:38 am Post subject: |
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God cares for man in that he has out of his own good mercy from all eternity elected some to everlasting glory and entered into a covenant of grace to deliver them out of the estate of sin and misery and to bring them into an estate of salvation by a redeemer.
Additionally, "All things work to the good for them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." |
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Justin Hale
Joined: 24 Nov 2007
Location: the Straight Talk Express
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| Posted: Sun Mar 02, 2008 6:49 pm Post subject: |
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| OneWayTraffic wrote: |
Fermi's paradox is quite valid for our galaxy. Considering the age of the galaxy, and subtracting a few billion years for the first 2 or 3 generations of short lived massive stars to generate heavier elements, there's still enough time for just one sucessful species to spread across the galaxy, or create self replicating robots to do so.
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The size of the galaxy and difficulty in (or impossibility of) achieving sufficiently high speeds to really get anywhere is the same hindrance. Also conditions appropriate for life are a rarity, with gas giant Jupiter-like planets the norm, rocky planets the exception and Earth-like planets the exception to the exception. |
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OneWayTraffic
Joined: 14 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2008 7:01 am Post subject: |
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| Justin Hale wrote: |
| OneWayTraffic wrote: |
Fermi's paradox is quite valid for our galaxy. Considering the age of the galaxy, and subtracting a few billion years for the first 2 or 3 generations of short lived massive stars to generate heavier elements, there's still enough time for just one sucessful species to spread across the galaxy, or create self replicating robots to do so.
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The size of the galaxy and difficulty in (or impossibility of) achieving sufficiently high speeds to really get anywhere is the same hindrance. Also conditions appropriate for life are a rarity, with gas giant Jupiter-like planets the norm, rocky planets the exception and Earth-like planets the exception to the exception. |
Still it would only take one sucessful species. Self replicating probes moving at any decent speed would cover the galaxy in a few million years.
Anyway my point is: We just can't know for sure. There's little objective, non inferential evidence either way. It seems overwhelmingly likely that we're not alone but I'm not going to add aliens to the list of known species until someone goes out and drags one home. |
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