BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 03:43 PM

"Now, the fact that you find your own faith more compelling than many direct observations by highly qualified eyewitnesses is interesting...and it's typical of most human beings."

This constant belittlement of anyone whose view challenges yours demonstrates your arguments are based on speculation, supposition, fallacy and hearsay. You seem to have brushed away my opinion, which is based on the current evidence science presents to us. I will change my opinion if empirical evidence is brought to light that would enable me to alter my opinion according to the facts. The facts presented in my post were made by highly qualified palaeontologists and (according to current understanding) give us insight into the way natural selection works and the role chance plays in the development of life.

With one breath everyone's saying there can't be any such thing as life we can't recognise and in the next post they're discussing why Greys have no bollocks, and then I'm getting lectured for trying to engage in a bit of meaningful discussion about the possibilities for extraterrestrial life but no-ones interested.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 04:18 PM

Is the way our scientists envision the evolutionary process still a theory, or has it been proven as fact?

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 04:19 PM

>>With one breath everyone's saying there can't be any such thing as life we can't recognise and in the next post they're discussing why Greys have no bollocks, and then I'm getting lectured for trying to engage in a bit of meaningful discussion about the possibilities for extraterrestrial life but no-ones interested.

I'm pretty sure that everyone you are talking to is familiar with theories of evolution. I don't know if they prove one way or another what would happen on another planet. I think that in evolution, to some degree at least, form follows function. Certainly this ...

>>They would have had to evolve as tool user, so two eyes for stereoscopic vision, something like arms and hands for tool using, something like legs for getting around and lifting heavy things, a mouth and ears for language, a nose to tell if their food has gone bad Etc. some of those things might be more or less evolved than their analogs in homo sapiens.<<

is partly in response to what you are saying. If man were to evolve in space, or more likely to genetically optimize himself for space he would wouldn't need a large butt. Traveling as far as they do, why would our theoretical aliens pack a large trunk that clearly is not needed in low gravity ;-)

By the way, most of my posts are kinda tongue in cheek. I am just speculating for fun.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 04:22 PM

I don't think anyone's saying there can't be any such thing as life we can't recognize. I think what's being said is that the possibility of life we can't recognize doesn't preclude the possibility of life that we could recognize.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 04:31 PM

No, stigweard has that part mostly right. I am basically saying that we basically have all the tools to recognize life as science defines it.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 04:31 PM

Well, I've always been quite interested in the current evidence science presents to us, stigweard. No problem there.

I'm also interested in what further possibilities lie beyond the evidence we have managed to find so far, that's all.

I've seen enough quite believable info by now about AFO sightings (including mass sightings over some cities) to consider it pretty much a certainty that some of them are real and are alien. I don't find the science community being too helpful in bringing empirical evidence to light about it, though...mainly, I think, because such evidence is being held in secret at a high government level, and the science community is remaining mum (on orders). Until it is openly released to the general public you won't have the science community commenting on any of that stuff publicly.

That is the problem. It isn't that the evidence isn't there, it's that it's not being officially presented to the public by the people who are holding it.

And from their point of view they obviously have what they think are very good reasons for maintaining that level of security.

Now when the occasional person in the professional realm talks, as Edgar Mitchell has done, and he's someone with strong credibility, the powers that be figure..."Well, he's still only one guy. How many people will hear what he says and remember it? And how many will believe it? And how will he be able to prove it? He won't be able to. Therefore, why should we worry? The coverup will remain effective as long as we don't release the empirical evidence we have. We are therefore still in control."

That's how it works. Dead simple. Just don't release the empirical evidence. Hold it in a government lab somewhere and deny, deny, deny. That's all it takes to maintain a coverup, because, stigweard, there are millions of people like you who won't believe it until they see the empirical evidence.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 04:47 PM

"That's all it takes to maintain a coverup, because, stigweard, there are millions of people like you who won't believe it until they see the empirical evidence."

But what is the alternative?

I'm sticking to dinosaurs.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:05 PM

I don't know why someone can't believe in dinosaurs and also accept the possibility that there can be humanoid types of life forms that could have arisen from contexts that did not have dinosaurs.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:07 PM

Little Hawk,

You don't have any scientific evidence of AFOs. You may have hearsay and testimony, but you do not have any reproducible experiments or observations.

Even if there was a ship with little green men parked on your lawn firing "shut up barking" beams at your wiener dog and they told you that they were from alpha century, you would still not have scientific evidence that they actually were aliens. All you would have is their word for it. For all you know they could be some very eccentric folks who grew up next to a superfund site in New Jersey.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:11 PM

The alternative, stigweard? Well, we all have to simply wait for whatever it is that will convince us on an individual basis...and we have to wait, of course, for the empirical evidence.

I've seen enough evidence by now to convince me, but you haven't, and that's okay. I don't have a problem with that. I am just as eager to see the irrefutable empirical evidence as you are, I assure you. I yearn for it. I really hope that before I die such undeniable empirical evidence will be seen by the whole world...but it may not be.

There are a lot of things like that which I hope for.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:52 PM

Art
With advanced 3rd or 4th generation light intensifying binoculors you are able to see more than satillites on linear tracks, you will see the classic manuvers of lights that are classicly attributed to ufo phenomena.
This is an every night phenomenon that is so ubiquious as to blow your mind.

Its like instant gratification for people who have never had a ufo experience up close but would appreciate a new experience.

People realize that technology isn't cheap so I bet people would pay an admission fee to see for themselves.

I seriously encourage people to see for themselves.
Let people judge for themselves what they are seeing.

The only real obstacle are clouds.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:05 AM

Obama quizzed on Roswell Aliens

Its the third bit. He answers it well.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:19 AM

Bush waving at aliens W waving

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Paul Burke
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 03:52 AM

They would have had to evolve as tool user, so two eyes for stereoscopic vision, something like arms and hands for tool using, something like legs for getting around and lifting heavy things, a mouth and ears for language, a nose to tell if their food has gone bad Etc. some of those things might be more or less evolved than their analogs in homo sapiens.

Not enough imagination used here. How could intelligent life get by with less than eight eyes, in four sets covering different wavelengths? How can you test the chemical properties of what you come into contact with without chemoceptors on the ends of your tentacles? How can you do any task without at least four arms (this one is utterly real)? How can you communicate without magnetic field sensors and a modulating field generator? How did you ever evolve without a means of telling what's going on behind you? How can life exist surrounded by all that corrosive gaseous oxygen and hot molten dihydrogen oxide?

Even here on Earth we have animals with many eyes and none, that can sense ultra- violet and infra- red, with electrical generators and receptors, with magnetic senses, with better eyes than us (octopuses and squid), with alternative manipulative appendages (octopuses and squid again, and elephants), that can't live without poisonous hydrogen sulphide in almost- boiling water, that have visible light generators, that rupture if brought to ordinary pressure....

We recognise humans as intelligent (though until recently not all humans), but you can't extrapolate from a sample of one.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 05:45 AM

"I don't know why someone can't believe in dinosaurs and also accept the possibility that there can be humanoid types of life forms that could have arisen from contexts that did not have dinosaurs."

I can accept the possibility there are humanoid life forms, it's just that the chances of it happening once are infinitesimally small, so the chances of it happening twice are even more remote. As for humanoids arising from contexts that did not have dinosaurs, that is utterly irrelevant, as the body plan for modern vertebrates was fixed long before anything with a backbone heaved itself onto the land for the first time.

I believe in dinosaurs because I go and dig them up, prepare and identify their bones myself. I know world-class palaeontologists who are on the cutting edge of discovery about these incredible animals. As I sit here typing this I am surrounded by solid evidence for the existence of dinosaurs.

I believe in UFOs because I saw one and the sighting was verified by the local airport, but I have no evidence one way or another as to what it was - I simply know it was there (of course, I have speculated for years to myself what it might have been).

I can see we're going to have some sort of alien aparthied in the future; if you don't have two arms, hands, eyes, ears and one mouth and nose you're not going to be considered 'humanoid' and somehow inferior. If you've got none of these attributes and eat rocks then you're right out of it - shades of the Horta here!

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:56 AM

"I can accept the possibility there are humanoid life forms, it's just that the chances of it happening once are infinitesimally small, so the chances of it happening twice are even more remote."

They are? How do you figure that? You're merely making a rather odd and arbitrary assumption when you say that...an assumption which proceeds from a specific (and popular) tradition in our present scientific culture.

I don't think we have any way of really knowing what the chances are of something occurring until we know all the relevant factors that are involved.

To know all the relevant factors we would have to know about everything in the whole Universe, not just about everything on this one planet here.

And we don't even know about everything on this one planet.

Therefore, I submit that we are in no real position to offer any certainty whatsoever on the chances of humanoid forms occurring once, twice, or any other number of times. To think we are is just whistling in the wind.

We make unfounded assumptions (because they fit some pet theory). They soon become commonly accepted assumptions. After that people start imagining that they are not just assumptions, but virtual certainties. That's where faith comes in.

*****

It's impossible NOT to believe in "UFOs", unless it's impossible for anyone to fail to identify some flying object that they see. ;-) That's why I don't use the term UFO much any longer. I use the term AFO instead. "Alien Flying Object" ...meaning something which definitely appears to be an intelligently piloted machine, and one NOT of Earthly origin...not something which is simply an "unidentified object in the sky".

******

"I can see we're going to have some sort of alien aparthied in the future; if you don't have two arms, hands, eyes, ears and one mouth and nose you're not going to be considered 'humanoid' and somehow inferior."

In truth, stigweard, such alien aparthied would be virtually inevitable...just as it is inevitable that most people will be nicer to good looking people than they are to "ugly" people. We are far more likely to initiate friendly and useful communication with someone who fairly closely resembles us than with something that looks like a pile of spaghetti with some waving tentacles and is the size of a greyhound bus... (grin)

It may not be fair....but it's common sense that people would react that way.

However, there might be a possible exception to the humanoid rule, I suppose. What if some aliens showed up who looked like cute little fluffy space bunnies? Well, I can see people being quite inclined to get friendly with such unscary looking aliens as that. In such a case, the humanoid looking aliens might actually find themselves at a cultural disadvantage as compared to the Space Bunnies. Doonesbury did a comic strip episode once along that very sort of theme. An alien being was wreaking havoc on the Earth, but when put on trial in the US Congress he was largely forgiven for it because he was so cute and lovable looking...so "telegenic". It was a satire directed at Oliver North.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Paul Burke
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:07 AM

Therefore, I submit that we are in no real position to offer any certainty whatsoever on the chances of humanoid forms occurring once, twice, or any other number of times. To think we are is just whistling in the wind.


Nonsense LH. Just consider that there are vastly more ways of not being non- humanoid than there are of being humanoid. Most creatures on Earth are not humanoid, and there's no evidence that their different shape was the reason why they didn't develop intelligence.

And that's even before you consider differences in environment. Humans are humanoid, not because it's a necessary part of being "intelligent", but because our environment- the 4 billion year history of our environment- shaped us that way. And, on the way, we (or our ancestors and the other creatures) shaped the environment. The chance of that being replicated elsewhere, from a different starting point, are vanishing.

"All" that's required to develop intelligence is the ability to sense the environment, and to respond to it actively. Plus a body plan (if there IS a body that we could recognise) that allows a sufficiently complex processing mechanism to make that response complex. Plus a lot of luck (like primates surviving the Ice Ages). Plus, if you are the religious sort, the Grace of God to provide you with a soul...

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:10 AM

I don't have a problem with the idea that non-terrestrial intelligences could be non-humanoid in form. But I disagree that any non-terrestrial intelligences must be non-humanoid in form. Or even that it's unlikely for non-terrestrial intelligences to be humanoid in form

Think about how evolution fills niches in different parts of the earth. In Australia there are marsupials (a very primitive form of mammal that have evolved along a different evolutionary path for more than 65 million years since leaving South America before the continents drifted apart). But they evolved along fairly similar lines as mammals in certain respects according to the ecological niche they fill. They're different from mammals from other continents, but they're also very similar in many ways. Function does indeed seem to dictate form to a very large extent.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:14 AM

>>>if you don't have two arms, hands, eyes, ears and one mouth and nose you're not going to be considered 'humanoid'

You are the dinosaur guy, but I would call that much classification maybe even exobiological taxonomy

>>and somehow inferior.

Certainly inferior in some limited ways, the ones with no ears or mouth are bound to be harder to talk to.

Then again the ones who communicate by reading our thoughts and placing their thoughts directly into our brains might be considered in some ways superior.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:16 AM

If a civilization anywhere EVER evolved to a class 2 civilization it becomes probable for a distribution of intelligent lifeforms.

Since we are not even a class 1 human race yet, it is perfectly normal to err on the side of the impossibility of a class 2 network of life - let alone a class 4 civiliation.



The class of civilization is based on the ability to progressively capture and control huge amounts of directed energy.


One of the greatest trips I would like to take is to go back in time when Mars was but a oceanic moon to its larger home planet Mu and then watch exactly what destroyed Mu. Was it the incoming Venus on its way to an inner orbit or did Mu do a mini black hole experiment that suffered a china syndrome and sink to the center of Mu and implode, or was it an asteroid... Whatever it was, both Mars and Earth suffered alot of impacts and debris damage from that nearby cosmic event that has left traces of the mystery.

To deduce what happened at this point is possible --- in priciple

But it would be like making a stick figure in a tub of water with food coloring, letting it diffuse and the water dry out....then step by step go backward with careful calculations.

TO me it would be better to make a time machine and see for myself.
The problem seems to be I could never tell you what I saw.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:21 AM

Donuel,

You certainly enjoyed that lecture. ;-)

If you go back in time, can't you just leave a time capsule? You could draw stick figures inside the Pyramids.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:44 AM

Paul Burke, I think that everything has a soul....not just human beings. I think that a body is built by a pre-existing soul...that is, a pre-existing and non-physical bundle of highly organized spiritual intelligence. I don't think that life spontaneously arose out of inert matter somehow by mere happenstance, I think that inert matter itself was fashioned into living forms BY pre-existing life itself. (spiritual life) And, no, I am not talking about the supposed Christian Father God figure up on his throne stretching out a divine hand when I say that. I'm talking about LIFE itself. Life IS God, as far as I'm concerned.

I am saying that until we know accurately the condition and nature of all life throughout the Universe rather than just the biological life on this planet, we are in no position to estimate the chances of humanoid life occurring once....twice...three times...or 50,000 times.

The great conceit of humanity is always this: They think they know way more than they do. Look at the scientific and popular notions of any past century, and you will see this folly of human delusive grandeur. People are self-preening know-it-alls who think they have reality all figured out, but their ruling scientific or religious orthodoxies are always overthrown in short order proving how little they really knew.

The same will happen to the ruling orthodoxies of our present civilization (which are mostly scientfic and technical orthodoxies), and those are the orthodoxies that your assumptions and stigweard's rest upon. I know they're all you have to rest upon.... ;-) But I am unimpressed. They are not enough.

I have no objection at all to the notion of non-humanoid aliens, by the way. It seems very likely that there would be some such aliens. If, however, credible witnesses to various AFO sightings have seen some humanoid aliens then I am not going to reject their testimony merely because I have some crackpot pet theory of my own that says "Oh, the chances against any aliens being humanoid are very, very high!"

That's bullshit. It's just an argument of convenience which jumps into your mind, because you would rather not believe that anyone has seen any aliens, period, and you're looking for any excuses you can think of to pooh-pooh various eyewitness accounts.

In so doing you are engaging in a pointless and unproductive side issue that has little or nothing to do with the subject at hand. It doesn't matter whether the aliens are humanoid or not! It matters whether they really exist or not and whether they are visiting here or not.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:12 PM

My take on it is this.

Its like the monkeys and the typewriters. You know, odds are a million monkeys on a million typewriters will produce at some point the entire works of Shakespeare. Of course the logical conclusion from that is that they would no doubt produce lesser authors like Tom Clancy and    Ann Rice at a much higher rate. Imagine how many times they would produce "Johnathon Livingston Seagull" or the words to "Bo Diddly" or "Louie Louie".

Think of the odds of them typing any English sentence as the odds of a universe of trillions upon trillions of other planets evolving sapient life. Since form follows function, think of the odds of them producing some work you recognize as the odds for humanoid life. But the odds of HUMAN life evolving here and on another planet would be on a par with the monkeys typing out the complete works of Shakespeare, the OED and the King James Bible, three times in a row.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:15 PM

"some crackpot pet theory of my own that says "Oh, the chances against any aliens being humanoid are very, very high!"

Much as I'd like to take the credit for this theory, it's not mine. A simple study of the processes of natural selection and evolution might well lead you to the same conclusion. We can't know how many forms of life there are in the universe, and even attempts to calculate the figure have been the subject of some debate (the Drake equation has been questioned recently - as it should be).

"That's bullshit. It's just an argument of convenience which jumps into your mind, because you would rather not believe that anyone has seen any aliens, period, and you're looking for any excuses you can think of to pooh-pooh various eyewitness accounts."

Er, easy now, no need to get leery - this is a debate right? This argument hasn't jumped in my mind for the sole purpose of disagreeing with you LH, I've spent time looking at the facts and I've thought about it. I have taken an interest in this subject since I was a boy when I would have agreed with you, but opinions change. I keep an open mind on whether anyone has seen aliens, but I'll decide for myself how valid any of these testimonies are myself, thanks.

The small amount of learning I've done in my main field of interest outside work (in geology and palaeontology) taught me the basic scientific principle of question everything. Reach your own conclusions based on reviewing the available evidence and literature and interpret the data as honestly as possible.

Perhaps I'll go - by not agreeing I'm obviously upsetting you.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:17 PM

"Imagine how many times they would produce "Johnathon Livingston Seagull" or the words to "Bo Diddly" or "Louie Louie""

Excellent Jack - your post gave me a belly laugh!

And a well illustrated point to boot!

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Paul Burke
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:42 PM

Think about how evolution fills niches in different parts of the earth. In Australia there are marsupials (a very primitive form of mammal that have evolved along a different evolutionary path for more than 65 million years since leaving South America before the continents drifted apart). But they evolved along fairly similar lines as mammals in certain respects according to the ecological niche they fill. They're different from mammals from other continents, but they're also very similar in many ways. Function does indeed seem to dictate form to a very large extent.

Good point Carol. Convergent evolution has produced strikingly similar forms filling given niches in widely divergent places and times. The plesiosaurs compare with cetaceans and for that matter sharks, rhinos resemble triceratops, and so on. But really all these are starting from a common body plan- vertebrates with a limb at each corner- that was set as long ago as the development of the chordates, and is really a contingency of our planet.

Certainly aerodynamic and hydrodynamic shapes will necessarily be moulded by the physics, but the moulding will be done on the basis of whatever basic foundation has evolved. There's nothing magical or even optimal about 2 legs and 2 arms, and arthropods find 6, 8, or many limbs work well. I could do with extra arms now and then...

And there's nothing necessary about bilateral symmetry, look at starfish, though having developed it has certain advantages in retrospect.

There may be other, secondary, considerations, like the size limits (in our environment) on arthropods, due to mechanical considerations and the need to grow by shedding the exoskeleton at intervals.

By the way, there's nothing "primitive" about marsupials.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:59 PM

>>>By the way, there's nothing "primitive" about marsupials.

So you say! You ever try to serve high tea to a possum?

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:03 PM

Marsupials are a primitive as compared to placental mammals. Which is another way of saying that marsupials are a primitive form of mammal.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:09 PM

>>>There's nothing magical or even optimal about 2 legs and 2 arms, and arthropods find 6, 8, or many limbs work well. I could do with extra arms now and then.

This is a very old game in science fiction and I love to play it.

Imagine an Arthropod or octapus evolving to the point that he could build a space ship.

His kind would have to develop metallurgy, he's need a brain big enough for Einsteinian physics and beyond. He would need to be a tool user. He couldn't even wield a hammer with lobster claws. Is refining of metal and alloy creation even possible under water?

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:12 PM

As I've said before, there's no reason to suppose that all sentient (or even sapient) life has a humanoid form.

But considering the infinite nature of the universe, there's no reason to suppose that earth humans are the only humanoid form of intelligent life, either. Or even to suppose that earth humans are the only humanoid form that is likely

And people are also not considering the possibility that our genetics have been interfered with by intelligent humanoid beings somewhere along the way. It's entirely possible that the first humanoid form arose in another part of the universe, and has been traveling around the cosmos "spreading their seed" so to speak.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:16 PM

See Nivens and the Pak (Ringworld, et al). A better explaination than most as to human development, and post-reproductive effects.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:37 PM

Information on Greys: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greys#Psychological_perspectives


I know this won't sway anyone, but this site has some interesting observations on the subject of alien life: http://www.astro-tom.com/technical_data/alien_life.htm.

Good job they're here - we'd have a bugger of a time finding them otherwise.

Having read through it I've decided I largely agree with most of it, so I now rest my case M'lud.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:46 PM

The Pak are a fun concept but they are hardly an explanation for human evolution. In those books he is saying that the symptoms of old age, loss of hair, arthritis, loss of teeth etc are actually poorly formed steps in the transformation to the Protector phase. Of course this ignores that we see similar symptoms of age in most animals and in pretty much all mammals.

Your point is well taken about Ringworld though.

Larry Niven is by far my favorite creator of Aliens. The Jotok are the closest example to the type of alien Paul Burke is talking about and the backstory of Ringworld parallels what Carol was just talking about.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:46 PM

I think using Greys as one's point of departure is a bit of a straw man, since not everyone who says they have seen non-terrestrial humanoid life forms have said what they saw were those described as Greys.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Stu
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:47 PM

"Marsupials are a primitive as compared to placental mammals. Which is another way of saying that marsupials are a primitive form of mammal"

Sorry - one last thing.

That's a misunderstanding CarolC; marsupials are not primitive mammals, they're just different. Placental mammals didn't evolve from marsupials, the fossil evidence indicates they evolved alongside them towards the end of the Mesozoic.

Monotremes, the third family of mammal (like the Platypus) were also though of as primitive but actually branched out from the mammalian line earlier and are as 'advanced' as us arrogant humans like to think are.

No more or less primitive.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:51 PM

JtS,

My comment was in support of CarolC'S

"And people are also not considering the possibility that our genetics have been interfered with by intelligent humanoid beings somewhere along the way. It's entirely possible that the first humanoid form arose in another part of the universe, and has been traveling around the cosmos "spreading their seed" so to speak. "

I am aware that "The Pak are a fun concept but they are hardly an explanation for human evolution."

Though it would be difficult to PROVE that the Pak are NOT the cause of human evolution.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:51 PM

Hey, stigweard...not to worry! There is no reason for you to go. I'm actually enjoying this whole discussion thoroughly. I may sound rather zealous and very serious when you read the words I've typed on a computer screen, but I'm actually having fun here. I cracked up when Jack wrote that stuff about how often the monkeys might come up with the words to "Louie, Louie".

I don't know what the odds are for or against humanoid life occurring more than once here or in the Universe. I don't think anyone else does either. I don't think there's any sure way of calculating such odds or even guessing at them. I think it's all just conjecture. People are always talking about "what the odds are" of this or that thing happening, but I don't think they usually have a clue what the odds really are...and in the end, "the odds" may have nothing to do with it.

*****

Paul Burke, I'm glad you said that "there's nothing "primitive" about marsupials".

Right on! Marsupials have been getting grossly unfair treatment in the press for years (specially from insensitive people like Jack the Sailor who marginalize anyone who can't meet proper form at a tea party) and it's time they were allowed the full dignity and respect they deserve! ;-) Chongo Chimp's campaign for president of the USA has put equal rights for Marsupials front and center. (He'll do anything to scrounge up a few thousand more votes. Well, almost anything...)

*****

Carol said... "And people are also not considering the possibility that our genetics have been interfered with by intelligent humanoid beings somewhere along the way. It's entirely possible that the first humanoid form arose in another part of the universe, and has been traveling around the cosmos "spreading their seed" so to speak."

Right. The same possibilities have occurred to me. I think it is quite possible that human genes have some off-planet sources mixed in by this time...and that homo sapiens was in fact a migrant to this world in very ancient times. The primitive ape-like skeletal and fossil remains that have been found may be our ancestors....or they may not be...or they may have been a part of our ancient genetic line, but not the only part of it. There may be off-world genetic lines included as well.

We may all be the sons and daughters of ancient immigrants to this planet. If so.... (grin) ...you can throw most of your present conventional ideas about human evolution on planet Earth out the window.

The aliens who I think are visiting us may be our own very distant relatives. And that could be why they're interested in how we're handling things here.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:53 PM

LH- crosspost.


GMTA

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:56 PM

>>>Good job they're here - we'd have a bugger of a time finding them otherwise.

I am with you on that. If Einstein's is the last word on interstellar travel, it will be a very lonely universe for humanity.

He was a real spoil sport for dreamers. It would take on the order of 80,000 years to get to the nearest star at the escape velocity of our solar system. Numbers like that would make exploring a challenge.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:58 PM

Who are "the Pak", BB?

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:02 PM

"It would take on the order of 80,000 years to get to the nearest star at the escape velocity of our solar system."


If one assumes a constant 1 g acceleration ( Bussard Ramjet, well withing today's design margins ( Article in 1970's about how to turn aa metalic asteroid into one, using 1970's tech, but NOT cheap) one can get to the nearest star in about 10 years, I think ( turnaround at halfway point, 4.5 LY distance, time dilation for crew at higher speeds) Why would one stay at the escape velocity???

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:05 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pak_Protector

Or read Niven's scifi...

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:09 PM

BB, I saw vehicles in the sky that could do flying maneuvers which utterly defied any of the known and accepted information we presently have about acceleration, deceleration, the effect of inertial forces on a moving object (and its occupants), friction with the atmosphere...and stuff like that.

I think there are possibilities out there that neither Einstein nor or present scientific community were or are aware of....forms of travel that are completely unknown to us. I think so because of what I saw.

I think that people from other stars would not bother coming this far if it took them a ridiculously long amount of time to do it.

After all, we wouldn't bother to, would we?

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:09 PM

"In Protector, Niven explains that humans (and all of Earth's primates) are descended from a colony of Pak breeders that were stranded on Earth 2.5 million years ago. The protectors that built the colony ship died when their Tree-of-Life crops failed (due to a lack of thallium in the soil). The original Pak Breeder population (called Homo Habilis) bred and mutated wildly, evolving into modern humans as well as all other Earth primates (such as gorillas, chimpanzees, and orangutans). All Terran descendents of the Pak could transform into the Protector stage if exposed to Tree-of-Life root (or the symbiotic virus it contains).

.....

Niven has stated in other writings that he invented the Protectors as a thought experiment to explain the common effects of aging on humans, and to create a fictional evolutionary explanation for human's long lives after females have passed reproductive age. Accordingly, most of the positive attributes of Protectors are based on negative human aging effects: sore joints, poor circulation, wrinkled skin, lack of sex drive, and rotting teeth are all turned to advantage during the shift from Breeder to Protector.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:15 PM

"I think that people from other stars would not bother coming this far if it took them a ridiculously long amount of time to do it."


At reativistic speeds, time dilation makes it reasonable for ( One-way) trips of only a few decades. Given a longer lifespan, this would NOT rule out any visitors (just bring along the family, or fellow colonists).

Look at what happens if one accelerates at 1 g for a few years. Once one gets near cee, time dilation makes it seem like little time has passed, and one can calculate trips to , say the center of the galaxy taking only a half century ( SHIP time) . Can't stop along the way, though.

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:17 PM

Oh, I agree, it doesn't rule it out. It just makes it fairly unlikely.

Interesting story about the Pak breeders. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:21 PM

>>Why would one stay at the escape velocity?

To conserve fuel.

Is there a working model of a Bussard Ramjet? That technology requires a self sustaining hydrogen fusion reaction contained to the point where it does not melt the ship into plasma. Once you have that, it also requires some sort of magical force field able to overcome the inertia of trillions upon trillions of particles of Interstellar hydrogen at relative velocities of thousands of kilometers per hour and gather them up compress them to fusion temperatures and emit the fusion products out the tailpipe with enough velocity so that their reaction mass would be able to accelerate a very large object.

Its fun to think about but it seems dubious.

Why don't we just buy the type one hyperdrive from the Outsiders. Damn! there is never a starseed around when you need one! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:29 PM

"magical force field"


1. you mean an elctromagetic field, like we are using in the tokamaks for earth-based fusion research?


"Any sufficiently advanced form of technology is indistiguishable from magic" - Clarke's Law

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:33 PM

>>At reativistic speeds, time dilation makes it reasonable for ( One-way) trips of only a few decades. Given a longer lifespan, this would NOT rule out any visitors (just bring along the family, or fellow colonists).<<

Lets assume that you are right. I don't think it at all likely that the nearest star system is inhabited with sentient life with technology that superior to us. So lets be very generous and say that they are coming 100 light years instead of four and the trip takes 200 years real time and say 30 years subjective (dilated) time for the crew. For a round trip it would take 400 years. Everyone they know at home would be 400 years older, when they got back. the crew themselves would be 60 years older.

Given that level of sacrifice does anyone else think it unlikely that they would come all the way here to buzz airports and stick probes up hillbillies' butts?

Subject: RE: BS: Astronaut Ed Mitchell on Alien visits
From: beardedbruce
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:42 PM

Given constant accel, it would be a lot less time than that for a mere 100 LY.


"So lets be very generous and say that they are coming 100 light years instead of four and the trip takes 200 years real time and say 30 years subjective (dilated) time for the crew. For a round trip it would take 400 years."


http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3aj.html

----------
Another advantage of a constant 1g acceleration is that it would allow the pilot to make very long journeys. To an observer on Earth, such a ship would take hundreds of thousands of years to reach the centre of the galaxy. Thanks to relativistic time dilation, however, the pilot would be only 20 years older on arrival. So, for the pilot, the centre of our galaxy is only 20 years away!

A Science Fiction Dream

Leaving aside the fact that we are not yet able to build fusion engines or sufficiently powerful superconducting coils, the Bussard ramjet sounds at first like an excellent prospect for interstellar propulsion. Unfortunately, there are strong theoretical objections to the principle of the Bussard ramjet.

Fusion as generated on Earth requires deuterium3, which accounts for only about 0.01% of interstellar hydrogen. Fusion in the Sun uses normal hydrogen, but achieving the conditions necessary for that would be very difficult. An optimistic estimate would be that only 1% of the hydrogen would be actually usable as fuel. So in fact much of the propulsive power would be used up slogging through a soup of useless hydrogen.

Also, one of the byproducts of the fusion reaction is neutrons4. Any crew compartment would need extremely heavy shielding against this radiation, adding to the mass of the ship.

Unless these and other serious problems can be addressed, the Bussard ramjet will remain a science fiction concept. Of course, we literally cannot imagine the capabilities of future technology, so the stated objections may eventually seem trivial.

Bussard Ramjets in Science Fiction

Tau Zero by Poul Anderson is the quintessential ramjet story. It also deals extensively with the concept of relativistic time dilation. This is not to say it is a dry, technical book, however. Like all classics of literature, it succeeds because it is, at heart, about people, and because it is a cracking story. It has been called 'the ultimate in hard science fiction' and is strongly recommended to anyone with an interest in the concept of the Bussard ramjet.

Rammer is a short story by Larry Niven. It was later reworked into the opening chapter of the novel A World Out Of Time. The short story is more of a cautionary tale of the unforeseeable consequences of cryonic preservation, and the novel is a fantasy of the far future, but both rely on the concept of the Bussard ramjet in passing. Niven's Known Space stories, particularly Protector, feature extensive use of ramships.

In Star Trek: The Next Generation, the starship Enterprise has 'Bussard collectors' on its warp engine nacelles. They are mentioned explicitly in two episodes, 'Samaritan Snare' and 'Night Terrors'. The technical manual states that they are an emergency fuel collection system only.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/A600436