BS: So, Are We Alone?

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Amos
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 01:11 PM

I think it bears repeating that the "vast size of the universe', as a disheartening obstacle to cross-species contact among the stars, is a hurdle only from narrow perspective of the body's common perceptic channels. It is pretty well established that black holes, worm holes and possibly trees of alternate universes govern things at very large scales, where we cannot see for ourselves, and that quantum entanglement, 13-dimensional strings, and time-reversal seem to be going on at the sub-atomic level of reality where quantum foam rules.

If you think of the universe as you would a trip in a Mini down a highway, things seem impossibly far. At other levels of measurement, the intertanglement of spaces and lines in the universe may be very, very different.

Early sci-fi was fond of referring to these possibilities under the general rubric of hyper-space jumps. However it might work, do not underestimate the appetite of the species for uncovering bold new ways of gittin' thar fum hyar.


A

Subject: Lyr Add: GALAXY SONG (Eric Idle & John Du Prez)
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 12:17 PM

Whenever life gets you down, Mrs. Brown
And things seem hard or tough
And people are stupid, obnoxious or daft
And you feel that you've had quite eno-o-o-o-o-ough

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour
That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned
A sun that is the source of all our power
The sun, and you and me, and all the stars that we can see
Are moving at a million miles a day
In an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour
Of the galaxy we call the Milky Way

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars
It's a hundred thousand light-years side to side
It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light-years thick
But out by us it's just three thousand light-years wide
We're thirty thousand light-years from Galactic Central Point
We go 'round every two hundred million years
And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding universe

The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding
In all of the directions it can whiz
As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know
Twelve million miles a minute and that's the fastest speed thereis
So remember when you're feeling very small and insecure
How amazingly unlikely is your birth
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth

The Galaxy Song

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Darowyn
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 12:10 PM

I don't have to go as far as that for an example of how what we believe is more influential on perception than the actual evidence.
Two examples that I have experienced personally:-
I was riding my motorbike along the road to Buxton one day when across the apex of a corner, I saw a railway signal box.
I knew that there was no railway alongside that road, but I interpreted the situation by imagining that there is.
Rounding the corner, the signal box was on the road, right in front of me. I could feel the delay while my brain processed the idea that there was a signal box, on a low loader on the road. For about a second and a half, I could not accept that I needed to stop- the signal box could not be there, so it wasn't.
Self preservation overruled that interpretation, and I hit the brakes and stopped safely.
Second.
I had taken my boat for a last run along the Driffield Canal, before we moved it to Worcester.
At what was then the limit of navigation, I put the kettle on to make some tea, and set off back to my moorings. Some minutes later, travelling pretty much due South, the kettle started to whistle, and, instead of tying up, I just shut off the motor and let her drift while I went below. This was just after passing under a footbridge.
Coming back with my tea, I put her back in gear and carried on. The bow pennant, formerly blowing left to right was now blowing right to left.
"Wind must have changed" I thought.
Then I noticed that the compass was showing a course of Zero- due North.
"Gonna need a new Compass" I thought.
Then I passed under a bridge.
"They must have put up a new bridge further down" I thought. (there is only one)
Then I noticed that the Ridge of the Wolds was on the wrong side.
I could not convince myself that a whole range of hills had moved ten miles eastward.
While drifting, the boat had nudged the shallows by the bank and turned round 180 degrees.
I had been able to ignore three absolutely incontrovertible items of evidence of that, because I thought I knew that I was motoring South.
Any Aircraft Pilot will have similar stories- often with far direr consequences.
The human capacity to ignore irrefutable evidence is outstanding.
That's why it is useless to argue with anyone who knows that they are right.
There are plenty of examples on here.
Closer to topic, there is a high statistical chance that life exists elsewhere. There is a high, but smaller chance that there is intelligent life elsewhere.
The same stats, relying on the vast size of the universe, means that there is a very small chance of our encountering it.
If we assume that we are average, there is an equal chance that any aliens will be more or less advanced than we are in any particular area.
If we assume that God who created the universe, concentrates his attention on our little speck of dust- well, that would be a very odd assumption, and it would require evidence far more impressive than an old book created on this planet alone.
Which, if it were presented to us, of course, many people would ignore!
QED
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: 3refs
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 10:10 AM

Learn sign language!

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: MarkS
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 09:55 AM

Yeah. And once a sweet young thing at a bar said she would go home with me, but I did not hear it.
Guess my mind was unable to believe whay my ears were hearing.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: 3refs
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 09:19 AM

In Carl Sagan's book, Billions and Billions, he tells a story about a Shaman on some island in the Pacific. The first European explorers had arrived at the shores of his island, but he was unable to see the ships. He knew that something was up because of the unfamiliar way the waves were hitting the shore. Eventually, he followed the waves out, as opposed to in, and was finally able to visualize the tall ships. Sagan's theory was, because the Shaman had never seen tall ships before, his mind was unable to believe what his eyes were seeing.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: M.Ted
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 08:58 AM

Let me get this straight--we don't believe there is any evidence that there is a God, but we do believe that there are beings millions of times more intelligent than we are who are masters of space and time, who are observing us as some kind of experiment--Right?
OK,I'm good with that.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: M.Ted
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 08:56 AM

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: open mike
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 01:21 AM

i can't believe no-one mentioned SETI yet.
http://www.seti.org/Page.aspx?pid=1345
An international grass-roots organization dedicated to the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Peace
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 12:54 AM

If so, who would we ask?

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 17 Jul 09 - 12:27 AM

W\The USA sent a probe about 2 weeks ago---searching for Earth-like planets. The proper distaznce from their own star. etc.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 11:32 PM

Sidebar...

I often wonder what life would be like on this planet if it hadn't experienced so many huge extinction events. If the Cretaceous-Tertiary Extinction Event hadn't wiped out the dinosaurs, we mammals would probably have remained small rodents scurrying through the underbrush. Modern paleontologists believe some smaller, warm-blooded dinosaurs were good candidates for evolving into creatures not all that dissimilar to ourselves. If the evolutionary time-clock hadn't been reset at that extinction event, it's likely that the time-span for "intelligent life" on this planet would be measured in tens of millions of years, instead of merely tens of thousands.

So, if its conceivable that this planet could have hosted an intelligent species unimaginably more advanced than our own, and given a universe with an infinite number of planets, who knows what might have evolved elsewhere?

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 11:01 PM

Gandhi said it with a beautiful sense of irony when he visited England in the 1930's. A journalist asked: " what do you think of Western civilization, Mr. Gandhi?" He replied: " I think that would be an excellent idea."

I do appreciate that excellent question, Rapaire!

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 10:01 PM

No, the real question is "Is there INTELLIGENT life on Earth?"

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 09:52 PM

Carl Sagan has suggested the probability of life somewhere in the numerous galaxies.
There might even be a planet that has the same chemical structure as Earth but by the time we find it, Earth might be gone. It would take a long time to get to that planet.

The big question is "is their real life on Earth"? :)

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 09:35 PM

How else can we explain Gargoyle(s)

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 07:01 PM

"... ability to home in on the emanations of consciousness."

Well, that keeps 'some' of us safe!

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Amos
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 06:56 PM

I dunno about heat seekers, but there may be a technical ability to home in on the emanations of consciousness. Since we're rampantly speculating, why not?


A

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 05:14 PM

Mrrzy:

Actually, we've no idea what forms life can take, other than our own, and not even a comprehensive view of that. Extremophiles have only been studied for a few years, and we don't yet know what the limits of our own chemistry is, even before we start to think about other chenistries.

And don't let anyone tell you chemistry xxx is impossible- they mean they don't know how it could work. Creationists here are fond of quoting chemists who say our own life couldn't have started without a miracle, so even without disagreeing with them, how can they discount other miracles elsewhere?

I agree that you can do a calculation that says out of x stellar systems, x/n have planets, x/n/m have planets that create life, x/n/m/p have planets where life gets complex etc. etc., but there's many a mussel in a mickle, to adapt a Yorkshire saying, and the Universe is BIIIIIIIIIIIIIIG.

So they're probably out there, and it's probably virtually impossible that we'll ever meet or even know about them.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 05:11 PM

A galactic version of a heat-seeker, perhaps?

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 05:00 PM

maybe not....but visitors would have hard time finding us, even if they had the means to travel.

But if you are on an tiny island all your life, 'alone' becomes relative.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 04:58 PM

Anything one man can imagine, other men can make real.
                   -- Jules Verne

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Amos
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 04:32 PM

Well, dimensionality is not as uniform or as linear as it appears to be; this is a fact at the quantum scale that only a few years we only suspected, but today we have demonstrated quantum entanglement and instant state exchange over a distance. We are struggling to bring our mathematicalc capabilities up to speed in light of this new range of phenomena, but I would not say we were there yet.

Even when electric lighting began to spread across the cities and into the farms, a century back, we had no idea at all how much that technology would evolve and what it would bring us in only fifty or a hundred years. I would be very reluctant to rule out breakthroughs in the problem of trans-dimensional reach of some sort.

So we may find ourselves passing the peace pipe with the Grays a lot earlier than we imagine. But this is all the most rampant speculation at the moment.


A

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 04:00 PM

It's rare for life to evolve past the microbe stage, and inevitable for it to evolve to it given water, I think. Even rarer to evolve intelligent life. But it's a vast, vast universe, so I think we're not, but I also think we'll never know, given the rarity.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: 3refs
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 03:54 PM

I recieved a copy of Erich von Däniken's "Chariots Of The Gods" about 1970 as a gift. I was just a kid, but I was hooked and have been ever since. Probably why I have a bit of an aversion to organized religion now(but not spirituality). Although many religious writtings hint at E.T's. Many believe that religion came from our contact with aliens. Will the universe keep expanding forever, as many believe. Or will it expand, then contract and blow up all over again. Some believe this has and will happen for eternity, over and over again. Billions of galaxies, each with billions of stars. Worm holes. Black holes. Dark Matter. The more we know, the more we realize we don't know!
To flatly deny the existance of something other than ourselves just baffles me. I figure most who believe that are probably members of The Flat Earth Society.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 03:19 PM

Wow- to both of the last two posters. :)

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 03:12 PM

Eventually...the Great Galactic Flush!

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Amos
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 03:08 PM

I don't think God would bother anointing the race if we were just pets, and it is clearly written in the Bible that he did so, and ... wait a minute. When I set up my daughter's goldfish, I clearly gave him dominion over all the water, gravel, scale mites and edible algae in the whole bowl...I mean, I wanted him to feel comfortable, you know, in his new place...so he wouldn't mourn the Pet Store...so that could mean...oh, dear....oh, dear....

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:40 PM

Thanks, el Hawk. It works for me.

"Having had goldfish less than 1/4 inch long, and having seen one about 4 feet long ( and more than 12 inch diameter), I cannot let this pass uncontested." bb

I did mention goldfish bowl<, didn't I? As for the differing sizes of goldfish, they mostly depend on the size of the bowl- as in, a pool will have bigger goldfish in it than those found in a bowl in the house.

For all we know, man would/will also grow much larger in a less gravity-affected world. (Anyone for the moon?)

I'll stick with the notion that we do "look pretty much alike and are fairly uniform in size."

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: meself
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:22 PM

You mean we might be living in a terrarium on a shelf in the bedroom of some teenage space-giant?

(No wonder it's so filthy.)

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: beardedbruce
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:21 PM

"they look pretty much alike and are fairly uniform in size, "


Having had goldfish less than 1/4 inch long, and having seen one about 4 feet long ( and more than 12 inch diameter), I cannot let this pass uncontested.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:21 PM

Very good analogy, Ebbie. ;-)

I think if there are any advanced races out there observing us right now (and there probably are), then they would be inclined to more or less quarantine this planet for the time being and keep us under observation till we come at least minimally close to achieving what could be termed an "advanced civilization" here. In other words, when we figure out how to get along with each other...

We're in a pretty primitive state at this point, and we're extremely dangerous, given our penchant for creating things like atomic bombs and cruise missiles. Those are good reasons for our visitors to show extreme caution, I would think....kind of like you or I would if observing a troupe of wild and potentially hostile baboons.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:09 PM

Little Hawk mentions goldfish above so I want to go with that image for a moment. The concept, of course, is not original with me.

Goldfish do not have legs, they don't breathe air, they look pretty much alike and are fairly uniform in size, their memory probably is fairly limited and their aspirations for the future also. In all likelihood, they don't have much idea of where they came from or where they go when some are 'fished' out of the bowl. Except for occasional glimpses of us - their keepers - they don't have much of a framework of reference to us.

Imagine us - mankind - in a goldfish bowl. We breathe air. We have legs. We look pretty much alike and are fairly uniform in size. For all we know when judged by someone 'out there', our memory and aspirations are extremely limited. And frankly, we don't know where we came from nor do we know where we go when we 'disappear'.

And except for occasional glimpses we don't have much of a framework of reference to any being 'out there'.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:08 PM

I firmly believe that life on Earth began as the litter left by a bunch of intergalactic party goers.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 02:08 PM

Good idea. You'll save a lot of valuable time that way. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: catspaw49
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 01:45 PM

Aldrin is a bit of a tool so anything he has to say (and over the years he has had plenty to say) is not all that more important than anyone else's half-assed opinions including mine.

Hell folks.......Let's really think this thing through.........Too many probab;e places in the universe for some type of life form not to exist somewhere and no reason to believe they aren't a million times more advanced than we are and have been out and about roaming the galaxies even before the earth was fully formed.

And why would you think they have to be a carbon based life form? Even if the DNA model applied to them, perhaps they had 4 or more different Amino Acids and the life produced was nothing at all like ours.

Considering the above possibilities, then is it not also possible that they are here right now but that as their life form is so different, we are not capable of recognizing them......nor they us?

I'm going to go off and scratch my nuts for awhile.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 01:28 PM

gnu - G'wan! You've just gone irrational over your unrequited love for Sarah Palin and it's causing you to utter bizarre nonsequitors and abuse your goldfish. ;-)

Lizzie - I have no idea if there's any correlation between crop circles and alien visitors from outer space. I am convinced, however, that many crop circles have been caused by some sort of unknown agency....not by us humans, that is. As to what that agency is or might be....? I have no idea.

It might be a completely separate matter to that of alien craft visiting this planet.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 01:15 PM

What do all think about Crop Circles?

OK, some seem to be man-made are man made...but how do you explain ones that are hundreds of feet in diameter, which appear overnight, seemingly with messages in their designs?   

I keep an open mind to everything, realise that there are a lot of charlatans out there in the UFO world, but I also consider it to be very arrogant to assume that *we* are the *only* planet in the solar system to have life on it. We know so little of what's beyond the boundaries of our own tiny world...and when you hear Buzz Aldrin talking on that Youtube link in my first post, above...well.....   ?

The Silent Circle

Linda Moulton Howe's 'Earth Files'

The Circle Makers

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Amos
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:56 PM

I haven't read the ISBN you posted, Bruce.

If you accept the persuasive testimony and some of the images, planet Earth has been scouted or visited or harassed or used as an experiment by non-Terrestrial beings flying in non-Terrestrial craft.

The questions, the moment you posit that, come fast and thick.

Who? What system, planet and locale sends them? More than one origin, or subspecies or tribe? If so how many?

What? WHat are these craft, which seems to fall into two major groups, scouts andmotherships, and what are these beings? What organic structure? WHat antecedents? From where? What is their history?

How? To make such exploration viable they would have to use hypoer-spatial transfer, come through wormholes, or do some other pan-dimensional trick. WHat is that trick? What principles underlie it and how many other technologies does it lead to?

Why? Exploration, racial experimentation, Galactic Shore Patrol, Space Mounties, renegade space buccaneers, protestant evangelicals from Antares...why are they doing what they are doing?         

When? How long has this actually been going on? What's the history of assignments, missions flown, reported results and debriefings??

Possibilities? Can we speak to such beings? Link to them somehow? Beg, borrow, learn or even steal their technology? USe them to better organize the human race? Do they have souls? Speak to the Infinite? What elkse do they know about thought, space, time, and the microarchitecture of energy?

"What questions", indeed. Enough to make your head spin.


A

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: gnu
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:51 PM

Those are just the voices in your head, LH.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:42 PM

I very much doubt we're alone, based both on the general probabilities, the public record, and on some personal experience as well.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: beardedbruce
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:41 PM

Amos,

What questions? In the volume I reference, I think you will find most of the answers.

Simple distance is probably reason enough- what have we got the is worth the trip? And until we start ( seriously) looking, how will we know that we are being talked to?

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Amos
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:39 PM

I would be inclined to think not, except for the huge array of unanswered questions this entails.



A

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Wesley S
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:38 PM

It's highly unlikely that we are alone. I'm not sure that they are flying saucer shaped craft around our planet - but there's someone out there somewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: beardedbruce
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:35 PM

No, we are not alone. But they may have good reason to keep away from us.

see:
Intelligent Life in the Universe
by I. S. Shklovskii (Author), Carl Sagan (Author)
ISBN-10: 189280302X
ISBN-13: 978-1892803023

Subject: RE: BS: So, Are We Alone?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:23 PM

No, of course not. I believe that Earth has often been visited by Others -- for either a good laugh or a good bad example.

Subject: RE: So, Are We Alone?
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:08 PM

Could a helpful alien elf move this to BS please. Thank you. Sorry, I keep forgetting the BS prefix!

Subject: So, Are We Alone?
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 16 Jul 09 - 12:07 PM

Buzz Aldrin seems to think we're not....

What do you think?