I’ve wanted to post this for quite some time now.

“Is Earth the only living planet in the universe?” is a question I’ve been pondering for a long time. I’m interested in what the rest of you think. Do you believe there is other life out there? Here are a few things you may want to consider:
The farthest planet from the Sun that we know of is Pluto, which marks the end of our solar system. Astronomers estimate that there are thousands, maybe even millions of other solar systems in the universe. And nobody knows where the universe ends, or if it even HAS an end. Surely there has to be SOMETHING else living out there. What do you think?

Didn't they find another planet past Pluto a few years ago?

As far as life being out there somewhere, I believe there is. With all the other galaxy's out there I think anything could be possible.

I think the question is rather unnecessary. Of course there's other life around. Simple probability shows us that. Not to mention the fact that astronomers have already found extrasolar planets.

Originally posted by BorgHunter
I think the question is rather unnecessary. Of course there's other life around. Simple probability shows us that. Not to mention the fact that astronomers have already found extrasolar planets. I dont think the question is unnecessary. Simple probablity does not make it fact. Until there is definite proof of existentence it will always be supposition. Just because you accept it as fact does not make it so.

Didn't they find another planet past Pluto a few years ago?
It is a possible theory to how Pluto and Neptune's orbits are thrown off. There is no proof yet.

I dont think the question is unnecessary. Simple probablity does not make it fact. Until there is definite proof of existentence it will always be supposition. Just because you accept it as fact does not make it so.
Don't you find that quite selfish? To beleive that this is the only planet in the entire universe with life on it? In the infinite universe? I beleive in aliens with no doubt. I even beleive they have been here.

Blib thanks for the answer, and of course you believe in aliens, after all you, are the king of worms.......:D :D

Originally posted by Blibblob

Don't you find that quite selfish? To beleive that this is the only planet in the entire universe with life on it? In the infinite universe? I beleive in aliens with no doubt. I even beleive they have been here. If you had comprehended what i posted then you would know that i never gave my opinion on the subject. I merely pointed out to Borg that her opinion was a little presumptuous. In my opinion there is life somewhere out there. But the fact is that we have no proof.

Um, excuse me, "her"? *Cough*

Originally posted by BorgHunter
Um, excuse me, "her"? *Cough* A prime example of what being presumptuous does. Thank you for your cooperation on this Borg.

Originally posted by HaVoK
In my opinion there is life somewhere out there. But the fact is that we have no proof.
This actually brings up another question: What should be considered as proof? A lot of people claim to already have proof of extraterrestrial life. This “proof” ranges from crop circles to surgical implants that were allegedly put there by aliens.

I’m almost certain there is life out there somewhere, but just how close is it?

They also proved alot of the crop circles to be man made(oops I mean person made). So who is to say that all of them were not man made(oops me bad, person made). After all where is the proof that a space ship did it, no one has actually seen the space craft that could have done it.

The other question that comes up, is what type of life are we looking for. For all we know aliens could be invisible and standing right next to us.

ACK! You said "alien"! That is not PC. You must say "extraterran lifeform"

Originally posted by mad dog
no one has actually seen the space craft that could have done it.
Actually, millions of people around the world claim to have seen UFOs. I didn’t believe any of this until I looked into it a little more. It seems these “sightings” have been going on since 1947, when an alien spacecraft apparently crashed in Roswell (and that’s a detailed story in itself).

Borg, LMAO :D

Mopo, actually sightings have been going on alot longer, look at cave men drawings. The only problem, there is no real proof out there atleast not for the public. When a space ship lands in NY and is on the 6:00 news then there will be proof. My question is even if there is life out there why would they even want to come to this planet. Unless they need to stop at the 7-11 for a pee and some smokes :D.

Suppose the Universe is infinite. If not infinite, EXTREMELY large according to what little data we have.

Now consider the number of solar systems within this universe.

Now consider the number of planets and moons within those solar systems within that universe.

Now consider that we are only one planet, in one solar system, with very limited knowledge (realistically next to none) of any of the planets, not to mention other solar systems around us.

Are we likely the only planet in all the possible planets and moons in all the possible solar systems with any sign of life? Probably not likely.

With that in mind, do I believe in UFO's? No. Do I believe that extraterrestrial lifeforms have visted Earth? No. Why? Because of all the planets in all the solar systems why would another form of life choose us (if they are capable of choosing, as well as capable of transportation), and if they ARE cabable of choosing and capable of the transportation, you'd think they'd be smart enough to not get involved with our fucked up planet, and the fucked up human race.

Right?

Well that's my take on it.

Age are you anti earth :D?

*grin*

Nah, just jaded and a bit amazed at the general stupidity of the human race.

Nothing personal of course. ;)

They would come here because although we're all fallible, fucked-up human beings, we are interesting. We have the ability to learn. Maybe we need a collective kick in the pants to stop our petty bickering and get our act together. The answer to one of humanities oldest questions: "are we alone?" may provide that kick.

I think it would depend on how much tech. they have and if this were the first planet they were visiting. You never know they may have been watching and waiting to see if we as humans can get over our petty differences. Example; I can watch a roach, but I would rather step on it then make contact.

A popular belief is that aliens don’t have emotions. I have no idea where that theory came from, but it is interesting. I mean, emotion is the main cause of conflict in the human race.

I believe all mammals have emotion, it's just humans tend to dramatize there's more.

Originally posted by mad dog
Example; I can watch a roach, but I would rather step on it then make contact.

First of all, I have to say Eww. :) Other than that, wouldn't you be the least bit interested in what the Roach's take would be? ie. Maybe the hi-tech aliens would make contact before they wiped us off the face of the planet, just in idle curiosity.

About the crop circles - it could be that they are an example of alien vandalism, and the Roswell incident was an angry parent putting his kid down once and for all...

Perhaps the crop circles all together draw a schematic.

Box19, I've seen roaches and they have been studied, proven to be a pest. I just wonder if the aliens are studying us finding out that maybe in there eyes we are a pest???????? Sometimes it is better to just sit back and watch, then you know how a thing is truely going to act. example I think bears are beautifull, but I don't see myself as making contact to see if they think I'm beautifull. So maybe the aliens just see us as just plain violent.

So maybe the aliens just see us as just plain violent.
Well, aren't we?

Originally posted by mad dog
I believe all mammals have emotion, it's just humans tend to dramatize there's more.
I believe all living creatures, even roaches, have some degree of emotion. When a roach senses danger, it runs.
My point is, if aliens have no emotion, chances are they are interested in finding out what “emotion” is.

Mopo if they are smart enough to learn space travel then more then likely they have emotion. Isn't it emotion that drives us to explore, unles of course they are just looking for food, Maybe we are on the dinner menu? :eek:

Well, you have to keep an open mind. It is possible for a race of beings to have no emotion and still be intelligent. The way I look at it: If there is a race out there with the same level of intelligence as humans, but with no emotion, chances are they were able to develop their technology much quicker than humans because they weren’t held back by personal preferences or certain beliefs. Also, they would never have any form of conflict or war because greed and hate doesn’t exist to them.

Originally posted by Mopoloton
Well, you have to keep an open mind. It is possible for a race of beings to have no emotion and still be intelligent.
Vulcans...:rolleyes: :D

But it''s usually emotion that drives us anyway; with technology it's wanting to do better than somebody else or get there first. The aliens might as well be sitting by the pool drinking lemonade rather than working to be technologically advanced. It's alien apathy, without the ambition to drive them why should they bother?

Originally posted by box19
But it''s usually emotion that drives us anyway; with technology it's wanting to do better than somebody else or get there first. The aliens might as well be sitting by the pool drinking lemonade rather than working to be technologically advanced. It's alien apathy, without the ambition to drive them why should they bother?
Not necessarily, when you ask the question, “how can we make society better?” people give millions of different answers. Why? Because we have different emotions and different viewpoints, and we often form opinions based on past events in our lives. If aliens have no emotion, they wouldn’t have conflicting ideas on how to solve a problem. They would use scientific logic to form a solution. After all, it’s common logic that suggests fixing something that is broke, not emotion.

Originally posted by BorgHunter
Vulcans...:rolleyes: :D
Actually, Vulcans aren’t born without emotion, their just taught to suppress their emotions.;)

Well I can accept that they might have less emotion, but I doubt they would have NO emotion. Maybe they'll have more emotion, kind of like nut cases(or preg. women :D) What happens if the other life form comes from a meteorite, and is a virus???

Oh...my...God! The PMSing aliens are back!!!

*almost spits her drink out* :D

Brief response though:
I believe all living creatures, even roaches, have some degree of emotion. When a roach senses danger, it runs.
Generally I wouldn't call this emotion. Human's have the same reflex 'fight or flight'. It's not so much emotional as an automatic nervous response.

Now if the roach felt fear at this danger, that would be an emotional response. But the reaction that happens takes place so fast there isn't really a chance for an emotion to form. The emotion happens after the brain makes the subconscious (or somewhat conscious) split-second decision.

Now maybe after that roach takes off, it sits around the corner and feels relief, or depressed that the cold, cruel world is so bitterly against his roachy goodness... but I suppose we'd need to ask him.

;)

Well, I guess choosing to run in that split second could be considered an involuntary reflex, but continuing to run is clearly a sense of fear.


Originally posted by BorgHunter
Oh...my...God! The PMSing aliens are back!!!

Could be worse. Suppose that in the alien race, the MEN are the ones who go through PMS! Now THAT’s scary… :D

Fine by me.

They can have child birth too. ;)

That would be fine with me too. It's a different species and doesn't have anything to do with me. :D

I think its totally UN-REALISTIC to think we are alone.....

Other planets in our solar system might have life and they are so far advanced from us,they block out any scanning coming from here..

I do not think we are alone (Maybe in our own little group of planets but i doubt it) but certainly not in space as a whole...

And ya gotta wonder where black holes go.. Are they a doorway to another part of space??

Some of you may find this interesting. This sight has artwork and cave carvings of UFOs and aliens......... some dated as old as possibly 5,000 years.


www.ufoartwork.com

Personally I hope there is life out there and believe there is.
I've seen a couple of things in the sky that sure baffled me.

I have had several "dreams" where aliens wanted to scan the right side of my brain. I told them they could only if they helped us with world peace. When I woke up the right side of my head felt weird and I couldn't move for several minutes. Another time I felt something to my head and thought "oh yeah, they have to plug me in sometimes".
I have always thought we aren't alone but this has freaked me out a bit.

I think Borg was pretty much on the money when he said that there was definitely life on other planets. Most likely there is even intelligent life on many other planets as well, and most likely we will never meet them.

As for people sighting UFOs, that's pure bullshit. Look back in the middle ages, look how many people 'sighted' the Virgin Mary. It's just a fad for the times. Notice how there were never any UFO sightings before the theory of UFOs originated, yet if extra-terrestrials existed then there is no reason for them to not visit us earlier.

I love dis thread :)

+1

As for people sighting UFOs, that's pure bullshit. Look back in the middle ages, look how many people 'sighted' the Virgin Mary. It's just a fad for the times. Notice how there were never any UFO sightings before the theory of UFOs originated, yet if extra-terrestrials existed then there is no reason for them to not visit us earlier.

Actually there were sightings even before the virgin mary. That's why I posted a link to some artwork a couple posts back.


Just pointing that out. :alien:

I didnt even read this thread yet, but ill go ahead and post. Hell no we are not alone.

See my thread here:http://allforums.net/showthread.php?t=23600

Actually there were sightings even before the virgin mary. That's why I posted a link to some artwork a couple posts back.


Just pointing that out. :alien:

Thanks, I didn't notice your earlier post. I just checked it out, and sorry if I'm a cynic, but those bits of art really don't convince me.

Thanks, I didn't notice your earlier post. I just checked it out, and sorry if I'm a cynic, but those bits of art really don't convince me.

Your welcome and that's okay.

I really wasn't trying to convince you, only to pique your curiosity.

:D

Theres life out there, but it aint here.

The fact that we have never picked up any extra-teresterial transmissions like we have been sending out for years makes me wonder if there is any other intelligent life out there. There might be life, but there doesn't yet appear to be any intelligent life that we can find.

The lack of detctable signals proves nothing either way. Our equipment might not be capable of detecting emmissions such as ours at the distance that life is from us. Not all intelligent life may emit transmissions. They could be xenophobic and shield their transmissions out of fear. They may be so far advanced that their transmissions would not even be recognized as such by us. We may just not have stumbled across the right place to look yet. They may even have constructed a Dyson Sphere, blocking out all transmissions, and even the light from their star.
It is difficult to prove a negative. I suspect that the most likely reason we have not detected transmissions is that we wouldn't know what to look for. Imagine a neandrethal trying to detect our transmissions. They would be looking for all the wrong things. That time is only a few tens of thousands of years removed from our own. It would be an amazing coincidence if life evolved at exactly the same time elsewhere.

The lack of detctable signals proves nothing either way. Our equipment might not be capable of detecting emmissions such as ours at the distance that life is from us. Not all intelligent life may emit transmissions. They could be xenophobic and shield their transmissions out of fear. They may be so far advanced that their transmissions would not even be recognized as such by us. We may just not have stumbled across the right place to look yet. They may even have constructed a Dyson Sphere, blocking out all transmissions, and even the light from their star.
It is difficult to prove a negative. I suspect that the most likely reason we have not detected transmissions is that we wouldn't know what to look for. Imagine a neandrethal trying to detect our transmissions. They would be looking for all the wrong things. That time is only a few tens of thousands of years removed from our own. It would be an amazing coincidence if life evolved at exactly the same time elsewhere.

Well said.

Forget about the universe; we might not be the only life in our own solar system.

Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter; is believed to have a subsurface saltwater ocean and it's possible the core of the moon can produce enough heat to produce life.

"The lack of detctable signals proves nothing either way."

I would take a mild exception to that: the lack of detectable signals proves a lot--namely that if there are signals they are not obvious. There are all sorts of conclusions to be drawn from that result, even if it does not definitively tell us they are not there.

I suspect, going by how quickly life appeared on Earth once conditions were set, that simple, microscopic, one-celled stuff must be common "out there."

However, while that is of biological interest, the big show is regarding the existence of "intelligent," or, as my Buddhist friends would put it, "sentient" life.

It seem it took more than three billion years for the evolution of multi-cellular life on Earth, but less than a million for the evolution of life itself. All the evolution that we think of (fishes and insects and dinosaurs and mammals and birds and molluscs and even worms) has required less than half a billion years.

This leads to the view that, while "life" is common, multi-cellular life is not and sentient life may be extremely rare.

This leads to the view that, while "life" is common, multi-cellular life is not and sentient life may be extremely rare.
But obviously not so rare that it couldn't evolve once. The universe is a remarkably big place; the idea that sentient life evolved somewhere else is not far fetched.

Yes, I agree--the universe is a big place, perhaps even infinite.

The fact that we happened only tells us sentient life is possible, but reveals nothing about the odds. If sentience is so uncommon as to happen, say, only once per galaxy, then as far as we can imagine, we are effectively alone.

"The lack of detctable signals proves nothing either way."

I would take a mild exception to that: the lack of detectable signals proves a lot--namely that if there are signals they are not obvious. There are all sorts of conclusions to be drawn from that result, even if it does not definitively tell us they are not there.

What is obvious to us today, is not neccessarily the same as it was a hundred years ago. Someone aiming a radio telescope at earth a hundred years ago would have detected no radio signals. Does that mean there was no intelligent life here then? Obviously it does not.
It is impossible for us to guess what signals we will be emitting a century or two from now. It is unreasonable to assume that life near us must be at exactly the same technological level as we are. A century is a blink of an eye in the age of the universe.
Even if radio waves are the preferred method of communication, we would effectively be able to detect such transmissions, unless they were aimed directly at us, at a distance of only a few thousand light years. That is only a small section of our own galaxy, and there is no telling how common, or where, intelligent life may have evolved.
What the lack of detectable signals shows so far is that we haven't yet found another planet that contains intelligent life. We might make that discovery tommorrow, or we might never make it.

I am curious what sort of novel signaling method you might have in mind other than electromagnetic radiation.

ACK! You said "alien"! That is not PC. You must say "extraterran lifeform"


I thought they were called Mexicans...




In all probablility, there are aliens out there. The chances of us ever finding any is probably very very very close to zero, simply due to the time it takes for anything to travel across the galaxy, much less the universe.

I dunno--if you assume the existence of only one society like ours (if intelligent life is at all common, then surely a few others like ours would appear) prone to go out and establish colonies, and you allow a hundred years of so between the foundation of each colony (once the process is started, a century or so seems reasonalble), the entire galaxy could be colonized in a few tens of millions of years.

The question then becomes, not why can't we find them, but, instead, why wasn't the Earth colonized long, long ago?

One can speculate as to various reasons, but keep in mind the three billion years there was nothing but microscopic life around, and the half a billion or so years after that when there was nothing approaching intelligent life. Humans arriving on such a world would naturally set up housekeeping.

I am curious what sort of novel signaling method you might have in mind other than electromagnetic radiation.

There are a number of possibilities that we know of, and what we don't know is an unassessable quantity. One possibility that we know of is entangled particles. If two photons are emitted in an event with opposite spins, they will maintain opposite spin states no matter how far seperated they are at any given time. If the spin state of one particle is altered, the other particle's spin will also be altered. If one were to maintain a group of such particles at each end of the desired transmission, information could be transmitted using this property. Incidently, there is a small time lag in the change. As best measured currently the time delay is about one tenth the time it would take for light to traverse the distance between the particles.

There may be many other ways of communicating. We don't know everything. In fact, the one thing we do know is that none of our theories of Physics is absolutely correct. The theory of relativity was known even to Einstein to be incorrect. The errors using relativity to calculate the motions of the planets halve the error of calculating their motions using Newtonian gravity. Neither exactly matches observation.

If we had been looking for evidence of extraterrestrials a mere hundred years ago, we would not have been looking for radio transmissions. We would have been using telescopes to look for canals on Mars. There is no telling what we will be looking for in another hundred years, much less another thousand or ten thousand. Ten thousand years ago, humans communicated over long distances by signal drums, and human messengers. Given that our technological progress has been accelerating over our history, what we will be capable of in another ten thousand is not predictable, because we don't have any way of expressing the concepts. Could someone ten thousand years ago have predicted radio, television, and the internet?

Ten thousand years is the merest blink of an eye in the age of the universe. An intelligent species could be a million years behind or ahead of us. If they are that far behind, they will be difficult to detect because they won't be emitting signals yet. If they are that far ahead, we will probably seem like the predecessors to truly intelligent life, with potential but not really developed enough to hold a meaningful conversation with.

Your point is well taken (although I really doubt anything that will come along that is as cheap as radio, and for sure nothing that is faster).

Still, the point remains that nothing has been found, so we can definately conclude that nothing within a sizable range is actively trying to signal us via radio. To me that is a meaningful result.

For the life of me I do not see how particle entanglement could be used over astronomic distances. First, one of the entangled particles would have to travel out there--requiring time and energy. Even then, the principle that information cannot be propagated in space-time faster than light will not be violated (although I don't know how the physicists get around that). Setting up a transmitter seems cheaper.

I remember, in my own lifetime, when it was known that computers would never be smaller than the size of a building, and no more than three or four would be needed for the country. After all, a paper and pencil were much easier to use for most calculations.
Sometimes the limits we perceive are simply problems awaiting a solution. The speed of light may not be as absolute as we originally thought. Three different phenomenons have been measured involving movement faster than the speed of light. The first is the change in the spin of entangled particles. The second is the speed at which electrons jump across a Josephson junction. The third is the speed at which electrons jump from one energy level in an atom to another. They were all measured in different ways, and all turn out to be approximately 10 times the speed of light. Perhaps this is a clue to what the problems are in our understanding of the universe. It is at the least, tantalizing and unexplained.

A good deal of my working career was involved in AI ("Artificial Intelligence" as it was pretentiously called). I shared the enthusiasm of thinking computers being just around the corner.

It turns out that what computers do is not what the human brain does, and all the talk of artificial intelligence has dwindled down to just a few die hards, and the AI movement and all the Silicon Valley companies that were created to write AI software have either disappeared or evolved into ordinary business software houses.

Every starving artist can cite vanGogh and daydream of their own artistic immortality--after they are dead--but it rarely happens this way. Most great artists are recognized and feted while they live, and the mass of starving artists are forgotten as soon as they starve.

What you say cannot be disproved, but it can be asserted that it may not be as likely as you hope. Nothing better than radio for long-distance communication has been found or is even remotely on the horizon, and radio has been around almost a century. I think the best we can reasonably hope for is continued improvement in radio technology.

My point is that the "lesson" of unexpected future developments is really more myth than reality. The futurist imagines great things, which rarely come to pass. (I remember "future-world" in the original Anaheim Disneyland. It drew a picture of flying Chevrolets.)

It is true that the future rarely occurs the way we expect it to. It occurs in some way however. A century is enough time for a technology, such as radio to mature. We undoubtedly will see incremental improvements in it, and I agree that none of what I have speculated about is anywhere near practical now. What the next breakthrough is, and when it will occur is unknown. I take it on faith that it will occur, because breakthroughs have occured in the past, and I see no reason they won't continue in the future.

As for artificial intelligence, I suspect that will not occur for some time. We are not very advanced in our understanding of how our own brains work. We know more now than we did a generation ago, but not enough to even begin to contemplate designing an intelligent computer. I read "The Emperor's New Mind" when it came out, and I think Penrose made some very good points about the nature of thought being analog rather than digital.

One of the real possibilities for AI involves designing an analog computer chip. That is much easier contemplated than done. Our intelligence is at least partly chemical, rather than purely electrical. We really don't understand enough to begin designing such a system. Much more basic research is needed.

It should not be necessary to understand in detail how our brains function to build machines that do the same sorts of things.

Over time, more and more people involved in this sort of thing are coming to realize that the old philosophical problem of "qualia" is not as easily disregarded as they once thought.

We do what computers do--we compute and store data and recall data and compare data--but we also do something that computers do not do--we experience. We are sentient. I think it is far more likely that we will find ways to give our minds the capabilities of computers than vice versa.

You can build a computer that "sees," in the sense of able to "detect" external objects, just as our eyes and the appropriate neurons in our brain detect things. What we may not be able to do (I think almost surely will not be able to do) is build a machine that experiences vision.

In the case of vision, this is not important--vision is the interface between our mind and the stimulation of neurons involved with input from the optic nerve--and even though computers will not employ qualia, other interfaces can be imagined.

But with other things--the things that make us experiencing, sentient beings, the issue is more difficult.

Now sentience plainly evolved as we evolved, and it develops in the infant as the infant develops, so we cannot say that sentience is supernatural. Still, it gives one pause, and behooves us to not be too sure, since qualia are not--in any way we can now imagine--comprehensible. New and unexpected insights are going to be needed, and I don't "have faith" that they will ever come. What makes us "us" may remain forever unknown.