Question Aliens...Do you think they exist?

[Pyromaniac605]

Methane is inert and dosnt react with anything. What chemical can it react with to form a breathing gas?

Okay, so maybe that was a bad example, but you see my point.

 

[cymrych]

By the way, methane is definitely not inert. It's the primary component in natural gas, and burns (reacts with oxygen) quite well. :thumbup:

 

[Codz]

Coming out of my campsite, why do you question everyone's belief on aliens? They are entitled to their position on this argument, just as you are. A belief does not need to be entirely sure. How are you so sure that he will answer you? Because you believe he will.

I never said they weren't. I believe though, it is incredibly narrow and arrogant to believe the Earth is it. Are you really comparing whether or not he'd answer my question to whether or not we are alone?

 

[RisingFury]

7 threads in just over 24 hours. You people have no life :lol:

 

[Codz]

7 threads in just over 24 hours. You people have no life :lol:

Eh, this is just a very enteraining community.

 

[Scruce]

Is it just me, or does XKCD time itself to Orbiter-Forum trending topics?

 

[Cras]

I never said they weren't. I believe though, it is incredibly narrow and arrogant to believe the Earth is it.

Because the evidence is so overwhelmingly suggesting otherwise? You are acting as if you are talking to someone who refuses to believe in Evolution.

There is no evidence at all for ET life, aside from a few overplayed thought experiments that insist that life is a an inevitable result of a planet having the right conditions.

I do not believe that, and that thought has gotten quite a bit more traction these past few years, so I am not the only one thinking that life's existances is a far more extraordinary occurance than required in the thinking, "The universe is big, lots of planets out there, thus there must be a planet with life".

I would put forth the question, what part about life comes across as so simple, and so hardy in terms of survivability in wide ranges of conditions, that leads one to conclude that it can be such a common occurance?

Now if you ask if I want there to be life out there, I fall on both sides of the fence. I would love it for intelligent life, a species of life that is better than the best of us that exists close enough that we can interact with it. Then we can go off together an form the Galactic Council, and have SPECTRES that go around bringing justice to the Galaxy. It would be great to share this space with another species of intelligent life. But I have huge doubts that this is the case. And I think in the slim chance that life does infact exist elsewhere in the Universe, it exists in a place and in a fashion that for us humans, it might as well not exist.

On the otherhand, if we are able to someday pinpoint an Earth like planet, or in fact an Earth clone, orbiting a near by star, and we develop the means to travel FTL to that planet, I would prefer to find the place capable of supporting human life naturally, and yet be completly devoid of life, so it can be there for us to use.

But to use the terms "narrow", and "arrogant", is not at all appropriate when dealing with a topic that cannot be proved either way.

 

[Codz]

Because the evidence is so overwhelmingly suggesting otherwise? You are acting as if you are talking to someone who refuses to believe in Evolution.

There is no evidence at all for ET life, aside from a few overplayed thought experiments that insist that life is a an inevitable result of a planet having the right conditions.

I do not believe that, and that thought has gotten quite a bit more traction these past few years, so I am not the only one thinking that life's existances is a far more extraordinary occurance than required in the thinking, "The universe is big, lots of planets out there, thus there must be a planet with life".

I would put forth the question, what part about life comes across as so simple, and so hardy in terms of survivability in wide ranges of conditions, that leads one to conclude that it can be such a common occurance?

Now if you ask if I want there to be life out there, I fall on both sides of the fence. I would love it for intelligent life, a species of life that is better than the best of us that exists close enough that we can interact with it. Then we can go off together an form the Galactic Council, and have SPECTRES that go around bringing justice to the Galaxy. It would be great to share this space with another species of intelligent life. But I have huge doubts that this is the case. And I think in the slim chance that life does infact exist elsewhere in the Universe, it exists in a place and in a fashion that for us humans, it might as well not exist.

On the otherhand, if we are able to someday pinpoint an Earth like planet, or in fact an Earth clone, orbiting a near by star, and we develop the means to travel FTL to that planet, I would prefer to find the place capable of supporting human life naturally, and yet be completly devoid of life, so it can be there for us to use.

But to use the terms "narrow", and "arrogant", is not at all appropriate when dealing with a topic that cannot be proved either way.

While I disagree, I respect your opinion.

 

[T.Neo]

I do not believe that,

And I think in the slim chance that life does infact exist elsewhere in the Universe, it exists in a place and in a fashion that for us humans, it might as well not exist.

I would prefer to find the place capable of supporting human life naturally, and yet be completly devoid of life, so it can be there for us to use.

In other words: your thoughts on what alien life is like, are driven by what you want alien life to be like.

Also, the notion that life is probable is not completely unfounded, it is based upon some reflections of research into abiogenesis and astrobiology.

Maybe what would be better than "I believe life is probable" and "I believe life is improbable" is something like the Drake Equation, factoring in many things that can affect the existence of life and its nature.

Granted, without actually knowing what the terms of the equation are, it is completely useless (just like the Drake Equation). But by plugging in hypothetical or even supposed figures, it could be a fun tool for speculation.

And I personally find the "easily accessible habitable planet" concept an interesting ethical thought experiment: should such a planet be left alone or researched with minimal impact, or colonised for the good of humanity (or the biological disapora of Earth as a whole) regardless of what impact it would have on that unique ecosystem?

But to use the terms "narrow", and "arrogant", is not at all appropriate when dealing with a topic that cannot be proved either way.

When suggesting that Earth is one of a few (or the only) planet on which complex life exists, one can only expect to get reactions on the order of "that is narrow, that is arrogant".

Mind you there are arguments that can quite justifiably be called "narrow"- and not just from the "this is rare" crowd...

 

[TMac3000]

Dno drec myhkiyka uid! (rehd: VVQ)

Pronounced: "DEnoh de-raeay-ku mae-ha-kukeeae-kukah ooee-de! (raeay-ha-de: FU-FUQ)"

Sounds vaguely like Enya's Loxian

---------- Post added at 04:01 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:35 PM ----------

As a committed Christian, I see no reason to think that God would not have populated the entire universe with other creatures. For some reason they don't come here. Why? Me mum thinks that it's because they are sinless, and God doesn't want them to become corrupted.

I haven't quite decided what I believe yet. I don't think we are the only sinfull creatures in the universe, but I don't quite buy the time and distance factor either. The universe has been around for a very long time, certainly long enough for an enterprising alien species to lauch a whole lot of interstellar missions, including one to that interesting little yellow speck on the outskirts of the galaxy.

What really intrigues me is the alien abduction issue. Bottom line: I do not believe that aliens kidnap people and butt-rape them with metal objects. But I also do not think that so many people could be lying, hoaxing, or making things up. The striking similarity in their experiences and the life long consequences compels me to believe that something happened to these people. I have heard some of my fellow Christians say that it's a Satanic deception. While I am open to that theory as well, I try not to go seeing a devil behind every bush, and frankly it doesn't sound to me like Satan's style.

So if these horrific experiences are not alien abductions, and they're not attacks from the devil, then what the heck are they? I don't know, and that mystery is what makes the phenomenon so interesting to me.

 

[Urwumpe]

Psychologists already investigated this, and came to the conclusion that there is no extraterrestrial cause behind, the people are really just making it up, rarely unintentional.

Before it had been extraterrestrials, it had been Demons kidnapping (or seducing) people. The stories are very similar at first glance, but then you also notice a strong correlation to the present of these people. The demons did not do, what humans could not imagine from their real life experiences.

 

[Cras]

In other words: your thoughts on what alien life is like, are driven by what you want alien life to be like.

I broke the idea into two in that post, and part of it is driven by what you say. Used the Socratic method and asked my self, do I WANT life to exist in the universe, and the only way to answer that is to specify the type of life. Simple life on Mars, Titan, somewhere else would be exciting. It would teach us a great many things. It would be a far more interesting place if there was another race of intelligent beings out there that we can be in contact with. But if they are hell bent on killing us all, then no, let's not have ET life in the universe.

But when it gets down to purely asking if I think that life actually exists somewhere out there, my answer is, not in a manner that matters. For example, most likely, that life is going to be too far away from Earth for it to be possible to have any sort of interaction with it, so it might as well not exist.

But like you said, it is fun to speculate, and it is a realm in which you can let your imagination run wild.

 

[T.Neo]

Simple life on Mars, Titan, somewhere else would be exciting. It would teach us a great many things. It would be a far more interesting place if there was another race of intelligent beings out there that we can be in contact with. But if they are hell bent on killing us all, then no, let's not have ET life in the universe.

Complex or even intelligent life does not necessarily mean "hell bent on killing us all". Just because it is a sci-fi trope, does not mean it is a basis for reality...

Also, I would be incredibly disheartened if only simple life existed elsewhere in the universe. Because complex life is so incredibly exciting, and can teach us so many incredible things, it would really be amazing.

Of course, that does not mean that simple life is not also immensely scientifically interesting, which it is.

But when it gets down to purely asking if I think that life actually exists somewhere out there, my answer is, not in a manner that matters. For example, most likely, that life is going to be too far away from Earth for it to be possible to have any sort of interaction with it, so it might as well not exist.

But that depends on two things:

1. What the distance to the nearest other instance of complex life is.

2. What is the distance beyond which meaningful contact is implausible.

3. What does meaningful contact entail.

I can envision a whole number of circumstances occuring. I don't think it's fair to just say "they will be too far for meaningful contact".

And that is where the role of speculation comes in: speculation is not fantasy. It differs from fantasy in that it is at least partially based on facts. Fantasy is just making stuff up.

Now, of course speculation is never going to give you the real answer... but it might point you in the direction where you could find it.

 

[Cras]

Complex or even intelligent life does not necessarily mean "hell bent on killing us all".

I agree.

Also, I would be incredibly disheartened if only simple life existed elsewhere in the universe. Because complex life is so incredibly exciting, and can teach us so many incredible things, it would really be amazing.

I agree.

Of course, that does not mean that simple life is not also immensely scientifically interesting, which it is.

I agree.

When I talk about meaningful interaction, I mean that we can see they exist, and see how they live. If they are intelligent life, then meaningful interaction could also count as communication.

If there is life elsewhere in this solar system, I would say meaningful interaction can certainly be achieved. We can send a probe to actually go there and watch them, can even take samples and directly interact with it.

If life lies outside the solar system, that is where what I call meaningful interaction becomes the key player, and all the points you bring up about it are certainly valid. The exact paramaters I cannot say, I have not put that level of thought into it, but the basis of the defination would entail that we can see it, observe it, and even try to communicate with it. As distance grows, communication is the first to loose meaning. It quickly becomes blind one way transmissions. But of course communication assumes the life we think is there is also intelligent. If it is not intelligent, then let us not worry about try to talk to the space slugs, but rather try and observe and see if we can figure out what it actually is and how it lives. As distance grows, the more we know is more a subject of history rather than the presence of life. We can make observations, but no way to say what we see still prevails there at the moment, and as distance grows, Special relativity tells us that the concept of NOW becomes more and more "fluid", and makes the idea that this life has really any bearing on our present almost irrelevant.

And the big extreme is if life exists outside the observable universe. This situation has the distance so extremely large that even pondering the idea of life being out there is actually one not worth bothering about.

Now there is a lot of room inbetween there, that light can send us signals that life could exists, or in fact the atmosphere is of such a way that maybe we can be sophisticated enough to determine its composition suggest that life must be there, or better yet, industrial life. That would be the near the outer limit of meaningful interaction. If life exists, and there is no means for us to observe it, then it might as well not exist, and I would go further and say that in the Universe we in habit, it actually doesn't.

It may be a bit too literal bringing of QM reasoning into the macro world, and this I honestly say is a topic that I have jumped from. I used to fully expect one day that life would be found in the universe, and if it wasn't found by us, it still must be out there somewhere. But at the moment, my views are different from that, and I doubt we will find evidence of life elsewhere, and if not found by us, then rather than assume it can still be out there, I consider that possibility a question without and answer, and if a question has no answer, it is not really a question at all.

But the odds are that for us to find a planet with life that orbits one of our neighboring stars is remote. It would certainly be a preferrable outcome, that a measurment is taken and someone can come out and say, look as what I see, this is caused by life on the surface! (preferred only to say NASA's new Mars lab finding fossils or actual life when it probes the Martian surface), but I just don't think we will be that lucky. I would think, that if we ever do find evidence of life, it will be on a far remote world, many many light years away.

 

[T.Neo]

Yes, what you say makes sense. But it still does entail issues #1 and #2, and those are both unresolved.

As is issue #3, really. You say that the longer communication or observation takes, the less meaningful it is, but this depends heavily on what you are observing or communicating with.

If you came to Earth 85 000 000 millon years ago, and them came back 200 years later, it is most likely that nothing considerably major would have occured in the interim. It all depends on how dynamic the environment is.

Of course, it is probable that the nearest instance of complex life to us is at least many light-years away, and it would take at least decades to reach. But we simply don't know the real numbers. We don't know enough to guess them, and saying that it's one way or the other and it'll affect things in an assertively definitive way, just doesn't feel right for me.

 

[Polaris]

I have an open mind on the subject- it's highly likely that SOME form of life exists beyond Earth- but whether it's intelligent or not is up for debate.

From the Wikipedia article:

The Drake equation states that:

where:
N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible;
and
R* = the average rate of star formation per year in our galaxy
fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets
fℓ = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point
fi = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop intelligent life
fc = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space
L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space.[3]
[edit]Alternative expression
The number of stars in the galaxy now, N*, is related to the star formation rate R* by

where Tg = the age of the galaxy. Assuming for simplicity that R* is constant, then and the Drake equation can be rewritten into an alternate form phrased in terms of the more easily observable value, N*.[4]

[edit]R factor
One can question why the number of civilizations should be proportional to the star formation rate, though this makes technical sense. (The product of all the terms except L tells how many new communicating civilizations are born each year. Then you multiply by the lifetime to get the expected number. For example, if an average of 0.01 new civilizations are born each year, and they each last 500 years on the average, then on the average 5 will exist at any time.) The original Drake Equation can be extended to a more realistic model, where the equation uses not the number of stars that are forming now, but those that were forming several billion years ago. The alternate formulation, in terms of the number of stars in the galaxy, is easier to explain and understand, but implicitly assumes the star formation rate is constant over the life of the galaxy.
[edit]


It's the Drake Equation.:2cents:

 

[PennyBlack]

My belief that other life exists out there is based on probability, but without the equation.
My mom said once "Where's there's one, odds on, there's another" and she was refering to one those rock pools we stumbled upon at the beach, which preserves the sealife when the tide goes out. I found a shrimp in one, but nothing else. She suggested that we would probably find something else in another one of those pools if we looked.
Looking at the universe and the countless stars with orditing bodies I'll take a step back and also say, looking at the orbiting body known as Earth, a rock pool within itself and the fact that it supports life irrelevent of what that life is... "That where's theres one, odds on, there's another."
But it's most definatly not true when I reach the bottom of the biscuit tin.

 

[xx_mortekai_xx]

What do you guys think? Personally, I believe it and I also believe that they are an exploratory race or a group or exploratory races. Reason being for my theory is if they were hostile and wanted to take is out, they'd have done it by now or have done it before but and do not wanna do it again.

http://alien-ufo-research.com/aliens_in_ancient_history_2/

http://www.history.com/shows/ancient-aliens

These links are probably gibberish and a load of crap but it's a source of belief at least. I don't know what else to say but please share you opinions.

Do you think they're aggressive? technology advances? what they look like? etc...

Sure, I think life outside of this planet exists.

It is not likely to be intelligent.

Also, even if it were, the known laws of physics disallow travel at faster than the speed of light, which severely hinders the ability to close the vast distances between here and virtually any location that could be viable.

For instance, the fastest vehicle we have ever launched into space is the probe going to pluto (if i remember correctly), and its moving at roughly 36,000 mph. At that speed, it would take the probe 82,000 years just to get to Alpha Centauri, which is 4.36 light years away. This is assuming a constant speed for the probe (which it doesnt have), and enough fuel to actually get there.

Its not a deal breaker, by any means, but the energy requirement is simply going to be massive just to get here. Unless they are harnessing stars or something, I dont think a civilization is going to have the ability to get here in a timely manner, which makes it less likely that THEY would actually come here.

A probe, on the other hand, might just be plausible.

 

[T.Neo]

the known laws of physics disallow travel at faster than the speed of light

It is far more complex than that. There are highly speculative methods that could theoretically allow travel faster than light, but they depend on various hypothetical factors, are very remote and most of them have a lot of potentially unsurmountable problems.

But to say "the known laws of physics prevent massive particles from accelerating to c" would be correct. That doesn't rule out "effective FTL"- though effective FTL can also create causality violations which is why its existence is doubted by many.

For instance, the fastest vehicle we have ever launched into space is the probe going to pluto (if i remember correctly), and its moving at roughly 36,000 mph. At that speed, it would take the probe 82,000 years just to get to Alpha Centauri, which is 4.36 light years away. This is assuming a constant speed for the probe (which it doesnt have), and enough fuel to actually get there.

1. That is a chemically propelled interplanetary probe. You'd never try to perform an interstellar mission of any sort with chemical propulsion.

2. The speed of the probe should be more or less constant in deep space.

3. I sure hope you do not think that the probe has to continuously burn its engines to maintain velocity. Space does not work that way. Once you are coasting, you are coasting. You aren't going to magically slow down, from magical friction that does not exist. The only thing you would need propellant for, would be course corrections (for which propellant need could be minimal) or deceleration at the destination (how much propellant you'd need depends on your velocity).

Its not a deal breaker, by any means, but the energy requirement is simply going to be massive just to get here. Unless they are harnessing stars or something, I dont think a civilization is going to have the ability to get here in a timely manner, which makes it less likely that THEY would actually come here.

No... you do not need to "harness stars" for interstellar travel. Fast interstellar travel would require energy expenditures that we aren't close to having, but likely still nothing compared to the energy emitted by a star in even a single second.

 

[Loru]

Pretty good speech about aliens by Neil DeGrasse Tyson and I'm thinking exactly same way.