Are We Alone?

[Detor]

There is a saying in astronomy: There are more number of galaxies on the universe than the number of sand particles that are on the beaches of earth.

I don't think that we are the only intellegent life form in this vast universe. The relevant question about this topic would be if we would be able to make a contact with any of them.

I don't have an answer to that. I really don't like to speculate about it. But any how as Einstein said: Imagination is more important than knowledge, i imagine that we will be able to make a first contact if we stop killing each other and try to be a more "intellegent" life form.

 

[martog]

Most of the calculations mentioned do not even take into account the possibility of life that could exist in intersellar space so I had to vote that there is life, somewhere out there.

[GorunNova]

Intelligent life out there is effectively certain, so the extra odds of interstellar life clinches it even more...

 

I seem to remember a story with a planet zooming along on it's own in interstellar space, heated by high levels of geothermal energy...

[Soulreaper]

I'm amazed so many people voted "no". That is interesting especially since this is a SCIFI site - so many no's could be expected from an business forum (no offence - just trying to find a fitting description) perhaps, but not here.

 

This thread has been going on for quite a while...

 

Does THE "NO" COME FROM:

* Thinking this topic ONLY applies to "humanoid" or human-simile life?

* Religious conviction?

* Disinterest - thus voting no just for the hell of it?

* 'Space? That's just delusional Sci-Fi and belongs on TV'?

 

[daffydk]

I'm amazed so many people voted "no". That is interesting especially since this is a SCIFI site - so many no's could be expected from an business forum (no offence - just trying to find a fitting description) perhaps, but not here.

 

This thread has been going on for quite a while...

 

Does THE "NO" COME FROM:

* Thinking this topic ONLY applies to "humanoid" or human-simile life?

* Religious conviction?

* Disinterest - thus voting no just for the hell of it?

* 'Space? That's just delusional Sci-Fi and belongs on TV'?

 

I think you got the question backwards , maybe??

 

No = No, we are not alone and there is life out there.

 

And thats what I think.. and thats why many of us sciefiers think that there is life somewhere out there among billions of galaxies, and billions billions billions of star systems.

[Soulreaper]

I'm amazed so many people voted "no". That is interesting especially since this is a SCIFI site - so many no's could be expected from an business forum (no offence - just trying to find a fitting description) perhaps, but not here.

 

This thread has been going on for quite a while...

 

Does THE "NO" COME FROM:

* Thinking this topic ONLY applies to "humanoid" or human-simile life?

* Religious conviction?

* Disinterest - thus voting no just for the hell of it?

* 'Space? That's just delusional Sci-Fi and belongs on TV'?

 

Indeed!!

I must be more tired than I thought! Thanks for correcting that one!

 

The Correct post is of course:

I'm amazed so many people voted "yes". That is interesting especially since this is a SCIFI site - so many yes's could be expected from an business forum (no offence - just trying to find a fitting description) perhaps, but not here.

 

This thread has been going on for quite a while...

 

Does THE "YES" COME FROM:

* Thinking this topic ONLY applies to "humanoid" or human-simile life?

* Religious conviction?

* Disinterest - thus voting yes just for the hell of it?

* 'Space? That's just delusional Sci-Fi and belongs on TV'?

 

 

[elderbear]

I voted "Yes."

 

I don't find any compelling evidence that we have company out there. Doesn't mean it's not there nor that it can't be there.

 

The Drake Equation is one tool for estimating the number of other civilizations we can could detect in our galaxy - and depending on the estimates people plug in (since we don't know exactly what numbers to use, they're our best guesses), we either should have immediate next-door neighbors OR we're effectively alone.

 

I did an exercise a few months ago (I'll have to see if I can find the notes) and came up with the "Elderbear" equation, which isn't too dissimilar to Drake's. My answer was a number between 0.8 (that would be us) and 100 radio using civilizations within our galaxy.

 

I don't think we've got much company ... not that it would do us any good w/o > lightspeed travel.

 

I think it's far more likely that "company" would be in the form of non-corporeal/trans-dimensional beings than other carbon-based life.

 

I do not accept arguments phrased as "I can't imagine it would/wouldn't happen this way, so therefore it mustn't/must be." Generally I hear those about the impossibility of evolution. But also in the context of ET. What they boil down to is "I cannot comprehend what science seems to tell us, so science must be wrong." I find this a blatant statement of ignorance.

 

I do make an exception, however, for people speaking from a faith based position. I don't give them scientific credibility - but when the discussion turns from science to other reality-maps, such as the spiritual-the scientific method isn't a very good tool. But I'm not going to feel compelled by "your" faith to change my reality map - I'm going to see if we can have an interesting dialogue that will help us both understand each other better, and therefore understand our little corner of the cosmos better.

 

:leaving soapbox:

 

To summarize: I'd like to have neighbors, but I don't find evidence compelling that we do. So, I classify that idea as most-likely fantasy. Thus, a "Yes" vote.

[TetsuoShima]

If it is up to proof, then it is evident that there are no other civilisations out there. If it is up to likelyhood, then it is clear that if you take this Drake equation and 'assume' that Earth has at least an approximation of a general 'galactic' civilisation. That there are other intelligent species out there in our galaxy. With some very simplistic reasoning and keeping the assumptions, at least in my view, reasonable, I found that there must be over ten intelligent civilisations out there.

L = +100

fc=fi=fl=1

ne=0.1

fp=0.1

R=10

multiply=+10

 

Of course, this equation speeks of civilisations wich have developped EM-transmissions and are using it to send information, to eliminate this factor, I placed fc=1, since EM-transmission is by no means necessary for intelligent life.

 

Now, this is just a speculation, since nowbody can predict the future, but if you're waiting for proof, you'll never get it. There is no way these civilisations will ever contact us, willingly or not. Poweroutput would have to be to great to be recepted over here along with distortions. Or they'd have to be aiming specifically towards Earth, wich is not very likely! And even if they did, they might be long extinct by the time we recieve anything. No, it's pretty clear that we'll never speek to/meet aliens! But, at least to me, it's pretty clear that they are out there. I know my argumants are not extreemly compelling, but that evident since there is no proof, but the chances are quite good. Still with 99 chances out of 100 success, you can still fail, so it quite possible that there is nothing out there, but chances that there is, simply are better.

 

 

R=10 (is generally accepted to be so)

fp=0.1 (estimates are 0.5, but proof is limited, so taken smaller number)

ne=0.1 (taken from our system, smaller number since it's not certain others are alike)

fl=1 (if it can support, it will support, general rule of nature)

fi=1 (if life starts, eventually intelligence will appear, evolution)

fc=1 (not important)

L=100+ (it is a reasonable assumption that intelligent life will not exterminate itself within 100 years after development)

 

Now, this gives the minimum number of civilisations with intelligent beings, but it says nothing about their development. That's where the EM-part comes in, but if you go into that, you're getting on slippery surface and into deep speculation. I speculated a bit in my assumptions as well, but nothing too serious, if you go into development, you can speculate as much as you want since you have no basis, because we haven't evolved enough ourselves yet.

[martog]

I would have expected our galaxies rate of star formation [R*] to be more than the generally accepted estimate of 10 stars a year. I wonder where I may further investigate this issue? It seems to me that if the value of R* was off, even fractionally, it would throw the equation into a downward spiral.

[Soulreaper]

Interesting.

 

To adress this from a more spiritual angle one could then conclude that as far as we know (with the concept of duality and the paradoxes of Macrocosm and microcosm [in theory] and without regards for 'how' intelligent extra terrestial life may be or not) the answer is truly then both Yes and No - equally, UNTIL the factual observation of one of those [currently] possibilities have been (You know what they say about light and light particles or realities for that matter - all are until a certain happenstance is observed).

 

*Ranting*

 

However, this topic doesn't have the intention of concluding a true yes or no, but merely to establish what a majority here believes or would like to believe or hold as real.

 

[danronq]

http://www.leaguelineup.com/welcome.asp?cmenuid=1&url=ball147

[GorunNova]

Sorry... I don't follow unqualified links -_-'...

 

Anyways, given the sheer number of stars and galaxies in even the known universe, the statistical likelihood that there's at least one other planet out there with intelligent life is pretty darned near certain... so I answered 'no', we aren't alone in the universe.

[TetsuoShima]

http://www.leaguelineup.com/welcome.asp?cmenuid=1&url=ball147

 

SPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAM!

 

This url belongs in the spam-thread!

[Nightfire]

I have only one answer! NO NO NO NO NO NO NO and A big NO

 

 

go to this site, study it, view the video and the book it refers to, and then I wanna see the answer!

 

48 people voted "yes", to you i say watch the video and read the book two times atleast

 

:)

[dorend]

Frankly, I think the idea that God, the creator of Earth (not to mention the entire universe!), would create life on ONLY one planet amongst possibly millions of life-sustaining environments is ludicris!!! I mean, come on!

[TV Man]

I would have liked to have option #3 on this poll, something along the lines of "unsure," because answering Yes or No to something we do not know for certain is presuming.

 

There's a story by Theodore Sturgeon that is quite interesting and sort of relevant to this discussion. In the story, there are 604 humans left on Earth, and they have some sort of immunity which keeps them from aging or dying. They decide they are going to pass on all our knowledge to a lesser creature who will someday evolve and understand the messages. They decide the otter is that creature.

 

So they go and place all the collective human knowledge on sheets of impervious metal because they figure it will be millenia before the otters can get to a point where they read. After all, no human has ever spoken with an otter, so it is assumed that otter intelligence is non-existent.

 

On the night before they are getting ready to christen the two final message plates, which contain Einstein's theories, and a bunch of other advance theories, one guy sees an otter walk up to the metal plates. The otter reads the plates and writes something on them. The guy later discovers that the otter corrected one of the theories and wrote the word "nonsense" over the other.

 

Sturgeon's point was that we assume we are the ultimate in creation. But our ethnocentrism just may get in the way of being able to understand what intelligence and life really are. We assume many things, including the assumption that there is no other life outside of Earth. But in fact, life on other planets might exist and might have no reason to deal with us.

[carcynsdad]

no way impossible

[oblisk]

I hope to find alien lifeforms that are fit for us to consume. Chicken/pork/beef are all getting boring.

[martog]

the only argument i have is that we may never see the lifeforms because the distance between planets and the rate of expansion in our universe (knowing there could be others). in my mind i think we may actually see a lifeform from other dimension before we see a space fairing race. i have done several calculations using the drake equation and found that there should be tons of life, just far apart. a part of me thinks that even my most conservate estimates are way off and the galaxies are simply teeming with life.

[mmsock]

The universe is simply too vast to misunderstood to deny at least the possibility of extraterrestrial life. I believe they are out there, but are not here with us. The real question in all of this though is this: If there are sentient, corporeal life forms out there, what do their women look like?