|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 17, 2007 0:31:00 GMT -4
The idea that there are human beings on a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri is biased and illogical and wishful thinking for three reasons. Well I didn't say anything about a human civilization on a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri. Humans had a bronze age. I was just condensing my reply. I could have typed "a culture that like us had a bronze age in the same sort of progression towards" etc. But I assumed you would know what I meant. We are getting bogged down in minutia here. Were you talkig about a bee civilization? Honey bees are "intelligent" and they communicate.
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 17, 2007 0:33:13 GMT -4
Quote:(#1) If they are just at the right timeline as we are in history as we are is difficult to even the most optimistic person to imagine.
What part do you not understand?
Buzz Aldren said something simular on Larry King to defend his notion that UFO's are probably not from aliens from outer space.
It is hard to imagine that two cultures so close to each other would be at the same point in their cultural advancement.
|
|
|
Post by Data Cable on Sept 17, 2007 0:38:35 GMT -4
Read my earlier posts to see why this is a bad thing that we devote so much attention to what science tells us is not so plausible. ...Such as, for example, a cure for cancer.
|
|
|
Post by Data Cable on Sept 17, 2007 0:41:41 GMT -4
What part do you not understand? What part of "the Bronze Age" is "at the right timeline as we are in history"? [edit: removed sneaky line-break ]
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Sept 17, 2007 10:59:48 GMT -4
Were you talkig about a bee civilization? Honey bees are "intelligent" and they communicate. Honey bees do communicate, but they also do not have a real language. Their communication is only useful in finding food sources. A honeybee can't communicate how it creates honey, for instance.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Sept 17, 2007 11:03:22 GMT -4
Quote:(#1) If they are just at the right timeline as we are in history as we are is difficult to even the most optimistic person to imagine. What part do you not understand? It seems very garbled. What were you trying to say? Were you trying to say "it is difficult for even the most optimistic person to imagine another culture being at the same point in their history as we are?" If so that still doesn't make much sense, as we're not a bronze-age culture. I don't think UFOs are aliens from space either.
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 18, 2007 1:44:20 GMT -4
It is hard to imagine that two cultures so close to each other would be at the same point in their cultural advancement.
That makes twice I have said this. Glance up this web page. I elaborated with this exact sentence prior to you being twice critical of an earlier post. But if this is not enough, let me add more description.
It is hard to imagine that two cultures so close to each other physically in the universe (such that they would be either neighbors or be within communication distance) would be at the same point in their cultural advancement.
I make a post and you lack the common courtesy to read it and return to where I was not first clear. I might run over my words only because I have software to program and all this takes a back seat.
The fact that you do not think that UFO's do not come from space aliens like Buzz Aldren is not my point.
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 18, 2007 1:50:29 GMT -4
Were you talkig about a bee civilization? Honey bees are "intelligent" and they communicate. Honey bees do communicate, but they also do not have a real language. Their communication is only useful in finding food sources. A honeybee can't communicate how it creates honey, for instance. "Real language"? As opposed to what? A fake language? "A honeybee can't communicate how it creates honey, for instance." I can imagine you are right. But on whose authority do you know this to be true? And how do you define language, communication and intelligence? And what makes your definition the correct one? You badgered and ridiculed my use of the comment "human intelligence" and "intelligent like us" thus implying that there are other worthy intelligence -- or were you? -- and yet not you reverse yourself and insist other species intelligence is not up to par or noteworthy. Not standing for anything is not any way of making a point. ===== Edit: Allow me to close this loop hole: Your not standing for anything is not any way of that you can use in making a point, Jason, I get the feeling that your posts are not aimed in any way of asking or thinking or coming up with solutions. Instead, you have entered this with something that you are already convinced to be true and you are trying to mold and shape reality to fit what you want to be true. This, by the way, is how FARMS works. It is not logical. It is not scientific. You have to consider the facts and where those facts point to. You do not decide beforehand to read the facts the way you have chosen to want to. Let me put it another way. I was a HUGE supporter of SETI@HOME in the beginning. I and my friends were excited about it. But then we learned otherwise. And we eventually lost interest and belief in it. But we had a luxury that Mormons and Scientolgists do not possess.. We had an open mind. It was not going to put any dent in our faith if we were alone in the Galaxy. We did not have a need to believe otherwise or else our religion would be shaken. I say this because I suspect this is a motivation to defend your position. But maybe I am wrong. You could just be a devoted Star Trek fan. But then again you could be wanting that the sky are filled with Gods as Mormons desire and believe to be tue with every fibre of their being. Orr you could be like a Scientologists who insist that we are the result of trillions of years of an intergalactic turmoil with conscious beings that have existed since the birth of the Universe. If ether even was true, I would accept it if science provided such evidence. I have an open mind.
|
|
|
Post by LunarOrbit on Sept 18, 2007 1:59:16 GMT -4
It is hard to imagine that two cultures so close to each other would be at the same point in their cultural advancement. Why would they have to be? If we discovered a civilization that was in it's early stages would it not still be intelligent life? You can say it a hundred more times, it won't make any more sense. A civilization doesn't need to be at the same level as us to be considered intelligent. It might be unlikely, but if it's not impossible you can't rule it out. You're the last person who should be criticizing others for not reading or ignoring what has been written. By all means, get back to work. Don't let us waste any of your time. In fact, if you feel you can't control the urge to visit the forum I can help you out...
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 18, 2007 2:15:33 GMT -4
It is hard to imagine that two cultures so close to each other would be at the same point in their cultural advancement. Why would they have to be? If we discovered a civilization that was in it's early stages would it not still be intelligent life? That would be great luck. It is not likely. Although possible, it would be very lucky and the probability would be low. I mean, we are talking about how statisticly likely the rise of intelligence is in our galaxy. Even if we find another culture in the stone age, they would be very very close to us. For that to happen, then the probabily of intellignece life occuring would have to be high.
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 18, 2007 2:22:08 GMT -4
That is not the point at all.
Intelligent life has to move or die. If we did not advance, discover, and fight the elements, countless diseases would have taken us over.
If they are not advanced, for how long are you implying they have remained unadvanced? A few hundred thousand years? Well, even in that case, we are looking on a time-line where they have appeared on the time-line RIGHT when we did . That is a miracle. That is akin to magic. THis is because even a few hundred thousand years is very close to RIGHT NOW when viewed on a time line of 4.3 billion years.
Or have they existed in a primitive state for a few hundred million years? That too is a miracle that they could have been so lucky that some virus or calamity did not take them out.
If you want to believe in magic. Feel free. I do not see how that is logical or scientific.
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 18, 2007 4:37:50 GMT -4
So I take it you are talking about a kind of Star Trek universe where instead of Kingdoms you are talking about cavemen?
When you say "Life, not quite advance as we are" is this sort of thing you mean?
The fact that you are capable of even considering for a moment that this is remotely statistically possible tells me that you are a child of the Star Trek generation. Gene Roddenberry very successfully took advantage that he was dealing with a population that could not grasp the math involved in having a galaxy full of life and yet had remained hidden and quiet for billions and billions of years. Just in time for us to come along.
Common Joe and Jane imagined that -- having being raised in any mainstream religion -- human beings had been around for a few thousand years at most and the universe was only a few million years old.
In this universe lots of things are possible. And clearly anyone who says otherwise is just backwards thinking, huh?
But this is, in truth, and forgive me for being so blunt, silly. We are about to set forth for the stars in, at the most, a few more thousand, and probably, a few more hundred years.
If the galaxy is full of like, what the heck is taking everyone else so long?
|
|
|
Post by LunarOrbit on Sept 18, 2007 9:57:23 GMT -4
If they are not advanced, for how long are you implying they have remained unadvanced? A few hundred thousand years? You're assuming (you seem to do that a lot) that they started at the same time as us. Maybe they got a late start, or maybe they are the second or third civilization to arise on the planet (ala Planet of the Apes). We aren't the first life to appear on Earth, the dinosaurs were around for millions of years before they were wiped out, and we didn't show up until millions of years after they were gone. We could be wiped out by nuclear war and there is still plenty of time left for new civilizations to pop up.There is lots of time for civilizations to come and go... our neighbours could be younger than us. Again -- if it isn't impossible you can't rule it out. The fact that we exist is proof that life can arise on planets, if it can happen here then it can happen elsewhere. Assuming we are the only life in the universe is ridiculous, in my opinion. Your narrow mindedness is unbelievable. Why you believe a civilization would have to have started at the same time as us, and developed at the same rate, I don't know. I'm beginning to wonder if you understand what "logical" or "scientific" mean. It is neither logical or scientific to assume something does not exist simply because we haven't witnessed it. As others have pointed out, up until recently we hadn't discovered any extra-solar planets. Does that mean they didn't exist until we spotted them?
|
|
|
Post by Bill Thompson on Sept 18, 2007 10:38:39 GMT -4
If they are not advanced, for how long are you implying they have remained unadvanced? A few hundred thousand years? You're assuming (you seem to do that a lot) that they started at the same time as us. Maybe they got a late start, or maybe they are the second or third civilization to arise on the planet (ala Planet of the Apes). We -- and I mean our star system -- are late-comes to the stage. If life and intelligent life are common occurances in our galaxy, how do you account for all the wasted time?===== Edit It is time to revist what we call "Fermi's Paradox" Fermi realized that any civilization with a modest amount of rocket technology and an immodest amount of imperial incentive could rapidly colonize the entire Galaxy. Within ten million years, every star system could be brought under the wing of empire. Ten million years may sound long, but in fact it's quite short compared with the age of the Galaxy, which is roughly ten thousand million years. Colonization of the Milky Way should be a quick exercise.
So what Fermi immediately realized was that the aliens have had more than enough time to pepper the Galaxy with their presence. But looking around, he didn't see any clear indication that they're out and about. This prompted Fermi to ask what was (to him) an obvious question: "where is everybody?"People who do not want to believe what this shows and who want to believe that we are not alone (a charcteristic of our psyche as a species, not a characteristic of science) will come up with all sorts of far-fetched explainations. But this sounds to me EXACTly like those far-fectched explainations conspiracy theroists have. And me drawing attention to this in amature astronomy web forums is as popular as me going to a Halo Gammers website and saying that it is wrong to think of war and violence as entertaining.
|
|
|
Post by wdmundt on Sept 18, 2007 10:43:58 GMT -4
If a civilization did exist on a planet in orbit around a nearby star, and if that civilization did not use radio, how would we detect them?
|
|