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The older I get the more I start to question if intelligent life even exists on Earth.
Alien Civilisations like us extremely rare?
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Permabanned
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We've observed less than 3% of the visibile universe, we have absolutely no idea what is beyond what we can see, but it would be realistic to suspect its endless.
Here's a very good video which covers the subject:
The universe is vast, but the chances of life and even intelligent life existing could also be just as vastly small.
Soldato
That doesn't feel like a correct stat. Something like 95% of Earth is undiscovered seems true.
Soldato
Settle in and watch. Actually, you don't really need to watch as they're basically podcasts with visuals.
Soldato
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Earth could be the only place in the Universe where intelligent life has arisen says Prof Brian Cox.
I have often thought this to be so. What are you thoughts? We have never seen any evidence amongst the stars. We have been looking for a while now. While we can now identify some solar systems with planets, nothing so far has even hinted at life elsewhere yet.
Alien civilisation like us 'extremely rare' in the universe, says Brian Cox
While microbial life forms could be common, the physicist believes creatures like us are unlikely.metro.co.uk
Given the size of the universe, there is loads of life out there, some if it will be intelligent.
Let's just hope it doesn't find us.
Soldato
If we exist then many others will exist, we're not special. It's a numbers game and the numbers are astronomical.
But you're not basing this on anything other than there being a lot of planets. The chances of abiogenesis could be equally as small.
Man of Honour
Earth could be the only place in the Universe where intelligent life has arisen says Prof Brian Cox.
I have often thought this to be so. What are you thoughts? We have never seen any evidence amongst the stars. We have been looking for a while now. While we can now identify some solar systems with planets, nothing so far has even hinted at life elsewhere yet.
Alien civilisation like us 'extremely rare' in the universe, says Brian Cox
While microbial life forms could be common, the physicist believes creatures like us are unlikely.
My thoughts are that there isn't enough evidence on which to base any meaningful assessment. Which is why Brian Cox is repeatedly using phrases like "could be" and "may be". They know that they don't know.
We haven't seen any evidence of alien civilisations, true, but what we have so far is a superficial glance at a tiny fraction of space. In terms of looking for alien civilisations, we're limited to looking for deliberately broadcasted messages sent with extremely high power or an extremely high level of signal emissions. Given that more advanced technology tends to be more efficient, the latter is probably extremely unlikely. Given that using a lot of energy and resources to constantly broadcast a "Hello world" signal is both wasteful and potentially risky, the former is probably extremely unlikely too.
Then there's the issue of scale. There's enough space for dozens of civilisations in this galaxy alone with each one being undetectable to every other one.
But the key thing is that we don't know anywhere near enough to make any meaningful assessment. We don't know how life comes into existence. Maybe it's so staggeringly unlikely that it's a once in a galaxy type of thing. Or maybe it's only extremely unlikely and so it's happened a million times in this galaxy alone. We don't know how life develops into complex life. In the only sample we have, it seems that just the change from prokyrotic to eukyrotic happened only once despite countless billions of opportunities and it took a couple of billion years. And that's just the first step in the development of complex life. But a sample size of 1 isn't enough to make a meaningful assessment of the odds. There are many other factors too. A couple of examples...the structure of the solar system is crucial to Earth being inhabitable. If it wasn't for the outer gas giants (especially Jupiter), Earth would be hit by impactors a lot more often. Would that make it impossible for conditions to be stable enough for long enough for complex life to exist? Maybe. Maybe not. How can you tell from a sample size of 1? Or Earth's ludicrously oversized moon. It's vastly more massive than would be expected for a planet with Earth's mass. It's probably extremely unusual in that respect. It plays an important role in maintaining stable conditions on Earth. A less massive moon couldn't have as much effect.
We don't really have a clue. We don't even know what all the relevant factors are, let alone how to evaluate them and their interactions. Anything other than "may be might be could be" is more a matter of belief than a matter of evidence and reasoning. Maybe there are a billion civilisations. Maybe just us. Maybe there were others in the past that no longer exist. Maybe anything. We don't really have a clue.
Do you know anyone who assumes that we are the most intelligent life form in the universe? Certainly nobody did so in the posts before yours.
We don't even know how much of the universe is undiscovered to us because we don't know how big the universe is. Or even if it has a size.
Soldato
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Iirc isnt it einstein that gets quoted as saying "ultimately we are either alone in the universe or we are not, and both possibilities are equally terrifying"?
Tbh, the idea of other intellegent life (by our standards, let alone in forms we couldnt recognise) somewhere, somewhen, against the vastness of the universe seems very likely. if we, or they, will ever survive long enough and travel far enough to even find the skeletons of civilisation amongst the stars is a whole different question. Could well be no species ever gets beyond its home star, let alone galaxy before something manages to wipe them out.
I'd love to be around to find out one way or the other, but i know that wont happen.
Tbh, the idea of other intellegent life (by our standards, let alone in forms we couldnt recognise) somewhere, somewhen, against the vastness of the universe seems very likely. if we, or they, will ever survive long enough and travel far enough to even find the skeletons of civilisation amongst the stars is a whole different question. Could well be no species ever gets beyond its home star, let alone galaxy before something manages to wipe them out.
I'd love to be around to find out one way or the other, but i know that wont happen.
Quite a few people feel we are not alone. I think we are as good as alone and we should be more protective of our home. If there is life elsewhere, it is too far away either in time or space for it to matter to us. I doubt we will ever see evidence of this ever. I really hope we don't end up blowing ourselves up before we get the chance to be the seeds of life in the universe.
Associate
I am sure there are and have been other intelligent civilizations, but it is not just the vastness of space, but also the time, the chances of 2 civilizations coinciding in time? And space? We have been civilized for what, 300 years?
Without qantum entanglement 'Stargates' I dont forsee any organic life exiting its own solar system.
The problem of heavy ion bombardment effects on organic tissue (particularly brain processes) beyond magnetospheres may cause disconfiguration psychosis. A related problem is that genes change after only 6 months in space (NASA twin studies) so that what left a planet might not be what arrives at its destination.
The problem of heavy ion bombardment effects on organic tissue (particularly brain processes) beyond magnetospheres may cause disconfiguration psychosis. A related problem is that genes change after only 6 months in space (NASA twin studies) so that what left a planet might not be what arrives at its destination.
Caporegime
I miss the good old days, when aliens visited regularly to give us anal probes. Who can complain about a free prostate exam?
The more we observe of the universe the more we seem the same patterns repeating of inhospitable and barren environments - the "default" state of the universe, so to speak, doesn't appear to be one where conditions favourable for life emerge often, it isn't zero chance as we exist but it does seem low enough a chance that it is quite conceivable even over billions of galaxies only a handful of such conditions will exist.
Man of Honour
I miss the good old days, when aliens visited regularly to give us anal probes. Who can complain about a free prostate exam?
I reckon the aliens who used to kill cows on Earth ruined the whole thing for all of us, causing their government to ban trips to Earth entirely. Even just for anal probing. Or maybe the aliens found Pornhub
Maybe a civilisation advanced enough to work around the problem of the vast distances would also be able to work around the medical problems. If such a civilisation can exist.
Man of Honour
Maybe. That's something else we don't know about life. That's a long list that starts with what life actually is. It's not as clear-cut as it might seem. We operate on the "I know it when I see it" principle, but it's not really nailed down. Hence, for example, the debate about whether or not viruses are alive.
Yes. All known life is. But that's far too small a sample size to draw conclusions from. It might be as small as 1, with all known life descending from a single lifeform and thus sharing the very basics.
5% of the universe sounds like an exceptionally large amount of universe. You sure about that.
Soldato
We don't know if our combination of circumstances is 1 in million, 1 in a gazillion, or 1 in infinity. We also don't know if intelligence can be made with other combos. We have a samples size of one right now.
The vastness of the universe that allows for seemingly infinite combinations also allows for seemingly infinite one-off's.
We seem to value life and intelligence so much that we just assume these things are important-enough outcomes that it just has to happen. It may be arrogant to assume that we are "special", but I also think it's arrogant to assume the stuff that 's "special" to us must be repeated throught the universe.
The vastness of the universe that allows for seemingly infinite combinations also allows for seemingly infinite one-off's.
We seem to value life and intelligence so much that we just assume these things are important-enough outcomes that it just has to happen. It may be arrogant to assume that we are "special", but I also think it's arrogant to assume the stuff that 's "special" to us must be repeated throught the universe.
At least as far as our current knowledge goes much of the universe is still constrained by a relatively simple set of core rules - which does limit the combinations - what we do know of the universe so far shows the same patterns repeated for instance there are only 7 main types of stars - possible 1-2 types we've not discovered yet.