Do Space Aliens really exist?

Tefal said:
Becausr of the vast didtances involved let a lone time scales.


The argument we havent seen them is pretty retarded.

Say theres 1 alien species in every galaxey.

Tbats still millions of species but wed never have rhe possibility of encountering them
Click to expand...

I didn't make up the argument; it's used to teach Astrophysics...

Say there isn't a single alien species in any galaxy. What you're talking about, and what I'm talking about, is complete speculation.

Found out what it's called: The Fermi Paradox
 
For me, the chances of existence is a futile thought. Physics has taught me that taking the agnostic view is often the clearer one. Do they exist? possibly... or even probably given some assumptions but is the question fruitful beyond a three letter answer? Not at all given the limitations that we assume.

dirtychinchilla said:
I didn't make up the argument; it's used to teach Astrophysics...

Say there isn't a single alien species in any galaxy. What you're talking about, and what I'm talking about, is complete speculation.

Found out what it's called: The Fermi Paradox
Click to expand...

If you live in Ashford, chances are we have had a drunk discussion in Staines about this at one point at The George or The Hob Goblin
 
Last edited:
dirtychinchilla said:
I didn't make up the argument; it's used to teach Astrophysics...

Say there isn't a single alien species in any galaxy. What you're talking about, and what I'm talking about, is complete speculation.

Found out what it's called: The Fermi Paradox
Click to expand...

What im saying js the argument we hevent met any is a very poor one.

For most of human history we in europe had no idea there was anyone living in america.

And thats a piddling distance compared to another galaxy

Fermi laradox is about high lrobabilites.
I gave you an incredibly low probability.
 
sityeuropa said:
Even if super advanced aliens were 20,000 light years away which is small in universe terms, If they set out on course for us and could travel close to the speed of light, it would take them 2 years to get here; however on Earth we wouldn't see them until 20,000 years from now.
Click to expand...

I'm not understanding this. If a light year is the distance light travels in one year (so, 20,000 light years would take 20,000 years at the speed of light), and the aliens were travelling to earth near that speed, surely it would take them 20,000+ years as well?

Edit: Oh, I forgot about time dilation. Silly me. Still hard to get my head around it though. :o
 
Last edited:
Remeber theres a valid argument theres only one electron in the whole universe too.

Desnt mean its right.
 
G-MAN2004 said:
I'm not understanding this. If a light year is the distance light travels in one year (so, 20,000 light years would take 20,000 years at the speed of light), and the aliens were travelling to earth near that speed, surely it would take them 20,000+ years as well?
Click to expand...

Yes it would.

Im not sure if hes talking about some kind of time dilation fkr the crew of such a ship thouhh
 
Tefal said:
Yes it would.

Im not sure if hes talking about some kind of time dilation fkr the crew of such a ship thouhh
Click to expand...

Yea he is, the speed that you travel compared to the target doesn't change but time does. Time would speed up for the crew members but the 20,000 years would still be the same for us on earth.
 
Last edited:
time dilation is a %%%%% if you travelled at c=0.9999999998 it would only take about 22years to travel across the entire milkyway (100,000 light years), but on earth a smidge over 100,000 years has passed.


Fermi paradox has lots of reasons why it might not hold true.
 
I think one of the points that may be overlooked is that given the huge number of planets in existence, there should be quite a large number of civilisations in existence if even a minuscule number of the planets have inhabitants.

Whilst I get what you're saying about Europe and America etc, you are assuming a very low level of technology there. Whilst we're making assumptions, you could assume that aliens have been around for a very long time and therefore have advanced technology etc.

I don't actually think that the Fermi Paradox means that there aren't aliens; I'm fairly confident that there are, but it's nice to have a different perspective.
 
dirtychinchilla said:
I don't actually think that the Fermi Paradox means that there aren't aliens; I'm fairly confident that there are, but it's nice to have a different perspective.
Click to expand...

Yea it doesn't, it basically concludes that we should have seen them by now given the age of the universe and the potential technological advancements of those civilisations. It doesn't really take into account our technological ceiling though, it may not be possible to fly across the galaxy so it doesn't really matter if certain civilisations have got to a level of technological proficiency beyond ours, they still won't be able to fly around galaxies, no one won't. The logical conclusion is there are civilisations as advanced as ours if not more but we will never meet.
 
Trusty said:
Yea it doesn't, it basically concludes that we should have seen them by now given the age of the universe and the potential technological advancements of those civilisations. It doesn't really take into account our technological ceiling though, it may not be possible to fly across the galaxy so it doesn't really matter if certain civilisations have got to a level technological proficiency beyond ours, they still won't be able to fly around galaxies, no one won't. The logical conclusion is there are civilisations as advanced as ours if not more but we will never meet.
Click to expand...

it doesn't really take into account age though. just because the universe and some star systems are much older, doesn't mean that they could support life. Early stars were giant and fast burning and almost certainly no good for producing stable plants needed for intelligent life, on top of that you have to wait for a certain amount of star generations to produce the heavier elements before anything can happen.
along with many other reason why Fermi paradox might not be right.
 
Last edited:
Avenged7Fold said:
I dont understand the last bit :confused:

Would knowing that somewhere outside of our reach/lifetime something exists make any difference to you?

If so, i have great religions to sell you
Click to expand...

The implications of such a happenstance would be incredible. So many questions would be answered. E.G. is life only found on Earth? Is it possible for an advanced civilisation to not destroy itself etc etc.

I'm a devout atheist so don't bother with the selling :p
 
Glaucus said:
it doesn't really take into account age though. just because the universe and some star systems are much older, doesn't mean that they could support life. Early stars were giant and fast burning and almost certainly no good for producing stable plants needed for intelligent life.
along with many other reason why Fermi paradox might not be right.
Click to expand...

No, true, the early beginnings of the universe was too hot for any life, i get that. But we're talking about billions of years, even 11 billion years after the big bang, we still have nearly 3 billion years to play with for a civilisation to accomplish galactic travel, like you said earlier, there's a lot of faults with the Fermi Paradox but it's probably correct to be fair. Where are they? :D
 
Last edited:
its not about just being hot, it would have taken many billions of years to get to life.
so no the chance of it being right is slim, there's a good chance we are towards the beginning of advanced life being possible.

then there's as said distances. which are huge. Especially when going between galaxies.
you also have the time constraint, even if advanced life arose before us, doesn't mean they became technologically advanced, didn't kill themselves at various points like atomic age, ai age etc, or that they survived for billions of years to fly between galaxies.

then you have the issue, of what are we looking for, and them looking for us, are radio waves have only just reached a few solar systems and at such a weak strength they aren't likely detectable. Same as with ETs the chance of them using such radio waves like we do is slim, as they don't stand up to the travel of such distances and are to slow for such communications.

so yeah there are literally dozens of issues with the Fermi paradox.
 
Glaucus said:
its not about just being hot, it would have taken many billions of years to get to life.
so no the chance of it being right is slim, there's a good chance we are towards the beginning of advanced life being possible.

then there's as said distances. which are huge. Especially when going between galaxies.
you also have the time constraint, even if advanced life arose before us, doesn't mean they became technologically advanced, didn't kill themselves at various points like atomic age, ai age etc, or that they survived for billions of years to fly between galaxies.

then you have the issue, of what are we looking for, and them looking for us, are radio waves have only just reached a few solar systems and at such a weak strength they aren't likely detectable. Same as with ETs the chance of them using such radio waves like we do is slim, as they don't stand up to the travel of such distances and are to slow for such communications.

so yeah there are literally dozens of issues with the Fermi paradox.
Click to expand...

Yea i understand that, Glaucus, i'm in the camp of, yes, there will be civilisations like us but they are a lot rarer than people think, I'm not in the camp of Aliens should be everywhere, Earth was extremely lucky with certain characteristics allowing life to form on this planet, from the simple stuff like being in the habitable zone to the rarer stuff of having a very large moon which contributes to a stable earth around it's orbital axis. A lot of people don't realise how fortunate we are with the sequence of events that allowed life to blossom.

Here is a book you might like. Superb read.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vital-Question-Why-life-way/dp/1781250367
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom