Aliens?

[Rich Boy Rob]

lmao, i wonder how the government would react to inter species mingling. what if you had a baby with an alien? would they take it away for experimentation? could we sue them? would you send it to school with all the earthlings or would it be segregation all over again?

Well assuming that our outer space cousins even have a genetic structure, let alone sex organs or bi-parental reproduction (a term I made up on the spot), I think that the government probably would take it away from you, dead or alive. As for suing them, as there is no law that forbids alien/hybrid abduction and human rights would hardly apply. Segregation wise, even if it wasn't official, imagine how much society would judge and look down a woman who had done dirty with an alien.

 

[Stratos99]

i was poking fun at the idea. though i do think alien sex should be regarded the same as regular sex with a human because equality and all that noise!

 

[Livewire]

Well assuming that our outer space cousins even have a genetic structure, let alone sex organs or bi-parental reproduction (a term I made up on the spot), I think that the government probably would take it away from you, dead or alive. As for suing them, as there is no law that forbids alien/hybrid abduction and human rights would hardly apply. Segregation wise, even if it wasn't official, imagine how much society would judge and look down a woman who had done dirty with an alien.

That scenario kinda reminds me of District 9. o.o I can't imagine that an Alien/human hybrid would be looked on in a positive light, seeing as we're very good at hating our own kind. :/

 

[sab]

I think that there must be life somewhere else in the galaxy. About them having super advanced technology, I doubt it. Think of all the other life forms on THIS planet that aren't even able to add numbers. And about us meeting up with them, I that even more astronomical. We would probably be the ones to discover them, and they would most likely have no more thn one cell. Aliens yes. Science fiction though will probably stay just that, fiction.

 

[Livewire]

I think that there must be life somewhere else in the galaxy. About them having super advanced technology, I doubt it. Think of all the other life forms on THIS planet that aren't even able to add numbers. And about us meeting up with them, I that even more astronomical. We would probably be the ones to discover them, and they would most likely have no more thn one cell. Aliens yes. Science fiction though will probably stay just that, fiction.

I agree, sometimes I do think Science fiction has warped our perceptions of extraterrestrial life and the universe, but until we know for sure, I think it's best to leave all the options on the table. They might be very advanced, they might not, but I don't see why they couldn't be as advanced as us, at least.

 

[Master Bait]

So, with this "New Life" bacteria thing, and new documents that are about to be posted on wikileaks about UFO sightings... what are your thoughts on the possibility of aliens existing, and the chance that we will meet them? What do you think our governments will do?



Me: I love space, and science fiction, but what we know of space so far is really boring. I'm not 100% sure if I even want aliens to exist, but they're our best bet for advancing to science-fiction-like technology in my lifetime. Overall, I seriously doubt that they do exist, (although, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they do) but it would be a dream come true for me if we do meet up with some. The changes to our society would be incredible, just from being able to confirm their existence. As for what we would actually do... (Actually... isn't there already some protocol for that?)

Kind of hoping for some actual discussion, and not just 1 line answers, so that's why I'm posting in Other Chat.

I think aliens exists however I doubt that they have those advanced techno stuff. At this generation it's impossible to find one since our technology isn't that far advanced yet. Maybe when hyper-drive technology is invented.

 

[sab]

I agree, sometimes I do think Science fiction has warped our perceptions of extraterrestrial life and the universe, but until we know for sure, I think it's best to leave all the options on the table. They might be very advanced, they might not, but I don't see why they couldn't be as advanced as us, at least.

They very well may have advanced techno no-how, but I still find it very unlikely. People back in the 70s said we would all have our own jetpacks by this time, but we don't. The problem is that it is just not cost efective, and it is naive to belive that people as a whole will act unselfishly, for the benifit of the community. Because of that it would be VERY foolish to think that we would adapt, and all have that technology.

 

[BenjiTheKid]

I would say it's definitely possible. We are certainly not the only planet in the universe. Or the only solar system, for that matter. Why wouldn't it be possible for at least one more planet with life to exist? I don't think it's like... science fiction, though. They could be developed, sure. But the stereotypical alien? I doubt it exists.

 

[Richard Lynch]

Copy pasta from the last thread on this (in addition to below, however, this scientific proof of life being able to exist in completely different forms (arsenic based), makes it even more likely to be life out there).

Okay, just a little bit of math here for you. Nothing complex, just basic multiplication and division.

Okay, so we have like 100 billion stars in a galaxy on average (the Milky Way is predicted to have between 100 billion and 400 billion stars, and some galaxies have less than this (and some have much more) so we'll be conservative and just for the sake of argument assume the average is just 100,000,000,000 stars).

Now, with our current technology we're pretty certain there are at least 50 billion galaxies out there, although estimates are that there are FAR more. Just for the sake of argument let's say there are only 50 billion galaxies (even though the real number is likely to be more than double this amount). Now, by multiplying these two numbers together (100 billion stars per galaxy where there are 50 billion galaxies), we get a total of 5 x 10^21 stars (or 5,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, that's 5 sextillion stars).

Of course, not every star system has planets on it, however it's thought to be very common for stars to have planets in orbit around them. Let us assume that only... one in a million stars has a planetary system (that's being very conservative). And to keep things simple, let's assume that every one of these solar systems has only one planet, even though they're likely to have more (remember our Solar System has eight). So divide the number of stars by the number of stars with a planet (1 in a million, so by a million) and we have 5 x 10^15 planets in the universe (or 5,000,000,000,000,000, that's 5 quadrillion planets).

Also not every planet is capable of supporting life, so let's say 1 in a million planets is capable of supporting life (so only one planet in every million is capable of supporting life, that's a low estimate). So all up we have 5 x 10^9 planets that can support life (or 5,000,000,000, that's 5 billion planets).

So get this - 5 billion planets in the universe are capable of supporting life according to this little math thingy. Let's remember that we've assumed a lower number of galaxies than there actually is, a lot lower number of planets than there is thought to be and a lower amount of planets capable of supporting life than there probably is. 5 billion planets is a much smaller estimate than probable, but even then - five billion planets! You can't look at that and say that there is NO life out there.

There's a few problems though. How common is life, exactly? The most accepted theory to the beginning of life was that it was an accident, that amino acids that had been moving around for a long, long period of time happened to collide in the right way and that started a chain reaction that gave birth to life. How likely would this be to happen? And then on top of this, we need to figure out if life would even evolve past bacteria and single-cell organisms. I don't know exactly, but I think it was like 2 and a half billion years for us to evolve from cells. Stars don't last forever and that 2 and a half billion years has taken up a lot of our sun's lifetime. What if life hadn't evolved far enough before its local star died? Also, what if life hadn't evolved on a particular planet enough to be considered intelligent or self aware?

Also, if there are intelligent aliens somewhere else in the universe, it's likely that they are far more advanced than we are. I mean, what are the chances that all advanced civilisations are progressing at the same rate we are and at the same time (in the same tens of thousands of years or whatever)? Our medical advancements have been amazing, what if these other life forms have found the secret to practically being immortal? The point I'm making is, if there is advanced life, why haven't we come in contact with them yet? Surely if they're that advanced they would have figured out a way to travel great distances in a short amount of time by now. Are they avoiding contact with us? Is it inevitable that intelligent life destroys itself before it is advanced enough to contact extra-terrestrial life?

Despite the points against there being intelligent life, I do believe there is intelligent life out there. Think of how big the universe is, how many stars, how many galaxies... it'd just be weird if we were the only race.

(Now I expect to get *shot* by Mizan or another science person if I got something wrong)

Deja vu!

As I think I responded the first time, what you just did is a more drawn out version of the Drake Equation, which may or may not be a crap equation. It's statistically intuitive, but I think it holds some logical merit.

In my opinion, it's stupid not to believe there's life out there. I think this has been covered to death, so I'll leave it at that. On the other hand, about visitation (an encounter of the Third Kind) I find next to impossible. The amount of time and (scientific) energy to travel to another solar system, let alone another galaxy, is tremendous to the point of being ridiculous.

However, I don't dismiss the possibility completely. The 1st Law of Arthur C. Clarke goes something like, "Any sufficiently advanced form of technology is indistinguishable from magic". So that only leaves one question... who knows?

 

[Yume Tsuki]

The galaxy is huge. There is also a planet discovered many lightyears away from ours with the same sort of climate.

So I say, there must be something out there. The chance is pretty huge.

 

[Alakazam17]

XD As others have said, I'll basically repeat my thoughts from the previous thread(s).

In my opinion, the question is not whether aliens exist(which, given the size of universe, which scientists recently proved has three times as many planets as we previously believed, is pretty much definite). The real question is whether or not beings from another world have at any point, past or present, set foot on Earth. Now, there are many UFO sightings and incidents of a supposedly extraterrestrial nature, but still no solid evidence that has been realeased to the public(or possibly to any of the world's governments either). Many of these could very well be hoaxes, and the remainder, while intriguing, still don't prove anything. UFO's could be secret military operations, celestial objects playing tricks with our minds, or something else entirely. I've also read about the possibility that instead of aliens, some of these occurrences may be caused by future humans capable of travelling back in time. In which case the idea of aliens visiting Earth is moot, as it will remain to be until the day we see one for ourselves. And if they have visited our planet, I don't blame them for hiding themselves. Humans have persecuted themselves for things like skin colour, gender, religious belief, and sexual orientation, to name a few. Reason tells me that any aliens we make contact with would be exponentially different from any of these factors, making me fear that humanity will go ahead and repeat its own history yet again. =/

So, aliens exist, though the question of whether they've been to Earth is still debatable. But the bigger question is still how will humans, as a collective people, handle it?

 

[Yume Tsuki]

XD As others have said, I'll basically repeat my thoughts from the previous thread(s).

In my opinion, the question is not whether aliens exist(which, given the size of universe, which scientists recently proved has three times as many planets as we previously believed, is pretty much definite). The real question is whether or not beings from another world have at any point, past or present, set foot on Earth. Now, there are many UFO sightings and incidents of a supposedly extraterrestrial nature, but still no solid evidence that has been realeased to the public(or possibly to any of the world's governments either). Many of these could very well be hoaxes, and the remainder, while intriguing, still don't prove anything. UFO's could be secret military operations, celestial objects playing tricks with our minds, or something else entirely. I've also read about the possibility that instead of aliens, some of these occurrences may be caused by future humans capable of travelling back in time. In which case the idea of aliens visiting Earth is moot, as it will remain to be until the day we see one for ourselves. And if they have visited our planet, I don't blame them for hiding themselves. Humans have persecuted themselves for things like skin colour, gender, religious belief, and sexual orientation, to name a few. Reason tells me that any aliens we make contact with would be exponentially different from any of these factors, making me fear that humanity will go ahead and repeat its own history yet again. =/

So, aliens exist, though the question of whether they've been to Earth is still debatable. But the bigger question is still how will humans, as a collective people, handle it?

True. Humanity will either try to make peace right away or try to, find the aliens orgins to swiftly claim new territory as theirs. They also might look diffrent of course. That will also be pretty much of a problem because there are still many humans who don't accept other humans to be alive... :l

 

[Kishijoten]

]Aliens are inhuman beings some people have a strong belief on. On the other hand, it goes the same way with other inhuman beings. For example, one may go against or stand up against, and debate against inhuman beings on whether their existence is real or just a rumor. Same goes with aliens, because their isn't any official proof on these creatures people call "alien"...Surly there aren't any official right or wrong answer for this kind of topic.

 

[zoo3891]

I believe that there are aliens, our universe is probably either Infinite or close to it, and it would be a miracle if humans are the only living, breathing, feeling thing in the vast universe. Especially if the universe existed forever, something like us has to have, is, or will exist. Maybe not in a human form, or not even in an animal form, but something intelligent. My greatest fear however is that they do exist but they have a violent nature, every animal on earth does.

 

[gollumcaprio]

I believe in aliens. It seems completely ridiculous to me that there is only one tiny, insignificant blue in the room, that life has developed dot.
As for intelligent life, I am sure that out there too, but much, much farther away, like on another galactic arm to the minimum. That is the reason why I think we have not always made first contact with extraterrestrial life: sheer distance. I think the signals we've sent into space can only travel at the speed of light, so that even the earliest radio wave scattering only 100 odd light years away from now on was that nothing in reality.

 

[Cruelty And The Beast]

I don't think that the size of the Universe necessarily means that there has to be intelligent life out there, we really don't know enough about all the variables involved to make a decision like this. I remain open to possibility but generally I tend to assume that they don't exist and will continue to until I'm provided with something more than simply incidental evidence.

 

[Livewire]

I don't think that the size of the Universe necessarily means that there has to be intelligent life out there, we really don't know enough about all the variables involved to make a decision like this. I remain open to possibility but generally I tend to assume that they don't exist and will continue to until I'm provided with something more than simply incidental evidence.

The size of the universe does matter though.

The Drake Equation. Basically it means this.

The age of the universe and its vast number of stars suggest that if the Earth is typical, extraterrestrial life should be common. Based on that, since there are millions upon millions of planets in the universe that have earthlike properties, their should be life there also. I doubt life only sprouted up on one planet, out of millions. The probability of us being alone is low.

 

[Otherworld9)]

Aliens Life is out there

It is pretty obvious life is out there. Billions of stars and planets in one galaxy, and thousands of galaxies in this universe. Scientists say that the cosmos might include billions of life debris. Who doesn't think life exist out there? Humans cannot create such pyramids at the time, nor nazca lines, nor could weird hyroglyphics (bad spelling) in pyramids and such. They might not need to live on oxygen at all if you think about it.

 

[Livewire]

Humans cannot create such pyramids at the time, nor nazca lines, nor could weird hyroglyphics (bad spelling) in pyramids and such.

I was waiting for somebody to mention this.

The history books say the Pyramids were built in 20 years, and there are 2.3 million blocks in the Great Pyramid alone. By that math, a stone would have to be cut from it's quarry, moved to the build site, and set into place every nine seconds, which is impossible.

Also, same thing applies to the Nazca lines. Too big.

And the hieroglyphs at Dendara/Saqquara, where there is a 2,000 hieroglyph of a Helicopter.

 

[Alice]

^ They had thousands of slaves working being literally worked to death. I don't see why that would be impossible.