A new reason why we haven't heard from ET

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Message 1806768 - Posted: 3 Aug 2016, 11:32:49 UTC

A Washington Post article reports on a new study published by Cornell University, that life on Earth might be premature in the life of the Universe. Therefore most other Intelligent lifeforms have probably not have been developed yet.

WP - A new reason why we haven’t found alien life in the universe
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Message 1806804 - Posted: 3 Aug 2016, 15:07:10 UTC - in response to Message 1806768.  
Last modified: 3 Aug 2016, 15:12:12 UTC

Bah Humbug

We are not exceptional in the universe--in fact we are very ordinary in the context of trillions of possible solar systems, if fairly rare in all of the requirements. We have not heard from THEM because if they exist they are too far away to eaves drop on, and we have not had the good sense nor the luck to be able to capture and analyze a one-shot focused "We are here" type of beam;======> if in fact any were beamed in our direction.

Who payed for these "Studies" ?
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Message 1806830 - Posted: 3 Aug 2016, 17:45:44 UTC

For me, personally, it's very hard to accept any theory which states that we are the only "intelligent" lifeform in the universe.

This article has been discussed on Gizmodo also. And there I found some comments, which, in my opinion, give a much better explanation. It's nothing new, we all know it, but still it's good to have a reminder from time to time:

The article states that "we’ve sent out spacecraft deep into the reaches of our galaxy.". (that was either a typo by Gizmodo OR has been corrected later; not sure) Somebody replied to this, saying that "we have not even gotten out the door yet." Then, a user nick-named "Domicile" posted this:

Out the door? We haven’t even gotten out of bed and gotten dressed yet. The farthest man-made object is just outside of our solar system (relatively speaking). We’ve been looking for aliens in earnest for like 60 years with very primitive tech.

The universe is billions of years old and we’re surprised we haven’t found anything in the minuscule amount of time we’ve been looking? The closest star is still 4.37 light years away.

Will we ever find intelligent life outside of our solar system? Probably not, doesn’t mean it’s not out there. It’s so hard to comprehend just how vast the nothingness is.


And this pretty much sums it up IMO.


Also, I found this pic there. It's not really accurate, but I think it's funny while still thoughtful:



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Message 1806984 - Posted: 4 Aug 2016, 8:38:02 UTC

Never hot-link an xkcd comic or you're gonna miss the mouse-over text:
xkcd: The Search ;)
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Message 1807053 - Posted: 4 Aug 2016, 16:51:14 UTC - in response to Message 1806830.  

For me, personally, it's very hard to accept any theory which states that we are the only "intelligent" lifeform in the universe.

This article has been discussed on Gizmodo also. And there I found some comments, which, in my opinion, give a much better explanation. It's nothing new, we all know it, but still it's good to have a reminder from time to time:

The article states that "we’ve sent out spacecraft deep into the reaches of our galaxy.". (that was either a typo by Gizmodo OR has been corrected later; not sure) Somebody replied to this, saying that "we have not even gotten out the door yet." Then, a user nick-named "Domicile" posted this:

Out the door? We haven’t even gotten out of bed and gotten dressed yet. The farthest man-made object is just outside of our solar system (relatively speaking). We’ve been looking for aliens in earnest for like 60 years with very primitive tech.

The universe is billions of years old and we’re surprised we haven’t found anything in the minuscule amount of time we’ve been looking? The closest star is still 4.37 light years away.

Will we ever find intelligent life outside of our solar system? Probably not, doesn’t mean it’s not out there. It’s so hard to comprehend just how vast the nothingness is.


And this pretty much sums it up IMO.


Also, I found this pic there. It's not really accurate, but I think it's funny while still thoughtful:



The article does not state that we are the only intelligent life in the universe but that using their hypothesis we on Earth would be one of the first intelligent lifeforms and that others will follow.
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Message 1807104 - Posted: 4 Aug 2016, 19:11:24 UTC - in response to Message 1807053.  

More nonsense. Our Earth is 5 billion years old. The Universe is 13.8 billion years old. So when do you think that solar systems were first formed; and why in an outer arm of a typical spiral galaxy would we be among the first.
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Message 1807144 - Posted: 4 Aug 2016, 22:15:33 UTC

Without additional data to determine the average age of Universes, we can't know if 13.8 billion years is young or old, so the hypothesis that we are among the first is entirely plausible. For all we know, 13.8 billion years is young, and 5 billions years for live to develop is early.
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Message 1807194 - Posted: 5 Aug 2016, 1:06:12 UTC - in response to Message 1807144.  
Last modified: 5 Aug 2016, 1:10:32 UTC

To answer our question we need to know when the first solar systems formed. I always thought that we were in a younger region of the cosmos.
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Message 1807210 - Posted: 5 Aug 2016, 1:57:35 UTC - in response to Message 1807194.  

We are indeed in a younger region. That doesn't mean we aren't a young Universe overall.

Think of it this way: say the average maximum age of a Universe is 1.2 octillion years old. Our Universe is only 13.8 billion years old, which would be considered quite young compared to the maximum age. Now, in these other Universes, let's say life doesn't typically evolve on average until their trillionth year. Our life evolving "only" 8.8 billion years after the formation of our Universe, we could be quite young.

So even though we might be in a younger region of our Universe, that doesn't automatically mean life must exist in the older parts if it isn't typical for life to develop that early in the formation of a given Universe.

Hence, like I said, we have no other datum to go off of to say for certain that life should exist out there already. All we truly know is compared to the rest of our own Universe, we are in a younger section. That really doesn't tell us much at all, in my opinion.
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Message 1807235 - Posted: 5 Aug 2016, 6:19:16 UTC

You need "metal rich" systems to have formed before life could exist. And from memory I believe the first of these was about 10 billion years ago.
To go from, only Hydrogen with some Helium stars to metal rich stars takes at least three generations.
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Message 1807238 - Posted: 5 Aug 2016, 6:28:21 UTC - in response to Message 1807210.  

Life started about 1 billion years after the formation of the earth. Intelligent life started less than 5 billion years after the formation of the earth. So when were the first rocky planets in a habitable zone started ? I presume that there would be many such planets with more or most of the requirements for intelligent life to form. I say this since there are 100 billion galaxies. We also need to ask can we detect intelligence now or ever from distances of millions of light years away. We therefore must assume that intelligent life existed millions of years ago.. Seems like a concatenation of unknowable facts.
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Message 1807594 - Posted: 6 Aug 2016, 18:32:33 UTC

OzzFan, are you talking about parallel universes?
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Message 1807642 - Posted: 6 Aug 2016, 23:41:10 UTC

On the one hand a lot of conditions are necessary for a planet circling a star to evolve life to the point we are at now. I'd say the biggest condition after presence of water is a low level of harmful radiation countered by a plentiful level of helpful radiation, primarily heat energy. So the most likely places to look are on the fringes of a galaxy.

On the other hand even though the odds of any given system having the right conditions are low the fact that there are billions of stars in the milky way alone makes it almost a sure thing that we are not alone. Unfortunately the distances involved also make the probability of us detecting other intelligent life very low at this time.
Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.
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Message 1808611 - Posted: 11 Aug 2016, 22:55:25 UTC - in response to Message 1807594.  

OzzFan, are you talking about parallel universes?


Not exactly. Much in the same way there's the Drake Equation in regards to the possibility of alien life, I'm talking about gathering enough information to put together an equation and recognizing missing variables and unknowns, that I think it would be premature to waive off the possibility that we just might be among the first intelligent life in the Universe, or at least our galaxy.

I most certainly can be wrong, and I'm not advocating that the assertion is true. I'm merely stating that I think it's just as plausible as any other explanation at this point in time. I like to think that in science, we accept all possible outcomes and scenarios until we slowly whittle down the unknowns.
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Message 1808667 - Posted: 12 Aug 2016, 6:30:34 UTC - in response to Message 1807642.  

It is also possible that a planet where intelligent life can develop might also need a moon or several, to stabilise the wobble and enable seasons.
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Message 1808677 - Posted: 12 Aug 2016, 8:05:20 UTC - in response to Message 1808611.  
Last modified: 12 Aug 2016, 8:06:49 UTC

It's OK to think that we are the most advanced civilization or form of life within listening distance from us.

I posit that it is less likely that we are the most advanced or only civilization in the entire universe. I refuse to believe that we are the oldest solar system in the cosmos as well.

In spite of those charlatans that say they are sure we will achieve contact with one of these other alien civilizations within the next 20 years, I suggest that we may very well never know if any of these assertions are correct.

We may be participating in a fool's game; yet, I and others still play the Lottery.
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Message 1808767 - Posted: 12 Aug 2016, 20:34:50 UTC - in response to Message 1808667.  

It is also possible that a planet where intelligent life can develop might also need a moon or several, to stabilise the wobble and enable seasons.



Are we able to determine if one of the Kepler-found planets has a moon?
The mind is a weird and mysterious place
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Message 1808800 - Posted: 12 Aug 2016, 23:26:28 UTC - in response to Message 1808767.  
Last modified: 12 Aug 2016, 23:35:19 UTC

Anyway Gordon, if I could be using your first name.

Astronomy is supposed to be a subject and in fact it is one of the oldest of all sciences.

Compare with a subject like superstition.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstition

One thing is supposed to be science, while another may perhaps be not so.

I was going to post a little more about this at BOINC, but am still not finished with the post yet.

Some people are dealing with the subject of ufology as being part of their lives.

Experiences being gained by some people may suggest that one part of our lives, or maybe world, could be related to phenomena out of the ordinary, sometimes called paranormal phenomena.

Is the possibility or likelihood of perhaps believing in a certain thing or phenomena always supposed to be related to the fact that some or many people are either naive, or may be lacking a knowledge or insight when it comes to a couple of things?

Being able to prove or deduce that other stars other than our sun are having planets definitely should be viewed as a scientific achievement and possibly a milestone.

For now I lost the exact wording or phrase here, but it goes something like you need to crack an egg in order to have fried eggs for your dinner.

A similar wording is that a bear needs to be shot in order for its skin or leather to be sold.

Look up the subject "crooked things" in the Wikipedia in order to see what you get.

Paranormal and methaphysical phenomena like dreams, hallucinations, dreams and the like are supposed to be related with your brain and not always about reality.

If you did not know, the planet Mercury has still to be 100 % charted or mapped, but at least we know what its composition and features are.

If I rather asked the question about whether or not any water is present on the planet Venus, the answer probably would need to be looked up.

I happened to be using Google Maps today on the city of Seattle, Washington state, U.S.A.

A landmark there is the Space Needle.

If I happened to know that the discovery of the Americas were some 500 years old of age, I probably would take such a structure for granted.

Why not rather ask the question about how the Earth and Moon were being formed?

Is it not the fact that we take such things like evolution and even the equations making up the laws of nature for granted, even though we may not be able to see a possible creator, or recognize the initial thought or idea behind what is thought as of being creation?

What is the difference between creation and evolution?

Is it possible to explain at least one thing in a given way and not necessarily another?

God, as being an entity, is sometimes also called the "Holy spirit".

Albert Einstein came up with the words or phrase "God does not play with dices", because he was an atheist and nothing else.

Evolution tells the fact that things are changing because of an environment which is doing the same.

The Uncertainty Principle tells that certain things may not be computed in advance, because the observation alone is affecting the motion or properties of the object being observed.

If I could accept the fact that the Earth is not flat, I could also believe the fact that other planets could be present around other stars in the Milky Way.

If I ever happened to be a skeptic or even debunker, rather a believer, would such a thing always be dealing with matters related to the subject of religion?

Is science supposed to be banal or corny, or maybe naive only because a couple or certain things may not be up for discussion (like the subject of ufology)?

Are you able to measure or value a couple or certain things related to science, only because you are able to come up with a couple of terms or words (methodology, logic, axioms) which makes it possible to explain a given thing and next measure it against something else?

In my opinion there is always a difference between a genius or an idiot, even though the latter may still be taking your questions.

Some people choose to "believe", while other choose not to be doing such a thing.

Is this still supposed to be about the subject of religion, or could it rather be something else?
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Message 1808808 - Posted: 13 Aug 2016, 1:59:14 UTC
Last modified: 13 Aug 2016, 2:04:33 UTC

There are rumors that the ESO telescope at La Silla, Chile, has found a rocky planet orbiting Proxima Centauri at a distance of 4.23 light years. The result should be confirmed within August.
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Message 1808850 - Posted: 13 Aug 2016, 9:39:54 UTC - in response to Message 1808808.  

This potentially could be very interesting. I have always felt that we should be concentrating on our nearest neighbor. Perhaps we should beam a message to this group of stars.
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