If you were the representative of a reasonably intelligent alien race, would you want to make contact with our civilisation?
I want to keep it at arm's length, and I'm part of it...
No, Im beginning to be convinced that while microbial life may be common either there are not many intelligent lifeforms in the Galaxy
If you were the representative of a reasonably intelligent alien race, would you want to make contact with our civilisation?
I want to keep it at arm's length, and I'm part of it...
Consider the number of billion to one coincidences that have got the Earth and us to where we are.
The planet is at exactly the right distance from the right kind of star.
Early in the planets existence we gained a very large satellite.
This has given us a tilted, stable rotation.
Thus there is liquid water. There are seasons. There are marginal conditions because we have tides and weather. This has not only allowed life to start, but the changing marginal conditions have allowed and encouraged evolution.
Along the way, there have been various planetary catastrophes that have rearranged evolution by changing conditions radically.
Humans, as such, have only been around for the last million or so years out of the two and a half or so billion since lifeforms existed. We have had radio communication for just over 100 of those several million years.
So, if you figure that a radio signal takes about 100,000 years to cross just our galaxy, and if someone over there notices it and replies by return, it would be between 50 and 200,000 years before the reply turned up, depending on distance, so the chances of anybody noticing anybody else are slender, bearing in mind that we don't know how long we can keep our present technological age going. If chance has allowed another planet with life forms capable of compatible technology to exist, what are the chances of ours and theirs existing in a matching time frame that would allow any form of actual communication?
Right on the money there Malcolm! I never understood why anyone got enthusiastic of finding or being found by another intelligent life form since the possibility is so remote as to be non existant. Iif we did pick up some message from deep space, it would be so old that the origin probably blinked out eons ago... forget it chaps, it ain't happening. I think we truly need to get our house in order at this end first before we could even consider moving out inhabiting anywhere else in any case, this little globe is in a bit of a state.
HmmmmOrder the Beef its a good talker.
I'm off to the restaurant at the end of the universe! :-))
If this timescale is transferred to the start of the Galaxy, intelligence should have appeared long before the earth was formed ie over 4.5 billion years ago. That intelligence would also be more advanced than us given the timescales.
In that time even if there was only one intelligent lifeform, it could colonise the entire galaxy even travelling at sub light speed in approximately 50 million years tops. They could send out von nuemann or bracewell probes if they didnt want to go themselves. We've already sent a kind of von Nuemann probe out in the Pioneer and Voyager crafts.
We dont see evidence of Dyson Spheres, von Nuemann or Bracewell probes, evidence to confirm other intelligence.
We dont see or hear them because there's no one sending them.
But what if we are "seedlings" of these older and more advanced planets? Why is the "homo-sapien" so different from the rest of Earths species? It could, possibly, be that "we" did get here from "elsewhere". Prove or disprove. No way of knowing. BY.
George Stephenson miners safety lamp{:-{ {:-{
As opposed to The Davy lamp that was used over
the rest of UK
Yours Aye
Ned
Quite right Brian, where do Geordies come from ? {:-{Well obviously not from where you come from. Even the great Merlin is reputed to originate from Carlisle. And, yes, the Lambton Worm still exists in the folk-lore of "up here". You lot down south only have bogey-men to scare your kids with. And what modern child is going to be scared of what comes out of its nose? The Lambton Worm is just biding its time.
I can think of no sound ,more rewarding,than that of,the skirl o"the pipes by a piper who knows what he,s, doing,
Wullie
If the Galaxy is teeming with intelligent life, where are they all? If there are civilisations thousand's or hundreds of thousands of years older than us, we should be able to see some sign of them? We should be able to pick up their radio chatter, they should have sent out the said von Nuemann or Bracewell probes. If there are that many other civilisations out there, there must be at least one or two who want to talk to us?
SteamboatI have heard of them and even heard some as well as the great Lambeg Ulster drums but,
You've never heard of the Irish and the Welsh War Harps which were said to be able to shatter weapons and split Shields
Or the North American Indian War Drums ????? Then of course there there were the Celtic and Pict Clarion War Horns
Freebooter
Wullie,and every day the Paperboy brings more %%
They are keeping me off the grass - PF again :}
Tolkien's work was intended, according to himself, as a home made mythology using the various bits of folk tales from the various races that made up the population of the UK.
Specifically, it was intended to provide a mythology for the English. He noted that most other races had a mythology, through which they celebrated their national identities, but the English did not seem to have one. The Germanic tribes and Scandinavians celebrated heroic struggle - Celtic mythology is full of magic and poetry, but the English seemed to be down-to-earth with no higher aspirations at all. Cf T H White, or see http://www.tolkien-online.com/tolkien-and-mythology.htmlJust to make you cringe a little more Dodgy,..I noticed in the news this week, that Peter Jackson,is looking to screen test,John & Edward Grimes better known as "Jedward"for the parts of the twin Hobbits Fili & Kili in the film The Hobbit,i wonder who he will get to play,Bifur,Bofor,Bombur,Dori,Ori Nori,Oin, Gloin,Balin,Dwalin,and Thorin Oakenshield, {-)
"..Tolkien had great interest, as he once wrote to a reader, “in mythological invention, and the mystery of literary creation”. As a scholar of mythology, Tolkien was also quite aware, as he went on to write in the same letter, that “[England] had no stories of its own, not of the quality that I sought, and found in legends of other lands”..."
So he drafted a mythology for the English. It told a story of a peaceful, inward-looking, rather pompous, class and family oriented race (the Hobbits/English) who nevertheless could rise to heroism of a high order when the situation demanded it, and who would then return to their little arguments about whose garden was better and what the neighbours were thinking. That is why the short coda at the end of the Lord of the Rings is there, why it is so important to the structure of the whole book, and why the recent film of the book ruins the entire work by leaving it out, on the grounds that there is no heroism and special effects in it.
I can't expect American Producers to understand literary structures - I think Saul Zaentz has a lot to answer for here, but I did hope for more from a Kiwi. I suppose it was pressure from New Line, though we must be thankful that Miramax did not fund it - they wanted a single film! Tolkein was right to refuse any film to be made of LOTR during his lifetime, no matter how rich he would have become...
"twin Hobbits"..Oops I meant say twin Dwarves, {-)
Wullie
You're absolutely right,I find London to be one of the loneliest cities on the planet, populated by some who still think they're living in the middle ages...
1610 rocks!
But recently I've been doing some reading about Fermi's Paradox. This lead me to read up on the Rare Earth hypothesis, von Nuemann and Bracewell probes. Wish I hadnt now! If you start reading up on these subjects, your faith (if that's the right word) in ET being out there somewhere must surely take a hammering.The simplest answer to the negativity of where they are, if they exist, is the zoo hypothesis. The Earth's in quarantine, perhaps studied, perhaps not, by an advanced alien culture who know the damage that is done by advanced cultures meeting more backward ones like ours.
Did you mean 1610 BC and Santorini?!
Yes, not altogether convinced by Rohl's new chronology but he makes an intriguing case and there certainly seem to be some major anomalies contained within the traditional interpretation.
Colin
Fact is, we really don't know what the conditions for life are so saying 'well only so many planets orbiting certain kinds of stars can produce it' is fallacious. Certainly, we can assume that our conditions, when replicated, could produce similarly advanced civilizations, but that doesn't mean they WILL and it doesn't mean civilizations could arise through other conditions.
Life is an incredible rarity if it exists outside Earth. So far it seems only one of our nine planets supports ANY life, and it has taken millions of years for that life to reach the point where it was even able to form the mental concept of extraterrestrial life.
The universe is like an enormous ocean and we are in a tiny boat in a storm, trying to hear the sound of someone else shouting.
Yes, it's very hard to keep up with things, especially when you are essentially a layman who is not in a position to either confirm or refute some of the more abtruse statements being made by both sides to support their positions. All you can do is stand on the sidelines and form a general impression. Mine is that there is still a lot to come out of the chronology argument and if it is eventually settled to the satisfaction of most people then, whatever the outcome, we are going to see some major reassessments of current assumptions which are likely to be very interesting indeed....
Colin
But we do have alien species. And they are living in our midst. Copenhagen would appear to be the favoured meeting place.
Bit biblical, but you'll find me there...
Not really an answer to that one! Nice one Bluetit. But next time.....leave me alone,and no more stupid "jokes".Merry Christmas Bryan, I thought the meeting place for Aliens was at Tynemouth Model Boat Club {-) {-)[/glow]
One huge problem with your argument is the timescale. True, we don't see evidence of other intelligences probing and reporting on us. But you're talking over a 4.5b year timescale for this planet, and we're a very short-lived life form on those timescales. If you wanted to keep tabs on a planet forming you might check it once every 0.5m years. Close investigation might be once every 100,000 years. Why should we expect to see something in the time we have been looking - about 100 years? Or, if you only count the SETI monitoring, about 30 years...
What did you expect,?...this is Mayhem,and we do what we do best,about every angle has been covered,regarding,"your initial post"so a little diversion was on the cards,I,would say you,ve done very well to have got 80 odd replies,..some people post,and never get a sausage, {:-{ {-) %%
Wullie
You could also argue that the subject has been distilled from pure conjecture down to the practical nitty gritty.
I may be interested in ancient civilisations but I can stll look up into the night sky and wonder - especially when the bl***y streetlight is off. I was in Sardinia in
September and returning to our accommodation at night it was pitch black and you could see the whole Milky Way stretching across the sky. Magic.
I also like to read science fiction - especially Space Opera.
So we are not all unimaginative.
Colin
So we can confidently say there is no species which has the technology to travel faster than light nor create wormhole travel.
{/quote]
Yes!If any had survived to be technically superior to ourselves, they would at least attempt to{/quote]
harness the power of their sun ie build a dyson sphere
explore the galaxy in their own spacecraft or
spent out exploratory probes ie von Neumann probes or Bracewell probes.
Not neccesarily. The other option - cheaper in terms of both technology and energy - is to create a Matrix-like alternative reality as their culture develops , and to spend their days playing World of Warcraft version MXXL! online, and leaving physical exploring to others.
As a species, WE might be twent/thirty years from true AI, and from a bioligical existence that exploration becomes "unnecessary" when confronted by online/alternative reality opportunities.
Andy :-)
I dont see where you get the pure conjecture from. All I have written on this subject is science fact. There is no conjecture there (apart from my one use of the word!). I dont question your interest in acient civilisations or sci fi etc. But I wouldnt take a thread you may start on those subjects into one of is there life out there?
{/quote]
Not neccesarily. The other option - cheaper in terms of both technology and energy - is to create a Matrix-like alternative reality as their culture develops , and to spend their days playing World of Warcraft version MXXL! online, and leaving physical exploring to others.
As a species, WE might be twent/thirty years from true AI, and from a bioligical existence that exploration becomes "unnecessary" when confronted by online/alternative reality opportunities.
Andy :-)
The connection is that a lot of people have used selective information from ancient civilisations to postulate that there is an alien influence which is why the topic has expanded somewhat.
As has also been posted, there is no direct evidence to suggest that there are any other concurrent civilisations out there so to suggest that there is a likelihood that there may be is just conjecture at the moment. May be right, may be wrong.
There is also the possibility that although we are not alone, the rarity of intelligence and the sheer vastness of the universe will conspire to make the chances of any actual contact so remote as to be effectively impossible.
Colin
I think that something we are overlooking is the true dimension of scale both in distance and time. As humans we can barely comprehend the vast distances and timescales on which the universe operates. To compare it to an ant trying to understand the human civilisation on earth goes nowhere by comparison. There may be signals traversing the heavens but on such a scale that a human lifetime is insufficient to even detect them.
As a very inadequate example, if you are on a flight to your holiday abroad you might fly over the Alps and other terrain. As you look down you can see the effects of water erosion carving valleys and river deltas. They look just like what you might see on a beach as the tide goes out and water carves patterns in the sand as it flows down the beach. It's all exactly the same, just on a different scale. And the scale of the universe by comparison is infinitely larger.
It may be that the Human race is simply on too small a scale to be able to make meaningful observations. Just like that ant but far, far smaller.
Colin
.... Now if that ant had a telescope and looked into the sky with it, it could see the aeroplane flying high above it. The ant wouldnt know what the aeorplane was unless it had a modicum of intelligence which for this argument, we'll give it. The ant now knows there's something techologically superior to anything it can make. It can now determine there is something more intelligent than it is.
And that is the best way we can search for intelligent life forms, by looking for their technology, not listening for their signals.
mine,s is Robert A Heinlein,followed by Frank Herbert,closely followed by the original author of the Bible, %%
Wullie
Of the modern authors I quite like Peter Hamilton, Alastair Reynolds and Iain Banks - the latter for his wonderful spaceship names.
Some interesting fiction centred on the ancient civilisations and Homeric period around at the moment though.
Hmmm. Heinlein - too fascist; Herbert - bit of a one shot in the shadow of Dune, and now an eco-cult figure; The Bible - well, lots of authors, some pretty dry, but Ecclesiastes, for instance, would be one of my choices for the best piece of writing ever....{:-{why am I not surprised at your responce,.... :-X
{:-{why am I not surprised at your responce,.... :-X
Wullie
...but still very much in infancy and with a very great deal to go yet all the same.
And again on the margins, there is Robert Rankin in his parallel universe Brentford, where the occasional invasion of evil aliens (who look like a younger Jack Pallance and leave a faint air of creosote behind them) must be thrust back. Compared to some, very light reading, but fun.
Harry Harrison - The Stainless Steel Rat.
And of course anything by Terry Pratchett :-)
Colin
Dear Dodgygeezer,
The whole idea is to get away from 'conventional' motion, Ion drives are a bit more than chemical drives, indeed, one will not get that far unless one can get replenishment for such...
I thought that the basic principle of space travel is that you chuck something out of the back at high velocity to make your spaceship move forward. To do that you need reaction mass which may take a number of forms. But you can't conjure something out of nothing.
Solar wind is OK but it does tend to tail off in Intergalactic space - so 'Im told!
Dilithium crystals are what you need.
Colin
ZZ, this gets to the core of my original post. Nearly everyone comes from the angle of we dont know what conditions life can exist in or it would take hundreds if not thousands of years for our signals to reach another intelligence and for them to reply. I used to be of this latter hypothesis myself until I started properly researching the subject.
The test for intelligent life existing in the galaxy is not one of can we hear their signals as SETI has been doing for years. There is a far simpler method. And that is simple observation not of radio signals, but one for artefacts or objects.
The speed of light is a law of physics. FTL travel is not possible. If it were, we'd have evidence by now of not only other species within this galaxy travelling here there and everywhere, we'd also see evidence of travellers from outside our galaxy ie Andromeda and beyond. Wormhole travel is fine in theory but again, if it were possible, we'd see evidence of wormholes opening and closing in the galaxy. But we dont.
So we can confidently say there is no species which has the technology to travel faster than light nor create wormhole travel.
Our Milky Way galaxy is some 10+ billion years old. There are an estimated 200 - 400 billions stars in the galaxy. The majority of these are not even stars similar to our own. But even if they were, statistically at least, with the age of the galaxy, some intelligent species should have arisen. Some will have anihilated themselves, some may have been anihilated by a dinosaur killing asteroid.
If any had survived to be technically superior to ourselves, they would at least attempt to
harness the power of their sun ie build a dyson sphere
explore the galaxy in their own spacecraft or
spent out exploratory probes ie von Neumann probes or Bracewell probes.
If the galaxy is teeming with life and any such intelligence had of pre existed us by just one million years, we should easily be able to observe a structure such as a dyson sphere. In fact, if the galaxy is teeming with intelligent life older than us, we should see many, many dyson spheres in every corner of the galaxy. But we dont see a single one.
If the galaxy is teeming with older intelligent life, we should have been visited many many times by these explorers. Some people assume we dont see such evidence because they want to keep us at arms length because of our aggressive insular tendencies. But, if the galaxy is teeming with life, it only takes ONE lifeform to make itself known to us. And even if amongst all this teeming older intelligence, would they all be peaceful? There's a 50 \ 50 chance some would be aggressive expansionists so keeping us at arms length wouldnt be an issue for them. But we dont see a single instance of an older intelligent lifeform.
If the galaxy was teeming with older intelligent life, we should find plenty of evidence of von Neumann or Bracewell probes. But we havent observed a single such probe.
Taken all this empirical evidence (plus the lack of a single accepted SETI candidate signal despite 40 years of looking), we can conjecture we dont see any such evidence or aliens or alien artefacts because they dont exist right now.
If they dont exist right now, that means we are the oldest most technologically advance lifeform in the galaxy right now and there's no one out there.
If the ant lived in a forest somewhere in South America, for many generations it would see nothing in the skys above it.
Then, in 1920, it might see a biplane or two, once a year. By 1960, it might see a regular stream of airliners, and in 1980 a Concorde passing by. Then the Concorde would stop, and gradually the stream of planes would get less as an economic slump occured. By 2020 it might see no planes at all, as people started to use virtual reality communications more and more.
So, over the millions of years that ants have been in existence, for a short 100 years the ant might have an opportunity to discover our civilisation with a telescope. If antkind had developed a telescope in the 1650s it would not see an aircraft even if it waited for 100 years - similarly if it developed a telescope in 2050 when we had stopped using aircraft.
Now, each ant lives for about 2 years. So very many ants will live their lives and die without being able to detect our technology. I think we would have to be incredibly lucky for an alien civilisation to be operating a technology that we could have a hope of detecting at the same time as we were actually looking, and I can't see why this vanishingly small opportunity should occur in our lifetimes....
Oh, and, Colin, who's your favourite SF author? I have a great respect for James Blish, but you don't see much of his work around anymore....
I remember.... Arthur C Clarke,s 2001 A Space Odyssey, what a double bill for a spaced out 21 year old,we came out really believing, {-) {-) {-)
Wullie
All of this is fine, but based on entirely human reasoning. Dyson's reasoning is based off an observed human behaviour, which is not a galactic constant.
Our own space program was a product of the atomic arms race and the desire to claim the ultimate 'high ground'. Note that even though technology has become more advanced, we have not returned to the moon or continued on to Mars because there is no political will to do so. An intelligent alien civilization could easily be beset with the same problems even if they are much older than us. The idea that all civilizations reach a 'utopian' age after a period of time is a fallacy.
There are more options to consider than two (full of intelligent life, or none at all). If we are talking about six or fewer civilizations around our own level, spread throughout the entire galaxy, then our search efforts are not nearly intense enough to provide evidence of their existence.
I remember going to the Cinema in 1971 to see a double bill,1st film was Erik von Danikens,Chariots of the Gods,the 2nd was Arthur C Clarke,s 2001 A Space Odyssey, what a double bill for a spaced out 21 year old,we came out really believing, {-) {-) {-)
Wullie
The monoliths in 2001 were von Neuman \ Bracewell probes. Clarke had this explanation scripted but Kubrick apparently cut from the film.
Consider the number of billion to one coincidences that have got the Earth and us to where we are.
The planet is at exactly the right distance from the right kind of star.
Early in the planets existence we gained a very large satellite.
This has given us a tilted, stable rotation.
Thus there is liquid water. There are seasons. There are marginal conditions because we have tides and weather. This has not only allowed life to start, but the changing marginal conditions have allowed and encouraged evolution.
Along the way, there have been various planetary catastrophes that have rearranged evolution by changing conditions radically.
Humans, as such, have only been around for the last million or so years out of the two and a half or so billion since lifeforms existed. We have had radio communication for just over 100 of those several million years.
So, if you figure that a radio signal takes about 100,000 years to cross just our galaxy, and if someone over there notices it and replies by return, it would be between 50 and 200,000 years before the reply turned up, depending on distance, so the chances of anybody noticing anybody else are slender, bearing in mind that we don't know how long we can keep our present technological age going. If chance has allowed another planet with life forms capable of compatible technology to exist, what are the chances of ours and theirs existing in a matching time frame that would allow any form of actual communication?
When I first watched 2001 I went with a group of acquaintances most of us were ether drunk, stoned or both, ( I was drunk). It didn't make much sense to me then and still doesn't even sober. I have found that I don't like most SF books made into films.
Regards,
Gerald
When I first watched 2001 I went with a group of acquaintances most of us were ether drunk, stoned or both, ( I was drunk). It didn't make much sense to me then and still doesn't even sober. I have found that I don't like most SF books made into films.How quickly you interject,that you were "drunk"which only reinforces my belief that you might have been the other,or both, {-) {-)
Regards,
Gerald
It didn't make much sense to me then and still doesn't even sober. I have found that I don't like most SF books made into films.
By definition:
1. The mass of the sphere will be very small compared with that of the star it encloses
2. The sphere will trap all radiation being emitted from the star
So how would you detect it?
Or is this the explanation for all the hidden "dark matter" in the universe? %)
Colin
...think of the Dyson Sphere as an engine. Main Sequence stars' peak energy outputs are in visible light. This light is utilised by the Dyson Sphere. Waste has to be emitted, and this would be as heat. So you'd want to look for point-source, infra-red bodies, emitting a substantial fraction of a star's energy.
Could someone explain to me again why a sophisticated civilisation needs a Dyson Sphere? I didn't catch it last time.
They were proposed as the natural end result of a growing alien culture's increasing energy consumption.
So it is simply a guess, based on the assumption that everything will continue to rise, and that no new energy production systems would be invented...?..........and that "they" would think like, and have, the same requirements as us?
..........and that "they" would think like, and have, the same requirements as us?
And not only would they speak English with a US accent, when the spaceships meet, they will ALWAYS be mutually the right end up.
Another rule - aliens never have either smaller heads or thinner necks.
A primitive hairy people
Just a question about looking for Dyson spheres.
A Dyson sphere is when a planetary civilisation dismantles the planets and other matter orbiting a star and uses it to build a shell around the star where lifeforms can live on the inside of the sphere.
By definition:
1. The mass of the sphere will be very small compared with that of the star it encloses
2. The sphere will trap all radiation being emitted from the star
So how would you detect it?
Or is this the explanation for all the hidden "dark matter" in the universe? %)
Colin
.... which we mere humans have only touched upon thus far......
Regards, Bernard
Now for the bigger problem.
A dyson sphere of the type proposed here - a solid sphere which would intercept all radiation from a sun - suffers from several intractible issues. It would be subject to extreme mechanical stresses, beyond theoretical limits for known or theorised materials, and worse, would be orbitally unstable.
Dyson himself never proposed such a structure for these reasons. They are completely impractical, and only exist in fictional descriptions where their various fundamental problems can be ignored. There are therfore very good engineering problems which explain why the fictional type of dyson sphere will never actually be built, no matter how capable an alien civilisation gets at matter manipulation. Dyson's explanation is here:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/citation/132/3421/252-a (subscription required) It includes the quote:
"A solid shell or ring surrounding a star is mechanically impossible. The form of 'biosphere' which I envisaged consists of a loose collection or swarm of objects traveling on independent orbits around the star."
It therefore seems to me to be unreasonable to base a belief that there are no alien civilisations on an inability to detect a particular construction which can only exist in the imagination. Mayhemers may wish to note that Dysons actual proposals involved individual energy collectors orbiting suns, that a sufficient number of these would probably modify the star's output towards the infra-red, and that the SETI study is looking, amongst other things, for such signals. SETI is ongoing and regularly reports possible sightings of interest. If someone wants to find out how long this study has been progressing, what fraction of the sky has been covered and how many items of interest have been found, we may have the basis for a more balanced opinion....
Regarding SETI's search, in 40 years not one verified candidate signal has been found. Frank Drake stated recently that if no such signal is found within the next 25 years, we would need to give serious consideration to the question of whether we were alone. Frank Drake is famous for the Drake Equation which can be used to calculate how many intelligent civilisations there are in the galaxy. Frank Drake is also a founder of SETI.
If Dr Drake shares your view that we are alone, he must have come to this conclusion quite recently. Here is part of an interview he held with Der Speigel on 12 June 2009:
" ONLINE: Mr. Drake, after searching for decades, no extraterrestrial signal has yet been found. Are we alone in the universe?
Drake: We are definitely not alone. At the same time, I think it will be very hard to find the extraterrestrials. If they are only slightly more advanced than we are, they may be using technologies that don't reveal them. Not because they are trying to hide themselves, but because of the fact that every evidence that we find of extraterrestrials has to come from some form of energy that is wasted. If they are clever, they will be using technologies that do not waste energy."
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,629411,00.html
... Nearly every exo system found to date has hot jupiters. ...... What Im saying is the evidence is mounting.....
My premise is, although there may have been past intelligent civilisations in the galaxy and may well be after we are gone, the probability is that we are the only intelligent civilisation in the galaxy right now.
Now this is the point at which I disagree. We are looking for evidence with ever-increasing sophistication.
Our early investigations really had little or no hope of finding anything. We are now just getting to the stage where we will be possibly be able to find earth-like planets, so long as all the conditions are right. Finding one will take about 3 years with Keppler.
To get to that stage, we passed through the stage of being able to find large gas giants close to their suns - hot jupiters. So of course we have found a good few of those. But the fact that we have found lots of hot jupiters does NOT mean they are more common than earths (though they may well be). It just means that our equipment can find these much more easily. We can find several hot jupiters in 6 weeks with Keppler.
So although we MAY be alone, I don't think you can say the evidence is mounting. That is misreading the evidence. We EXPECTED to find lots of gas giants first - we didn't expect that we would find an equal number of both kinds of planet with this equipment. All we can say is that the experiment is proceeding as expected...
With respect DG, I dont understand how you can really disagree with the evidence from the number of and type of exo solar systems found so far. 400 exoplanets found so far and virtually every one of these a hot jupiter ie large gasseous planets which orbit so close to their parent stars that their year is measured in upto 10 - 15 of our days.
It is simply a selection pressure. What's one of those? Well, if I stand outside Ibrox on a particular Saturday, I might be led to believe that most people on Earth wear blue. Clearly this is not the case - I've just read the data wrongly - or, rather, extrapolated a result from incomplete data.
.... the angle is so fine that to see the shadow or flicker of a planet passing between us and the star must be Millions to one at the distances we are talking about ... In fact if the plane of rotation is more than a degree or two out you might never see it...
...as for all you Astronomer Extraordinaries, and budding physicists,
All this talk about "Kepler". He was a German,right? Now the question...was there or was there not a "Keppler" (2 "Ps") who was an Englishman? The "Kepler" that is constantly referred to on this thread seems to me to be somewhat divorced from the "Keppler" whose laws of Interplanetry Motion seem to hold good.
...
But that's meaningless in the wider scheme of things. It is simply a selection pressure. What's one of those? Well, if I stand outside Ibrox on a particular Saturday, I might be led to believe that most people on Earth wear blue. Clearly this is not the case - I've just read the data wrongly - or, rather, extrapolated a result from incomplete data.
Spotting hot Jupiters occurs simply because that's the only type of system that the current methods can detect. It doesn't mean that "most", "a few" or "almost all" extrasolar systems are like this - we just haven't enough data to put a figure on the rareness or otherwise of "our" type of system.
And that's why Kepler's so exciting - we're now just a few years away from some real figures for the proportions and types of extrasolar systems. First time in human history. I think that's quite exciting. :-))
Andy
What you are neglecting to take account of is that the vast majority of exoplanets found to date are hot jupiters which orbit very close to their parent star..... The averages dont look good.
Let us put a few hypothetical figures down to illustrate the points.A few condescending comments in there DG. Im aware of how difficult it has been to detect exoplanets and that many stars have been been searched. However, the people searching for exoplanets do not do so blindly (sic) as you appear to suggest. They 'target' particular star based on a range of criteria. The notion the exoplanet seekers just point their telescopes at any old star in the galaxy wouldnt be an accurate one if that is what you subscribe to.
It is comparatively easy to detect a big planet close to a sun. In this position it occludes the sun well, and causes the maximum gravitational wobble. Our telescope systems have scanned many star systems and found a few planetary systems - mainly HJs.
Now we have a new, more powerful system, which may pick up habitable zone earths. It will take 3 years to do so, for reasons I explained earlier. But it can detect HJs much faster, in the order of a week or so.
We have pointed it at, let us say, 100 systems. Out of these, we confirm 10 HJs. It is possible that there are 50 habitable Es in the data as well, but we won't know for 2-3 years.
We have confirmed the HJs, so we announce them. They get added to the pile of already-detected HJs, so it looks like we are only detecting HJs. But this is because:
- our early detection could only detect HJs (being simplistic)
- our current detection will detect HJs first
If you knew how many systems had been scanned to detect the 10 HJs, you could make some comment about possible earths. For instance, if only 10 systems had been scanned, and all had an HJ, it would be reasonable to say that habitable Es look as if they might be rare, since we assume a habitable E cannot co-exist with an HJ. But I do not know this figure. Do you? Because it is important for your argument, and you seem to have left it out....
A few condescending comments in there DG.
However, it is not quite the numbers game you make out either.....
The point Im making is; should keppler and current techniques continue to find exosystem containing hot jupiters, then the chances of earth size planets in the habitable zone dramaticly decreases. ... That is the thrust of my original post.
But here is another reason why, probably, we are the only intelligent lifeform in the galaxy. A magnetar is a type of neutron star which can extinguish life at distances of tens of thousands of light years....There are estimated to be 30 million inactive magnetars in the galaxy...
If a magnetar is inactive, I assume that it must at some time past have been active, and thus purging the locality of life. Next question is.....could life evolve around there after that kind of wipe?
These HJs that are being found (sort of a nearly binary system?). Would we be talking about a nearer 30 year spell to find a Jupiter like ours?
...we are probably alone as the only intelligent civilisation in the galaxy right now.
The argument is made that we see:
- no radio or lasers
- no evidence of colonisation/exploration
- no dyson spheres
and that therefore the chances are that we are alone.
Now, I just can't see that these statements constitute a foolproof case for no alien intelligence. There is no reason these things should even exist - they just represent what we can imagine doing with our current technology. It is as if a jungle tribe were to discount intelligent life in the suburbs of a western town because they could hear no drum beats...
You should also remember that we are at the very beginning of even looking into space - we really know very little about what is out there. We have few telescopes capable of looking for evidence of things like radio or lasers, and apart from SETI, NONE are actually looking for this evidence.
Around the world there are perhaps a hundred high-class telescopes run by research councils looking at specific phenomena in space, and these will rarely coincide with the evidence requirements for extra-terrestrial civilisation. There are very few in the southern hemisphere. SETI is now part-time and unfunded - it only ever covered the sky for a few degrees either side of the ecliptic - their ARGUS project has barely begun - we have not even looked away from the Earth in all directions with simple detectors at one wavelength yet!
So, given that we haven't looked hard for things that might well not be there, I'm not surprised that we haven't found anything yet.
Great summary and some great replies ... but there are two points worth bearing in mind:
The first intelligent species to get to go colonising - and to survive long enough! - will naturally have already occupied the galaxy. So they, as effective "controllers" might impose zoo-hypotheses on other species, or, indeed, instigate the eradication of other species about to "go interstellar". Anything they wish, really, which sways the "surely by now a species would've..." argument down to the particular decisions of this first one.
Secondly, the phrase "only intellligent species right now" needs to consider both the average lifetime of an intelligent species, and the speed of light. If, for example, an intelligent species last on average for a couple of hundred years, tend not to colonise other star systems, and are placed perhaps a few hundred to a few thousand light years apart, then there's every chance that right now there ARE other intelligent species in the galaxy, but we'll never communicate with them (they're not in our light cone) and therefore we'll never know of them - except by their artifacts should we ever explore other systems...
Andy
All,that has been said on this subject,..is supposition,I question everything,we,re told the Galaxy is 10+ billion years old,..how do they know,...how did they come up with that figure,..its all guesswork,if you want to ask anything,ask yourself this,...Who am I,..Why am I here,Where am I going,...
Wullie
I dont think the zoo hypothesis holds up though. The zoo hypothesis really only looks possible if there are only a small number of colonies. A small number of colonies would be relatively easy to impose a will on although having said that, if the colonies are spread out over the 100,000 light year expanse of the galaxy, it could prove difficult to maintain the line. Again this would prove Fermi's Paradox since the galaxy wouldnt be teeming with said life.
I'm not so sure.
From the top: intelligence/sentience isn't a "natural" outcome of evolution. It happened for us, but it didn't happen during the previous 100 million years of mammalian existence. Indeed, it needn't have happened at all. It's not a "given" for evolution, it's a random artifact, and our species who's got it has somehow managed to survive until the development of technology. (Which, for Model Boat Mayhem, is handy, not least for us as individuals being here right now, and not when we were chipping flints... ok2)
For those worlds with life (some small fraction?) where intelligence arises (few, at best?), and which develop technology (why should they?) and which become space-faring (is there a need?) and which go on to colonise other systems (it's very expensive?) and take over the galaxy (why, at the end of the day, bother?) there's every likelihood that there's only a short period before the biological sentience is put in a big alien-PC and the wetware gives over to the hardware - not least because it'll always take centuries to travel between the stars.
From that point on, we have no idea what the "rules" are for society and for "will". The sentience quotient may well mean "they" are utterly alien to our ways of thought, as much as I am with regards to communication with my herb garden. They have, after all, the potential to be billions of years more advanced, and they may/must be (?) just the one, doing what they know is best.
Andy
Wullie, you old / young cynic! This may help http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milky_Way#AgeOldish, {-)I would,nt say i,m cynical,.its just i always wonder who comes up with all these figures/names etc etc e.g.beryillium...? why beryllium,was it just a thought that popped into whoevers head,..it sounds as bad as Carpenters Unobtainium, {-) all these weird and woderful names,i question them all,and wonder at them,...just think of me as A C Clarkes, Moon Watcher,..there,s not a day goes past,that i don,t look to the heavens, and think,...there has to be something,...maybe it,ll be the ray of light when i,m popping my Clogs, %%
Oldish, {-)I would,nt say i,m cynical,.its just i always wonder who comes up with all these figures/names etc etc e.g.beryillium...? why beryllium,was it just a thought that popped into whoevers head,..it sounds as bad as Carpenters Unobtainium, {-) all these weird and woderful names,i question them all,and wonder at them,...just think of me as A C Clarkes, Moon Watcher,..there,s not a day goes past,that i don,t look to the heavens, and think,...there has to be something,...maybe it,ll be the ray of light when i,m popping my Clogs, %%
Wullie
However, if I may respectfully point out you do not take into consideration a couple of very important and valid points.
Oldish, {-)I would,nt say i,m cynical,.its just i always wonder who comes up with all these figures/names etc etc e.g.beryillium...? why beryllium,was it just a thought that popped into whoevers head,..it sounds as bad as Carpenters Unobtainium, {-) all these weird and woderful names,i question them all,and wonder at them,...
Wullie
Wullie may enjoy this little animation of Tom Lehrer's classic hit for chemists.. http://www.privatehand.com/flash/elements.html
I understand your points to be these?
1 - the galaxy is old - there should be time for civilisations to appear
2 - the idea that humans would not recognise alien signals is flawed because aliens would use similar physical phenomena to us to communicate
3 - there are galactic limitations for habitable planets which limit their numbers
4 - dyson spheres have not been found by seti
Umm. Pause for breath...
1 - the galaxy may be old, but humanity has been searching for a very short time, and has not even looked properly yet. I submit that even in an area teeming with intelligent life, a short untutored glance may notice nothing.
2 - this seems to be a misconception of what I said. I said nothing about technology being unable to be recognised because it was alien. I said it might not be recognised because it was beyond our current technical capabilities. Clarke's third law applies, as does my 'jungle drums' illustration. A human tribe which did not understand electromagnetic wave propagation could not detect radio which other humans understand - we do not understand, and cannot detect, for example, the instantaneous transmission of data through quantum spin manipulation. In fact, since I just made that up, we have no idea whether it makes sense or not, but if it did exist it would be a far superior data transmission method for long distance use, and would be the obvious way of passing inter-system information - radio or light would be thought useless and not used at all...
3 - I know of no suggestion that there are major restrictions on human-habitable areas of the local galaxy. Obviously places where there are strong radiant clusters would be unsuitable - the galactic centre, for instance, but most of the areas in the arms would be fine. Our system is primarily influenced by the heliosphere; the sun is the main driver for habitability. Of course, if there were such galactic limitations, that would go some way towards explaining why we have found little evidence of alien intelligence so far...
4 - This is an odd point to make. Seti is not looking for phenomena associated with dyson spheres, so of course it would never see any. In fact, I can only think of one project which has done any work on looking for these - the 2004 Fermilab IRAS filter-based search - which reported in 2009 that it had found a few candidates but remarked that it was hard to distinguish between natural and artificial shading. The general feeling seems to be that we are right at the start of this kind of investigation, so it is odd for you to say "We have had the technology to search the sky for dyson sphere constructs for at least 100 years" (which I think is an exaggeration - CCDs have been around for less than 30 years). This statement suggest that we have been looking for 100 years, which is certainly not true.
Given the small amount of work that has been done on Dysons, I am surprised that you claim that "The rotation and orbit of the earth around the Sun means all the sky is covered and the supposed lack of suitable telescopes in the southern hemisphere doesnt really hold up to scrutiny.". Any individual telescope can only see a maximum of 1/2 of the sky (more like 1/3 when horizon limitations are taken into account). The earth's rotation and orbit are essentially in the same plane, so northern telescopes cannot ever see southern star systems. And the Arecibo telescope that SETI uses is fixed, and can only scan a 40-degree band of the sky anyway.
As well as these limitations, few telescopes are ever tasked to search for 'extraterrestrial intelligence'. They are too busy with basic research. We may have had the technology to look for a fair time, but the actual history of SETI investigations is best described as 'symbolic', and certainly not comprehensive. Occasionally small projects to examine a restricted set of stars at one radio wavelength have been undertaken - it is unsurprising that these have found little. We are only just now moving into an age of readily-availible computing power which would make large-scale studies practical. Which takes me back to my original point - the most obvious reason for not finding anything is that we have not seriously looked so far....
Oh, and a point for those who see other animals as a 'different' form of life. As far as we can tell, there is only one form of life on this planet (though research in deep sea trenches might throw up something unusual). It's protoplasmic, protein-based and uses DNA to store, transmit, and duplicate genetic information. (let us leave RNA and viruses for another thread). Sometimes this life exists as a single cell, sometimes cells come together to form a symbiotic relationship. This can result in strange shapes. But they're all the same single lifeform.
DG, I think you borrowed your "Quantum Spin" without acknowlegements - Paul Dirac I think....
. But Fermi's Paradox is that if the galaxy is teeming with intelligent civilisations, they should be easily spotted... Fermi's Paradox is based on the fact that with plentiful intelligence, it should easily be spotted. It is not. It can be concluded therefore that the galaxy isnt teeming with intelligent life. If it is not teeming with intelligent life, it must by definition be quite rare.
Point 2, again in a galaxy teeming with intelligent civilisations, it is very unlikely that all of these civilisations are using a communications medium we do not know off or understand.
Point 3. The Rare Earth Hypothesis would give you more information. I'd also suggest having a magnetar, nutron star or super nova within a 1000 LY's could make your region of space in the galaxy a rather unsavioury place to be.
... It was Dyson who suggested searching for such constructs many years ago and he didnt seem to think it was beyond our technology now so Im surprised you claim the technology isnt there.
Dyson proposed in 1959 such constructs could be detected in the infra red. Spectral analysis of light by using telescopes could also be used. Telescopes have been available for far more than a hundred years so it isnt beyond realism that even quite straightforward observations of the galaxy would not reveal such items.... Even if we were not specifically looking for such constructs as a Dyson Sphere or its variation, the infra red signature of such would literally stand out like a beacon.
Well, it's been a very interesting discussion but it seems to me that the arguments are now being repeated to no useful effect. People have their views but there is no way of arriving at a definitive conclusion - not in the next half a million years or so anyway.
The only provable fact seems to be that Wasyl is broadcasting on all available wavelengths but the message is undecipherable. :}
Colin
Im sorry but someone is getting seriously mixed up with FP and the Great Silence.
Fermi's Paradox does not refer to aliens making themselves known to us.
Wullie,...who might end up a coal shoveller {-)
Well, it's been a very interesting discussion....
As I recall, his quote was "If they existed, they should be here by now" - in other words, 'Where are the spaceships?'. But the only point I wanted to make was that I was talking about the technical issues of us detecting alien civilisations with our current capabilities, rather than the associated one of 'Why aren't there any aliens here?' (to which one of the answers is, of course, that they already are, and are running model boat forums...).
Coal Shoveller? Luxury! We used to dreeemm o' coal shovelling when I were a lad...
Glad you like it - we try to give satisfaction....
Im certain Fermi's exact quotes are not recorded anywhere as it was over lunch at Los Alomos the paradox was postulated, informally by Fermi...
Topical Bryan, but it doesn't go into the depth of argument we've seen on here.
Colin
I'm not so sure.
From the top: intelligence/sentience isn't a "natural" outcome of evolution. It happened for us, but it didn't happen during the previous 100 million years of mammalian existence. Indeed, it needn't have happened at all. It's not a "given" for evolution....
I'm intrigued - what does p13 of the Sunday Times say?
And here's the definitive answer: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8478033.stm
On BBC Breakfast they were explaining this to the audience - "The Sun is a star and has nine planets.....".
And here's the definitive answer: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8478033.stm
On BBC Breakfast they were explaining this to the audience - "The Sun is a star and has nine planets.....". Really deep intellectually challenging stuff. No doubt they think that a Dyson Sphere is that ball thing on the front of the new vacuum cleaners.....
Colin
.. this from the telegraph gives a clue that the scientific community may be losing faith with SETI http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/7068765/The-search-for-aliens-should-start-on-Earth-not-outer-space-says-scientist.html
"Prof Davies said: We need to give up the notion that ET is sending us some sort of customised message and take a new approach."
It has been suggested that SETI may be only effectively searching half the galaxy since the southern hemisphere has few or no telescopes to perform this function.
While SETI searching for a candidate signal has been ongoing for nearly 50 years, its never been put out there before that due to a lack of southern hemisphere telescopes has this impinged in any way SETI's search to a greater or lesser degree. And neither should it.
We only have to consider the dynamics of the Earth, Solar System and Galaxy to see a suggestion that the southern hemisphere is not able to contribute fully to the search is, in short folly.
If they are out there, they are probably like us http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/7071013/Aliens-are-likely-to-look-and-behave-like-us.html
Perhaps more interestingly he also thinks "that because much of the Universe is older than us they would have evolved further down the line and we should have heard from them by now.
Most interestingly to me he also seems to think that:
They could come in peace but also be searching for somewhere to live, and to help themselves to water, minerals and fuel...
Europa has twice the liquid volume of water of all the Earth's oceans. Titan is full of methane, and the asteroids have all the minerals you could wish for. And none of these places has a gravity well anything like the Earth's, being about 0.15 G.
So either we have a professor who knows little about the distribution of raw materials in the Solar System, or a professor who is inclined, for some reason, to present a Hollywood view of the subject. In either case, I am disinclined to accept his reported opinions without further information...
If you're capable of traveling in space there's nothing at all harsh about the environment of Europa or Titan. And certainly nothing harsh about grabbing an iceball of any size you like from the Oort cloud without even getting out of your ship. But the main point is that there's MUCH MORE raw material there than there is on Earth, able to be gained with much less expenditure of energy.
Why come to a place where there is less of everything, and you don't know what the Americans and Russians might do if you started to 'invade'. Or do you think that the aliens would be able to handle nuclear war just fine, but be unable to land a remote pumping unit on Europa unopposed?
I can't think of any basic resource at all which isn't hundreds of times more common elsewhere in the Solar System than it is on Earth. Perhaps guano?
Have you any questions about the response I gave with respect to orbital axis tilt?
....
Why do you dismiss SETI before 1999? Its not logical and its an inaccurate stance to take.
...
Havent seen your comments about axle tilt.
EDIT what made you give up on your SETI farm of 20 machines after nearly 10 years? Was it the realisation that after all those years and machine time, not a single candidate had been found?
Havent seen your comments about axle tilt.- you will find them above at 09:03 pm...
what made you give up on your SETI farm of 20 machines after nearly 10 years? Was it the realisation that after all those years and machine time, not a single candidate had been found?No - it was that once they made the upgrade from SETI Classic to BOINC in 2005 I was able to use the farm for a variety of other purposes which I thought more useful, and I slowly ran SETI processing down. I think one or two slower machines are still ticking over on it, but most of my systems currently do Folding@Home(cancer research) and GIMPS Mersenne Prime Number searches. 10 years is not a long time to do a SETI scan - hundreds would be more appropriate, but I personally will probably benefit more from the F@H work.... %)
I never really understood the idea of looking for hydrogen's natural resonance frequency. If the white coated gentlemen are right about it being the commonest element out there, it sounds like trying to read a document printed in black on black paper.......
Unless it is somehow possible to convince the world that pouring resources into the project is worth doing for the benefit of about ten generations down the line, it ain't going to happen. Even then, keeping the financial people's hands off the value of the resources would be an impossible task.
It would also be rather a shame if the galaxy's 100000 sentient species were all listening and not broadcasting. :-))
Andy
Using the princable of Occam's Razor ----- {:-{----- Maybe there are Thousands or Millions of advanced Civilisations in this Galaxy But no one has developed a faster than Light or Warp Drive, so--- they are restricted to their own solar systems ---- Maybe FTL drive is not possible or maybe it is not possible for a living being to travel FTL !!!!! This could maybe explain why we haven't had the Nabors knocking on the door asking if they can borrow a bowl of sugar...As for communications using radio waves to reach the nearest solar system is like going out into your front garden and shouting to a friend who lives a mile away (The chances of him hearing it are astronomic and even if he did hear it it would be so distorted by background noise he wouldn't recognise what it was anyway :(( :((
Freebooter
But, one only has to consider the SETI 'farm' of headless pc's that DG ran to show how almost futile SETI@Home is. Consider this example;
...
Taken in this context and with people leaving the project due to disillusionment at finding nothing, its easy to see why SETI@Home resorts to sending begging emails to users no longer in the project and asking them to return.
I am intrigued at your maths. You don't need to estimate - you could just ask me, and I would tell you that I have somewhat over 1m 'credit' units processed. This is with the new more complex process, where each work unit attracts different amounts of credit, depending on how difficult it is.
If we stay with the old Seti Classic, where you processed one work unit for a point, I have slightly over 12k work units done in slightly over 180k processing hours - around 20 processing years. But this is not '20 years of data' - it's 1 years worth of 20 machines running, or 4 years worth of 5 machines running...
Given that in the early days many of my machines were 286s, and a modern machine can easily be 100 times faster, this would equate to 70 days 'worth of data' today. In a few years time this will be the equivalent of 1 days 'worth of data', according to your analysis.
Of course this isn't really '20 years worth of data'. It's 15 hours of 286 processing for 12,000 snapshots of part of the sky (which probably took Ariciebo a few minutes to obtain). Is this a lot? Not really - this is just what it took to do an automated check if the snapshot contained anything interesting or not with the computers we had then.
At this rate it has been estimated that it would take up to 2025 to find an interesting signal. The timescales would, of course, have been impossible for manual checking. This is a reason why I think that we have only just got to a stage where we are capable of conducting a decent search....
Oh, and Seti peaked at about 0.5m active users. Now that BOINC allows people to provide processing for many other projects (15 at last count) this has dropped to about 0.25m active. I don't think this is too bad, given the competition....
Im impressed you kept 20 headless pc's going for nearly 10 years.
The point I was making is that for all the inordinate amount of time you had your 20 headless pc's crunching, nothing was found.
SETI@Home regularly sends me emails asking me to rejoin the number crunching. Strangely enough, they also ask me for donations of the monetary sort. I dont suppose Im unque either so clearly they are losing a lot of people.
Last I heard from Seth Shostek (not personally you understand) was he expects to find a signal in the next 100 years so Im surprised you mention 2025! However, I think he'll be waiting a lot longer.
From the same article:
"...It is hoped that within about four years Kepler will have found planets of the same size as Earth that are also in the “habitable zone”...."
And that is why I believe we should wait for a few years before coming to the conclusion that there are few or no planets similar to Earth in our local area of space....
... Still doesnt answer Fermi's Paradox, or the Rare Earth Theory...
Kepler may well find Earth size planets in the HZ. But unpalitable as it may seem, it may also prove beyond doubt, that there are none.
Umm? It doesn't provide answers for the Problem of Pain, or who the Dark Lady was either. It's not designed to do so. It's designed to look for a limited range of planetary systems...
Another thing it cannot do is prove "beyond doubt" that there are none. It is our first telescope with a good chance of finding some planets of this type. You do not seem to appreciate the experiment's limitations. I thought I had explained earlier at length that Kepler will ONLY be able to detect planetary systems where the orbital plane is directly in line with our line of sight, so finding no such planets certainly does not mean that no HZ E-types exist....
It may find some, it may not. But we will have to wait about three years before HZ E-type information starts to come in, and, as I said at the beginning of this thread, it is pointless to speculate until the data is available, and incorrect to say that failure to find HZ Es in the first 6 weeks of data implies that there will be few or none by the end of the experiment....
Its true Kepler cannot prove beyond doubt that there are none since it isnt looking at the whole of the galaxy.
... Well, not if they are being consistent anyway.
Plus, its interesting in this clip http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/space/article7000795.ece that it is now considered that we may not need to search 'out there' at all.
Then why did you say: "Kepler may well find Earth size planets in the HZ. But unpalitable as it may seem, it may also prove beyond doubt, that there are none."?
It is quite reasonable to extrapolate findings if there it finds some, and to point out that it cannot see everything if it finds nothing. There is no inconsistency with this. Of course, they have done neither of these things yet, so we will have to wait and see...
As well as being an astrophysicist Paul Davis styles himself as an 'astrobiologist' and has set up the 'Centre For Fundamental Concepts in Science' centre at Arizona State University, one of whose aims is the search for alternative forms of life. You are presenting his lecture as if it were settled science policy, while it is almost certainly a puff piece for his work and a plea for more funds.
The very article you quote includes other scientists putting opposing points of view, such as Colin Pillinger. I'm sure I included this quote about this biological proposal before:
"Not all are convinced by the “shadow biosphere” concept. Colin Pillinger, who led the Beagle 2 Mars landing mission, said: “I prefer to deal in scientific fact — this is wildly science fiction. You’d be off your trolley to go searching for arsenic-based life.”
Colin Pillinger seems to believe that Paul Davis is well on the way to becoming a crackpot...
Its interesting to hear Professor Pilger ridicule the possibility of life based on other elements, in this case arsenic. Although respected perhaps Professor Pilger should really know better than to ridicule such suggestion when searching for alien life.
Look at all this and then tell me you think we are the only intelligent life in the universe
_ (http://videos.komando.com/2009/08/20/hubble-ultra-deep-field/)
Freebooter {:-{
Thanks for the reference - an interesting paper indeed.
I find that many technical papers (particularly in Climate Science) are mined selectively for quotes which support the quoters stance - to such an extent that a paper which says one thing is often claimed as saying its opposite. You will recall that my belief is that we have really done very little yet in the difficult field of IE, and that we are only now starting to have a capability which has a chance of success, while your thesis was that we have tried and failed, so you believe that there is 'nobody out there', and, presumably, that we should not waste time and money looking.
This paper runs through the little that has been done to look for extra-terrestrial intelligence so far, and points out some of the difficulties. Then it goes on to propose more sophisticated searches based on the latest astronomical findings latest and technology. It calls this 'interstellar archeology' (IE).
It mentions possible signals such as 'stellar salting' and looking for other kinds if stellar engineering, but only as a putative thing to look for. Beyond Annis' estimates, it mentions no work of any kind which has been done in looking for these signals. So why you say "No sign of stellar salting ie using the star to signal their presence" is beyond me - the paper only proposes that this is one thing that might be looked for, not that there has been extensive search and failure.
However, the most interesting point comes right at the end. The thesis of the paper you quote is neatly summed up in its conclusion:
"The presence of natural signatures that mimic interstellar archeology signals is a significant problem. Both Dyson Sphere searches and searches for artificially-driven Blue Stragglers are seriously compromised by natural signals. Conventional SETI is much better in this regard.
In short, interstellar archeology has many problems. On the other hand, the time may have come when interstellar archeology including SETI should be considered seriously as part of the web of science."
I would say that this neatly and comprehensively sums up my position, and does not support yours at all. It is kind of you to draw our attention to a paper which looks like the last word on the subject.
"I think it supports my position considerably and makes your position pretty untenable."
"Over 100 galaxies searched for and not one sign of stellar engineering of any sort or any galactic archaeology."
Searching for a radio signal is, many people accept, a flawed approach.
If you think it is a 'flawed' approach, why do you claim that, because it hasn't been successful yet, there must be nothing there? That argument would only hold if Seti@Home had a very strong chance of success.
Long rambles asserting that you are right and that anything I say is 'preposterous' and 'amusing' will do your argument no good at all.
Either answer my points or stop posting.
...SETI@Home is seriously flawed....
Tweedledum and Tweedledee ........ %)
....but it's awfully entertaining, isn't it?
Are we intelligent life??? I began to wonder!!!! If so by who's yard stick ???? So far as I know we have yet to build a dyson sphere (if that denotes intelligent life )in fact as far as Space and Galactic exploration goes we're not even in the same class as the first caveman to paddle across a river on a log to see whats on the other other side.... To imply that we are the only intelligent life form in the universe must rank as one of the crazyest most short sighted statements ever made in the short history of mankind ..... We haven't even finished exploring and evaluating our own little planet yet .... and it's only 10 000 miles in dia.... how the hell can you say that we are the only intellgent life form in the whole Universe ???? We don't even know if there is life on the Moon or Mars yet (I'm not talking about little Green men, but any life form)
Freebooter {:-{ {:-{ :((
Justaboatonic
Your virus Sounds as if it would react like a cancer (Maybe we are being contacted and don't know it {:-{) to me ... However The "experts" say we can't go faster than the speed of light --- I agree we can't at the moment--- but the same experts said that if man exceeded 35/40 MPH he would suffocate--- they also said man can't fly and so far man can't!!! But man can sit in or on a machine and the machine can fly --- Splitting hairs I know --- But man can't fly --- Yet!!! But it is said that "When man starts living on the moon he will be able to fly" --- Splitting hairs again because he will need some kind of wings--- This could go on for ever ---But the point is --- I think the speed of light is another barrier like the sound barrier I just think we haven't found or invented the maths or the equipment to be able to exceed it YET... I also think we haven't yet invented the equipment to find other intelligent life... On a lighter note, so far, we can't hold a conversation with a Dolphin --- Yet --- As I said earlier in this thread --- I think it is the hight of arrogance to think we are the only intelligent life in this Galaxy never mind the universe ...its too big, to be empty O0 And if we don't blow ourselves or the Earth up or get wiped out by some big space rock I think we will go to the stars and meet other ETL But be honest if you lived in this part of the Galaxy would you go out of your way to meet us... I wouldn't and I'd make sure the family silver was well hidden...
Jimmy James
De Freebooter
Hi JJ.
I will ignore that one, Colin!
But it is a very serious question and one which few great minds down the centuries can agree upon. It is important because unless we agree upon what we are looking for how will we know if and when we find it?
For example, earlier in this fascinating discussion there has been reference to life forms which may not have achieved any technological level which would allow them to receive or create communications. There has also been reference to life forms that have become extinct. How do we count or discount these if they exist or have existed?
I shall always remember a fascinating story by Fred Hoyle (a one time Astronomer Royal?) in which he described an inter gallactic life form like some kind of cloud that was dispersed and sought ultimate knowledge. When one "cloud" found the answer and sought to pass the information to its kin it ceased to exist!
I should probably add that I am someone who has an intrinsic belief that there have been, must be or will be other life forms out there. My definition of "life form" being a "sentient entity".
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy" Hamlet
Roger in France.
Just why is the "Big Bang" theory so widely accepted as being the "truth" and unique?
Are you suggesting that extra terrestrial intelligence or artificial intelligence can arise without there having be a life form to set it off?
Roger in France
I would think that I wasn't the only forum member to have watched both "The Solar System" and the Horizon programme on "Dark Matter.
What a contrast. The "Solar System" was just brilliant. Well researched, written and presented. Superb graphics and photography..and human interest.
The BBCs "Horizon" offering on Tuesday went straight into the "could do a lot better" category. How the programme makers could manage to turn what is a fascinating subject into such a mass of turgidness beats me.
Really, how often do you need to see the same balloon being inflated or the same (with lights and flames) purporting to illustrate the "Big Bang". Take all those pepeats out and with decent editing you may just have filled 30 minutes as opposed to the 60 they inflicted on us. And just to rub it in, the main subject ("Dark Matter") was only given a few grudging minutes towards the end. I that really the best the BBC dould do with the subject?
However, I'm posting on this thread because, although a little out of the "mainstream", I think it belongs here.
Some questions.
Just why is the "Big Bang" theory so widely accepted as being the "truth" and unique?
Perhaps there was an earlier "BB" and all the "stuff" (galaxies and so on) went merrily sailing on outwards forever...or perhaps reached a stasis point. But no, according to "Horizon" the galaxies are not slowing down as gravity weakens (another oxymoron) but are accelerating. If they were slowing down as they reached the stasis point then surely they would all stop and begin to return to their point of origin. Not happening (allegedly). But if you think about it we (said very loosley) we could have "BBs" going off all over the place, how would we know.
The word "Universe" is only a "man-made" thing anyway. If 2 "universes" created by 2 seperate "BBs" were to get tangled up with each other perhaps another "BB" would happen (if gravity is "universally") true. However, if what I heard last night is true and the galaxies have now speede up, maybe they are being attracted towards other sources.
My little brain can just about accept the concept of a naturally expanding universe (as long as can remember that the word "universe" is only an adjective), so I can imagine "others"....but eventually the brain fizzles out.
In all this cosmology we, on our little planet, are really quite parochial. Even the word "alien" has to be a man-made word.
What if the whole supposed point of the Horizon programme missed the idea that the so-called "Dark Matter" is, in fact a seperate or another facet / type of universe?
As far as "intelligent" life is concerned then again we can only judge such a thing by our own yardstick. Could be we are as thick as alien planks as far as "they" are concerned. If we do eventually meet up with another life-form then so be it, but we have enough little problems to solve on our own little spheroid before we find another shoulder to cry on.
Oh, and by the way,...I agree with Fred Hoyle that we may have been "seeded" on this planet sometime before yesterday. BY.
However, because the Bracewell \ von Neuman probes are artificial, be self replicating and capable of interacting with other intelligence, they must also be intelligent.Interaction and replication is no measure of intelligence, assuming that because these can happen involves intelligence is a leap of logic too far. Being able to reach conclusions not determined by pre-programming is a big step towards intelligence, otherwise it's just having knowledge. It is possible to have huge knowledge and no intelligence. I've seen filing cabinets like that, and the people working them. Sometimes the people have the greater level of intelligence.
Unless there was SOMETHING there to create a disturbance.
apparently they can't run it at full power until it's been beefed up which means another year out of action.Probably needs the meter re-slotting to use Euros rather than Swiss Francs.
Interaction and replication is no measure of intelligence, assuming that because these can happen involves intelligence is a leap of logic too far. Being able to reach conclusions not determined by pre-programming is a big step towards intelligence, otherwise it's just having knowledge. It is possible to have huge knowledge and no intelligence. I've seen filing cabinets like that, and the people working them. Sometimes the people have the greater level of intelligence.
One thing I never could follow about the big bang. It almost invariably gets depicted as an ever inflating balloon, starting at one unitary point. From this, EVERYTHING got shot out with equal force in all directions. It must also have been propelled uniformly. So where did all the little whirls and eddys that became galaxies and suchlike come from? If everything was started from the same point with the same force, everything should just have expanded like the skin of the balloon. Unless there was SOMETHING there to create a disturbance. Which knackers up the classic big bang.
Must send out for more ouzo.
This is all fascinating. However, as my scientific knowledge of the subject is very limited I researched the two types of "probe" referred to above.
I noted that they had been referred to as "concepts".
My research appears to show that no such probes are known to have existed and Earth science certainly has not the capacity, currently, to create such a thing.
So why are they being used to support arguments? I may as well say I can conceive of a very sophisticated ear trumpet that has not picked anything up, but if anything existed I would hear it!
Roger in France
More eminent people starting to come to the same conclusion... intelligent life – is probably very rare....
..However, I do think we are probably the oldest, most advance intelligent civilisation in the Galaxy right now...
http://dingo.care2.com/cards/flash/5409/galaxy.swfIt certainly does %% :-))
Says it all, but only if you have the sound turned on.
With even the nearest vaguely possible contender (and the possibility factor needs to have its vagueness expressed in scientific notation) being as far away as it is (50 light years was it?), our earliest coherent transmissions have only been hitting it for a few years, and their instant reply might be part way back. IF there is anybody there listening, and interested enough and equipped to do so. IF they are within the same development/technology window as us. If they haven't done what we are heading for, sending our radio signals down optical cables so that they revert to being a non-emissive planet, or have the bubble of their civilisation pop, and revert to a non-technical society.
The galaxy might be awash with spandex-clad lady spacefarers, about the same size as us, but the over-riding practicality remains that unless one of them (or us, for that matter) really has a viable means of travelling faster than light, with our life expectancy, meaningful contact is not a possibility, so for all practical purposes, they are not there.
Other life is very probable, though. A planet in the "goldilocks" region, with liquid and weather will probably have lightning (recently spotted on Venus), and thats basically all that is needed to start the ball rolling. Keeping it rolling and in the "right" direction is another set of coincidences altogether. Its a long way from having caustic soda and salty water and a supply of electricity to having a Lego set, but that is a very short trip compared to evolving us.
We as a species are rather arrogant assuming that intelligent life forms are a rarity in our Milky Way. But how many life forms have developed here on planet earth that either have gained a level of Intelligence or thought processes not so different to ours.
Nature works on random numbers and chaos is the driver; if an event takes place such as a mass extinction then nature will evolve to use this to its advantage. The single great leap that has marked species out as an advanced life form is the development of technology. Even the simple act of taking a bone fragment and being able to fashion that fragment into an implement with the thought process that that implement will do a job is probably a regular occurrence through out the cosmos. Self awareness has always been a marker to defining the development of our species to that of others but there is even research to indicate that other species on our planet are self aware. Given enough time almost any species with a similar form to ourselves can evolve. It’s inconceivable that nature would develop only one intelligent species with the thought processes of humans . The big question and there is always a big question , will any intelligent self aware species be around long enough to perfect the ability to communicate beyond its home world? Equally our species has evolved rapidly on a cosmic scale so once again there is no reason to believe that this random occurrence is not universal.
Bowwave
I doubt it. Roughly 10% of stars in the galaxy are like our Sun, not too big so as to have a short life, not too small so as to give out insufficient heat and light. Likely hardly any of those 10% of Sun like stars will have a solar system like ours and even if some did, its unlikely a terrestrial planet like earth would be in the habitable zone ad infinitum etc, etc....
"...But dont take my word for it, just ask Professor Paul Davies..... Paul Davies suggests that .... there really is no one out there.."
David Kipping reckons 22.7% F, G and K-types. Here is his estimation which suggests 75m habitable environments (planets or moons in a habitable zone) in the galaxy. You keep saying that something does not exist, but this does not make it so.... http://www.homepages.ucl.ac.uk/~ucapdki/numberofhabs.html
Thanks, I will. It is very odd to see it being suggested that Paul Davis supports the concept that there is 'nobody out there'. He is the chair of the "SETI: Post-Detection Science and Technology Taskgroup" of the International Academy of Astronautics. He suggests that SETI technology should be developed, not stopped. Here is an interview with him last December: http://www.astronomynow.com/mag/1001/PaulDaviesInterview.html
I draw your attention to the following quotes:
" I don’t think we have the sensitivity yet to pick out random radio traffic buzzing between civilisations. What I think is a big lacuna in the search so far is that beacons have not been actively searched for. It is much more probable that we would pick up a multidirectional beacon than random messages between civilisations or domestic radio traffic or anything deliberately directed at us. All those scenarios don’t stack up, but beacons do. We can imagine a long vanished civilisation that has left a beacon, and this could go on for millions of millions of years. There really has been no systematic search for them, and yet we have the technology to do that."
"..I don’t think there is any problem in pursuing radio and optical, but my theme in The Eerie Silence is that we should continue searching for messages because we are set up to do that, but that we should also be looking for the most general signatures of technology right across the board..."
That's 3 types of star. Last time I checked, the Sun was only one type.
"..Where have I "suggested that Paul Davis supports the concept that there is 'nobody out there'."?.."
There are lots of ways of classifying stars. Kipping has picked these three divisions (which are next to each other on the Main Sequence) as star classes perfectly capable of supporting planets with liquid water. I assume that is the purpose of this discussion?
Your proposition was originally that Earth-like planets are rare or non-existent, and now seems to be that intelligent life is rare or non-existent elsewhere (a proposition which is unlikely to be proven either way in our lifetimes). You cited Davis' book in support of this.
Do I take it that you now believe we haven't looked hard enough or in the right way, and that we should increase or improve our efforts? This is what Davis is saying, which suggests he believes that intelligent life is out there to be found.
My own position is that earth-like planets are relatively common in the Galaxy, and I suspect that where the conditions are appropriate life will develop quite rapidly. We know too little about the development of intelligence to be able to hazard a defensible guess at how common that is, but I would be surprised if it turns out to be a very unusual evolutionary path....
My position is clear despite your repeated attempts to spin it other ways....
..then it's a shame you have problems enunciating it. I really cannot tell from your posts whether you believe that we should increase and improve our search for extraterrestrial intelligence (as Paul Davies argues), or whether you believe that this is doomed to failure and we ought to give up.
And I'm just a tentative stirring in the primaeval slime, so don't take any notice....
From now on, I'll ignore your rather borish (sic) attempts to prove yourself superior and shout down any and every opinion that does not meet yours.
However, its not all sweetness and light. The proposition is based on extrapolation so the calculation could be wildly out of kilter with fact.
"This extrapolation is the least certain part of our analysis. The true answer might be one in eight or one in two - but we know that it isn't one in 100,"
You ever think that maybe we are the only civilisation in the universe, and in the far distant future once we have finished nuking each other and end up colonising other worlds (which is going to happen one way or the other) eventually we will evolve into different races, making new species of intelligent life!
Of course this will take another 100, million years for that side of evolution to take place but its worth thinking about.
And here's one for some of you... when a UFO is spotted and its claimed its an alien, you ever think it could be a visitor from another time zone (yup time travel) or parallel universe's checking in on our progress of evolution, ok i watch to much star trec but still it make more sense then some one saying were not alone or wait are we, look around the world we have, how many species of animals are there, to many to count i imagine and were still discovering new ones daily, and the ocean is still a majority mystery!. Perhaps there are millions of intelligibly civilisations out there, just there all on this planet, maybe its not intelligence in the way we think, for all we know dolphins may think were primitive!
''So long & Thank's For All The Fish!''
what future some one in the USA SAID THE WORLD ENDED YESTERDAY as of this morning cornwall is still where iit was yesterday so much for fortune tellersPerhaps they should have had a farewell camping holiday on the upper slopes of Grimsvoetn. The world would have ended as far as they were concerned, complete with an appropriate amount of fire and brimstone, we wouldn't have noticed, everyone's a winner.