from the absence-of-evidence-is-not-evidence-of-absence dept.
The Fermi paradox questions why aliens have never visited Earth despite the Universe being so old and so vast that races should have evolved interstellar travel and come calling by now. Now two scientists believe they may have the answer.
Astrobiologists Dr Michael Wong, of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, and Dr Stuart Bartlett, of California Institute of Technology, have hypothesised that civilisations burn out when they grow too large and technical.
Faced with an ever-growing population and eye-watering energy consumption, worlds hit a crisis point known as a "singularity" where innovation can no longer keep up with demand. The only alternative to collapse is to abandon "unyielding growth" and adopt a balance that allows survival but prevents the society moving any further forward, or venturing far from its own spot in the universe.
Writing in the Royal Society Open Science, Dr Wong and Dr Bartlett said: "We propose a new resolution to the Fermi paradox: civilisations either collapse from burnout or redirect themselves to prioritising homeostasis, a state where cosmic expansion is no longer a goal, making them difficult to detect remotely. "Either outcome — homeostatic awakening or civilisation collapse — would be consistent with the observed absence of (galactic-wide) civilisations."
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @03:58PM
...seems to fly in the face of, or simply ignore the Kardashev scale (theory).
The article smacks of demoralization propaganda IMO.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:03PM (22 children)
What an utter lack of imagination. The Known Space hypothesis that different civilizations become space-faring at different points in their development based on the difficulty of achieving escape velocity from their home world based on gravity, natural resources, and to a lesser extent rotational speed makes much more sense.
Just because some groups of humans (even if they are presently a majority of the population) can't give up their own whims and desires to achieve a greater common goal doesn't mean that every sentient species in the universe suffers the same self-defeating natural tendencies. Many will, many won't, and many (including humans, in my opinion) are on a balance point where shifts of popular opinion could send them either way.
At the present time, I'm going with the "Einstein is right" hypothesis as to the current observation of the Fermi paradox. Even if there is a way to cheat the speed of light, it is apparently much harder than flinging some mass into interstellar space. We might be clever enough to crack that riddle in the future, or not. There are all kinds of values you can plug into the Drake equation, nearly all are more conjecture than observation based, so it's quite easy to put enough backspin on interstellar travel development to say: nope, E.T. just hasn't gotten around to visiting - yet.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 4, Interesting) by HiThere on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:18PM (20 children)
There's more to it than that. An elephant sized intelligence would have a lot more trouble leaving the planet. So would a hive based intelligence (if that's possible biochemically). And some species are more limited in the environments they can tolerate than others. A, say, intelligent dolphin-like creature would have lots of trouble refining metals and dealing with electricity. Humans may need artificial gravity to live in space for years at a time (centrifuge-based gravity counts), but other species may have stricter requirements.
This largely leaves out the question of automated probes, of course, but how sure are we that we'd have noticed them?
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:55PM (8 children)
Why would that be? First: what can you, a sub-elephant-sized intelligence, really say about the disposition of individual elephant-sized intelligences? Much less societies of elephant-sized intelligences. Are these intelligences housed in herbivores, carnivores, queen-brood hives like ants, aquatic, terrestrial, flying, floating, burrowing, or other types of bodies? Intelligence is a measure of the ability to achieve what one desires, greater or lesser intelligence has little or no bearing on the desires of the individual, or the actions of a society to achieve collective desires.
Absolutely, and on a planet where dolphin-like creatures roam the land in super-marine vehicles, dominating all other species, it would really come down to: do these super-dolphins desire to travel between the stars, or would they rather muck about chasing fish? If they've gone to the trouble to create super-marine terrestrial vehicles - possibly through barter with or domination of land based species better suited to manipulate metal alloys, or through the development of underwater technologies that we have had no need to even conceive of, much less put significant time and effort into the development of - taking those artificial environments from the mud into space would be a next logical step. In any event, not just dolphins, but all manner of strange creatures, intelligent or not or just so strange that we are incapable of classifying them, will go down various paths of development, most absolutely inconceivable to us at this time, and in the billions of billions of planets in the observable universe, some will reach for the stars. What's the ratio? We are about as qualified as a week old lemur in the pilot's seat of the space shuttle to land that question anywhere near a true answer.
Do we, really? And do our robotic probes? Also, what bio-chemical interventions might obviate that need for gravity?
Some will, and some will have looser requirements.
We're not. Whether robotic probes, active radar/sonar type scanning, or even corporeal visitation of living bodies. Any technology sufficiently advanced as to visit Earth from another solar system would most likely appear as magic to us, if it is not entirely invisible.
The one thing to remember in all of this: our best estimates of the lifetime of the universe hover in the neighborhood of 14 billion years. Our planet: 4.5 billion years. So, it took us 32% of the age of the universe to evolve. Are we average? Most likely. In what density of planets capable of evolving what we call intelligent life? Absolutely unknown at this time. The fact that we haven't observed any signs of what we call intelligent life would seem to put an upper bound on the density of planets evolving intelligent life in our universe, but that upper bound is still incredibly high.
My feeling is: when we do finally encounter extra-terrestrial life, it will completely revolutionize our understanding of what life is / can be. When we do finally encounter what we would call intelligent extra-terrestrial life, it will do the same 100 fold more intensely, if they don't just extinguish us as soon as they notice us.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:14PM (4 children)
Parent said:
"Are we average? Most likely."
You have no data to base that on.
It's about as accurate as the joke that the probability of something happening is 50/50 because either it does or it doesn't. Insufficient data: sample population size = 1.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:21PM (3 children)
Exactly. We know nothing, so us being average is the most likely guess - minimum error from possible truths. If you must assign a value, there's a fair argument that average is the best value to assign because anything else has a better chance of bigger error.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:29PM (2 children)
Not everything has a symmetrical distribution. Perhaps you should refresh your memory of statistical moments. The average is not necessarily the one with the smallest error or most probable, especially if it turns out reality isn't unimodal.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 06 2022, @12:56AM (1 child)
In the absence of all information, a uniform distribution or a bell curve are the two most reasonable assumptions, both are best approximated by a 50% guess.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @04:17AM
Except most phenomenon are neither bell curved nor uniform outside of their assumptions. But even if they were, that doesn't mean that you one observation will be exactly on the "average" (however you define it), or that the prior probability of dichotomous event is 50/50. Would you say that if I picked one random person off the street that their salary is necessarily the "average" from that area? Unlikely but it is the same assumptions underlying it. Would you say the probability that at least one black hole radiates ultraviolet light is 50/50? Unlikely but it is the same assumptions underlying it until you check them all. Or two mix them. If I grabbed a random person off the street in a world where no two people had the exact same salary, would you say the chances of the next individual I grab having a greater salary is 50/50? What if the first person was "average" using one of the common definitions of my choosing? If I tell you there is a standard failure curve on my widget and its MTBF is 5 years, would you say there is a 50/50 chance a widget makes it to five years? Or 5 log(2) years? Here is a fun one, what is the average voltage of the North American power grid? Depending on who you ask, the answer may shock you. Is there a 50/50 chance that a random person selected with agree with your chosen answer to that question? Either they will or they won't, according to you.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday May 06 2022, @12:12AM (2 children)
The elephant would have a harder time leaving the planet because it's larger, heavier, harder to lift, etc. We could do it now, if we wanted to, but that's after over 50 years of development, that might well not have been done without Mercury, etc.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 06 2022, @01:00AM
I'd argue that the difference between putting elephants into interplanetary spaceships and humans isn't all that great. The main problem with elephants is feeding them on the trip and if we were serious about it I assume something like intravenous feedings would be the way to go.
If elephants had nuclear weapons and two global superpowers just learning to put things into orbit, you bet your trunks they would have found a way to space-race themselves through a Mercury-like program right up to a conclusive demonstration of reliable delivery of payloads so large they would make the other side sure that they could be obliterated by nuclear weapons on ICBMs. Putting their fat selves in orbit would no doubt have been part of that.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday May 06 2022, @08:18PM
It isn't though, not really.
An elephant takes exactly the same number of elephant-masses of fuel to reach orbit as a mouse takes mouse-masses of fuel. Normalized for the scale of the intelligence, the requirements are identical.
We built human-scale rockets because we're human-scale. We could easily have built much larger rockets (and are doing so with Starship) - and in fact due to the squarer-cube law larger rockets are actually a bit more efficient since the dry mass of the rocket becomes a a smaller portion of the fuel+rocket mass. In fact we designed much larger rockets, but never got them funded - probably because we had decisively won the pissing match with the USSR that had inspired the funding in the first place, and in the process had firmly established precedent that rocketry should be done at grossly inflated military-industrial complex prices.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:59PM (2 children)
I doubt it. The weight of a human is insignificant compared to the weight of the machine needed to put that human in space.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:23PM
en elephant too. We just have to learn how to work mass attraction, make your destination pull you towards it, You can never get lost that way either. And the more weight you carry, the greater the pull. But for now, we just have to learn about electromotive propulsion, and maybe how to ride gravity waves. And let's forget about the interstellar crap until we achieve FTL travel. We have to do 100 light years per second to be worth it, 1000 per second for intergalactic travel to be practical, Get you to Andromeda in a little over a half hour
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:59PM
Using Earth as an example, NASA's general rule is that each pound of payload takes 225 pounds of fuel to reach Mars. Four humans at around 640 pounds would require about 144,000 pounds of fuel. Four African bush Elephants at 52,000 pounds would require 11,700,000 pounds of fuel. The additional fuel mass is almost two fully-loaded Saturn V rockets. Instead of one rocket to reach Mars with humans, you would need at least three for just the human-sized equipment and the elephants. Add the increase in food, elephant-sized equipment, and all the other things they would actually need, and you are looking at a much more difficult and expensive mission to travel just to Mars.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:06PM
Bull. Size is mostly irrelephant for getting off a planet. Whether mouse or whale size, an intelligence is going to build technology on a scale proportional to themselves. In an absolute sense, getting an elephant to orbit is going to take a lot more fuel than a mouse - but the ratio of passenger mass to fuel mass will be the same either way. In fact the elephant will likely have a slight advantage since rocketry benefits from being scaled up: the square-cube law means that your fuel-to-rocket ratio improves with increasing size, so you're carrying less "dead" weight.
Aquatic species would certainly have a huge disadvantage in metallurgy. Probably nothing a few thousand more years of technological development couldn't fix - an eyeblink on the galactic timescales we're discussing, but it might legitimately never occur to them to develop in that direction. Electricity could be more complicated - a lot of aquatic species can, like sharks, actually detect even the tiny electric fields from other creatures nervous systems. That would likely give a technological species a huge advantage in understanding electricity, even if a lot of practical applications would be difficult to implement underwater.
If you assume a technological aquatic species evolved on a rocky world though, then it would likely be only a matter of time before they began exploring and colonizing the surface, sort of their analog to a space program, but with vastly lower barriers to entry. Which would likely mean they'd already have extensive experience maintaining long-term artificial habitats before they ever reached orbit, assuming they eventually did.
A hive intelligence would be an interesting question. If they were linked via touch or smell like most Terran hive species are, then any scouting party, etc. would essentially become a separate "individual" with reduced intelligence until it rejoined the larger collective, and the collective would presumably be accustomed to managing itself in that manner. It would probably mean that there would be a minimum crew size to maintain enough intelligence to operate their spacecraft, and if the minimum were large enough they could face a much more real scaling problem than the elephants. A swarm of bees the size of an elephant still doesn't interact with the world on the same scale as an elephant. There might also be issues with the maximum time a "scouting party" could be separated from the hive before developing individuality or other unwelcome complications.
If they linked via subsonics, organic radio, or other long-range communication methods though... then the hive might never have evolved to deal with portions of itself being temporarily separated from the whole. Those broadcasts could obviously be artificially extended to keep the crew in contact - but light speed delays would likely become a problem beyond low orbit. And while "budding off" a new hive to colonize new territory might be feasible (in fact they'd probably already exist on different continents, if not smaller scales), that would likely mean their first voyage beyond low orbit would have to be an ark-ship. A daunting task with minimal benefit to the original collective - especially if you consider they might never have evolved even the concept of inter-hive communication, and the new spaceborn hive would have a huge strategic advantage if it decided it didn't like the offworld options, but wanted to claim the homeworld for itself.
(Score: 4, Funny) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:11PM (1 child)
SpaceX Starship can get 150 tons to low earth orbit.
An African Bush elephant weighs 13,000 pounds. Asian elephant 8,800 pounds.
One small step for an elephant. One giant leap for the grasshopper it was about to step on.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:45PM
Thank you DannyB, I actually laughed out loud.
(Score: 2) by Mojibake Tengu on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:40PM (2 children)
You greatly underestimate elephant size intelligence. And certain much bigger people than we are.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganesha [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gana [wikipedia.org]
According to ancient Puranic texts, Ganesha, a popular figure from Hindu mythology, not only is the elected leader of Gana race, but Śiva (a titular Deva of Yaksha-svarupa class of celestial beings) keeps this whole race of Ganas as the most favourite to him and trusts them as pet crew members on his vahana spaceship.
As his wife is said personally responsible to oversee artificial primates evolution, this (or equivalent) ship is visiting our planet regularly every 60 000 years, at least last two visits at Manosarowar area were recorded 15 000 and 75 000 years ago. Those records are kept at Kashi temple.
In China, this very 60k years period is known in mythology as regular rebirth of Primordial Chaos goddess Shanggu, who she brings equity to pending conflicts between gods and demons and restores the peace for a while.
Not that corrupted monotheists nor other demonists wanted you to know anything about that.
The edge of 太玄 cannot be defined, for it is beyond every aspect of design
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Friday May 06 2022, @12:17AM (1 child)
Damn, I don't think we'll have Richard Dean Anderson around to deal with them when they drop by next :(
Nor Will Smith for that matter.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @04:15AM
Aliens will come to Earth, get slapped by Will Smith, see the Twitter drama, and go back where they came from.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:06PM (1 child)
Well, we detected:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CA%BBOumuamua [wikipedia.org]
I mean, it was probably just a hunk of rock zooming through space, but there you go. Now, how would we be able to tell, if said hunk of rock was a space craft disguised as a hunk of rock?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday May 06 2022, @12:27AM
More to the point, that was the first one we've detected, but they probably come through fairly regularly. (I believe the current estimate is several times/decade https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-03530-3 [nature.com] . So we probably would have missed any from before last year.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:46PM
Small groups of space mormons would split off from the main civilization and keep on colonizing. Then you still end up with aliens colonizing everything. Hypothesis defeated.
Let's face it. Alien ships are visiting Earth right now and we have them on video.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by pvanhoof on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:11PM (5 children)
The reason advanced alien lifeforms have no communicated with us yet (and will probably never do) is simply because distances are far too great to do any meaningful communication at light speed. Just look up the light years of distance between us and the nearest star. That amount of years times two to say hello to each other.
Perhaps there is bacterial life closer by. But they are all probably not advanced enough to come up with things like radio communication.
Why the same advanced alien lifeforms who can't communicate with us because of distance have not visited earth yet? Yes, again, because of the distance.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:14PM (1 child)
Some of us live in hope, a few more months without cleaning the bath and anything could be possible.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by pvanhoof on Friday May 06 2022, @05:52AM
Ah, so you are the one behind this research [extremetech.com]? How's the bath water at Boston university? Nice and warm?
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:40PM (2 children)
>That amount of years times two to say hello to each other.
And? We're not talking about a cozy afternoon chat, we're talking about noticing that they exist, and hopefully exchanging cultural and technological wealth, scientific insights, independent data about the fundamental principles of life, etc. None of which is time sensitive.
A species with technology not much better than ours could easily spot us from a hundred light years away, a volume which likely includes somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 planets. If life is even remotely common that's not bad odds.
With a thousand years of technological development, they could probably spot us from halfway across the galaxy. With a million, potentially from another galaxy. And those would all still be fellow young species species that are practically the same age as us on the timescale of the universe. Obviously as they get further away they're seeing us further in the past, so you wouldn't have to get that far before it wasn't obvious that there was technological civilization here - but Earth's oxygen-rich atmosphere has been broadcasting "life exists here" at a power vastly higher than all of human energy consumption for about half a billion years.
Of course, spotting us doesn't necessarily mean we could spot them back. There could well be a thriving interstellar communication network that our technology is still a bit to primitive to detect. A few generations of space telescope from now and we may find we're getting regular broadcasts amounting to "Hello, can you hear us yet?" Why send a broadcast powerful enough for a primitive species to detect when we'll be able to detect their normal broadcasts soon enough? Maybe to offer help through some technological great filters - but do you necessarily want to help a species join the galactic stage if they're too violent or irresponsible to survive their own technological ascension? I mean, physical trade and traditional warfare might be unprofitable over interstellar distances (without FTL), but extermination and replacement, or just exponential expansionism, are likely to be quite viable to any species so inclined. Heck, we're already close to having the minimum prerequisite technologies.
(Score: 2) by pvanhoof on Friday May 06 2022, @05:48AM (1 child)
It might very well have happened that they've spot us. However. Before their hello reaches us it might also very well be that all life on earth has died out already. You know, our sun going supernova and all that?
That's about how long light might take to reach us from their star depending on which galaxy they are at.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday May 06 2022, @04:32PM
Yeah, barring FTL, I don't hold out much hope for intergalactic contact.
However, our galaxy is relatively small, only 100,000-200,000 light years across, and contains an estimated 100 to 1000 billion planets. And judging by current detection about 4% of those are terrestrial, with another 31% being "super Earths", which may well be just as suitable for the emergence of life. And a huge fraction of which are billions of years older than Earth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:11PM (25 children)
With visitation comes conquest, it's only natural, look at what happened to North America
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:16PM (1 child)
It's Brandons fault.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:19PM
Then you should ask him to go.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:20PM (10 children)
This (probably) only applies if you assume that FTL is possible. Otherwise by the time they get here, they won't want to live on a planet.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:08PM (6 children)
Indeed, by the time they get here they may no longer be able to live on a planet. Living in a space ship probably comes with its own evolutionary pressures, and there will be enough generations for evolution to happen.
However they probably will be interested to send probes down to Earth, just as we send probes down into the ocean, just out of curiosity.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:24PM (5 children)
If there is enough time to have evolutionary changes, then there are going to be social and other changes as well.
If we are born and will die on this mission, then what is the point of life? We are nothing more than a delivery mechanism for our descendants who will reach the destination, but have changed from our original species in detectable ways?
Why would they care about adhering to the original policies and porpoises of the mission? Decisions made by dead people long ago on a planet now far away -- and too far for us to ever return to even if we turned around. Do you want me to turn this car around?
The civilization who sent them may lose interest by the time the mission arrives. If they haven't wiped themselves out.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:25PM (1 child)
There is one way to keep a goal for a long time, even when it no longer makes sense (or even didn't make sense right from the beginning): Religion. It is God's will for them to get to the destination. The destination of course will be a paradise (let it for the then-current leaders to explain how the destination not being a paradise doesn't invalidate that religion), and those who die on the way will be resurrected after that paradise is reached (again, explanation on why this doesn't happen is for the then-leaders; probably the explanation will be something about how the destination will turn into a paradise later, and then the dead will rise).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:46PM
This leads to differences of interpretation of the holy SD card handed down from the ancients. Then accusations of heresy. Apostasy. Religious wars. Torture of heretics. And the worst of all . . . atheists! Then televangelist charlatans.
I think the biblical book of Acts church leaders would be astonished at what they see of Christianity today.
Somehow, I don't think creating a religion is actually going to control that final generation.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday May 06 2022, @12:20AM
If you're only interested in the end point, then you have a point. But in that case why are you bothering to live now? People live in an environment, and their choices are determined by how they want to live. The comment that "they'd send probes down" is probably correct, but we might well not notice them. We sure wouldn't have noticed them 3 or 4 centuries ago (at least not as probes). Why they'd do it? Because they're still exchanging slow emails with the home planet, and it's good to have some news to offer so they'll keep talking to you. It's hard to keep advancing your technology, science, etc. when you've got a small population. (After awhile they may build large enough vessels that they don't need that as much, but they'll probably still like to gossip about the old home.)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Friday May 06 2022, @12:22AM (1 child)
This isn't the dolphin thread; that 's the one above ;)
(Side note: I can't tell whether you purposefully did that, or porpoisefully did that; please assume this comment is intended in good humour)
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday May 06 2022, @11:58PM
Who will offer thanks for all the fish?
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:05PM (2 children)
Not necessarily. Relativistic effects mean that if you have enough energy at your disposal it's perfectly possible hop in a starship and fly to Alpha Centauri in a few minutes for a picnic. Four years will still have passed on Earth during your voyage, but that's really only a problem if you had a hot date back on Earth that evening.
Cryogenics is a much cheaper possibility, but comes with some serious problems related to the fact that you're accumulating years (decade? millenia?) worth of radiation damage while all the biological processes that would normally repair that damage are suspended. Still, with enough shielding and careful removal of all the radioactive isotopes in your body and ship, it should be feasible.
Finally, on a more exotic front - last year some enterprising researchers discovered that Alcubierre-style warp drives don't require any mythical negative mass so long as you limit them to sub-light speeds, while still allowing you to fine tune the rate at which time passes within the bubble. Not quite as flashy as FTL, but you're still essentially getting reactionless thrust, inertial dampening, and a stasis field. All without breaking causality in the process.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday May 06 2022, @12:22AM (1 child)
You're ignoring the hazards of a faster traversal. Space isn't empty, it's just that the stuff in it is rather spread out, but if you go fast enough you'll be hit by meteors going at a good fraction of c. Even a grain of sand is quite destructive at that velocity.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday May 06 2022, @04:43PM
True, but if you have command of the energies needed to accelerate to such insane relativistic speeds (and stop again at the far end), various EM-based shielding technologies are probably not a problem
And it's not really applicable to the other two - cryogenics avoids going fast, and matter probably can't survive crossing the extreme gravitational gradients of a warp bubble. Radiation might - but since ship mass is irrelevant, radiation shielding is simple. And it may be possible to shape the bubble to guide most material around it
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:00PM (9 children)
You're talking about what the trans-Siberian land bridge migrants did to the megafauna, right? In comparison, the Spaniards were downright cordial, and the U.S. annexation of Hawaii was almost genteel.
As we become more capable / confident / less fearful, we become kinder to those we visit. Not saying that has any bearing on aliens, just human nature.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 1) by liar on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:46PM
Or maybe the Trisolaris's are on the way, and we'll know in 450 years...
Noli nothis permittere te terere.
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:09PM (7 children)
We became kinder to those we visit, and we also decided not to visit. There are still a few uncontacted peoples [wikipedia.org]
It's conceivable that an advanced civilization with FTL travel might decide to leave us alone until we reached their level (life imitating art, as the Vulcans left us alone until we achieved warp).
OTOH, it seems far more likely that there is no FTL Santa Claus. Given that, they may have decided that multi-generation ships are unethical and decided not to send one even if they detected industrial signatures. The number of candidate planets within 100 light-years can't be that big. Sending a multi-generation ship knowing that you might arrive at a nuclear wasteland or a civilization that collapsed back in to a Dark Age seems unlikely. Best case scenario, you have a colony that sends the digital equivalent of its history via long-distance narrow-beam communications. There's no real interplanetary civilization without FTL.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:27PM (6 children)
Thing is, if you can build a multi-generational ship (and who says that the aliens aren't immortal?) why would you ever need to visit a planet covered in life?
Such a ship is likely quite vulnerable, probably would run in stealth mode, could "fuel up" on rogues, comets, etc. without ever needing to approach a star, and considering how long they're spending away from stars, they probably don't like all that nasty radiation anyway, at least not since spending thousands of years away from it.
Visiting a planet covered in life would be risky, they would have to be awfully bored to want to take that risk.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:02PM (3 children)
How bit a ship we talkin' bout? Now there's an interesting question. When I was in school, I had a suite-mate with a poster of the London skyline, and the caption was "If a man has grown tired of London, he has grown tired of life". It might not be so boring for a civilization on a ship that large. So let's use that as a benchmark. How big a ship to carry a population the size of London, cruising throughout the galaxy and living off the "land" as it were?
I guess propulsion isn't even really a great need once you've got a stable galactic orbit. You have to shield yourself from galactic cosmic rays. You just don't spend too much time at the observation windows and you should be fine. It seems like fast-moving macroscopic objects that you fail to pick up on in time to dodge are the biggest problem. It'd be ironic if Voyager were an anomalous mass and velocity in the galaxy and they didn't properly plan for such an encounter; but since the ship is ginormous it shouldn't be a total fatality event.
We spend a lot of time dreaming of FTL, but really the shields might be an even greater Star Trek marvel.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:46PM
At light speed, the universe becomes opaque, and turns thick and creamy, like a nice guacamole sauce. It won't feel nearly so "empty" as it does now, the entire universe has an "atmosphere" that will feel very dense at those speeds.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:44PM (1 child)
Have you seen Pixar's Wall-E? Anything smaller than that is probably doomed, at least for humans, tardigrade may be plotting an escape of the heat death of the Universe to reach "the other side," and they won't need much in the way of resources or environmental controls.
The universal truth is (probably) that interstellar travellers will all be spending a great deal of time interstellar space, and as such I would expect them to adapt and evolve to life away from stars, becoming very different from life that evolves near stars. Maybe life from the gas giant moons will be more directly adaptable to interstellar space travel, starting from a colder baseline, but will that life be energetic enough to get off their moons and go places? Conceivably, some such life somewhere has an 8 billion year head start on us.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:51PM
I haven't seen Wall-E, but I've heard of panspermia [wikipedia.org] and for all we know, it may be why we're here!
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:28PM (1 child)
The second law of thermodynamics.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:49PM
Are you talking about the heat death of the Universe?
If we manage to develop self-aware silicon based consciousnesses, they could self-repair indefinitely as long as they have access to energy and materials to do the maintenance.
Evolved wetware self destructs, otherwise it wouldn't evolve, but nothing says that self destruction is an inherently required property of life.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:19PM
Seems unlikely - what do we have that they couldn't get cheaper elsewhere?
At best our alien bio-chemistries are almost certain to be incompatible, with a good chance of being mutually toxic. And if the biosphere is of no use, and any slaves taken could kill you with a kiss, then what exactly is the point of conquest? (Even assuming non-toxicity, slavery is much better served through abduction and breeding of a domesticated population than outright conquest.)
All the mineral wealth of Earth is much more easily accessible from other sources, even without considering the inconvenience of an intelligent species putting up active resistance.
The only thing Humanity has to offer aliens is whatever unique aspects we bring to our cultural and scientific output - neither of which is improved by subjugation.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by anubi on Friday May 06 2022, @12:26AM
We ( Native North American ) also trusted unvetted beings.
The British were already well versed in the psychology of dominating others...aka "leadership" which uses instruments of obedience ( money/debt, advanced weaponry to enforce debt servicing ).
It's very easy to be a leader if you can get control of the instruments of obedience.
However, you need to keep the subordinated in the dark long enough for subordinators to entrench themselves deeply enough that you cannot defend yourself.
That happened once over here a little over 200 years ago.
It's happening again as I type this. Except it's not the British. It's the Bankers. Fomenting wars that both sides will go into debt to them to finance construction of instruments of war.
Side note... I am indebted to Apk here for his numerous posts warning about the Talmud. I wasn't aware of just how insidious this document is until I did some research. This research changed me forever and I now know what all the mideast hubbub is all about. I am so appreciative we have sites such as this where anyone can run almost anything up the flagpole, even if not many, or even any, will salute it.
But I would ask that once per story is sufficient.
Otherwise, people get noseblind and won't smell the rat.
Yes, I will go ahead and put my reputation here and karma on the line to back up my defense of this guy, but if I have piqued this interest of others to see what he's so concerned about, then I consider it worth it.
I know some would refer to it as spreading hate, while I would like to offer it as an invite to do your own research and make of it what you will.
My people lost their land and way of life. I see that same danger again.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:21PM (7 children)
If all you knew of Earth was from watching Jerry Springer, would you want to come for a visit?
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:26PM (5 children)
Have you seen the price of fuel? I don't mind visiting backwater places, but, I'll just stick to the casinos until fuel prices come down.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:54PM (1 child)
Which is of great utility if you live in Arkansas.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:29PM
Runaway isn't visiting.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:03PM (2 children)
Nobody wants Meet Meat [youtube.com]. Especially Runaway meat.
https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/thinkingMeat.html [mit.edu]
Who would have thought that Runaway's moronic ignorance would be what is "protecting" the planet from First Contact.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @07:17AM (1 child)
Meathead? Archie Bunker? Runaway must've had his meat smoothed out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @06:06PM
Self-aware chicken fried steak?
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:19PM
Depends, does it byacc? https://esolangs.org/wiki/Airline_Food [esolangs.org]
Anyhow, this essay's "burnout/homeostasis" supposition is mirroring Tom Murphy's Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet: https://escholarship.org/uc/energy_ambitions [escholarship.org] or https://doi.org/10.21221/S2978-0-578-86717-5 [doi.org]
Between the book and the essay, everything that needed to be said, have been said. So I'll leave it at that.
compiling...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @04:37PM (8 children)
... we're alone in the universe. And based on all the evidence provided so far, it's the most likely one.
(Score: 2, Funny) by fustakrakich on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:15PM
So is everybody else [theoatmeal.com]
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:16PM (1 child)
Even if we *aren't* alone, if there is other intelligent life, it is likely so far away from us that we will never find it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:31PM
Intelligent life forms are mooning our pilots and nuclear bases.
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:43PM
We don't know what we don't know. We know next to diddly and squat about what's truly out there in the universe. Assuming we are completely alone in the universe is at best anthropocentric, and at worst creationist. It's arrogant either way. Your theory IS as valid as any other, but that's because we have only really explored an infinitesimal part of the universe.
Using the Drake equation with generous numbers still results in astronomically low odds. But, since we are talking about the astronomically enormous universe, those low odds become probable.
YMMV of course.
Answer now is don't give in; aim for a new tomorrow.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:13PM (3 children)
Not really. The only evidence we really have at this stage is :
- Earthlike (=mass, mineral composition, distance from sun) planets are not particularly rare (though also having such a large moon might be more so)
- life was present on Earth almost as soon as liquid water could exist (from a geologic timescales)
- life on Earth seems to have undergone a few sudden evolutionary "jumps" between that early slime and human civilization. Those could be reasonably be interpreted as he result of some very unlikely evolutionary step - but there were only a few.
- we see no compelling evidence of advanced technological civilizations in our galaxy (though we have seen some hints, e.g. we've discovered stars with radioactive heavy elements in their atmospheres, which are very unlikely to get there naturally - and which had previously been proposed as a relatively cheap way for a spacefaring civilization to create a "we are here" beacon.)
- given our current level of technology, we know it would be almost impossible for us to detect a similar civilization around even the nearest star, unless they were expending enormous resources trying to attract our attention. And given our technological trends, it seems likely that more advanced civilizations might actually become more difficult to detect, at least unless they started building lots of Dyson spheres.
Assuming life actually arose here rather than migrating from elsewhere, that suggests that life is likely to arise very quickly when conditions are favorable (since it's very statistically unlikely that we evolved from slime that emerged much faster than the average for slimeworlds) took, and thus that at least "primordial slimeworlds" should be relatively common. And given the estimated 100 to 1,000 billion planets in our galaxy, that's a whole lot of opportunities for those slime worlds to have produced more advanced life.
Though the probability of evolving from slime to spacefaring civilization is pretty much a complete unknown.
Of course, right now we have only a single data point, from which it's reckless to assume too much. Once we start seriously searching for life on Mars, Europa, etc. we'll have a better idea on how common at least slimeworlds really are. The estimates based on Earth alone suggest we should find at least evidence of past life elsewhere in the solar system. And actually, based on the tenacity of life on Earth, if there was ever life thriving on another world, there's probably at least deep-rock chemovores still there now.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @06:30AM (2 children)
We are almost certainly alone in the galaxy. I can't say for sure if we are alone in the universe, it's just too big; there could be a billion year old civilization in a galaxy two billion* light years away.
The thing is, these do seem to be kind of rare. Missions to find Earthlike planets around other stars have all come up empty. Though it's still better to describe these results as inconclusive rather than negative, it's the sort of inconclusive that says "this is going to take a LOT more searching" rather than "we need to run this experiment again to improve our confidence." What Kepler did find is that the Sun is an unusually quiet star.
What's more, most Sun-like stars seem to have solar systems that look a lot different from ours. Most Sun-like stars with nice, well behaved gas giants seem to have super-Earths [iop.org] instead of actual Earthlike planets. We don't know that a cool Jupiter is required - the "protect from comets" theory seems to be out of fashion - but it means our solar system is strange.
We live on a rare planet, orbiting the quietest star in the quietest part of the quietest galaxy in our region of the universe.
Do you have more information on this? Why would this be any different from normal variation in star metallicity? And if it is unusual, couldn't it just be the result of a planet crashing into the star?
People often believe this, but it's not true. You can only make assumptions like that when the sample (that's us) is drawn at random from the population (all the planets). But it's not, because we did not choose ourselves at random.
This is similar to the Doomsday argument [wikipedia.org] - which any person throughout history could have used to "prove" that the world was about to end. But... check it out. Still here. Unless Tiny Russian Man has a fit.
Instead, consider this thought experiment. A thousand people are locked in cells, locked with combination locks, and the only means of escape is for them to pick the locks. None of them are skilled at picking locks, though, so all they can do is try combinations randomly. It's reasonable to assume, as the experimenter, that the prisoners will escape following more or less a random, normal distribution.
But this doesn't apply to the subjects, who can only see things from their own perspectives! Assume the subjects, after escaping, proceed to a comfortable waiting room where there is cake.
Now assume a subject escapes. The experimenter nods sagely, notes the time, and goes back to watching the monitors. The subject, meanwhile, proceeds to the waiting room, and finds that no one is there and the cake has not been cut. Should that subject:
1) Assume that they are the first one to escape, or
2) Wonder if they are actually the only one in the experiment, or
3) Construct convoluted theories about how all the other subjects are hiding under the sofas
For some reason when the Fermi paradox comes up, everyone trips over each other to claim option #3. Sure, it's reasonable to consider #3. I might look back down the hall and shout "hello?" But in the end, #1 and #2 are far more plausible.
Now, we and the experiment subject do have one other piece of information not mentioned. We know how long we have been in the experiment! We know that the universe, while extremely old from the human perspective, is extremely young compared to how old it's going to get, and that for much of that time, it wasn't habitable at all, because not enough heavy elements had formed. We're in the position of being that hypothetical escaped subject... and we know the experiment was only running for 14 minutes, and we couldn't even start trying for 7 of those minutes.
Yes, but it's actually quite easy to build Dyson spheres (or rather Dyson swarms). You just need manpower. Or robotpower, more likely. We're at the inflection point now, where we transition from "slimeworld" (with extremely lumpy slime) to spacefaring. It's weird, but metamorphosis is always weird, whether as a civilization or an individual. But it's not going to take much more time, because we have everything we need.
* Yeah yeah, expansion of the universe etc., that's not the point
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday May 06 2022, @04:18PM
Actually, once you account for the fact that Earth-size planets are inherently *far* more difficult to spot than jumbo planets, things look a lot better.
As it is, almost 4% of all planets we've discovered so far are terrestrial, with another 31% being "Super Earths", which may well be just as suitable for evolving life, even if a civilization there couldn't get to space using chemical rockets.
Granted most of those aren't in their star's "Goldilocks Zone", but even if only 1 in 10,000 planets is suitable for life to evolve, we're still looking at as many as 100 million such planets in our galaxy. And the odds are probably a lot better than that, espeically once you factor in some of the new realizations about the life-bearing potential gas giant moons and "eyeball planets", both of which dramatically increase the size of the Goldilocks Zone.
>[...radioactive elements in stars...] Why would this be any different from normal variation in star metallicity?
Sadly I have no links on-hand. Keep in mind though that to astronomers "metal" refers to everything other than hydrogen, and most of everything heavier than helium sinks deep into the core. As a star ages the amount of heavier elements like carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, etc. increases - but the closer you get to iron, the more difficult the fusion becomes, and none of the *really* heavy elements like the radioactives form in stars at all, only in supernovae. So for a star to to have enough radioactives in its upper atmosphere where they become visible to spectroscopy, something *really* unusual has to be happening. Especially without evidence of a recent supernova nearby. Absolutely not conclusive - the universe is a big place where hideously unlikely things are bound to happen, but it's still one of the most cost-effective ways we've thought of for a civilization to try to draw attention to itself.
>People often believe this, but it's not true....
Actually it is. Just as you can look at a set of starting conditions for an experiment and extrapolate forward to say that the final outcome of any give test run is far more likely to be fairly close to the average than being one of the extreme outliers, you can also look at the final outcome and extrapolate backwards to say that the initial conditions were far more likely to be among those for which that outcome would be a high-probablility result, than conditions for which the observed result would be one of the extreme outliers. Like - if you find a body shot through the head, it's possible that they were just the extremely unlucky recipient of a stray bullet, but it's far more likely that someone intentionally shot them.
Without more data points we can't say for sure that our biogenesis was "typical" for a life-bearing world, and *certainly* can't say anything about how common life-bearing worlds are; HOWEVER, if we *only* consider the planets on which life arose, then even without knowing anything about any of the others we can still say that, statistically speaking, it's far more likely that the time needed for biogenesis here was within a standard deviation or two of the norm, rather than us being an extreme outlier.
Take away the cake in your escape experiment (since that's compelling evidence that they're first, rather than that everyone else left already), and they should *absolutely* assume that they took a fairly typical amount of time to escape - simply because they know that will be true of the overwhelming majority of those who escape. It might not be true, but it's definitely the way to bet.
As for knowing how long we've been in the experiment - the age of the universe (current or eventual) is actually fairly irrelevant - what's relevant is the age of the planets with a similar composition to ours - and we know (to within the limits of the accuracy of our cosmology), that our solar system formed about halfway through the period in which it was physically possible for systems like ours to form (with the early formers having up to a few billion years head start on us) and that virtually all the stars that will ever exist in the universe have already formed.
>it's actually quite easy to build Dyson spheres
For a sufficiently advanced definition of easy - sure. But you also need motivation, and a *whole* lot of raw materials that you wouldn't rather do something else with. A star puts out a LOT of power, and you're not going to dedicate limited resources to capturing more of it than you have a use for. I mean, even if humanity goes the extreme population growth route and eventually converts all the mass of the solar system into artificial habitats, it's *still* not clear that we would have a use for more than a small fraction of that power.
Certainly some fraction of spacefaring species would eventually do so - but it's not at all clear that any significant percentage of them would. I mean, maybe they just really prefer to live on planets, with open skies above them, and no threat of total destruction of their country by a suitcase nuke. If they used the raw materials of their solar systems to build dozens of paradise planets instead of orbital habitats, then the population would never reach levels where it's worth capturing more than a few percent of their sun's output.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday May 06 2022, @05:08PM
Oh, and no, we're not at the edge of emerging from "slimeworld" status - that happened when the first multicellular life evolved, at least 2.5 billion years ago. I've never heard "slimeworld" used to refer to a planet with multicellular life, it's a designation for a living world that hosts nothing but single-celled slime. Either because more complex life never evolved, or because it all died out (e.g. it's estimated that in billion years or two the rising temperature of the sun will mean Earth will no longer be able to support complex life)
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:41PM (3 children)
... the yearly Fermi paradox post.
Thing is, the extra-terestials will visit us no sooner than we have solved the Fermi paradox. Old tradition, ya know.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:29PM (1 child)
the extra-terestials will visit us no sooner than we have Linux on the Desktop™.. So we have time...
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday May 10 2022, @02:57PM
Linux is on my desktop. Without systemd, even.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @04:22AM
Maybe monthly, since we just had one in April.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @05:44PM (11 children)
I like Space, it's interesting and would be cool to see Elon get to Mars.
From a Christian perspective, we are technically Aliens, but the Earth was literally Terraformed from a hunk of lifeless rock and/or water. God is an Alien, as are the Angels, and they visit the Earth as they see fit. Satan and his Angels are also Aliens. There's quite a high probability that there are other Aliens out there.
There's a few schools of thought on Aliens:
#1 They are perfect and haven't sinned. As such God doesn't want us to see them, so we don't.
#2 They may or may not be perfect and/or have/haven't sinned. God still doesn't want us to see them, so we don't.
#3 We just haven't seen them yet, and God doesn't care that we do or don't see them. (Possibly, because we won't be able to interact with them before His 2nd coming.)
Seriously, I hope we aren't the only ones in the Universe. There is no definitive answer in the Bible. I.E. It doesn't tell us that he created other worlds and sentient species, before man.
There are some hints that he may have, though.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Job%201%3A5%2D7&version=KJV [biblegateway.com]
It all hinges on who "the sons of God" are in this statement. It could just mean that Satan came before the Lord when people were worshiping God on the Sabbath. It could also mean when the Angels had gathered before the Lord. Or maybe it could be that the sons of God were Aliens, which would be a somewhat fringe thought.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:53PM (10 children)
While I do not have completely encyclopedic knowledge of the bible, I have formed an opinion on this interesting topic.
From a Christian perspective I would tend to think (sadly) that there aren't any aliens. The earth really is the center of the universe. The bible only uses four words to describe "and the heavens above" during creation, but uses pages to describe every single inch of this place where we live. While I liked the idea of sinless aliens, from C.S.Lewis books, I doubt it. If an alien race sinned, then would Jesus have to die again? In the book of Hebrews it is clear that Jesus died once for all time. On this planet. A sacrifice never to be repeated again (sorry catholics). And Jesus is the one and only mediator between God and man (sorry catholics). So, if Jesus is the only son of God, then his once for all time sacrifice is the only sacrifice for sin ever, anywhere.
You are correct that the Bible gives no direct indication either way about there being "others" somewhere else in the universe. But if there were, they would have to be sinless. And I highly doubt this. Even Lucifer sinned. Then managed to drag 1/3 of the angles with him.
Whoever the "sons of God" were in the book of Job (1:5-7), it is unimportant enough to the meaning to not warrant any further elaboration. One principle of interpretation I adhere to is that every verse has 31,101 other verses pressing down on it.
I too have always hoped we are not the only ones in the universe. However from a biblical perspective of what is to come (Rev chapters 21 and 22) I think I would be quite happy with the new heaven and new earth. Considering the sheer size of the holy city (specified in those chapters) the "new earth" would seem to need to be vastly bigger than this present earth. There is plenty of scriptural evidence that this earth will indeed be destroyed in favor of a new earth. (and new heavens)
All of that said. Who knows?
The most theologically profound thing I find in the bible simply is: Jesus loves us. If I can eventually be in his presence, not to mention meeting every saint who has ever lived, and hear all of their stories, do I really need there to be any aliens?
Whether there are any aliens? I don't think the bible really gives us a clue.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:11PM (3 children)
First the Supreme Court leak, and now this on SN. Can Dominion be far behind?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:28PM (2 children)
No matter what you may think of the bible, it is just an opinion about what the bible says about aliens.
Didn't Odo finally return to the Dominion and merge back into their shape shifting ocean of ooze?
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:54PM (1 child)
He did and then was rejected, if I recall correctly. Did he finally go there and stay? I forget.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:06PM
As I recall, Odo did go to the Dominion planet (the new secret location). And merge into their ocean. While his two friends accompanying him (IIRC, it was Kira and Bashir, but don't hold me to that). And the Dominion was happy to just take their word that they would not reveal the location of the Dominion planet.
This occurs in the very final episodes where they are trying to close off the story threads, but not so very well.
Other spoiler: Sisko dies in a way bringing some kind of victory to the Bajoran prophets with lots of religious overtones.
It was so brazenly obvious that DS9 copied many elements of B5. B5 in the final episodes of season 5 very nicely move all the pieces off the chessboard. People get promoted. Get to pursue their dreams, etc. Yet leaving room to start new stories in this existing universe.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:51PM (5 children)
From "The Greatest Fight in the World: C. H. Spurgeon's Final Manifesto": (Charles Spurgeon)
While his questions are a bit odd, he did touch on the possibility that there were other worlds. There is no doubt in my mind that, if there are other worlds. They will be unfallen worlds that worship God. Satan was the first stirrer of trouble and he was cast down to Earth. He was limited in where he was able to influence. Heaven and Earth is where the battle between Christ and Satan took place and Satan has already lost. We're just abiding by God's time and soon the final blow to Satan and his consorts shall come.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:57PM (1 child)
The passage that he was quoting:
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ephesians+3&version=KJV;NIV [biblegateway.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:23PM
My take on that, just an opinion. What was given to Paul was something that enabled him to proclaim to the Gentiles:
1. the incalculable riches of Christ
...and...
2. shed light for all about the administration of (the plan of salvation through Jesus); aka: the administration of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things.
Reason? So . . . that God’s multi-faceted wisdom may now be made known . . . (to basically everyone, the church, rulers, authorities)
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:14PM
I would agree that, from a biblical perspective, all other possibilities are closed off if there are other worlds with created intelligent beings.
I would hypothesize that these worlds must never be contacted by earth.
In regard to aliens and the bible, there are other considerations. Once the new heaven and new earth are set up, the holy city is on the new earth in Jerusalem. That is where universe is ruled from. I still fall back to the idea that the bible doesn't really leave a lot of room for there to be other worlds -- at present. But it could be as long we they are unfallen.
With Satan being the first stirrer up of trouble, as you say, why wouldn't he tempt other worlds to sin just as he did on earth?
Of course, who knows about there being other worlds after the new heaven and new earth?
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @04:56AM (1 child)
In Mormonism, God is an exalted alien who attained a divine nature, became God, and obtained (I'm not sure how exactly) Earth, as his planet to be the god of, and that other planets have their own gods. This is incompatible with the other Abrahamic religions*, all of which** hold that there is one*** God, for the entire universe.
If communication is established with aliens (don't worry, it won't be, there aren't any), everyone will be eager to see what their religion is, if any, and what Earthly religions it's compatible with, if any.
In some theories of Christology, Jesus died on Earth for everyone in the universe. Penal substitutionary atonement, without limit. Calvinists, and Universalists, will love this. The aliens will certainly be surprised to hear about it.
I find this implausible. Preaching the Gospel is essential to Christianity, and these aliens would have no way to hear it unless they had their own version of Jesus. This seems to be the position of C.S. Lewis, who I believe wrote some books about this. Moral example theory; God must provide a sinless example, both so that humans can have a standard to aspire to and so that they can participate vicariously in the standards set by God.
An alternative is that aliens do not sin. I guess this is your position. This probably fits best with the ransom theory, or recapitulation theory. Well, I think the ransom theory is garbage (Satan is not more powerful than God), and it puts a very interesting spin on recapitulation theory. Jesus only came to Earth because Jesus was only needed on Earth. Personally, I think it is implausible that physical beings of any kind with the capability for moral reason can avoid sin.
And of course, the obvious possibilities that there are no aliens, or there is no God. But those are trivial solutions, in the context of this question.
* Unless Hinduism is Abrahamic; no one is quite sure
** Except Gnostics
*** Or perhaps three
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday May 10 2022, @03:09PM
To be fair, when all that stuff was written, the entire earth was considered to be the entire universe. So it's entirely unclear whether the words used should be translated into modern English as 'planet' or 'universe'.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by srobert on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:27PM (3 children)
My theory is that space travel gets more expensive the farther out you go. This pale blue dot, orbiting a non-descript yellow star in a sparsely populated spiral arm of the galaxy is hardly noticeable. We have radio broadcasting emanating only a little over a hundred light years away from our planet. So we are known to few, if any, and to those who would know, we don't appear worth the effort. The galaxy is probably packed with far more worthwhile interests.
Earth is a little like the Shire in the Lord of the Rings, not attracting Sauron's notice. For which we might be grateful.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:08PM
At 100 light years out, is there even enough of a radio signal left to detect?
Something about square of the distance.
What about 200 light years out?
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:00PM
Even the Shire was visited by the Ring Wraiths.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:29PM
>We have radio broadcasting emanating only a little over a hundred light years away from our planet. So we are known to few, if any, and to those who would know, we don't appear worth the effort.
However, our oxygen-rich atmosphere has been broadcasting "There is life here!" with a power far greater than the entirety of human energy consumption, for about half a billion years. Every advanced technological civilization in the galaxy that has bothered to look probably knows that there's life here.
Whether that's interesting or not is a different question - the speed with which life appeared on Earth after liquid water was able to form hints that at least primordial slimeworlds should be fairly common (assuming our life actually started here). In which case, yeah, there wasn't been a whole lot to indicate anything interesting going on here until the industrial revolution started adding large amounts of synthetic chemicals to the air.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:50PM (2 children)
My personal theory is that we are the apex lifeform in the galaxy and the reason nobody visited us yet is that we are superior to them in every way shape and form. I away the attack from Klendathu so that we can go out and stomp some bugs.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday May 05 2022, @06:55PM
Nice, but can we forego the dystopian government? No? One can ask at least.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @08:09PM
Aliens?
Yes!
Maybe this planet is some other planet's "hell".
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday May 05 2022, @07:06PM (4 children)
Civilization collapse? That sounds like another way of saying Great Filter which causes a civilization to die. Just a new term for an old concept. There are many possible great filters which collapse a civilization. Many possibilities have been spelled out without hand waving. The most obvious is would you like to play Global Thermonuclear War? Or AI kills us off by taking all our jobs and nobody can afford to live and humanity dies off. The robots are smart enough to stop sending out probes with destructions on how to find our planet. Or climate change kills us off. Or a pandemic. Or an asteroid. Or Trump gets re-elected. Or many possible things.
But not impossible to detect remotely. If they end up with a Dyson Swarm around a star, they will be detectable.
Neither of the Civilization Collapse nor Prioritising Homeostasis are new concepts.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday May 05 2022, @09:42PM (1 child)
Civilization collapse isn't really a Great Filter unless it's almost entirely inevitable. A collapse is extremely unlikely to completely eradicate the species, so a new civilization will replace it in relatively short order. One that probably hasn't lost *all* the technology, and has (hopefully) learned some valuable lessons from the last fall. Repeat ad nauseum and almost every species should get through the Filter eventually. Even if it takes hundreds of tries, it's still an eyeblink compared to the billions of years head start most "Earthlike" planets in the galaxy have over us.
Perhaps such a "filter" should actually be called something more like a Great Pratfall? "Yeah, we've all been there. How many times did your species' civilization collapsed before you finally colonized another star?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @07:03AM
I like the idea of the "Great Pratfall." It really gives everything a sense of scale.
"So how did you rebuild after your nuclear wars?"
"Wait, wars? We only had one, and we only used two bombs. Wasn't that bad unless you were standing too close."
"Wow! Good job! Why did you need 10,000 years to get into space then?"
"Lead poisoning. We kept giving ourselves lead poisoning. Got us twice. Almost three times."
"Ha! Good thing we're lithovores, we eat lead for breakfast. Literally! Any trouble with predators? We think that's why we evolved intelligence. Got some ravenous beasts around here."
"Nope, we're top of the food chain. Parasites though, what a pain. Spread through bugs and poop."
"Poop, really? Don't you wash up?"
"Didn't always, just never occurred to us."
"So, about that 'traditional gesture of friendship' of yours..."
(Score: 3, Touché) by ChrisMaple on Friday May 06 2022, @01:59AM (1 child)
If you consider what a job is, what production is, and what is required to achieve and maintain civilized life, you'll se that AI "taking all our jobs and nobody can afford to live" is so nonsensical as to be meaningless.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 06 2022, @06:09PM
So you've never heard about capitalism? Weird.