Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 WarAngel wrote:
I admit to being quite interested in the Ancient Astronaut Theory and Ancient Aliens is a favorite show of mine. That being said when I ask myself "What do I actually believe?" I am unable to come up with a definitive answer. I do think there is something to it because of the ammount of evidence put forth that at least shows a possibility. If it were only one or two things that could easily be dismissed but this much requires a further look. If the powers that be are so sure they are right then why not investigate and prove the fringe groups wrong.

The whole ancient alien's theories have been proven wrong on many occasions by you know real archeologists. Why is it still a popular theory then you ask, for 1 every time we prove them wrong in something they come back at us with a "well maybe" or simply ignore the fact staring in their faces. Like did you know, the same guys who are spewing out this nonsense are not even history specialists? Many haven't even picked up a history book on the culture they say "that's an alien on that carving!" Why believe some guy with out any credentials to speak of over say Dr. Zieed Hawas (Yeah I know I probably butchered the spelling of his name) the guy who is the major authority on ancient Egypt, they can't even open up a tomb in Egypt with out him supervising. The main problem why this sticks around in popular culture stems from the fact we love to over romanticize our history, or simply think our ancestors where complete idiots based on they haven't invented many things we enjoy today. Don't believe me? Start researching and you will see how many times archeologists put the smack down on the ancient astronauts theory.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

Fluxator wrote:
Guys, please don't use the word believe. It implies there's no logic or reasoning involved. Why do you think people believe in God and not think God exists?

How does it imply no logic or reasoning? For instance, if I believe that the sky is blue, because of X, Y, and Z then there is logic and reasoning. If I believe that my vehicle is better than a buddy's vehicle, because it has better fuel mileage, better safety ratings, and a better pricepoint, then there is a certain level of logic and reasoning.

If anything, believe is the much better word to use, as opposed to saying something like "I have FAITH that there are aliens out there" as faith is the belief in something that cannot be proven.

I disagree, I think people use it when there's uncertainty. I've never heard anyone say they believe the sky is blue, that's a rather terrible example to be honest. I suppose believe is stronger than think but it really still implies there's no real proof. Like I said, that's why the majority of people believe in God.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 chapgrimaldus wrote:

 WarAngel wrote:
I admit to being quite interested in the Ancient Astronaut Theory and Ancient Aliens is a favorite show of mine. That being said when I ask myself "What do I actually believe?" I am unable to come up with a definitive answer. I do think there is something to it because of the ammount of evidence put forth that at least shows a possibility. If it were only one or two things that could easily be dismissed but this much requires a further look. If the powers that be are so sure they are right then why not investigate and prove the fringe groups wrong.

The whole ancient alien's theories have been proven wrong on many occasions by you know real archeologists. Why is it still a popular theory then you ask, for 1 every time we prove them wrong in something they come back at us with a "well maybe" or simply ignore the fact staring in their faces. Like did you know, the same guys who are spewing out this nonsense are not even history specialists? Many haven't even picked up a history book on the culture they say "that's an alien on that carving!" Why believe some guy with out any credentials to speak of over say Dr. Zieed Hawas (Yeah I know I probably butchered the spelling of his name) the guy who is the major authority on ancient Egypt, they can't even open up a tomb in Egypt with out him supervising. The main problem why this sticks around in popular culture stems from the fact we love to over romanticize our history, or simply think our ancestors where complete idiots based on they haven't invented many things we enjoy today. Don't believe me? Start researching and you will see how many times archeologists put the smack down on the ancient astronauts theory.

I think it's just another one of those cases in which people look for meanings in things that are totally fictional or made by chance.

I'm in the boat that believes there is life (probably intelligent) out there, but they are too far away/not interested in us.

I watch ancient aliens when I catch it on TV. A lot of what is discussed makes sense, but I'm sure it is mostly just coincidence and unsupported theories (most conspiracy theories can make sense too if put in a logical argument, but don't hold up against questioning).

It is also amusing to start a sentence with: "Ancient astronaut theorists believe...."

I'm whistling the X-Files theme right now.

Yeah I think the word believe has been given a bad rep because of the whole faith versus science thing. But to believe that the theory of gravity is an accurate enough model of the world around us isn't the same as thinking angels* push you down a building when you step off the ledge.

When sufficient evidence has been presented, and the model works suitably well, you can say that you believe in it. Otherwise we fall into the semantic trap that anti-science people, or even YEC spring on science-minded people: you weren't there, you can't say you have direct proof. Which is nothing more than an attempt to level the playing field par le bas.

*generic angels. My intent is not to offend anyone this morning.

The universe is too big for there not to be intelligent alien life out there.

It's also so fething big, that it's highly unlikely to bump into any aliens in a Mos Eisley Spaceport style cantina.

However, people that say aliens built the pyramids and such can suck an egg. WE did that gak. Humans. Humans are very smart*. Even ancient humans.



*Except for the people you see on the "People of Walmart" website.

 kronk wrote:
The universe is too big for there not to be intelligent alien life out there.

It's also so fething big, that it's highly unlikely to bump into any aliens in a Mos Eisley Spaceport style cantina.

However, people that say aliens built the pyramids and such can suck an egg. WE did that gak. Humans. Humans are very smart*. Even ancient humans.



*Except for the people you see on the "People of Walmart" website.

You built the pyramids!? Wow, I never knew people could live so long. Humans aren't very smart, some humans are very smart, some are smart and most are comparable to a goat.

Fluxator wrote:
You built the pyramids!? Wow, I never knew people could live so long. Humans aren't very smart, some humans are very smart, some are smart and most are comparable to a goat.

If you didn't think humans could live so long, clearly you've never talked to Frazz

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 Kovnik Obama wrote:

 chapgrimaldus wrote:
-snaps fingers- a part of me was hoping some believer would come in so I can use logic and facts to ground his/her imaginary aliens to make my bread

Here ya go



N (and pretty much all the other values) will vary a lot depending on who you ask, and the original estimate by Drake (and the Order of the Dolphin, which Sagan was part of ) was between 1000 and 100,000,000. for the Milky Way.

On a similar note, Stephen H. Dole adapted the equation to estimate the number of currently humanly habitable planets in the Milky Way. The figure given was above 36 millions.

As much fun as it is to speculate the sheer number of alien civilizations using the Drake Equation, at the end of the day it is still just speculation.

To quote Enrico Fermi, "Where are they?"

The Fermix Paradox is a bit of a bear. HOWEVER! We have learned A LOT about how we as a species leave signs and signals in the known universe. The issue that came out is that any given Intelligent Species is only going to be emitting detectable signals for a certain part of their development cycle. Here's the catch. The other intelligent species in any given group has to be at the EXACT SAME point in their own development cycle, assuming they develop technology similar to our own and even using similar principles to have a ghost of a chance of hearing us, or we them for that matter. So it's not as simple as "Where are they?" because it's about as simple as hitting a bullet with another bullet with both rounds being fired at each other from across a continent, when if the bullets don't strike at just the right SECOND, they'll phase right through each other because they're incompatible technologically.

Has anyone heard of the solway firth spaceman?
(if you find an explanation for it you get a years free printing from kodak!)

Aliens?
I see them regularly at Lowes and Home Depot....

 Mathieu Raymond wrote:
Yeah I think the word believe has been given a bad rep because of the whole faith versus science thing. But to believe that the theory of gravity is an accurate enough model of the world around us isn't the same as thinking angels* push you down a building when you step off the ledge.

When sufficient evidence has been presented, and the model works suitably well, you can say that you believe in it. Otherwise we fall into the semantic trap that anti-science people, or even YEC spring on science-minded people: you weren't there, you can't say you have direct proof. Which is nothing more than an attempt to level the playing field par le bas.

*generic angels. My intent is not to offend anyone this morning.

Angels are the universe's kindest psychopaths... they let you live to death --Doctor Who

 curran12 wrote:
Do I believe there is other life out there? Yes.
Do I believe there is other intelligent life out there? Yes.
Do I believe we're ever going to see it in even the distant future or that it interacted with us in the past? No.

This in a nutshell.

I think to imagine the universe without the 'lottery' of life developing in other locations at some other point I think is to not understand the sheer scale involved.

However, that same scale (both of time and space) makes it extremely unlikely that we will encounter that life.

There is also, as Carl Sagan has speculated, that life as it has developed has ended in a million times as a million little expanding mushroom clouds throughout the universe. The very same veracity and aggressiveness that evolution has bestowed as life's survival method ultimately ends up destroying it (or at least its 'higher' forms).

Fluxator wrote:
You built the pyramids!? Wow, I never knew people could live so long. Humans aren't very smart, some humans are very smart, some are smart and most are comparable to a goat.

To be more precise, most human brains are, on a global scale, only a few ticks above the other animals we consider intelligent, and are about twice as good at processing data as a Cray-II.

The thing to keep in mind is that we are naturally restricted to processing data which are associated to our sensitive functions, while a non-biological computer can operate on any format of data we can adapt it too. So we don't seem very intelligent when we compare ourselves to the calculating power of a Cray-II, which can accomplish mathematical operations on a scale and at a speed that seems ridiculously godlike to us, but we are incredibly effective at processing, for example, visual data. At any given time, your visual cortex is only directly ''seeing'' a portion of your visual field the size of your thumb at arms lenght (probably smaller than that too, depending on what you are looking at), yet it maintains a visual field about ten thousand times that size. And that's just one type of visual data manipulation our brain accomplish constantly, amongst dozens other operations such as stereoscopic and cyclopic visions, visual quantification, etc..., and that's just one format of data being treated, amongst a few others.

So we are pretty intelligent. Our Sentience Quotient is +13, most animals hover between +9 and +11, which really isn't that much of a gap. But that gap contains what was needed for us to develop technology and language, which are amazing ways to, basically, export the result of one mind's computation into another mind, and thus breaking the limitations of our brains.

Now, Sentience Quotients are only limited by the possibility of a processing unit to accomplish a measurement on a marker. Effectively, that's Planck's constant, and that gives us a Sentience Quotient ceiling of +50. So the interesting implication here is that, inside a 4 to 5 point gap, we go from being able to do what cat and dogs do, to being able to build the atom bomb and travel to the moon. We also almost entirely lose the ability to communicate across that gap. Imagine meeting a specie with SQ +20!

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 Kovnik Obama wrote:

 chapgrimaldus wrote:
-snaps fingers- a part of me was hoping some believer would come in so I can use logic and facts to ground his/her imaginary aliens to make my bread

Here ya go



N (and pretty much all the other values) will vary a lot depending on who you ask, and the original estimate by Drake (and the Order of the Dolphin, which Sagan was part of ) was between 1000 and 100,000,000. for the Milky Way.

On a similar note, Stephen H. Dole adapted the equation to estimate the number of currently humanly habitable planets in the Milky Way. The figure given was above 36 millions.

As much fun as it is to speculate the sheer number of alien civilizations using the Drake Equation, at the end of the day it is still just speculation.

To quote Enrico Fermi, "Where are they?"

The Fermix Paradox is a bit of a bear. HOWEVER! We have learned A LOT about how we as a species leave signs and signals in the known universe. The issue that came out is that any given Intelligent Species is only going to be emitting detectable signals for a certain part of their development cycle. Here's the catch. The other intelligent species in any given group has to be at the EXACT SAME point in their own development cycle, assuming they develop technology similar to our own and even using similar principles to have a ghost of a chance of hearing us, or we them for that matter. So it's not as simple as "Where are they?" because it's about as simple as hitting a bullet with another bullet with both rounds being fired at each other from across a continent, when if the bullets don't strike at just the right SECOND, they'll phase right through each other because they're incompatible technologically.

That is one possible solution the to paradox but is by no means the reason we haven't detected anyone else yet. There are other ways to explain it as well: we truly are alone (Rare Earth hypothesis), we haven't been looking long enough, we are deliberately not contacted (zoo hypothesis), they lack the technology, they don't know what to say (we would have that same problem because who would "speak for Earth?"), or they are simply too alien for us to understand. There is, of course, one the wildest explanation: the universe is a simulated reality.

 Kovnik Obama wrote:

Fluxator wrote:
You built the pyramids!? Wow, I never knew people could live so long. Humans aren't very smart, some humans are very smart, some are smart and most are comparable to a goat.

To be more precise, most human brains are, on a global scale, only a few ticks above the other animals we consider intelligent, and are about twice as good at processing data as a Cray-II.

The thing to keep in mind is that we are naturally restricted to processing data which are associated to our sensitive functions, while a non-biological computer can operate on any format of data we can adapt it too. So we don't seem very intelligent when we compare ourselves to the calculating power of a Cray-II, which can accomplish mathematical operations on a scale and at a speed that seems ridiculously godlike to us, but we are incredibly effective at processing, for example, visual data. At any given time, your visual cortex is only directly ''seeing'' a portion of your visual field the size of your thumb at arms lenght (probably smaller than that too, depending on what you are looking at), yet it maintains a visual field about ten thousand times that size. And that's just one type of visual data manipulation our brain accomplish constantly, amongst dozens other operations such as stereoscopic and cyclopic visions, visual quantification, etc..., and that's just one format of data being treated, amongst a few others.

So we are pretty intelligent. Our Sentience Quotient is +13, most animals hover between +9 and +11, which really isn't that much of a gap. But that gap contains what was needed for us to develop technology and language, which are amazing ways to, basically, export the result of one mind's computation into another mind, and thus breaking the limitations of our brains.

Now, Sentience Quotients are only limited by the possibility of a processing unit to accomplish a measurement on a marker. Effectively, that's Planck's constant, and that gives us a Sentience Quotient ceiling of +50. So the interesting implication here is that, inside a 4 to 5 point gap, we go from being able to do what cat and dogs do, to being able to build the atom bomb and travel to the moon. We also almost entirely lose the ability to communicate across that gap. Imagine meeting a specie with SQ +20!

Fascinating. We should get a game on sometime.

We should, although we'll be mostly playing mirror matches ^^.

Wha?

 gossipmeng wrote:
I'm in the boat that believes there is life (probably intelligent) out there, but they are too far away/not interested in us.

I watch ancient aliens when I catch it on TV. A lot of what is discussed makes sense, but I'm sure it is mostly just coincidence and unsupported theories (most conspiracy theories can make sense too if put in a logical argument, but don't hold up against questioning).

It is also amusing to start a sentence with: "Ancient astronaut theorists believe...."

I doubt the "not interested" aspect. Distance is the issue as to why there hasn't been "first contact" yet. I imagine we're still hundreds, if not thousands of years, before we cross that gap.

 Mathieu Raymond wrote:
Wha?

I play Dark Angles and Merovingia too.

I'll have a small Nid force ready by January, I hope.

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 Kovnik Obama wrote:

 chapgrimaldus wrote:
-snaps fingers- a part of me was hoping some believer would come in so I can use logic and facts to ground his/her imaginary aliens to make my bread

Here ya go



N (and pretty much all the other values) will vary a lot depending on who you ask, and the original estimate by Drake (and the Order of the Dolphin, which Sagan was part of ) was between 1000 and 100,000,000. for the Milky Way.

On a similar note, Stephen H. Dole adapted the equation to estimate the number of currently humanly habitable planets in the Milky Way. The figure given was above 36 millions.

As much fun as it is to speculate the sheer number of alien civilizations using the Drake Equation, at the end of the day it is still just speculation.

To quote Enrico Fermi, "Where are they?"

The Fermix Paradox is a bit of a bear. HOWEVER! We have learned A LOT about how we as a species leave signs and signals in the known universe. The issue that came out is that any given Intelligent Species is only going to be emitting detectable signals for a certain part of their development cycle. Here's the catch. The other intelligent species in any given group has to be at the EXACT SAME point in their own development cycle, assuming they develop technology similar to our own and even using similar principles to have a ghost of a chance of hearing us, or we them for that matter. So it's not as simple as "Where are they?" because it's about as simple as hitting a bullet with another bullet with both rounds being fired at each other from across a continent, when if the bullets don't strike at just the right SECOND, they'll phase right through each other because they're incompatible technologically.

That is one possible solution the to paradox but is by no means the reason we haven't detected anyone else yet. There are other ways to explain it as well: we truly are alone (Rare Earth hypothesis), we haven't been looking long enough, we are deliberately not contacted (zoo hypothesis), they lack the technology, they don't know what to say (we would have that same problem because who would "speak for Earth?"), or they are simply too alien for us to understand. There is, of course, one the wildest explanation: the universe is a simulated reality.

Then there's the "Super Predator" explanation, and a wide variety of others. I'd say what I outlined is probably one of the more likely ones in general.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Then there's the "Super Predator" explanation, and a wide variety of others. I'd say what I outlined is probably one of the more likely ones in general.

The "superpredator" idea attempts to say why we can't find anyone now, but also has the possibility of us being alone now and humanity becoming the galactic apex predator in the future. Your suggested solution to the paradox is really no more likely than any other (except for maybe the 'they are already here' silliness). Equally as likely is that if there is extraterrestrial life and they are/were broadcasting, our instruments simply aren't sensitive enough to pick it. Even our largest and most sensitive radio telescope (the Arecibo Observatory) could only detect a civilization such as no more than 0.3 light years away. The closest star system to us the Alpha Centraui (α Cen AB-C) system which is a little over 4 light years away. If there was a civilization there with comparable technical prowess, and there most likely isn't, we wouldn't be able to detect their background radio noise.

The answer is yes. They're out there. Each one of us is being prepared for a good probing. Bring your astro-glide.

 djones520 wrote:


I doubt the "not interested" aspect. Distance is the issue as to why there hasn't been "first contact" yet. I imagine we're still hundreds, if not thousands of years, before we cross that gap.

Ohh come now, you should no by now that time is made up of timey wimey, wibbly wobbly... stuff. The reason why there hasn't been first contact is because of A) the Silence B) the MIB have wiped our memories of contact and C) We're just not important enough yet to warrant the Doctors attentions.

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Then there's the "Super Predator" explanation, and a wide variety of others. I'd say what I outlined is probably one of the more likely ones in general.

The "superpredator" idea attempts to say why we can't find anyone now, but also has the possibility of us being alone now and humanity becoming the galactic apex predator in the future. Your suggested solution to the paradox is really no more likely than any other (except for maybe the 'they are already here' silliness). Equally as likely is that if there is extraterrestrial life and they are/were broadcasting, our instruments simply aren't sensitive enough to pick it. Even our largest and most sensitive radio telescope (the Arecibo Observatory) could only detect a civilization such as no more than 0.3 light years away. The closest star system to us the Alpha Centraui (α Cen AB-C) system which is a little over 4 light years away. If there was a civilization there with comparable technical prowess, and there most likely isn't, we wouldn't be able to detect their background radio noise.

Which would all be the solution I basically just said in my original post. Even if the Galaxy is teeming with life the windows required for any two given technological civilizations to be able to detect each other are incredibly small.

Sorry for the bit of lack in response time, my net went out for a day or so, but while I was thinking over this thread and playing Mass effect 3. I would LOVE LOVE LOVE for all the races in it to be real and be able to talk or bone one of em Maybe a Volus lol jk. Anyways fun comparison between ME3 and the real world. There was this scare a while back about the "trumpets" blowing around the world, which those of you who don't know this phenomenon check it out on google or youtube but while playing ME3 I noticed the reaper "BRRRAAAWWWWWMMMM" sound, sounds just like those "trumpets" maybe the reapers are real and we just aren't advanced enough to be harvested . As you can probably tell I am in an air head, light hearted mood haha

This is the sort of question in which either answer leads to one half of the human race loosing all hope.

welshhoppo wrote:
This is the sort of question in which either answer leads to one half of the human race loosing all hope.

How so?

Because Religious people will watch as their entire creationist theory falls to the ground.


And non religious people will fall to the ground as they realise religious creationism was right all along.

Hopefully they are or its a bit of disapointing Universe