Aliens, Area 51 and the Unknown...

[habernac]

an old friend of mine worked at Area 51 for a year or so, he can't talk about anything he saw or did there. He's also quite certain he'll be under lifelong surveillance.

[photon]

Originally Posted by MJK

But it's possible for something to come here and make stuff, like....oh crop circles for example?

Sure it's possible. I'd gladly accept it if the evidence supported it.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by MJK

So.....
...Do you think some people know things that we don't...

No. Not possible.

Nobody knows anything that I do not.

[Dion]

nm

[Dion]

nm

[HOZ]

Originally Posted by habernac

an old friend of mine worked at Area 51 for a year or so, he can't talk about anything he saw or did there. He's also quite certain he'll be under lifelong surveillance.

Does anyone know what happened to that lawsuit by former Area 51 workers filed against the government? The one where they are all suffering from all sorts of ailments and they want the government to release the toxin details to doctors so they can be treated.

[Thor]

Originally Posted by habernac

an old friend of mine worked at Area 51 for a year or so, he can't talk about anything he saw or did there. He's also quite certain he'll be under lifelong surveillance.

I'm sure its not paranoia.

[Rhettzky]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

No. Not possible.

Nobody knows anything that I do not.

Depends what kind of 'knowns' we are talking about here...

"Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know." ~D.R.

[T@T]

For those with google earth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAT0ICR-KT0

[FlamesAddiction]

I believe that there likely is intelligent life outside of our planet, but I have doubts that we'll ever find it or that they travel here. It seems almost impossible to traverse the distance it would take.

I think it's more likely that any non-human intelligent life will be a creation of humans. We'll create an intelligent life and transform Mars into a living planet for them. Don't ask me why, we just will.

[T@T]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

I believe that there likely is intelligent life outside of our planet, but I have doubts that we'll ever find it or that they travel here. It seems almost impossible to traverse the distance it would take.

I wont go as far as saying your living in a fishbowl but just consider:

1) a mere 100 odd years ago man couldn't fly and now we go 17,500 mph and go into earths orbit with the space shuttle.
2) 150 years ago it took an average of 3 months to travel from NY to LA, now it takes 4 hours and can be done in an hour or so
3) A little over 500 years ago the people thought the world was flat and the Americas were a myth. Now it's populated by about 700 million.

What if another form of intelligent life is only 1000 years older than us?

1000 years = a blip in time.

Moral of the story..nothing seems "impossible"

[MJK]

Originally Posted by T@T

I wont go as far as saying your living in a fishbowl but just consider:

1) a mere 100 odd years ago man couldn't fly and now we go 17,500 mph and go into earths orbit with the space shuttle.
2) 150 years ago it took an average of 3 months to travel from NY to LA, now it takes 4 hours and can be done in an hour or so
3) A little over 500 years ago the people thought the world was flat and the Americas were a myth. Now it's populated by about 700 million.

What if another form of intelligent life is only 1000 years older than us?

1000 years = a blip in time.

Moral of the story..nothing seems "impossible"

Well said sir, well said!

Bravo.

[photon]

Of course there's two other considerations to that...

First is it's entirely possible that the laws of physics ultimately prevent any species from leaving their solar system. The amount of energy required to reach even the closest stars are more than the entire planet produces or even could produce with its natural resources, and that's not even asking how we'd store that energy, or considering that it would take longer to get there than our species has been sentient. I'm an optimist and I think we'll reach the stars eventually, but it's by no means a given at this point.

The other consideration is should we even go? Fermi's paradox raises an important question. One solution to the paradox is they are out there, and that they're like the predators here that camouflage themselves, waiting for unsuspecting prey to happen by.

[Tower]

Event Horizon anyone?!

We can use that energy to "whip around" the galaxy like a sling shot.... Just remember, one wrong move and .......

[jydk]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Originally Posted by jydk
The Rosewell UFO was a stagged event by the US governemt to determine how people would react to the possibilty of a UFO landing on our planet. Its was also to test how easily we (civilians) accept what they tell us. The government knows that even if we don't believe what they tell us, without hard evidence people will remain calm and collected. Ultimately there is nothing anyone can or will do.

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
Frick, I remember that I was terrified about being invaded by balloons and swamp gas when I was growing up.

What it means is the government crashed a fake UFO, let a few see the crash, those who saw it would believe it was a UFO and tell others. Then the goverment told everyone it was just a hot air balloon to determine how people would react to the conflicting stories. this was all done to test theories that people accept and believe higher authorities over, well I guess everyone else.

[Dion]

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by photon

Of course there's two other considerations to that...

First is it's entirely possible that the laws of physics ultimately prevent any species from leaving their solar system. The amount of energy required to reach even the closest stars are more than the entire planet produces or even could produce with its natural resources, and that's not even asking how we'd store that energy, or considering that it would take longer to get there than our species has been sentient. I'm an optimist and I think we'll reach the stars eventually, but it's by no means a given at this point.

And then you have to consider that in a universe mostly full of nothing, that an advanced race would happen to be close enough that even if we figured out the energy problem, we could communicate with them in a reasonable time frame.

Even more of a problem, considering the age of the universe, you would have to be lucky to find an advanced race that exists at the time. Considering that humans have only existed for a blink of an eye, and that when all is said and done, our species will probably only exist for a short moment in astronomical terms, is it not reasonable to think that the same would be true for alien civiliztion?

We'd have to be extremely lucky to find an alien race close enough and alive at the same time, nevermind just the logistical problems of traveling there (or having them travel here).

Maybe not impossible, but pretty much hopeless for all intents and purposes.

[T@T]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

And then you have to consider that in a universe mostly full of nothing, that an advanced race would happen to be close enough that even if we figured out the energy problem, we could communicate with them in a reasonable time frame.

Even more of a problem, considering the age of the universe, you would have to be lucky to find an advanced race that exists at the time. Considering that humans have only existed for a blink of an eye, and that when all is said and done, our species will probably only exist for a short moment in astronomical terms, is it not reasonable to think that the same would be true for alien civiliztion?


We'd have to be extremely lucky to find an alien race close enough and alive at the same time, nevermind just the logistical problems of traveling there (or having them travel here).

Maybe not impossible, but pretty much hopeless for all intents and purposes.

Full of nothing? there are so many star systems that could support life that man can't count that high.

Why? what if they were just older and more advanced, there could be an advanced race 2 or 300 million years old. if dumb dinosaurs could last 250 million years on this planet why couldn't a smart race flourish on another? give man a few hundred million years of development lets and see how hard this "logistical problems of traveling" would be.

[photon]

Originally Posted by T@T

Full of nothing? there are so many star systems that could support life that man can't count that high.

Well not really uncountable, but still lots and lots.

Why? what if they were just older and more advanced, there could be an advanced race 2 or 300 million years old. if dumb dinosaurs could last 250 million years on this planet why couldn't a smart race flourish on another? give man a few hundred million years of development lets and see how hard this "logistical problems of traveling" would be.

We're pretty fortunate to be able to be around for such a long time without anything wiping out life here actually. Between gamma ray bursts to stars going nova (you don't have to be very close to a nova to have your planet sterilized) and all the other ways a galaxy can kill you, the number of systems that have been quiet for the billions of years it took life to arise here is lower than one might think.

Even given that, one would think that there should still be examples of galaxy spanning millions of year old civilizations out there... but we don't find any, there's no trace of them. That's Fermi's Paradox.

That's why I say there might be physical limits to the problems of traveling that simply cannot be overcome. Or maybe most beings reach a point where rather than reaching outwards to travel, they reach inwards, uploading their minds into computers where all the traveling they could ever desire to do is satisfied virtually. Or maybe almost no species ever gets to develop far enough to get out of their own solar system, being wiped out by themselves or some cosmological event, or few enough do that statistically speaking there's few enough in the universe at any given time as to make it seem completely empty.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by T@T

Full of nothing? there are so many star systems that could support life that man can't count that high.

Relatively speaking though, the universe is almost completely empty space.

Why? what if they were just older and more advanced, there could be an advanced race 2 or 300 million years old. if dumb dinosaurs could last 250 million years on this planet why couldn't a smart race flourish on another? give man a few hundred million years of development lets and see how hard this "logistical problems of traveling" would be.

I don't think there was a single dinosaur species that lasted that long. There were actually several mass extinction events during "dinosaur times". Dinosaurs from 250 million years ago were not the same ones that existed 200 million years ago. Extinctions happen very frequently - over 99% of all species that ever existed on this planet are now extinct. From an evolutionary standpoint, a species has to practically win the lottery to make it. In fact, we might even be in one right now as the current rate of extinctions are around 100x the normal background rate. Just look at how many hominid species have become extinct. The average age of most species alive right now can probably be measured on a scale of thousands of years rather than millions.

Evolution also does not follow a specific path. If a species develops intelligence and then goes on to survive for millions of years, there is an equally good chance that intelligence could de-evolve as it could get to a point where it is not necessarily adventageous for creating progeny. I suppose this is digressing a lot though...

I won't say it is 100% impossible that either we, or an alien race, can travel the distances of space to meet each other, but I am pessimistic about it to the point that I wouldn't consider it likely. It's like how that particle collider in Switzerland could theoretically create a blackhole, or how at any moment, it is theoretically possible that all matter could suddenly cease to exist. When it comes to meeting an alien race, I visualize it as 2 people meeting for an old western style dual at high noon. They would also be blind folded, placed miles away from each other, and not given a watch. They would then have to come to within 20 feet of each other at the exact specified time and fire their guns simultaneously to hit each others bullets in flight to cancel them both out. Theoretically possible, but the amount of obstacles in the way is staggering.