Are we alone in the universe? Poll

[PHC1]

Originally Posted by Puma Cat

You guys should read the Millenial Hospitality series by Charles Hall. He talks about his time interacting with the Tall Whites when he was working near the Nellis Range in the southern California desert.

He recounts how the Tall Whites had spacecraft with instellar drives based on fiber optics that allowed them to travel at faster than light speeds, and when he mentioned Einstein's Theory of Relativity that nothing could travel faster than the speed of light, they laughed comically among themselves, and stated Einstein was wrong in his understanding of the Universe.

And that would not surprise me one bit. In fact I would expect that to be the case. The scientific community is much more open to the idea of extraterrestrial life out there in the past few decades than ever before. There are Billions of dollars worth of “eyes and ears” pointed to the heavens but we shouldn’t discount what’s under our own noses either.

[PHC1]

Originally Posted by IM3CPO

Well, no. Your example doesn't really work. A person doesn't automatically forget how to apply context or a "totality of circumstances" when formulating an opinion or analyzing their situation and drawing conclusions.

If you wanted to have the best shot at your example working like you intended, you would need to give more context. For example, if a person traveled by himself/herself to Mars and stood in the middle of a desert there and said "I don't see anyone else, therefore I must be the only one in existence [within the context of Mars]", then I suppose they would be correct and your example would work. But assuming there is no city is not accurate as they have nothing to do with each other. Technically that one person on Mars could have built the city they happen to not be able to see at the time, so again, you are falling into the same non sequitur traps as before. Here is another way to convey this. Someone could say "This horse has four legs. Therefore horses have four legs.", even if they have not seen every horse that exists, is still reasonable and based on facts. But saying "Horses have four legs. I saw an animal with four legs. It must be a horse." is not necessarily true, and is a fallacy.



I am not jumping to conclusions; My only point is there is no reason to assume there is other life. All evidence we have to this point supports this statement (no life outside Earth). Again, assuming the outcome of what future evidence will or will not support is dangerous as you will most likely miss or ignore important actual, empirical, evidence.




OK



I do see what you are saying here and while its the next logical step in the conversation of Aliens and life forms on other planets, its technically not something that needs to be addressed as long as the topic is limited to purely whether the life outside our planets exists. Where life came from or where we came from is out of scope.



I think its safe to say your opinion is rather short sighted. For example, modern day humans dont come close to utilizing 100% of their brain potential. Pick whatever person you think is the smartest that ever existed they they statistically didnt use more of their brain than anyone else either. To say people can't break this barrier at some point tends to oppose many of your other statements about the rapid rate of progress. Why cant the "machines" at some point enable us to unlock our true potential? Again, your statements are somewhat contradictory..



I would not agree.. AI is clearly not superior to us in every way. AI has LOTS of issues. One easy example is up sampling a picture. NVidia GPU's have Tensor cores that are designed for AI applications. They have a feature where their video card can render an image at a lower resolution, then use the AI core to up sample the image to a higher resolution as a way to display the higher resolution image at a faster rate than what could be done natively. The problem is the AI cant get the images to look correct. NVidia even admitted it used hundreds of thousands of AI analyzing literally trillions of game footage images and the AI cant do what any average intelligence human being can do within seconds. Can they be used to solve certain problems? Yes.. And can they be used in some situations where they have advantages over humans? Yes. But they are far from perfect and there are countless situations where they will never be able to work. They are a tool, just like the other tools I mentioned last time.



True...



This is a big assumption. There is no way to prejudge whether someone is or would be good at something based on non-related skills. Just like it would not be not accurate to prejudge someone's ability based on race, gender, etc.



But your statement overlooks the fact that we also went technologically backwards several times during human history. Like the Pyramids in Egypt or more generally, the seven wonders of the Ancient World. Or more recently, the devolution impact the black plague had on human development. Technology has regressed several times and some technologies have been lost entirely.



Logic would dictate other life forms would be affected the same way we are. Going through periods of advancement, and devolution. Its possible we could be on a brink of exponential technological gains, but its also possible we stagnate or go backwards over the next generations. Again, there is no reason to put limits on future facts or outcomes.



This gets to the crux of the initial question. There is no evidence of other life outside this planet. Period. And there is no information that supports this will change at any time in the future. I am not putting limits on what potential new evidence the future holds; only that nothing currently supports the notion any evidence in the future will be different than the evidence of the past.



As stated earlier, technological changes are definitely occurring and will continue to occur. It doesnt have any bearing on life outside this planet though. Its simply not related.



Well, I also happen to have some experience on this side of things too. And yes, sightings boil down to three groups: One is genuine atmospheric anomalies. Another is human technology. Lastly, people make stuff up or are simply wrong about what they perceived/witnessed/experienced. I suppose a forth category or maybe a subcategory of #3 is being in an altered state of mind (dreaming, hypnosis, drugs). But its not aliens...

I appreciate your input and you have valid points as well. However, throughout all of your answers I still fail to see any evidence that our planet is unique in any particular way that would allow it to harbor life while countless others that we have found so far that fall under the same criteria as “habitable” and relatively speaking “nearby” to us, since we can not see very far nor go there explore them, are not.... We have only started looking and they are there next to us (relatively speaking). If these “Goldilocks” planets are there and are highly suspect for supporting life, it doesn’t necessarily mean “there is” intelligent life on them but it also doesn’t mean “there is not”. Now, if science finds that unique ingredient and it doesn’t exist elsewhere, we can probably stop looking. That won’t happen, we are not unique.

We are nothing more than the ordinary basic elements that exist throughout universe and carbon based life of which there is countless variety of. Judging by our planet alone, the variety of living organisms on only one planet and surprisingly only one tree of life, (yes we are distant cousins of mushrooms and toads and birds and fish, etc), imagine the variety that can potentially exist throughout the universe.

[PHC1]

So we are just starting to explore what's in our own neighborhood of the Milky Way galaxy. It's been less than a decade since Kepler telescope launched. Gaia also came on board about 6 years ago... What have we found so far in our own neighborhood the Milky Way Galaxy that is one of hundred of billions out there? Keep in mind, we are the equivalent of infants looking at the mobile above our cribs....

To date, NASA's prolific Kepler space telescope has discovered about 30 roughly Earth-size exoplanets in their host stars' "habitable zone" — the range of orbital distances at which liquid water can likely exist on a world's surface.

Also, who's to say that life requires liquid water on the surface? A number of frozen-over moons outside our own solar system's habitable zone, such as Jupiter's Europa and Saturn's Enceladus, have buried oceans that may be capable of supporting life as we know it. (And we haven't even gotten into the possibility of life as we don't know it, which may depend on something other than water as a solvent.)

In 2014, Kepler began K2, during which the craft observes a variety of cosmic objects and phenomena over shifting 80-day "campaigns." Some of these campaigns involve planet hunting; indeed, 354 of the spacecraft's 2,681 confirmed alien-world discoveries to date have come during K2.

Kepler's total tally represents about 70 percent of the roughly 3,800 known exoplanets. And the Kepler count will continue to grow; nearly 3,000 planet "candidates" await confirmation by follow-up analysis or observation, and history suggests that most of these will end up being the real deal.

This is just one of a hundred billion other galaxies that we think are out there.... Also keeping in mind that it is a slow process to evaluate them but... 40 billion
In November 2013, astronomers reported, based on Kepler space mission data, that there could be as many as 40 billion Earth-sized planets orbiting in the habitable zones of Sun-like stars and red dwarfs in the Milky Way, 11 billion of which may be orbiting Sun-like stars.


Source https://www.space.com/42275-habitabl...d-by-gaia.html

[PHC1]

Don't miss it. "Unidentified: Inside America's UFO investigation" airs tomorrow on the History Channel!

Between 2014 and 2015, seasoned pilots in the U.S. Navy experienced a number of harrowing encounters with UFOs during training missions in the U.S. While pilots were mid-flight, their aircraft cameras and radar detected seemingly impossible objects flying at hypersonic speeds at altitudes up to 30,00 feet (9,144 meters); these mysterious UFOs did so with no visible means of propulsion, The New York Times reported on May 26.


In total, six pilots who were stationed on the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt between 2014 and 2015 told The Times about spotting UFOs during flights along the southeastern coast of the U.S., extending from Virginia to Florida.

Video of two aerial encounters appears in the series, showing clips of UFOs: one tiny white speck and one large, dark blob. These UFOs later came to be known respectively as "Go Fast" and "Gimbal."

The objects had "no distinct wing, no distinct tail, no distinct exhaust plume," Lt. Danny Accoin, one of the Navy pilots who reported UFO sightings beginning in 2014, said in the documentary.

"It seemed like they were aware of our presence, because they would actively move around us," Lt. Accoin said.

Accoin told The Times that he encountered UFOs twice, during flights that were a few days apart. He also said that though tracking equipment, radar and infrared cameras on his aircraft detected UFOs both times, he was unable to capture them on his helmet camera.

Lt. Ryan Graves, an F-18 pilot, said in the documentary that a squadron of UFOs followed his Navy strike group up and down the eastern coast of the U.S. for months. And in March, 2015, after the Roosevelt was deployed to the Arabian Gulf, Graves said the UFOs reappeared.

Lt. Graves and others are speaking out now because what they saw raised concerns for them about their comrades and national security, Christopher Mellon, a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, told the History Channel.

In 2015, following this spate of UFO sightings, the U.S. Navy issued official guidelines for personnel to report and investigate aerial objects, according to The Times. Those Navy protocols were updated earlier this year; all data will be classified information and will not be made available to the general public

[Route 66]

Thanks for the heads up about the program being aired on History tomorrow. I've already set up my DVR to record it.

[PHC1]

Originally Posted by Route 66

Thanks for the heads up about the program being aired on History tomorrow. I've already set up my DVR to record it.

[Beet Farmer]

I think the Solar System was mined, basically the 'asteroid belt' was a rocky planet, which was broken up to take the metal core and add it to Earth's.early on. plus more water... Then the Moon odd entry into the mix. Took a pretty calculated angle to make it work out.. The fact the molten core is turning in two separate directional layers...
So I say aliens modified the Earth to make it a better habitat for life in general.
Personally I think Humans are way over rated by themselves. eventually some actual intelligent species will arise long after Humans are nothing left but a 1cm black mark in the geological record..
I bet on descendants of cuttlefish, making a way better show of intelligent life than Humans did.. Give or take several million years from now.

[Ventoux]

No, we are not alone.

[PHC1]

WASHINGTON — In the $600 billion annual Defense Department budgets, the $22 million spent on the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program was almost impossible to find.

Which was how the Pentagon wanted it.

For years, the program investigated reports of unidentified flying objects, according to Defense Department officials, interviews with program participants and records obtained by The New York Times. It was run by a military intelligence official, Luis Elizondo, on the fifth floor of the Pentagon’s C Ring, deep within the building’s maze.

The Defense Department has never before acknowledged the existence of the program, which it says it shut down in 2012. But its backers say that, while the Pentagon ended funding for the effort at that time, the program remains in existence. For the past five years, they say, officials with the program have continued to investigate episodes brought to them by service members, while also carrying out their other Defense Department duties.


In the interview, Mr. Elizondo said he and his government colleagues had determined that the phenomena they had studied did not seem to originate from any country. “That fact is not something any government or institution should classify in order to keep secret from the people,” he said.

For his part, Mr. Reid said he did not know where the objects had come from. “If anyone says they have the answers now, they’re fooling themselves,” he said. “We do not know.”

But, he said, “we have to start someplace.”


https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/16/u...reid.html?_r=0

[radio times]

What creates it all dash it, that's what I want to know. Where's Inspector Holmes when you need him.