The Fermi Paradox - Why we haven't been contacted by aliens

[Dunerdr]

We're never gonna make level II until there's a minimum intelligence standard for breeding. I propose a shot to make the body sterile at 13. At 18 your tested if your not the future of idiocracy you are eligible to breed. If not you get a neck tat and another shot. Now here's the beauty. You got all these increasingly intelligent people running around stressing over research and what have you. They walk out find em a broad with a neck tat, **** her stupid and go back to work without fear of consequence. It's gonna take it's toll on the used mobile home business and foot print gas pedal installers but it's a faster track to level 2.

[Bob Dole]

Originally Posted by Dunerdr

We're never gonna make level II until there's a minimum intelligence standard for breeding. I propose a shot to make the body sterile at 13. At 18 your tested if your not the future of idiocracy you are eligible to breed. If not you get a neck tat and another shot. Now here's the beauty. You got all these increasingly intelligent people running around stressing over research and what have you. They walk out find em a broad with a neck tat, **** her stupid and go back to work without fear of consequence. It's gonna take it's toll on the used mobile home business and foot print gas pedal installers but it's a faster track to level 2.

Does not knowing the difference between a possessive pronoun and a contraction mean that you fail the test?

[keg in kc]

Originally Posted by Bob Dole

Does not knowing the difference between a possessive pronoun and a contraction mean that you fail the test?

heh

(although I'm fuzzy in whether they're (or should I say 'their') pronouns or adjectives)

[ThaVirus]

Just gotta slap on a few high powered inertial dampeners. No biggie.

[Halfcan]

Maybe we have already been visited by aliens?

[Rain Man]

if you find a way to travel in a physical space that is different then the one with asteroids and planets and stuff, then you don't have to worry about hitting anything when you travel.

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by Rain Man

if you find a way to travel in a physical space that is different then the one with asteroids and planets and stuff, then you don't have to worry about hitting anything when you travel.

Now we're talking..

[TribalElder]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anunnaki

[keg in kc]

What if they aren't from another star system? What if, say, Earth itself has a history of which we're not aware? What if humanity itself has a history to which we're not aware? What if civilization exists on a recurring cycle, like in Azimov and Silverberg's Nightfall, rising and falling repeatedly over the millennia? What if past human civilizations reached pinnacles even higher than our own, even spread to a degree throughout the solar system, only to destroy itself much like we've seemed intent upon doing for the last century? What if some small remnant has survived over thousands or tens of thousands of years, perhaps continued to advance? Or what if something related to it has survived, something technological or bio-engineered, not human?

There are infinite other alternatives to what something like Roswell could be. It doesn't have to be dumb aliens. Or aliens at all. Yet maybe it could be that, too. Who's to say in a hundred years or a thousand we won't come up with a way to traverse what we see as impossible distances. Or maybe whatever happened there or in other parts of the world where people have reported strange things are part of the closed environmental system here on Earth, events centered around global mechanics we either aren't aware of or don't yet understand. Maybe it really is too far to travel.

That's what makes this a true mystery, not knowing. And the important thing is being open minded or imaginative enough to even ask the question in the first place, the question of what any of the hundreds of inexplicable events in the last century may have been. Maybe we'll never find any answers. And hell, it's easier to just point and laugh, and not even try.

[Dave Lane]

Originally Posted by keg in kc

What if they aren't from another star system? What if, say, Earth itself has a history of which we're not aware? What if humanity itself has a history to which we're not aware? What if civilization exists on a recurring cycle, like in Azimov and Silverberg's Nightfall, rising and falling repeatedly over the millennia? What if past human civilizations reached pinnacles even higher than our own, even spread to a degree throughout the solar system, only to destroy itself much like we've seemed intent upon doing for the last century? What if some small remnant has survived over thousands or tens of thousands of years, perhaps continued to advance? Or what if something related to it has survived, something technological or bio-engineered, not human?

There are infinite other alternatives to what something like Roswell could be. It doesn't have to be dumb aliens. Or aliens at all. Yet maybe it could be that, too. Who's to say in a hundred years or a thousand we won't come up with a way to traverse what we see as impossible distances. Or maybe whatever happened there or in other parts of the world where people have reported strange things are part of the closed environmental system here on Earth, events centered around global mechanics we either aren't aware of or don't yet understand. Maybe it really is too far to travel.

That's what makes this a true mystery, not knowing. And the important thing is being open minded or imaginative enough to even ask the question in the first place, the question of what any of the hundreds of inexplicable events in the last century may have been. Maybe we'll never find any answers. And hell, it's easier to just point and laugh, and not even try.

Then everything is a mystery. How do you know you really exist? How do you know this isn't the matrix. It's a mystery. No one knows. How do you know I'm not the frog prince of Kolab connecting to the WWW on a really big antenna.

You know how we know? Because there is 0 evidence to support either possibility. Doesn't mean a negative can be proven but your civilization repeating concept would have left clues somewhere in the evolutionary / fossil record. There is none. So the default position must be until there is some evidence to support said idea it's just that. Some semi-literate person spitballing an idea.

[keg in kc]

Originally Posted by Dave Lane

Some semi-literate person spitballing an idea.

I suppose "semi-literate" was your attempt at biting sarcasm, but I don't take that as an insult at all. I find the topic to be fascinating. So I actually have taken the time to read about a variety of fringe subjects, not in place of, but rather in addition to more traditional views regarding science and technology and the world.

I suppose I could have just laughed it all off years ago as tinfoil hat stuff (and honestly a good deal of it is), since it clearly did not fit the pre-packaged views that were programmed into me during my formative years. But I guess about the same time I began to question religion, I began to question what I see as a near mirror to religion in the scientific community. It's conservative, resistant to change, resistant to new ideas, too focused on maintaining the status quo rather than pushing the boundaries of discovery.

Your arbitrary dismissal of things you clearly have no interest in, and thus know very little about, is I think a great example of that. You already know everything there is to know, so why bother asking any questions.

[Dave Lane]

Originally Posted by keg in kc

I suppose "semi-literate" was your attempt at biting sarcasm, but I don't take that as an insult at all. I find the topic to be fascinating. So I actually have taken the time to read about a variety of fringe subjects, not in place of, but rather in addition to more traditional views regarding science and technology and the world.

I suppose I could have just laughed it all off years ago as tinfoil hat stuff (and honestly a good deal of it is), since it clearly did not fit the pre-packaged views that were programmed into me during my formative years. But I guess about the same time I began to question religion, I began to question what I see as a near mirror to religion in the scientific community. It's conservative, resistant to change, resistant to new ideas, too focused on maintaining the status quo rather than pushing the boundaries of discovery.

Your arbitrary dismissal of things you clearly have no interest in, and thus know very little about, is I think a great example of that. You already know everything there is to know, so why bother asking any questions.

As the great scientist Bill Nye said show me the evidence. Show me something concrete, anything that a person could point to as evidence. Not eye witness testimony because honestly eye witness testimony I give almost 0 credence too. Something concrete. I think it was Clinton that opened the files to see what was there and he said there was nothing to Roswell.

Here's the issue for Fermi's paradox, say there are about 300,000,000,000 stars in the Milky Way (the sort of median number). If you had an incredible ship that travels 10-20 light years in a day. Say you had 5 of these exploring the galaxy. How long before one of them would find us? Figuring even that somehow you could go to a couple systems a day and scan the entire system for life on all the 60+ moons of Saturn and all the planets in a half a day, how long would it take?

It would take 30,000,000,000 days to find us if we were the last planet and they did a absolutely perfect job of exploring. So let's look at a half of that figuring on average they should find us in the middle of the bell curve. So 15,000,000,000 days would be the average length of time to find us given 5 space craft that are beyond anything that is possible.

Given these parameters it would take just over 41,000,000 years to find us. That's with a fleet of ships that can each do 20 light years in a day. That's the isolation of space.

[beach tribe]

Originally Posted by Dave Lane

As the great scientist Bill Nye said show me the evidence. Show me something concrete, anything that a person could point to as evidence. Not eye witness testimony because honestly eye witness testimony I give almost 0 credence too. Something concrete. I think it was Clinton that opened the files to see what was there and he said there was nothing to Roswell.

Here's the issue for Fermi's paradox, say there are about 300,000,000,000 stars in the Milky Way (the sort of median number). If you had an incredible ship that travels 10-20 light years in a day. Say you had 5 of these exploring the galaxy. How long before one of them would find us? Figuring even that somehow you could go to a couple systems a day and scan the entire system for life on all the 60+ moons of Saturn and all the planets in a half a day, how long would it take?

It would take 30,000,000,000 days to find us if we were the last planet and they did a absolutely perfect job of exploring. So let's look at a half of that figuring on average they should find us in the middle of the bell curve. So 15,000,000,000 days would be the average length of time to find us given 5 space craft that are beyond anything that is possible.

Given these parameters it would take just over 41,000,000 years to find us. That's with a fleet of ships that can each do 20 light years in a day. That's the isolation of space.

Given the fact that Genesis has only happened once in the existence of our current tree of life in accordance with Darwinism, it's also a possibility that the % of planets it has happened on may not be as high as some believe...if at all.

[Bowser]

I imagine in 500 years there will be some poor entry level schlub having to go through and categorize conversations on the ancient internet. He'll come across prognostications such as these and chuckle at our primitive ways of thinking and seeing the universe.

[Discuss Thrower]

Originally Posted by Bowser

I imagine in 500 years there will be some poor entry level schlub having to go through and categorize conversations on the ancient internet. He'll come across prognostications such as these and chuckle at our primitive ways of thinking and seeing the universe.

"Heh. They thought Vernon Gholston was a can't-miss pick