It is the infinite arrogance of man to think that he matters.

I don't think Humanity has created anything worthwhile for an alien species to begin with.

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^ I agree - that's why we need to meet the stellar community as worthy partners. - To do this we need to embrace Transhumanism. We're not evolving anymore - so we have to pull our species up on our own. Eugenics, genetic modification or computer augmentation.

Human beings need to be the boot loader for a much, much larger intelligence. We're barely sentient.

The Space/Time/Origin sf series is an interesting look at the fermi paradox. have avoided most of the para above due to spoiler spider sence though. may re read if i watch it.

All latest, (credible), cosmological theories point towards no possibility of faster than light speed travel. Warping or folding space, tachyons.. even worm-holes bit the dust. I think other life forms couldn't get here if they wanted to, and if they could the odds of them discovering our puny planet are pretty much zero given the size of the universe.

Not to douse the hopes any foil-heads, just sayin':)

How did they handle the music? The original Theremin infused Bernard Hermann score was brilliant.

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Enzo, the Fermi paradox accounts for the probability of no faster than light travel. The milky way is at least 13 billion years old. That's more than enough time for thousands of civilisations to arise and colonise other stars using space ships that only reach a small fraction of the speed of light.


DFT, they really threw out most of the trappings of the 1950s original - I didn't hear any Theremin music at all. It was your typical, modern Jerry Bruckheimer style movie music - that is to say - completely forgettable.

I think, therefore I'm awesome and aliens want to know me.

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^You think you think - but to an alien you're really just a product of your hormones and instincts.

>> ^dag:
Enzo, the Fermi paradox accounts for the probability of no faster than light travel. The milky way is at least 13 billion years old. That's more than enough time for thousands of civilisations to arise and colonise other stars using space ships that only reach a small fraction of the speed of light.

Yea but that's also so much time that many intelligent life could have lived then died. The key to finding life isn't just being in the right place, it's being there during the right time as well. It's important to realize we may be alone...right now. Or if there is life out there it may be in very primitive stages and not yet intelligent (we're still waiting for intelligence here on Earth). Our time here on earth is nothing more than kleenex skeet compared to the age of our galaxy.

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You'd hope that a super-advanced civilisation wouldn't just off itself en masse. So while the begin date for intelligent life could be anytime - you would hope that there isn't an end date.

Civilisations might reach a stage where they become hermitic. If you can create or simulate entire universes virtually - why bother exploring other planets. Vernor Vinge had the idea that at some point civilisations "ascend" to an unknowable god-like state that is so far advanced from life as we know as to be indescribable to us.

Right now the only reason we are bound to a three dimensional reality is that our bodies are bound there. When we begin to shed our biology our reality is boundless.

It does pose a question that if we can make realities that are as real or more real that what we experience now, why should we want to explore this reality? Maybe we shouldn't. Until then, it's a good place to start.

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^That's my personal belief on why we don't see the ETs. When the virtual becomes as real as the real - civilizations turn inward. If you can create a virtual galaxy simulated down to the atomic level - why bother with real space. For one thing FTL travel would be no problem in the simulated galaxy.

For that matter, we may be living in one now. To simulate a galaxy at the atomic level- we're talking about Dyson spheres of computronium.

I'm sure aliens would be plenty interested in studying us, regardless of our inferiority. None of us care too much about bees, but they've been studied extensively by science, and they are very common terrestrial insects. Imagine how exited we'd be if we discovered space bees - perhaps giant space bees with projectile plasma stingers.

Unless - of course - the aliens made us in the first place, and have already moved on to more advanced projects.

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^I suppose that's right- but we wouldn't set up a "Bee Liaison Consulate" near prominent hives. For the most part Bees don't even know what or who we are. Similarly, ETs may be just as unfathomable to us. They could be all around us, but we just don't see them due to our puny 3-dimensional senses.

It reminds me of that story about Columbus visiting native Americans for the first time. The natives were unable to really see the ships and people for what they were because they didn't have anything in their visual vocabulary to relate them to. They thought the sails were a kind of white cloud and the men some thorny creature with a metal carapace (armour).

I genuinely think that the aliens have been here for a long, long time.

I sometimes think that we're one of their experiments.

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^Yep - that's very possible. Though I don't believe any of the UFO abduction stuff.

Fermi said the F word?

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Oh yeah. He had the worst potty mouth. Called Drake the C word at a party.

Well, extraterrestrials are quite real. The, ah, "source" for this information claims that the universe really does look as diverse as the cantina in Star Wars.

My argument with the "source" was if the alien technology was so advanced, why dissect cows? Can't they download all that information? The answer was that aliens are devoid of and do not understand human emotions.

Supposedly the main alien groups are the "grays" (the generic Area 51 midgets) and the "reptoids". What they want is either too complex or ridiculous to imagine, and as there is no solid proof for any of it, the skeptics must rule.

After hearing all this, I was madder that the ET retards have anti-gravity tech and dimensional warp drives while we with our "love" can only make lame hoverboards with leaf blower engines.

>> ^dag:
Oh yeah. He had the worst potty mouth. Called Drake the C word at a party.


Copernican?

This is a very interesting article about your inquiry. You have to register to see it, but it is very in depth. Registry takes only a minute though.

http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/20569/?a=f

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^ I had read that article in an earlier non registration version, but read it again. He makes some great points. But I think he too easily dismisses the other possibilities, that Earth is deliberately excluded from the galactic civilisation or that we just haven't looked in the right place yet.

I don't share his hope that we are the only intelligent life in the galaxy.

If we live in the 3rd dimension, and cannot see beings in the upper dimensions. How are we to know if there are, in the quantum sense beings.

Most of all aliens, selfishly, are portrayed alike to humans. This personification is a manifestation of our ego centric evolution.

Bluntly, there may be a universe where the possibility that a human like extraterrestrial being made contact. There may be a universe where the being made contact, and that contact was unbeknown to main stream consensus.

There is even a possibility, of impossibility.

When human kind attains this knowledge, then they will have attained a very high level of existence, where things really don't matter much.


Anecdote:

I had a chat with some one about morals, meaning and purpose. It was something like this:

me: "Nothing really matters, there is nothing to die for. Nothing to fear, nothing to live for. But to just live."
Them:"If there is nothing to live for or believe in then you should just shoot yourself now, and get it over with."
me: "That is petty, and very admirable human emotion. What does it take just to exist? Nothing, there is nothing to worry about."

People freak out at the notion that some one next to them does not give a care about any thing. That's not the case, because being human means you are as fallible as the rest of the lot. I still worry about shit.