I dont buy into the 1% more superior aliens having a hard time communicating with us. If chimps had a written language we'd have been talking for a long time now.

>> ^deathcow:

I dont buy into the 1% more superior aliens having a hard time communicating with us. If chimps had a written language we'd have been talking for a long time now.


We are very similar to the genetic history of everything on this planet. Imagine you are born on a planet that was thrown from any an all nearby galaxies. Your planet didn't even a sun, you had no solar system, only your planet. Every form of life derived for the thermal activity of your planet. As a result, your complete narrative of communication would be different. Perhaps, even, being the very lack of competing life forms, you are the only one of your species. And thus, there is no need for language, or even, the thought of communication.

Even so, I think the point here wasn't that we COULD communicate, but would they want to. It's like talking to children, they are so dumb!

http://videosift.com/video/Just-1-told-by-Neil-DeGrass-Tyson

he repeats this argument (and most of his arguments) many times over... Like a comedian without any new material... for decades.

To the guy who says he doesn't buy into the whole thing, deathcow or whatever... That if apes had a better communication system we'd have been communicating with them blah blah... You missed the whole point of the video; its this lack of skill that we have in anything that would be so amazing to a more developed race. The superiority complex that hes talking about is perfectly explained by your comment.

>> ^Trancecoach:

he repeats this argument (and most of his arguments) many times over... Like a comedian without any new material... for decades.


He's a front man for a very large organization. Unfortunately, I don't think he's really allowed to say anything too new or controversial. When you're a figurehead, I think your required to parrot the same thing to every audience to make sure that everyone gets the same message.

Exactly, right now there's an alien out there thinking: man, if they would just put down the glowing rectangular-box-toys and start projecting their thoughts with the accompanying emotion-signifying-odors, we could be having a great conversation!

Chimps speak, we just don't care enough about termite mounds or poo-throwing techniques to pay much attention.

>> ^A-Pex:

To the guy who says he doesn't buy into the whole thing, deathcow or whatever... That if apes had a better communication system we'd have been communicating with them blah blah... You missed the whole point of the video; its this lack of skill that we have in anything that would be so amazing to a more developed race. The superiority complex that hes talking about is perfectly explained by your comment.

http://videosift.com/video/Cosmic-Quandaries-with-Dr-Neil-deGrasse-Tyson

Much as I love Neil DeGrasse Tyson, I feel he's wrong on this. I've said it before, but I think our ability to understand abstract concepts such as math should mark us as sufficiently different from the other species on our planet.

>> ^ChaosEngine:

Much as I love Neil DeGrasse Tyson, I feel he's wrong on this. I've said it before, but I think our ability to understand abstract concepts such as math should mark us as sufficiently different from the other species on our planet.


That's a temporary uniquness. We're ahead in time. The most "advanced" species currently on the planet. Not the end-all of uniqueness. If we were to vacate the planet for five million years, there might very well be a Planet of the Apes where the chimps evolve rapidly in our absence to the point of full technological civilization. But humanity would have continued to evolve over those five million years. And we'd probably have kept tabs on the chimps somehow (this is the story behind 2001). And by the time the chimps reached the point we are at now, we'd probably be utterly disinterested in talking to them (or wise enough to just sit back and watch the show).

>> ^ChaosEngine:

Much as I love Neil DeGrasse Tyson, I feel he's wrong on this. I've said it before, but I think our ability to understand abstract concepts such as math should mark us as sufficiently different from the other species on our planet.


It's really just a matter of perspective though. Compare a bee with a slug. Bees are way ahead of slugs as far as visible complexity, yet to us, they're complete idiots. Even if we do rely on them.

And humans have been around for what? Maybe fifty-thousand years? Yeah, we've done A LOT in that time. But what could we do with another fifty-thousand? What about a million? (If for some reason we overcome the astronomical probability that we'll destroy ourselves) I don't really think there's any telling what we could do.

Not to mention the fact that everyone just assumes that aliens will be some sort of humanoid or even just act human or share any of our characteristics at all. Sure, here on Earth, life is carbon-based. But then why does everybody just assume that if we encounter life, it will also be carbon based? Answer: because we can't possibly understand how it could work any other way. And not because we just assume, but because we looked and it seems impossible according to the laws of chemistry. But that doesn't mean we're right just because we can't see the answer.

What about this: math is an abstract concept like you say. But the system most of us use is based on the power of ten. The digit repeats and a new one is added at the tenth place. Could that have something to do with the amount of fingers we have? Well what if the alien in question used a system that repeated at the ninth place? Their whole system would follow different rules. What if they used a system that had an individual symbol for every number up to two-hundred fifty million, seven hundred sixty-seven thousand, eight-hundred and fifty-three? What if they were so evolved that powers didn't even make a difference and they could fill a quadratic equation with numbers that were all based in different powers?

And if they were a race (another human term) whose individual bodies consisted of different, interchangeable parts, then math would be essential to their existence. It would be as natural as eating. To a species like that, we would look like childish morons playing with our own snot. Even though we use separate, distinct powers to program computers.

And that's just assuming that our aliens only understand things as far as the three dimensions we live in. What about a fourth dimensional alien that only communicates through careful waves of sulfur emission? To us, it might just be a giant blur that smelled like shit. You know what we'd do? That's right, we'd light it on fire.

"The latest disaster for the solar system is that the United States has decided to go to Mars. And, of course, later we intend to colonize deep space with our Salad Shooters and Snot Candy and microwave hot dogs. But let me ask you this: What are we going to tell the Intergalactic Council the first time one of our young women throws her newborn baby out of a seventh-story window? And how do we explain to the Near-Stellar Trade Confederation that our representative was late for the meeting because his breakfast was cold, and he had to spend thirty minutes beating the shit out of his wife?

Do you think the elders of the Universal Board of Wisdom will understand that it’s simply because of quaint local customs that over 80 million of our women have had their clitorises and labia cut off and their vulvas sewn shut in order to make them more marriageable and unable to derive pleasure from sex and thus never be a threat to stray from their husbands’ beds?

Can’t you just sense how eager the rest of the universe is for us to show up?"

- George Carlin

While you claim to disagree with Tyson here, I think he would actually agree with you! We are very different from chimps, but where does this ability to understand abstract concepts like math come from? I doubt a human isolated from our culture and learning tools would be discussing the finer points of differential equations, I wouldn't be surprised if they were more similar to a chimp than our vision of a human. If we disregard all the knowledge that we've accumulated over the centuries then I think the only difference that remains is that 1% difference in DNA. And all that we've accomplished, discovered and written down has been a result of that 1% difference applied over those centuries. Thus, we arrive at the current year, where we are certainly significantly different from chimps.

Then it becomes exciting to contemplate how much more complex and intelligent a being 1% different from us would be! Can we even begin to imagine what they know about the universe?
>> ^ChaosEngine:

Much as I love Neil DeGrasse Tyson, I feel he's wrong on this. I've said it before, but I think our ability to understand abstract concepts such as math should mark us as sufficiently different from the other species on our planet.

Lately I pretty much always act as though people from the future or aliens are observing everything I do. Wormholes, dudes. The light of other days!

>> ^budzos:


That's a temporary uniquness. We're ahead in time. The most "advanced" species currently on the planet. Not the end-all of uniqueness.
....
And by the time the chimps reached the point we are at now, we'd probably be utterly disinterested in talking to them (or wise enough to just sit back and watch the show).


Actually we're not "ahead in time", or the "most advanced" species, simply the most successful. There are plenty of species with a more complex dna structure.

Why would we be disinterested in talking to them? We're interested in talking to them now and they have no ability for complex reasoning.

Chemistry allows for silicon based life forms, it's just not as likely as carbon.

>> ^Ryjkyj:


It's really just a matter of perspective though. Compare a bee with a slug. Bees are way ahead of slugs as far as visible complexity, yet to us, they're complete idiots. Even if we do rely on them.
And humans have been around for what? Maybe fifty-thousand years? Yeah, we've done A LOT in that time. But what could we do with another fifty-thousand? What about a million? (If for some reason we overcome the astronomical probability that we'll destroy ourselves) I don't really think there's any telling what we could do.
Not to mention the fact that everyone just assumes that aliens will be some sort of humanoid or even just act human or share any of our characteristics at all. Sure, here on Earth, life is carbon-based. But then why does everybody just assume that if we encounter life, it will also be carbon based? Answer: because we can't possibly understand how it could work any other way. And not because we just assume, but because we looked and it seems impossible according to the laws of chemistry. But that doesn't mean we're right just because we can't see the answer.
What about this: math is an abstract concept like you say. But the system most of us use is based on the power of ten. The digit repeats and a new one is added at the tenth place. Could that have something to do with the amount of fingers we have? Well what if the alien in question used a system that repeated at the ninth place? Their whole system would follow different rules. What if they used a system that had an individual symbol for every number up to two-hundred fifty million, seven hundred sixty-seven thousand, eight-hundred and fifty-three? What if they were so evolved that powers didn't even make a difference and they could fill a quadratic equation with numbers that were all based in different powers?
And if they were a race (another human term) whose individual bodies consisted of different, interchangeable parts, then math would be essential to their existence. It would be as natural as eating. To a species like that, we would look like childish morons playing with our own snot. Even though we use separate, distinct powers to program computers.
And that's just assuming that our aliens only understand things as far as the three dimensions we live in. What about a fourth dimensional alien that only communicates through careful waves of sulfur emission? To us, it might just be a giant blur that smelled like shit. You know what we'd do? That's right, we'd light it on fire.


I will admit that a species that has absolutely no comparable experience with us would be a problem. There's a mad, wonderful chapter in Greg Egans Diaspora that discusses the idea of complex creatures that have evolved in multi-dimensional space. I don't recall the exact maths, but they essentially live "rotated" into extra dimensions. I'll grant they will pose a challenge.

But it's not unreasonable to assume that some life forms would have evolved on a similar ecosystem to ours. We're already comfortable in working outside base 10, and there are some smart people who are working out establishing common symbol patterns based on fundamental mathematical principles. I don't care if you can interchange your head with your elbow, or you reproduce by thought, 1+1 =2. That does not change. Same for Pythagoras' theorem, prime numbers and so on.

My overall point is that something that is smart enough to figure out all the problems of going out into space will figure out how to communicate with us.

Or more likely, simply harvest the planet for resources. They're bound to be low on food and fuel by then

If NdT wants to imagine that there intelligent life out in the cosmos whose intelligence is greater than humans, then I would hope that he might also lay awake at night and imagine the possibility that humans might be the highest level of intelligence in the universe, too.

I'm just saying, if you want to posit theories on the premise that humans might pale in intelligence on the spectrum of intelligent beings, I think it would be equally as wise to question the possibility that we might be at the top of that spectrum. You have to at least rule it out.

Science: consider all hypotheses before running away with a conclusion.

"advanced" doesn't refer to the DNA complexity.. it refers to our cognition.

>> ^ChaosEngine:

>> ^budzos:

That's a temporary uniquness. We're ahead in time. The most "advanced" species currently on the planet. Not the end-all of uniqueness.
....
And by the time the chimps reached the point we are at now, we'd probably be utterly disinterested in talking to them (or wise enough to just sit back and watch the show).

Actually we're not "ahead in time", or the "most advanced" species, simply the most successful. There are plenty of species with a more complex dna structure.
Why would we be disinterested in talking to them? We're interested in talking to them now and they have no ability for complex reasoning.

Totally true. If we are the most advanced, and the universe is indeed full of life, that signifies one of two things:

1. Other civilzations have been more advanced before us, and died out.
or
2. We are the first to reach this level of advancement

Either proposition is kinda scary to me.

I kinda dig this latest news bit about the star just found to be way off in the expected levels of lithium. One of the proposed explanations is that some advanced civilization sucked all the lithium out of the star, either to make use of it as a resource, or to use it as a signal of their presence.

>> ^brycewi19:

If NdT wants to imagine that there intelligent life out in the cosmos whose intelligence is greater than humans, then I would hope that he might also lay awake at night and imagine the possibility that humans might be the highest level of intelligence in the universe, too.
I'm just saying, if you want to posit theories on the premise that humans might pale in intelligence on the spectrum of intelligent beings, I think it would be equally as wise to question the possibility that we might be at the top of that spectrum. You have to at least rule it out.
Science: consider all hypotheses before running away with a conclusion.

Well in my scenario we had been observing them for five million years. At that point we'd probably know all we need or want to know.

Humanity wants to talk to chimps and dolphins right now because they're new to us the sense of not being understood. And because of what it can teach us about ourselves. In five million years, we'll sort that shit out.

>> ^ChaosEngine:

Why would we be disinterested in talking to them? We're interested in talking to them now and they have no ability for complex reasoning.

I'm sure there are probably millions of advanced civilizations out there. Even if they are more intelligent than us by 1% it'd still take them a bit to understand us. Many of them would have been around much longer than us though, being a young planet.

I hope in my lifetime there is a genius quantum physics baby that redefines & interprets the universe to us. I'm positive that we just don't get it; we have not an inkling of an idea of what is really going on here.

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