Are we (and have we always been) alone in the universe...is there or was there ever other life, never mind intelligent life?

[bill5]

2 hours ago, Notes_Norton said:

We keep looking for planets like ours, but, why should they be? 

Because based on all available evidence, it's the only kind of system that can support life. And no, I wouldn't be at all surprised if that turned out to be wrong, but there's some pretty compelling evidence to back it up.

[ProfD]

11 hours ago, bill5 said:

Because based on all available evidence, it's the only kind of system that can support life. And no, I wouldn't be at all surprised if that turned out to be wrong, but there's some pretty compelling evidence to back it up.

My rhetorical question is why do we need another planet to support life. 

 

It's not like we're running out of room or resources here on Earth.😎

[RABid]

I sometimes wonder if Venus had intelligent, industrial life eons ago and triggered global warming.

[Shamanzarek]

The oldest known form of life on Earth is a bacteria-like organism called Archaea. These were discovered in the last fifty years or so but their significance has become more apparent in recent years. I believe info regarding Archaea has been suppressed for the time being as it could make all our current knowledge of evolutionary biology obsolete and require re-writing of textbooks on the subject. Up until recently life on Earth has been thought to have originated in the oceans. Archaea have been found near hydrothermal vents in the deepest parts of the ocean. They have also been found around geysers and volcanoes on the Earth's surface. It appears Archaea originate from deep below the Earth's surface. Some Archaea consume iron and and as it passes through their body it is converted to magnetite. Other Archaea break down and convert other substances but info regarding what they produce is sketchy at the present time. The discovery of Archaea is the main reason Mars missions since the late 90s have had a strong focus on digging down into the Martian soil in search of similar organisms. The discovery of the alleged Martian meteorite in Antarctica that appears to contain bacteria-like organisms is also a factor for searching below the Martian surface.

 

Since Archaea are found in the most extreme environments on Earth it is speculated they could form on almost any body with significant internal nuclear forces. With their ability to breakdown and transform elements they may play a key role in creating a suitable environment for more complex lifeforms.

 

In the 90s it was discovered that the human brain contains a significant amount of magnetite. It is also found in many other creatures. In the human brain there appears to be two types of magnetite. One type is speculated to come from pollution in the environment and the other is naturally occurring. Studies are ongoing so there is no definitive answer yet.

[KenElevenShadows]

3 hours ago, RABid said:

I sometimes wonder if Venus had intelligent, industrial life eons ago and triggered global warming.

Not sure about that, but there's this:

Astronomers may have found a signature of life on Venus

"Evidence indicates phosphine, a gas associated with living organisms, is present in the habitable region of Venus’ atmosphere."

 

"The astronomers, led by Jane Greaves of Cardiff University, detected in Venus’ atmosphere a spectral fingerprint, or light-based signature, of phosphine. MIT scientists have previously shown that if this stinky, poisonous gas were ever detected on a rocky, terrestrial planet, it could only be produced by a living organism there. The researchers made the detection using the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) in Hawaii, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) observatory in Chile.

 

The MIT team followed up the new observation with an exhaustive analysis to see whether anything other than life could have produced phosphine in Venus’ harsh, sulfuric environment. Based on the many scenarios they considered, the team concludes that there is no explanation for the phosphine detected in Venus’ clouds, other than the presence of life.

 

“It’s very hard to prove a negative,” says Clara Sousa-Silva, research scientist in MIT’s Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS). “Now, astronomers will think of all the ways to justify phosphine without life, and I welcome that. Please do, because we are at the end of our possibilities to show abiotic processes that can make phosphine.”"

 

https://news.mit.edu/2020/life-venus-phosphine-0914

 

That's not quite as exciting as what you were looking for, admittedly.

[ProfD]

12 minutes ago, KenElevenShadows said:

The MIT team followed up the new observation with an exhaustive analysis...the team concludes that there is no explanation for the phosphine detected in Venus’ clouds...

I realize people have to *work* on something. But, this is the benefit of 1st world privilege.

 

There's no shortage of stinky problems here on Earth.  But, some folks can afford to look through a telescope at a planet 46 million miles away to observe farts.🤣😎

[bill5]

On 6/29/2023 at 11:11 AM, ProfD said:

Supposedly, human beings only use a fraction of their brains. 

A very old, just-won't-die myth

[Anderton]

16 minutes ago, ProfD said:

I realize people have to *work* on something. But, this is the benefit of 1st world privilege.

 

There's no shortage of stinky problems here on Earth.  But, some folks can afford to look through a telescope at a planet 46 million miles away to observe farts.🤣😎

 

For me, it's a tough call about "pure" research in general. MIT research was funded to the tune of $500MM from Federal sources and $282MM from private sources. But of the government funding, the biggest amount was from the Department of Health and Human Services. So if that money is going toward research for cancer cures or eradicating malaria or whatever, that's useful. 

 

BUT...figuring out if other planets support life...I have no idea how much $$ went into that, and whether it was from Federal or private funding. It certainly does seem to me like it shouldn't be a priority, given all the other issues on earth. But if it's privately funded, I can't really complain about what they do any more than they can complain that I could have sent more money to St Jude's if I hadn't bought a black Telecaster

 

Then there's the X factor. A lot of people questioned NASA's non-military usefulness from the outset. By now, it's clear that we owe many technical advances that impact our daily lives from NASA's research. But to my way of thinking, the single most impactful result from NASA was the image of the earth viewed from space. No one had ever seen that before. This fragile, blue ball floating in a cold, hostile environment, seen by people around the world, had serious impact at the time. 

 

So yeah, spending a lot of effort on Venus's atmosphere seems for sure like something we can put on the back burner. The difficulty is separating the research that will produce genuinely useful results we can't anticipate, and the research that goes into a rabbit hole and results in nothing except waste.

[bill5]

57 minutes ago, KenElevenShadows said:

Not sure about that, but there's this:

Astronomers may have found a signature of life on Venus

"Evidence indicates phosphine, a gas associated with living organisms, is present in the habitable region of Venus’ atmosphere."

 

"The astronomers, led by Jane Greaves of Cardiff University, detected in Venus’ atmosphere a spectral fingerprint, or light-based signature, of phosphine. MIT scientists have previously shown that if this stinky, poisonous gas were ever detected on a rocky, terrestrial planet, it could only be produced by a living organism there. The researchers made the detection using the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) in Hawaii, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) observatory in Chile.

 

The MIT team followed up the new observation with an exhaustive analysis to see whether anything other than life could have produced phosphine in Venus’ harsh, sulfuric environment. Based on the many scenarios they considered, the team concludes that there is no explanation for the phosphine detected in Venus’ clouds, other than the presence of life.

 

“It’s very hard to prove a negative,” says Clara Sousa-Silva, research scientist in MIT’s Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS). “Now, astronomers will think of all the ways to justify phosphine without life, and I welcome that. Please do, because we are at the end of our possibilities to show abiotic processes that can make phosphine.”"

 

https://news.mit.edu/2020/life-venus-phosphine-0914

 

That's not quite as exciting as what you were looking for, admittedly.

"There might be life on Venus" Isn't exciting??  I guess I'm easily excited then.

[Anderton]

1 minute ago, bill5 said:

A very old, just-won't-die myth

 

From what I understand, that was based on what brain activity could be measured at the time. We now have more sophisticated ways of measuring what's going on in the brain, and there's a lot more activity in a lot more lobes than previously supposed. 

 

My favorite piece of brain research is that musicians have a thicker corpus callosum than the general population. That means we have a six-lane highway providing communications between the left and right hemispheres, whereas most people have a two-lane asphalt road.

 

 

[bill5]

I think when the left side of my brain saw what was up with the right side, it built a toll bridge

[KenElevenShadows]

12 minutes ago, bill5 said:

"There might be life on Venus" Isn't exciting??  I guess I'm easily excited then.

 

Hahaha!

 

I'm excited by it. But compared to what RABid is approaching, maybe not so much!  

[KenElevenShadows]

50 minutes ago, ProfD said:

I realize people have to *work* on something. But, this is the benefit of 1st world privilege.

 

There's no shortage of stinky problems here on Earth.  But, some folks can afford to look through a telescope at a planet 46 million miles away to observe farts.🤣😎

 

I dunno. I think looking for life on other planets is fascinating. I also think that humans are innate explorers seeking the unknown, looking for answers. Deny that and we don't seem to do nearly as well as a species.

[KenElevenShadows]

21 minutes ago, bill5 said:

Responding to: "Supposedly, human beings only use a fraction of their brains."

 

A very old, just-won't-die myth

 

I dunno. Have you seen the comments on most YouTube posts?  

[ProfD]

57 minutes ago, KenElevenShadows said:

I dunno. I think looking for life on other planets is fascinating. I also think that humans are innate explorers seeking the unknown, looking for answers. Deny that and we don't seem to do nearly as well as a species.

Sure.  Exploration could satisfy our curiosity just as music does for creativity.  

 

My inner comedian just finds it funny that human beings will look at new construction homes without cleaning up and/or repairing their permanent residence.😁😎

[GovernorSilver]

[Notes_Norton]

3 hours ago, KenElevenShadows said:

I dunno. I think looking for life on other planets is fascinating. I also think that humans are innate explorers seeking the unknown, looking for answers. Deny that and we don't seem to do nearly as well as a species.

If we weren't explorers, we would probably all still live in Africa. At least according to the latest theories of where Homo Sapiens originated.

 

What's on the other side of that hill? What's on the other side of that river? What's on the other side of that ocean. What's on the other side of that space that surrounds us.

 

On the other hand, I do agree that there are a lot of problems here on Earth that urgently need addressing.

 

There is a balance somewhere, but I don't know what that balance is, and even if I did, I doubt it would make a difference.

 

 

Insights and incites by Notes ♫

[KenElevenShadows]

There are a lot of problems that require addressing here, but we also have eight billion people to address them. Therefore, I feel that a few thousand scientists doing space exploration won't impact addressing the pressing needs of our planet.

[Anderton]

2 hours ago, ProfD said:

My inner comedian just finds it funny that human beings will look at new construction homes without cleaning up and/or repairing their permanent residence.😁😎

 

Especially considering that this is an awesome planet, with enough resources to handle our current population. It's just that the way its resources are divided up is so incredibly inefficient and corrupt that people believe there isn't enough to go around, so the "haves" keep trying to have more as insurance, and the "have-nots" have to struggle for what they get.

 

Buckminster Fuller once determined that if everyone on earth dedicated two weeks out of the year to maintain a societal infrastructure, everyone could have food, clothing, shelter, and IIRC, basic medical care. The idea was that people could do whatever they wanted the other 50 weeks, whether it was goofing off or creating SpaceX or whatever. Maybe he was on to something. He was a pretty smart dude. I'd go work on a farm or fix traffic lights or whatever for 2 weeks to keep the world moving along for everyone.

[bill5]

1 hour ago, Anderton said:

Especially considering that this is an awesome planet, with enough resources to handle our current population. It's just that the way its resources are divided up is so incredibly inefficient and corrupt that people believe there isn't enough to go around, so the "haves" keep trying to have more as insurance, and the "have-nots" have to struggle for what they get.

But the current population keeps growing, while resources keep shrinking. Doesn't paint a bright picture for the future. And corruption isn't going anywhere...

[Sundown]

This is the most I can say on a topic that is not my expertise ….

 

The universe is larger than our brains can comprehend. The Milky Away alone is enormous and beyond our travel capabilities, and the Milky Way is not even a spec in the larger universe. And that’s the observable universe, which is again is a limitation of ours….

 

It’s possible that we we are alone, but Boy that seems unlikely in the world of probability and scale.

 

But I tend to agree with Stephen Hawking … If there is life out there, it’s not in our best interest to signal it. It’s likely more advanced than us, and everything we know about nature says that it’s best that we STFU.

 

Todd

[bill5]

ah phooey.    As I mentioned before, IMO any life form able to last long enough and not destroy itself to get advanced enough to reach us isn't going to be hostile. And if they are that advanced, they'll probably find us anyway. 

[Notes_Norton]

One rule in science fiction is that when you meet ET aliens, never let them know where you live. They might decide to invite you to dinner, and you might be on the menu.

 

And we sent two Voyagers out there with our address.

 

It's a good thing the distances are so vast, as the chances of aliens finding one of them before we destroy ourselves is slim.

 

Insights and incites by Notes ♫

[ElmerJFudd]

On 6/30/2023 at 10:44 AM, RABid said:

I sometimes wonder if Venus had intelligent, industrial life eons ago and triggered global warming.

yes, we had to leave Venus as a ragtag fugitive fleet.  we would have made it to Earth sooner had we not been hampered by those dang Cylons.  
 

[David Emm]

On 6/29/2023 at 8:41 PM, KenElevenShadows said:

I just wanted you to know that all of us in Starfleet use transporter biofilters. These scan and remove disease and virus organisms from incoming individuals. The biofilter is only effective against known organisms that it is programmed to recognize, of course, but it prevents that very thing. Y'know, standard containment and eradication protocols. The viral organisms isolates them, and if necessary, we can study them or of course purge them. 

 

Just remember, I'm here to help.

 

See, there's that wish fulfillment thing I mentioned. More likely: the AI that does the filtering will get tired of our crap and let a virus through that turns us inside-out. It will establish itself as the dominant intelligence and end up exploring a planet populated by metal-phages that will eat them and poop out telepathic milkweed pods who act as a planet-wide mental colony. Then Klingons will wipe their butts with it and that'll be all she wrote. Pardon my pessimism, but I'm on the side of those who think it was a dumb idea to send naked pictures of ourselves into space. At best, its naive and at worst, its as Notes described it: a menu. 🤨 Any aliens who eat me better have a liking for bile!    

[Finale]

Of course, there were/are/will be other advanced civilizations in other solar systems. The problem is that they will almost never exist at the same time. If it's correct that our planet is 4 500 000 000 years old and we consider mankind "intelligent" since 5 000 years but able to communicate with outer space since, let's say, 100 years, the percentage of time that some encounter could happen between us and another outer space civilization is 0,000000022 %.

 

Now multiply this extremely small percentage by a similar extremely small one for another civilization elsewhere in the universe and then consider the time needed to travel between worlds thousands of light years apart. The percentage of chance for close encounter between two worlds is so infinitely small that the number of zeros after the point/decimal would probably not fit at this current font size on a gigantic drive-in theatre screen. Unless... They can control time.

 

Or... They are already visiting us since a long time and currently today (Nimitz encounter, etc). And they only come for our minerals, water, etc. They don't want to communicate with us as we are way too stupid, primitive, hostile and self-destructive.

[bill5]

Yep, distance as well as time are two major factors making an enounter remote in the extreme...of course, this is "with technology as we know it" and doesn't take into account wormholes or some other radical means of travel (or even simply communication) which are a quantum leap above anything we know or can scarcely imagine.

 

You would think if they found our planet and were able to get even a probe here, though, that it would include some kind of time capsule that as soon as our tech got advanced enough we could find. Who knows, maybe we'll try that one day with other planets.

[o0Ampy0o]

I admit I have not read all of the posts. Has anyone thrown in a family of Mankind concept? Like an advanced civilization which actually is concerned FOR us and is interested in making sure their naive siblings don't choke on any BBs as they prepare to spit them through a straw?

 

We certainly are dangerous to ourselves. An advanced civilization capable of finding and traveling here probably is capable of determining that we are untrustworthy, unpredictable and should be treated as hostile and dangerous until we are not.  We all should anticipate that governments would react to an alien visitor with the same suspicion and readiness to make a preemptive strike as they would any Earthly inhabitant snooping around too much.

 

The US only took out those weather / spy balloons because they were easy targets. There is no evidence that anyone has ever shot down one of the crafts demonstrating the capability to dance circles around known technology. None of these UFO / UAP sightings have included them firing any weaponry at us. They are mostly just seen then they move away out of range.

 

If anything they show off, maybe tease with their advanced technology never sticking around very long. You never hear of any of them hanging around very long. Imagine one making an appearance and staying for several days, time enough to organize excursions to view it. Give us a chance to take pictures with multiple cameras. It is common to see beautifully clear and detailed video taken from drones on Netflix. They have appeared in daylight. Why poke the bear? Why not acclimate the inhabitants of Earth and begin the process of accepting they exist?

[Threadslayer]

On 6/29/2023 at 6:03 AM, Notes_Norton said:

It would be like me going to the most run down, most dangerous, most polluted city in the world, and visiting the wrong side of town.

 

We're making a mess of our planet, and hating others is growing like windfire.

 

Plerhaps we need Klattu and Gort to visit us.

 

(For the unaware, watch “The Day The Earth Stood Still”)

 

Notes ♫

Klaatu barada nikto!

[David Emm]

4 hours ago, Threadslayer said:

Klaatu barada nikto!

 

A fine film NOT overwhelmed by its science-fiction elements.

 

I love when the professor says to Klaatu "Please have a seat. There are several million questions I'd like to ask you."