Are we really alone? Life beyond the stars.....

[Plawranc]

My view is straight forward.

Each star system has a planet formation, and as there are inumerous stars with planets in their orbit there is an infinite number of sentient species.

And as technology advances and we reach out, its a safe bet that the Armunioids of Reayath (random name) are doing the same thing, and we will bump into each other sooner or later.

[Martyn]

If you believe in evolution, and we're the first species to evolve 'intelligent' (i.e. self-aware) life. Then by definition we must be dumbest intelligent species around.

Furthermore - look at what we do to each other. Supposedly intelligent are we? How many wars / deaths have been needless. Terrorists want to kill us because we don't agree with them. They kill for an opinion. Few rich nations pay more than scant attention to our starving brothers because ... well I'm not really sure, are you?

...and what happens when a more advanced civilisation meets a less advanced civilisation?

If there's a more advanced civilisation out there, then I reckon their view of humanity won't be great. At best we're pretty stupid, at worst we're insane.

Let's hope the aliens out there, if any, are more benevolent and less war-like than we are.

[moot]

If you believe in evolution, and we're the first species to evolve 'intelligent' (i.e. self-aware) life. Then by definition we must be dumbest intelligent species around.

Furthermore - look at what we do to each other. Supposedly intelligent are we? How many wars / deaths have been needless. Terrorists want to kill us because we don't agree with them. They kill for an opinion. Few rich nations pay more than scant attention to our starving brothers because ... well I'm not really sure, are you?

...and what happens when a more advanced civilisation meets a less advanced civilisation?

If there's a more advanced civilisation out there, then I reckon their view of humanity won't be great. At best we're pretty stupid, at worst we're insane.

Let's hope the aliens out there, if any, are more benevolent and less war-like than we are.

anthropomorphism

[mechanic]

Is there other life in the universe?

Here, I put these two images side by side. The background is a choice snippet from a 3D simulation of a vast area of the known universe. The foreground is a depiction of neuron networks in the brain.

Any similarities you notice?



Is there other life in the universe? My answer is that the universe is life on a scale we cannot comprehend. For all we know the universe is a growing brain of a newly conceived feotus. That may explain the expansion. It may also explain the 'In the beggining there was nothing...which exploded' big bang theory.

Our universe is life, we never have been alone in this cosmos.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

Is there other life in the universe?

Here, I put these two images side by side. The background is a choice snippet from a 3D simulation of a vast area of the known universe. The foreground is a depiction of neuron networks in the brain.

Any similarities you notice?

(Image removed from quote.)

Is there other life in the universe? My answer is that the universe is life on a scale we cannot comprehend. For all we know the universe is a growing brain of a newly conceived feotus. That may explain the expansion. It may also explain the 'In the beggining there was nothing...which exploded' big bang theory.

Our universe is life, we never have been alone in this cosmos.

Maybe Douglas Adams got it only half right - the scale is much bigger than earth. Now where's my towel?

[Ghosth]

Look at the science fiction of 50-60 years ago, much of what they were writing about we have today.

Heck look at star trek, we have flip communicators (cell phones) Tricorders (ipad?) etc.

Project that trend 50, 200 years in the future. You don't think someone will figure a way around the whole light speed thing? I think its just a question of time, and finding a better way up out of the gravity well.

Once we can cross interstellar distances in weeks not decades finding other intelligent life is a question of time.

[dedalos]

Look at the science fiction of 50-60 years ago, much of what they were writing about we have today.

Heck look at star trek, we have flip communicators (cell phones) Tricorders (ipad?) etc.

Flip communicators  -  They had them back then.  They were called radios.  Only change so far has been the size of them
iPad                      -  Just a smaller laptop or close to it.  It does not have the power of a laptop yet.  How does it compare to a tricorder?
etc                       -  Like?????  Martians attacking?

We went to the moon without the flip communicators or the iPad tricorders but have not been back in 40 years.   My point is, we have not advanced as match as we like to think lol.  If you guys think we will be traveling faster than light any time soon you are being too optimistic.

[moot]

There's been some spectrometers developed that are roughly hand held size.
There's been lots of lab-on-a-chip development recently, and I presume they could be swapped in and out of such a hand held device.

http://steelturman.typepad.com/thesteeldeal/2006/03/beam_me_up_scot.html


The Moon metric isn't particularly good.  That one's due in major part to politics, not technology.  Very recently some admins inside NASA have blocked some designs that meet the requirements that Congress demanded of NASA for the launcher that's meant to replace Shuttle.  Also see the rotten practices of ATK relative to the use of its solid rocket boosters.  The list goes on.

FTL - Look up Mach/Woodward Effect thrusters and wormhole generators.  
http://www.cphonx.net/weffect/alt.php
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=13020.0 (it's as long as it's comprehensive in debate)
Not arguing this is it, or how likely it is to pan out, but arguing the dynamics of it: this thing is not researched, only shunned. No one that I've seen has successfully defeated the theoretical foundations of the conjecture (unlike any of the other fringe items like EM Drive, Blacklightpower, etc), only argued the ludicrousness of its implications.  A symptom of a less-than-ruthless search for game changing science and technology.

etc-
Metamaterials, memristors, nanotube and graphene applications, organ synthesis, solid roadmap to curing aging, RNA nanomanufacture, major gene sequencing advances, many different schemes attempting useful fusion in ITER's shadow, Thorium fission schemes in the meantime (China just announced they're doing it), numerous alternatives to traditional silicon schemes to computing so Moore's Law-ish progress in computing power continues for the foreseeable future, significant progress in AI automation....

[CptTrips]

Flip communicators  -  They had them back then.  They were called radios.  Only change so far has been the size of them

Off topic, but I want one!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUeQJXznCtY

,
Wab

[dedalos]

The Moon metric isn't particularly good.  That one's due in major part to politics, not technology.  Very recently some admins inside NASA have blocked some designs that meet the requirements that Congress demanded of NASA for the launcher that's meant to replace Shuttle.  Also see the rotten practices of ATK relative to the use of its solid rocket boosters.  The list goes on.

I think it is a pretty good measure.  No matter what the reasons, the result is the same.  Even the private sector has not been able to sell 5 day cruises around the moon and back  - for example - in 40 years.  That's what I mean by being way too optimistic.  If the private sector did not get it done in 40 years, I don;t expect the governments and politicians to do anything with any speed.

[moot]

Private sector only very recently got on the case. Can't argue with something that hasn't happened yet, but a handful look set to make a lot of progress, e.g. Space X, Bigelow, Masten/Armadillo, Scaled/Virgin, Blue Origin, SpaceDev.

If you have consistent technological progress dammed back by politics, you can get an appearance of stagnation while tech is making lots of headway.


Masten and Armadillo made tons of progress, mainly thru the NGLLC Xprize. Developed pretty impressive VTVLs.  Definitely will be a major milestone in the evolutionary tree if we eventually get something like the express postal delivery VTVLs in Vernor Vinge's Rainbow's End.  On top of any of the intended purposes - lunar lander technology.

Technology which also applies to circumstances like SpaceX's Dragon capsule, should it land vertically like they intend to:
http://www.spacex.com/multimedia/videos.php?id=58    @ 4'32"

Bigelow's literally pioneering the habitat aspect. Using tech that illustrates how politics can obfuscate substantial tech progress: Bigelow did all this with TransHab tech developed and abandoned by NASA. Not only does he have countries signed up to use his orbital habitats, but these habitats can be applied beyond orbit, e.g. in this latest NASA design:
http://spirit.as.utexas.edu/~fiso/telecon/Holderman-Henderson_1-26-11/

A major development.

Space X has been all over the news so there's not much I need to say.  In the launcher biz it did in about a decade what just a handful of countries have done.  They have plans in accordance with CEO Musk's objective: colonize space.
 
And the private sector in the last 40 years has been a major driver of progress.  As much progress as SpaceX has made, it's still just a puppy compared to what ULA can do.

[LLogann]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_J5rBxeTIk

[moot]

Cosmos At Least 250x Bigger Than Visible Universe, Say Cosmologists
http://arxiv.org/abs/1101.5476

[Gh0stFT]

You don't think someone will figure a way around the whole light speed thing? I think its just a question of time, and finding a better way up out of the gravity well.

not me,
E=mc2, for normal Matter it is and will not be possible to travel faster then light.
Under the special theory of relativity, a slower-than-light particle with nonzero rest mass needs infinite energy to accelerate
to the speed of light. Objects who traveling near the speed of light, cannot move faster, no matter how much energy it absorbs.
Its momentum and energy continue to increase without bounds, whereas its speed approaches a constant value—the speed of light.
As the object approaches the speed of light, the relativistic mass grows infinitely, because the kinetic energy grows infinitely and this energy is associated with mass.

and this is not science fiction...
but finding a "better way around this problem" you talking about is cheating!

[moot]

Wormholes
Alcubierre warping
And correspondingly more such things in the next thousands of years of better understanding nature.


Another private orbital access initiative for Dedalos - Reaction Engines' Skylon.

A successful EMC2 Polywell development would mean 1200 people on Mars for the price of a few Apollo landings.
http://www.askmar.com/Fusion_files/2007-5%20ISDC%20Presentation.pdf
more at http://www.askmar.com/Fusion.html

Low output from R&D doesn't mean no progress. No progress would be those R&D groups twiddling their thumbs.  Roadblocks happen in R&D, and only in retrospect can you figure out how it could have been done without any delays.  Progress doesn't happen on its own.