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  1. #16
       
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by Scholar
    I'm just curious about people's thoughts on the subject. I know a few people who truly believe we, humans, are alone in the universe and that there isn't any other intelligent life out there.
    i understand, but also take the point that they're suffering from terrible logic / neurosis / psychosis, etc.


    so maybe the real question is-- "what to do with your crazy friends?" or do i have that wrong?

    but if so, i'd recommend just working around their crazy belief systems. i mean yes, it's a total PITA, but i think it's kinda what we're tasked with upon the matter of friendship. but it DOES heavily suggest who's worth being friends with and who is not. are not.

  2. #17
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by Scholar
    Answer the questions based on your belief.

    If you do believe life exists elsewhere:
    • Do you think we've ever been visited by extraterrestrials? Do you believe aliens crashed in Roswell, AZ?
    No.

    • Do you think those life forms look the way Hollywood depicts them or do you anticipate they look more human?
    Extra-terrestrials in general? No clue what they would look like.

    • Do you think we will ever be visited by ETs in such a way where everyone in the world knows about it? (eg. they appear in a large city & videos of them go viral)
    Highly unlikely. I think our best bet is finding other life on planets in our own Solar System, maybe on Europa or Titan, or maybe bacteria on Mars.

    • Do you think ETs will be benevolent or are you expecting a war of the worlds to occur should aliens ever come to earth?
    War, and we'd get destroyed.

    • How likely are the odds that we'd even encounter ETs in our lifetime? Will humans bees we develop the ability to travel at the speed of light in order to reach distant solar systems within a reasonable time gap?
    We might find evidence of bacterial life in my lifetime on a planet in our Solar System. I can't really say what the odds are of that happening.

    • And lastly, will ET existence change your perspective of religion?
    No. I'm already an atheist and assume life exists on billions of other planets, and probably in other universes, if other universes do indeed exist.


    If you don't believe extraterrestrials exist elsewhere in the universe:
    • What makes you think it's improbable?
    I'll answer this for my parents. The Bible doesn't mention extra-terrestrials so therefore they don't exist (my parents don't believe dinosaurs ever existed either. Religion is brain rot).

    • If they do exist, how different will your viewpoint be on religion?
    It wouldn't change at all for my parents. They would claim the scientists are lying just like my parents already claim. If extra-terrestrials appeared before them, they would assume they were demons or some shit lol.

    • How would you go about explaining there being stars similar to our sun with planets revolving around them similar to our solar system? And how much do you believe in your own odds against there being a planet similar to earth, in the sense that it is capable of sustaining life?
    God made the stars so we have something pretty to look at up in the sky. The Buybull says God made all this for us hurr durr.
    Last edited by FiveRings; 08-20-2013 at 07:39 AM.

  3. #18
    Lurker embersyc's Avatar
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    If you do believe life exists elsewhere:
    [b]

  4. #19
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by OldSkoolball#52
    The secular crowd tends to support the "its so big, there has to be!" argument.

    Then they deride creationists who believe earth/life is too intricate to have happened by chance. And usually in an arrogant manner, like "omgz ever heard of science, redneck? hahahah"


    The "its so big, it has to!" So-called 'theory' has the same amount of empirical validity and logical reasonin as creationism.

    Just remember that, you silly lil hypocrites.
    Sorry, you're wrong. We KNOW that life can come to be. We don't need to know exactly how it happened to know that it happened. We're here so therefore it clearly happened. That's the difference between thinking there are probably ETs out there and believing in a magic sky man. There is zero evidence for any magic sky man. We KNOW life can arise because it happened on our planet.

    You said you are an agnostic. Are you an agnostic atheist or an agnostic theist? Creationism is not a debate any more. Life evolved and continues to evolve, and that's a fact equal to the fact of gravity and the fact that the Earth is round.

  5. #20
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    there are hundreds of billions of planets in the universe.

    to make an absolute claim that we know for sure that no life form of any kind (even in the tiniest microbe form) exists anywhere else but earth is to make an absurd claim that we have tested all other planets and have concrete evidence and data for the entire universe.

    that, of course, is impossible with our current technology.

    many planets have already been obliterated long ago anyway, and all we have are traces of light to determine their once existence. we don't have the capacity to travel back in time nor in distance to those planets to understand what kind of state they were in before and whether or not they were able to support life.

  6. #21
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by FiveRings
    Life evolved and continues to evolve, and that's a fact equal to the fact of gravity and the fact that the Earth is round.
    Yes I realize species evolved over many years. But we do not know the PRECISE conditions under which life originally generated. How do you know the improbability of it? If you know anything about quantum physics, you'd know the saying "Nothing is mathematically impossibe. Only improbable." So how do you know the exact, EXACT conditions to generate a cell on Earth, down to the very nanoliter of methane, and carbon, the specific distance in milimeters from the sun, the parts per billion of salinity in the water... wasn't a one-in-a-googleplex probability that hasn't been replicated anywhere else? So far seven billion people on Earth and counting, and none with the same fingerprints. Even more snowflakes, and still no two alike. Even beyond the assumption that life can be physically and spontaneously generated by chance (and I agree that is valid as a theory) there is also the possibility that reality itself is far more complex than you can even imagine right now. You cited gravity as a physical law. What is this, 1950? You don't realize the law of gravity breaks down in certain instances and scientists have absolutely no idea how or why??

    The fact is you don't know. Your romantic leap to "it has to be!" is no more grounded in evidential logic than someone claiming that there has to be a design to life because there are questions science can't answer. You're enticed by the idea of life out there, so you are racing ahead to that conclusion without the proper logistic backing, same as anyone else might do with a given religion.
    Last edited by OldSkoolball#52; 08-20-2013 at 10:49 AM.

  7. #22
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by OldSkoolball#52
    Yes I realize species evolved over many years. But we do not know the PRECISE conditions under which life originally generated. How do you know the improbability of it? If you know anything about quantum physics, you'd know the saying "Nothing is mathematically impossibe. Only improbable." So how do you know the exact, EXACT conditions to generate a cell on Earth, down to the very nanoliter of methane, and carbon, the specific distance in milimeters from the sun, the parts per billion of salinity in the water... wasn't a one-in-a-googleplex probability that hasn't been replicated anywhere else? So far seven billion people on Earth and counting, and none with the same fingerprints. Even more snowflakes, and still no two alike. Even beyond the assumption that life can be physically and spontaneously generated by chance (and I agree that is valid as a theory) there is also the possibility that reality itself is far more complex than you can even imagine right now. You cited gravity as a physical law. What is this, 1950? You don't realize the law of gravity breaks down in certain instances and scientists have absolutely no idea how or why??

    The fact is you don't know. Your romantic leap to "it has to be!" is no more grounded in evidential logic than someone claiming that there has to be a design to life because there are questions science can't answer. You're enticed by the idea of life out there, so you are racing ahead to that conclusion without the proper logistic backing, same as anyone else might do with a given religion.
    Ok. So you meant to say intelligent design rather than creationism. Creationists believe life was created in it's current form and that we didn't evolve from other apes.

    Not knowing exactly how life started on Earth does not make belief in a god any more rational. It simply means we don't know, which is ok to admit. Rather than plugging a god in this gap, who itself would be far more complex than the first self replicators (so this god would need an even bigger explanation for it's existence), we should admit that we don't know and that science is working on figuring it out.

    I don't "believe" in extra-terrestrials. I think they probably exist because I don't see anything special about the planet we live on.

  8. #23
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Odds are there has probably been some life out there somewhere. I don't know if it's intelligent, on a micro level, or even if it still exists, but the universe is so vast it boggles the mind that it would be empty. Odds are, there is at least one other planet out there that can sustain life to some extent.

  9. #24
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by knickballer
    As for the war question I think once we are advanced enough as a specie we might have to defend our planet from invaders. Right now our civilization isn't lucrative for us to get invaded from some superior civilzation
    I just hope we're not too advanced by the time the reapers awaken for the next round.

  10. #25
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by FiveRings
    Ok. So you meant to say intelligent design rather than creationism. Creationists believe life was created in it's current form and that we didn't evolve from other apes.

    Not knowing exactly how life started on Earth does not make belief in a god any more rational. It simply means we don't know, which is ok to admit. Rather than plugging a god in this gap, who itself would be far more complex than the first self replicators (so this god would need an even bigger explanation for it's existence), we should admit that we don't know and that science is working on figuring it out.

    I don't "believe" in extra-terrestrials. I think they probably exist because I don't see anything special about the planet we live on.

    Yes I guess Intelligent Design was what I was referring to.

    My point is just because something happens once, does not mean it happens more than once. You have to know exactly why/how it happened before you can confidently make further conclusions. If you see a hurricane happen in Florida, you dont just assume they must happen in Minnesota because the country is so big. You have to know specifically what causes it, and if those conditions are met in other places you are speculating about. Even then, it is not a gaurantee.

    I am ok with saying life elsewhere is a "definite possibility" based on our scientific understanding of life and evolution so far. But saying "there has to be, because teh universe is big" is not science and is typically just wishful thinking poorly disguised as logic.
    Last edited by OldSkoolball#52; 08-20-2013 at 11:26 AM.

  11. #26
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by OldSkoolball#52
    Yes I guess Intelligent Design was what I was referring to.

    My point is just because something happens once, does not mean it happens more than once. You have to know exactly why/how it happened before you can confidently make further conclusions. If you see a hurricane happen in Florida, you dont just assume they must happen in Minnesota because the country is so big. You have to know specifically what causes it, and if those conditions are met in other places you are speculating about. Even then, it is not a gaurantee.

    I am ok with saying life elsewhere is a "definite possibility" based on our scientific understanding of life and evolution so far. But saying "there has to be, because teh universe is big" is not science and is typically just wishful thinking poorly disguised as logic.
    I'm open to the idea that we could be the only life in the universe. I don't think that is likely but I could be wrong.

    Life hardly took any time at all to begin on Earth. The Earth is about 4 and a half billion years old and life's been around for 4 billion of those years. There are many, many ELPs out there, so I would be very surprised if life didn't arise on some of them given the age of the universe which is 14-15 billion years old, and it only took half a billion years for life to arise here. Almost 15 billion years is a long ass time for things to happen and for life to arise elsewhere. Life on Earth can survive in some pretty extreme conditions so there's a good chance there's life on non-ELPs as well. This is not even taking into account other possible universes that might also exist.

    Like I said before, original creation by a god is not an idea that deserves to be taken seriously because a god would need a far greater explanation for it's own existence. This doesn't mean that I "believe" there is no god. God is a nonsensical idea, but I would be forced to change my mind in the face of real evidence.

  12. #27
    NBA Legend and Hall of Famer tpols's Avatar
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by OldSkoolball#52
    Yes I realize species evolved over many years. But we do not know the PRECISE conditions under which life originally generated. How do you know the improbability of it? If you know anything about quantum physics, you'd know the saying "Nothing is mathematically impossibe. Only improbable." So how do you know the exact, EXACT conditions to generate a cell on Earth, down to the very nanoliter of methane, and carbon, the specific distance in milimeters from the sun, the parts per billion of salinity in the water... wasn't a one-in-a-googleplex probability that hasn't been replicated anywhere else? So far seven billion people on Earth and counting, and none with the same fingerprints. Even more snowflakes, and still no two alike. Even beyond the assumption that life can be physically and spontaneously generated by chance (and I agree that is valid as a theory) there is also the possibility that reality itself is far more complex than you can even imagine right now. You cited gravity as a physical law. What is this, 1950? You don't realize the law of gravity breaks down in certain instances and scientists have absolutely no idea how or why??

    The fact is you don't know. Your romantic leap to "it has to be!" is no more grounded in evidential logic than someone claiming that there has to be a design to life because there are questions science can't answer. You're enticed by the idea of life out there, so you are racing ahead to that conclusion without the proper logistic backing, same as anyone else might do with a given religion.
    well, you just posted that quantum physicists say that nothing is impossible only improbable.

    So if there are others universes, and space is virtually infinite, it would be impossible for their not to be some type of life somewhere else.. no matter how improbable the chances.

  13. #28
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by tpols
    well, you just posted that quantum physicists say that nothing is impossible only improbable.

    So if there are others universes, and space is virtually infinite, it would be impossible for their not to be some type of life somewhere else.. no matter how improbable the chances.

    You can take that a step further and say that life exists elsewhere exactly like it is here. A perfect mirror image is possible given infinite probability.

  14. #29
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by tpols
    So if there are others universes, and space is virtually infinite,
    This is again speculative assumption. Thats called inductive reasoning, it is what Aristotle and Freud did. That has not been the scientific standard since the late 16th century thanks to Francis Bacons pioneering work developing the scientific method.

    Multiple universes are possible. But there is no evidence of them right now. You are casually taking for granted conclusions that have NO supporting data. Again, that is called inductive reasoning and it is antiquated in the scientific community. It has been for hundreds of years.

    You are drawing conclusions based on a premise that doesnt legitimately exist as far as the scientific method is concerned. Bacon is rollin over in his grave! Not to mention Copernicus, Newton, and Franklin. First gather your proof of infinite universe/multiverse. Then we can talk about it as a premise for the odds and probability of life.


    Amateurs on ISH throwing around 'facts' that life long scientists have yet to definitively conclude. Its silly. If you consider yourself scientfically minded, be patient and wait for the data. Theres no gaurantee youll even live to see it, but if you proceed without it youll look like a fop.

    Tread extremely carefully with absolutes. As Niels Bohr (or Heisenberg, I mix them up) said about studying the atom: "If you think youve figured it out, you did something wrong"
    Last edited by OldSkoolball#52; 08-20-2013 at 12:33 PM.

  15. #30
    the Sho Kosugi of ISH -p.tiddy-'s Avatar
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    Default Re: Do you think life exists elsewhere in the universe?

    Quote Originally Posted by OldSkoolball#52

    This is again speculative assumption. Thats called inductive reasoning, it is what Aristotle and Freud did. That has not been the scientific standard since the late 16th century thanks to Francis Bacons pioneering work developing the scientific method.

    Multiple universes are possible. But there is no evidence of them right now. You are casually taking for granted conclusions that have NO supporting data. Again, that is called inductive reasoning and it is antiquated in the scientific community. It has been for hundreds of years.

    You are drawing conclusions based on a premise that doesnt legitimately exist as far as the scientific method is concerned. Bacon is rollin over in his grave! Not to mention Copernicus, Newton, and Franklin. First gather your proof of infinite universe/multiverse. Then we can talk about it as a premise for the odds and probability of life.


    Amateurs on ISH throwing around 'facts' that life long scientists have yet to definitively conclude. Its silly. If you consider yourself scientfically minded, be patient and wait for the data. Theres no gaurantee youll even live to see it, but if you proceed without it youll look like a fop.
    I haven't read the this thread yet, only this last post...but the thread title reads "do you THINK life exists elsewhere..."

    not "is there scientific proof that life exists elsewhere..."

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