Are We Alone ?

[AValon]

Because if somehow NASA get their arses into gear and load up a space ship with some new-fangled tech and launch it next week, that's about the furthest the star can be in order to report any useful information in our lifetimes.

 

 

I thought they were now exploring the possibility/probability of 'bending space'?

[CrackpotForeigner]

Limpid: Well, yeah, that's why I said they'll find us before we find them.

 

AValon: How's that coming along?

[limpid]

 

Because if somehow NASA get their arses into gear and load up a space ship with some new-fangled tech and launch it next week, that's about the furthest the star can be in order to report any useful information in our lifetimes.

 

I thought they were now exploring the possibility/probability of 'bending space'?

We are only a new branch of physics and engineering and a new kind of power source away from folding spacetime. It'll probably happen, but it's a long way off.

[Pelle]

 

The book I've got is in no way trying to argue that this information came from aliens or anything I think the main argument is that the Great Pyramids were built in correlation with the three middle stars in orion.

 

There's a wiki page here that has some critisisms of the theory.

I'm not sure what's mysterious about that. You can look up and see those stars most nights. Copying that pattern to place the pyramids doesn't involve aliens. As aliens would come from elsewhere, then Orion's belt would be meaningless to them as it only looks that way from where we observe it. If anything, if they are laid out like Orion's belt, then they cannot have been placed by aliens.

 

 

Too true. I often think about that when I watch a movie involving aliens and they say that they come from a planet within that constellation when the constellation in fact is just a constellation seen from here and the stars most likely lie very far from each other. Seldom let that affect what I think of the movie, though.

 

Anyway, the book I read just had a short chapter about it and of course mentioned the possibility of aliens. I just find it curious and interesting. Though, TV's explanation sounds very likely, indeed. But I still think that theory belongs in the boring thread.

[useless]

 

The book I've got is in no way trying to argue that this information came from aliens or anything I think the main argument is that the Great Pyramids were built in correlation with the three middle stars in orion.

 

There's a wiki page here that has some critisisms of the theory.

I'm not sure what's mysterious about that. You can look up and see those stars most nights. Copying that pattern to place the pyramids doesn't involve aliens. As aliens would come from elsewhere, then Orion's belt would be meaningless to them as it only looks that way from where we observe it. If anything, if they are laid out like Orion's belt, then they cannot have been placed by aliens.

 

 

Sorry but the book has nothing to do with aliens whatsover I just mentioned it in relation to Pelle's post about the dogon tribe. The mystery of the book is how the tribe apparently had information about Syrius B before anyone else. I haven't read it in a long time but I think it argues that the information came from the ancient egyptians, and doesn't mention aliens at all.

 

I think another part of mystery was apparently a certain part of pyaramid points directly at the stars in question, so how did they manage to do that? and again aliens don't get a mention.

Edited March 29, 2014 by useless

[darrenm]

No but not in any way shape or form that we can possibly contemplate.

 

Science answers many questions but also asks more.

 

Our entire theory of the space time fabric checks out with the calculations in what we can see and measure.

 

But it all relies on assuming other stuff beneath what we can see - dark matter. Something that has to be there otherwise it doesn't work.

 

I'm not sure anything is real. I'm not sure the universe as we see it is real.

 

There's as much possibility of there being infinite multiverses with infinite number of singularities as there is anything else.

 

And time might not be linear, it might be parallel, but we can't comprehend that.

 

So to answer the question, I don't know.

[CrackpotForeigner]

I've just had a read of the Wikipedia page called Interstellar Travel: An excellent read, highly recommended if you find the concept interesting.

[birdistheword]

As I said there's no evidence to suggest either way. We will perhaps never know the answer to this, and almost certainly will never know in any of our lifetimes. One would assume due to the universe being so vast, there's a high chance there is other 'life' but because we have no evidence we cannot say is true. Likewise there is no evidence to refute the claim that we are not alone.

 

Some of you may find this interesting...

 

http://www.nikon.com/about/feelnikon/universcale/index_f.htm

[AValon]

Limpid: Well, yeah, that's why I said they'll find us before we find them.

 

AValon: How's that coming along?

 

 

Branson's probably n it as we speak

[Xela]

I think there is an alien spaceship at Diego Garcia. Probably next to MH370.

 

In all seriousness, there is probably life out there but we may never encounter it.

[dont_do_it_doug.]

Because if somehow NASA get their arses into gear and load up a space ship with some new-fangled tech and launch it next week, that's about the furthest the star can be in order to report any useful information in our lifetimes.

I thought they were now exploring the possibility/probability of 'bending space'?

We are only a new branch of physics and engineering and a new kind of power source away from folding spacetime. It'll probably happen, but it's a long way off.

To do that they'd need to harness the power of gravity, perhaps using dark matter?

Genuine question looking for a lay mans answer. Or as lay man as you can get!

[limpid]

 

 

 

Because if somehow NASA get their arses into gear and load up a space ship with some new-fangled tech and launch it next week, that's about the furthest the star can be in order to report any useful information in our lifetimes.

I thought they were now exploring the possibility/probability of 'bending space'?

We are only a new branch of physics and engineering and a new kind of power source away from folding spacetime. It'll probably happen, but it's a long way off.

To do that they'd need to harness the power of gravity, perhaps using dark matter?

Genuine question looking for a lay mans answer. Or as lay man as you can get!

 

Gravity is an analogy to describe how space-time is distorted by (condensed) energy. It describes a weak field. Gravity isn't likely to be useful in folding space as gravity is something which occurs as a function of spacetime. Layman's terms: No, gravity probably doesn't have much to offer for doing this.

 

No-one knows what dark matter is, other than that matter doesn't interact with it. Are you thinking of exotic matter? If so then it's likely that exotic matter will be needed in any attempt to fold space. That's why we'd need a new type of power source. As a previous poster said, see how much energy is needed to accelerate a small mass to relativistic speeds. Now think how much energy is likely to be needed to fold space. I think the last estimate I read was all the output of the sun over its lifetime would be needed. Physics is still a long way from doing any of this; we are still a long way from knowing if this is even possible. Layman's terms: u wot m8?

[useless]

What does folding space actually mean, am I right in thinking that masses bend space. So I presume folding space is something completely different, It sounds dangerous, maybe if we could find some of these wormholes it'll be safer.

[limpid]

What does folding space actually mean, am I right in thinking that masses bend space. So I presume folding space is something completely different, It sounds dangerous, maybe if we could find some of these wormholes it'll be safer.

No-one knows. Think of a sheet of paper. Put a dot on the top left and the bottom left. You can see how far they are apart, now fold the sheet and the dots are much closer together. That's the thinking here. It might be impossible, it might be that spacetime is already folded in higher dimensions and we just need to find convenient spots. At those spots we would open a wormhole between the points on the sheets. We'd need exotic matter to form and maintain the wormhole, because ordinary matter is part of spacetime.

 

But all of this is pure fiction. Going to orbit in a little metal shell on top of a very large bomb is also dangerous.

[MakemineVanilla]

Life is one thing but intelligent life is another.  Think of how many billions of species Earth has churned out before intelligent life arrived.

 

The fact that we named our own species homo sapien (wise or intelligent man) always seems like an act of egregious egotism and self-delusion because all available evidence indicates that the vast majority of us are neither intelligent or wise.

 

I think homo habilis (skilled man) would have been more appropriate, which is certainly more evident amongst the vast majority.

 

But even if the vast majority have the brass neck to co-opt the achievements of the likes of Newton and Einstein, it would seem that in the great scheme of things, intelligence is an overrated and ill-defined attribute.

 

Surely a truly intelligent species would be so well attuned to its environment that its survival was assured: something our own species has yet to achieve.

 

When weighing the success of our species against others we have a very long way to go before we can award ourselves first prize: after all the sponge has been around for 760 million years and homo sapiens only around 250 000.

 

Sitting around in an ocean seems like a better survival strategy than the 'intelligent' invention of weapons of mass-destruction.

[limpid]

 

Life is one thing but intelligent life is another.  Think of how many billions of species Earth has churned out before intelligent life arrived.

 

The fact that we named our own species homo sapien (wise or intelligent man) always seems like an act of egregious egotism and self-delusion because all available evidence indicates that the vast majority of us are neither intelligent or wise.

 

I think homo habilis (skilled man) would have been more appropriate, which is certainly more evident amongst the vast majority.

 

But even if the vast majority have the brass neck to co-opt the achievements of the likes of Newton and Einstein, it would seem that in the great scheme of things, intelligence is an overrated and ill-defined attribute.

 

Surely a truly intelligent species would be so well attuned to its environment that its survival was assured: something our own species has yet to achieve.

 

When weighing the success of our species against others we have a very long way to go before we can award ourselves first prize: after all the sponge has been around for 760 million years and homo sapiens only around 250 000.

 

Sitting around in an ocean seems like a better survival strategy than the 'intelligent' invention of weapons of mass-destruction.

 

I'm not sure that evolution could ever produce something such as you describe. It's random and favours descendants which are better able to use the resources available.  There are many niches where evolution has produced something which is essentially perfect for it's environment.

 

The fact that you can ask this question is what makes us intelligent. Intelligence isn't a measure of "fit for purpose". It's an ability to abstract ideas from the real world.

[CrackpotForeigner]

Yeah next we'll be expecting the world to evolve politicians who care about stuff beyond their term of office. In fact they've evolved not to.

[PieFacE]

 

What does folding space actually mean, am I right in thinking that masses bend space. So I presume folding space is something completely different, It sounds dangerous, maybe if we could find some of these wormholes it'll be safer.

No-one knows. Think of a sheet of paper. Put a dot on the top left and the bottom left. You can see how far they are apart, now fold the sheet and the dots are much closer together. That's the thinking here. It might be impossible, it might be that spacetime is already folded in higher dimensions and we just need to find convenient spots. At those spots we would open a wormhole between the points on the sheets. We'd need exotic matter to form and maintain the wormhole, because ordinary matter is part of spacetime.

 

If we actually had the ability to do this, would we attempt it?

 

I mean, surely it would be impossible to know what the consequences of doing such a thing would be to life as we know it?

[limpid]

 

 

What does folding space actually mean, am I right in thinking that masses bend space. So I presume folding space is something completely different, It sounds dangerous, maybe if we could find some of these wormholes it'll be safer.

No-one knows. Think of a sheet of paper. Put a dot on the top left and the bottom left. You can see how far they are apart, now fold the sheet and the dots are much closer together. That's the thinking here. It might be impossible, it might be that spacetime is already folded in higher dimensions and we just need to find convenient spots. At those spots we would open a wormhole between the points on the sheets. We'd need exotic matter to form and maintain the wormhole, because ordinary matter is part of spacetime.

 

If we actually had the ability to do this, would we attempt it?

 

I mean, surely it would be impossible to know what the consequences of doing such a thing would be to life as we know it?

 

As we learn more, we can predict the consequences. Human nature suggests that if we can, we will.

[Ikantcpell]