quote:

Originally posted by JALLEN:
The nearest star is 4.2 light years away. We have only had ham radio for little more than 100 years.

Those guys haven't even heard us yet, let alone answered. This assumes they might want to after they hear what we talk about.

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. If earth has sent out ham radio emissions for 100 years, how could they not traverse 4.2 light years? Your second point I understand.

It's depressing to think we are the only intelligent lifeform in the universe. It's a lonely neighborhood.

I hope there are thousands of civilizations out there that have been far more successful than us at not destroying themselves and have gone on to great things. Maybe even learning some secrets of the universe that we'll never know. Since we are so far apart the only way we will ever meet is if they figure out how to travel great distances much quicker than we can.

quote:

Are we alone ?

Absolutely not.

I don't know if the numbers are right, but this quote from the movie Contact comes to mind:

You know, there are four hundred billion stars out there, just in our galaxy alone. If only one out of a million of those had planets, and just of out of a million of those had life, and just one out of a million of those had intelligent life; there would be literally millions of civilizations out there.

And a little later:

I'll tell you one thing about the universe, though. The universe is a pretty big place. It's bigger than anything anyone has ever dreamed of before. So if it's just us... seems like an awful waste of space. Right?

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Are we alone ?

Absolutely not.

How many extra terrestrials have you met?



.

Interesting subject, I visit Green Bank Observatory (NRAO mentioned in article), since changed to GBO, a couple of times a year.

We can kid all we want, but I firmly believe the human race will be in contact with beings from another planet before our species vanishes.

Whether it will be good or bad, only time will tell.

Are we talking life or are we talking "intelligent" life?

It seems like every time the subject of life "out there" comes up, people start assuming they are talking about, so called, intelligent life, with us as the example of intelligent. If we use that narrow focus, then I would say no. If we are talking about planets that have life with every thing up to, but excluding intelligent life, then I would say yes.

quote:

Originally posted by Jus228:
It's depressing to think we are the only intelligent lifeform in the universe. It's a lonely neighborhood.

I hope there are thousands of civilizations out there that have been far more successful than us at not destroying themselves and have gone on to great things. Maybe even learning some secrets of the universe that we'll never know. Since we are so far apart the only way we will ever meet is if they figure out how to travel great distances much quicker than we can.

I don't find it at all depressing. I have no dog in the show because we would never meet anyone from another intelligence, if there were one. Therefore, existence of others is of no possible consequence to me.

I believe God created the Universe and us, and I'm quite satisfied to stick with His plan, whatever it is.

flashguy

quote:

Originally posted by Todd Huffman:
I don't know if the numbers are right, but this quote from the movie Contact comes to mind:

You know, there are four hundred billion stars out there, just in our galaxy alone. If only one out of a million of those had planets, and just of out of a million of those had life, and just one out of a million of those had intelligent life; there would be literally millions of civilizations out there.

The math for within our galaxy doesn't work, even if you use a British Billion (a million millions; a US Billion is only a thousand millions). The logic (using British) would only provide 400 civilization, not millions. A million million million would be a British trillion, but it would be a US quintillion.

OTOH, if referencing the entire Universe (which was not clear in the quote), the math is better.

flashguy

I think last year I read a report re deep space science, that the rhythm of black dots that seemed to rotate on the surface of a countless stars, weren't sun spots as once thought, but planets orbiting the stars. The scientists indicated the statistical number of planets in the universe went up a few orders of magnitude with that discovery.

Arthur C. Clarke used the Empire State Building to represent the age of the earth.on that scale ne inch was about a million years. For most of the building, there would be no life or only primitive goop. Humanity, in a form we'd recognize, would be representated by a book laid on to of the TV antenna. Put a worn dime on top of the box and that's the amount of time we've had any sort of civilization. The Industrial Revolution to today? That's a stamp.
Any alien civilization visiting earth would have to find a dimenon top of the Empire State Building, more likely they'd fine little of interest.
This also knocks out the UFO issue. In the 19th century OFOs had propellers, sails and made of wood. By the 1950s the science of UFOS appeared to be 50-100 years ahead of us. Today, it's amazing the UFOs appear on radar. They don't have stealth?

quote:

Originally posted by ggile:
Are we talking life or are we talking "intelligent" life?

It seems like every time the subject of life "out there" comes up, people start assuming they are talking about, so called, intelligent life, with us as the example of intelligent. If we use that narrow focus, then I would say no. If we are talking about planets that have life with every thing up to, but excluding intelligent life, then I would say yes.

Seems kind of arrogant of us humans to assume we are the smartest guys on the block.

quote:

Originally posted by deepocean:

quote:

Originally posted by JALLEN:
The nearest star is 4.2 light years away. We have only had ham radio for little more than 100 years.

Those guys haven't even heard us yet, let alone answered. This assumes they might want to after they hear what we talk about.

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. If earth has sent out ham radio emissions for 100 years, how could they not traverse 4.2 light years? Your second point I understand.

Putting aside attenuation, radio signals would in fact have theoretically travelled 100 light years from earth. If Alpha Centaurans were monitoring our broadcasts, they're getting it on a 4.2 year delay.

All of this assumes of course that light speed is a constant.

remember all the UFO videos and still shots

blurry, out of focus, no horizon or anything that could be used to actually add some dimensions to the image...

now that there are several billion cameras in cell phones crawling all over the planet, how many 10 megapixel images of UFO's have we seen?



now that hi-def is essentially everywhere the UFO's seem to have disappeared...camera shy?

quote:

Originally posted by striker1:

quote:

Originally posted by deepocean:

quote:

Originally posted by JALLEN:
The nearest star is 4.2 light years away. We have only had ham radio for little more than 100 years.

Those guys haven't even heard us yet, let alone answered. This assumes they might want to after they hear what we talk about.

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. If earth has sent out ham radio emissions for 100 years, how could they not traverse 4.2 light years? Your second point I understand.

Putting aside attenuation, radio signals would in fact have theoretically travelled 100 light years from earth. If Alpha Centaurans were monitoring our broadcasts, they're getting it on a 4.2 year delay.

All of this assumes of course that light speed is a constant.

I agree. A light-year is used as a measure of distance in astronomy and other fields of science. But it's related to time via the speed of light and approximately the speed of electromagnetic energy. So it would take about 4.2 years for ham radio signals to travel that far.

Given background noise and other noise, plus signal attenuation, you would have to integrate a received signal a long damn time to detect it in noise. Good luck trying to get an angular fix on a signal even if you could detect it.

quote:

Originally posted by TigerDore:

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Are we alone ?

Absolutely not.

How many extra terrestrials have you met?



.

I'm pretty sure my third grade teacher, Mrs. Edelson, was, like, from Venus or something.

quote:

Originally posted by BamaJeepster:
Whenever this topic comes up I always encourage people to read this link:

The Fermi Paradox

It's a very interesting take on the topic.

Oh, and if you like that you should take a look at their 'Putting Time in Perspective' discussion as well. Really cool.

Putting Time in Perspective

Thanks for making me feel less significant than an atom in a speck of dust

You know how on scifi shows like "Stargate" they talk about "the Ancients" or somesuch, always an ancient race that was there before everybody else? Some race that is treated as almost holy or godlike for their wisdom?

Well, isn't it possible that we're not getting any contacts because we're the first horse out of the gate? That WE are "the ancients" to be?

Maybe we should consider that possibility, and start acting like we want to be looked up to. Not broadcasting "The Gong Show" or it's political equivalent out into space on a daily basis might be a start.

To answer the initial question - I don't believe we're alone, and I don't believe anyone is close enough to answer our babbling. I think if anyone could hear us, they'd have yelled, "STFU" by now.

quote:

Originally posted by BamaJeepster:
Whenever this topic comes up I always encourage people to read this link:

The Fermi Paradox

It's a very interesting take on the topic.

Oh, and if you like that you should take a look at their 'Putting Time in Perspective' discussion as well. Really cool.

Putting Time in Perspective

Very nice. Thanks for sharing, missed it before.

The speed of light isn't just a good idea. It is the law.

I figure chances are that there other kinds of life out there. The distances involved seem to preclude any reasonable chance of interacting with it, except on the off-chance that we detect some signal from them some day.