Aliens and Parallel Universes

SelfSim · Jul 31, 2019

Ophiolite said:
Then the discussion will be at an end. I asked if English was your second language because it was a neutral explanation for your writing style. I shall now work on the basis that you are well aware of what you are writing.

I do not sit idly by when someone engages in manipulative behaviour apparently because they sense they have lost the argument. I have not, I repeat not stated I am unable to defend my definition of alien life. I have stated that I currently lack the technical expertise to adequately defend one small portion of that definition in the specific way that you demand. That is quite a different matter and it is reprehensible of you to descend to such low tricks in such an obvious way.

When you are ready to continue the discussion in an honest and open manner, then I shall be happy to continue. In the meantime you might do a brief search on google scholar where you will find many peer reviewed documents addressing silicon lifeform metabolism. I imagine you will find plenty there you also disagree with. You are the one in this discussion who is taking a non-standard position. You are the one who needs to defend the notion that speculation about alien life is just an opinion. So I also expect such a defence from you before I rejoin.

What a cop-out!

All I get from this, is that because there are a bunch of nutters who write papers in crank journals and another group of mainstream scientists who write about the likelihood that all life is carbon based, (.. duh! ..), you think I’m being dishonest in my discussions with you?

Further, because you don’t recognise an argument based on an objective context, which leads to the conclusion that ’Alien life’, (eg: silicon based), has no more scientific substance than some episode of Star Trek, you accuse me of ‘manipulative behaviours’ and ‘low tricks’?

What a joke! You are no representative of science, my friend!

For thoughtful readers: the demonstrably scientific objective reality is:

'Any opinion, or inference taken solely from an objectively untestable model or definition, (either in principle or in theory), or a prediction not yet tested out, is a belief’, where 'a belief' is defined as: 'Any notion held as being true, for any reason'.

QED.

Shemjaza · Jul 31, 2019

stevevw said:
I think there still would have been mammals as they were around with the Dinosaurs. It may have just taken longer for them to evolve into more intelligent species.

Different ecosystem means different traits are useful at different times. Mammals at the time didn't have the advantage against dinosaurs, so were a comparatively inconsequential family.

stevevw said:
According to evolution it did go in many ways. Just about every feature and ability has evolved. I don't think there is any trait left to evolve. Not really for the same reasons you say it was probably inevitable that aquatic life moved onto land would be the same logic used for the evolution of the other features you mention. It would have been logical for there to be creatures with 4 limbs because there were four fins available that could be used as legs. The pressure of gravity compared to the buoyancy in water would have caused a creature crawl rather than be upright at first. Growing hair would be natural as a way to keep warm in cooler regions. It seems natural for a mother to have a reserve of milk to ensure her baby receives nourishment. Though I don't agree with the theory on how these traits evolved.

You say all these things are inevitable... yet the majority of life has different strategies.

You say "It seems natural for a mother...", and it is natural to do so, but it is also natural not to.

If you wound back the clock on evolution to early life... or any stage, you wouldn't get exactly the same result.

stevevw said:
Doesn't evolution go to great lengths to explain how the environment and conditions on earth produced exactly what we see. It claims remarkable convergence that has seen the repeat of complex features over and over again due to similar environments and needs. So if a similar environment was on another planet it would end up repeating the same again.

Environment conditions did... but not in a precise fashion. We have very similar environments around the globe... but there are no kangaroos in Africa and no jaguars in Australia. Similar niches might produce vaguely similar techniques, like a thylacoleo or antelope... but not the same creatures.

It also ignores feedback effects of species further changing an environment.

And as I have explained, a technological intelligence may require extremely unlikely sequence of traits.

stevevw said:
How do you mean

You keep prefacing statements with "According to evolution theory", despite the following idea not being supported or proposed by evolution theory.

Ophiolite · Jul 31, 2019

SelfSim said:
All I get from this, is that because there are a bunch of nutters who write papers in crank journals and another group of mainstream scientists who write about the likelihood that all life is carbon based, (.. duh! ..), you think I’m being dishonest in my discussions with you?

And there is the dishonesty again: a total misrepresentation of what I have said and of the current status of exobiology. The cop out is coming from you and your delusional misrepresentations. Please have the decency to desist from further communication. We are done.

SelfSim · Jul 31, 2019

Ophiolite said:
And there is the dishonesty again: a total misrepresentation of what I have said and of the current status of exobiology. The cop out is coming from you and your delusional misrepresentations. Please have the decency to desist from further communication. We are done.

I am done when you have the decency to withdraw and stop making entirely unsupported accusations about my honesty, and when I choose to stop posting.

Getting back to the matter at hand, Wiki gives a good summary of Hypothetical Types of Biochemistry. The section on Non carbon based biochemistries says (my emboldenment/underlines):

On Earth, all known living things have a carbon-based structure and system. Scientists have speculated about the pros and cons of using atoms other than carbon to form the molecular structures necessary for life, but no one has proposed a theory employing such atoms to form all the necessary structures.

Speculations are beliefs, (or opinions), whether they're made by scientists or not. The reason no one has proposed 'a theory', is because there is insufficient theoretical evidence to substantiate that a speculated, non carbon based specimen would be capable of exhibiting life's basic testable functions: (Homeostasis, Organisation, Metabolism, Growth, Adaptation, Response to stimuli, Reproduction, etc).

The same Wiki also provides commentary on speculated Silicon based life. None of that commentary leads to any conclusion that speculated silicon based biochemistries, leading onto exhibiting life's above functions, is anything other than a purely a speculative belief.

What's 'seriously misleading' and 'delusional' thinking in science, is regarding such things as being anything other than a belief ... like it, or not.

ViaCrucis · Aug 5, 2019

stevevw said:
If there are aliens that are like humans then they would need saving as all creation has fallen. Christ died once and for all so these aliens would have no chance of salvation.

Christ died on a hill outside Jerusalem. There were populations of people living around the world for centuries between Christ and contact with Christianity. Do we presume that generations of people without contact with a Christian "have no chance of salvation"?

Intelligent, sapient life elsewhere in the universe does force us to ask certain theological questions. And it probably should cause us to evaluate some of our assumptions.

So the existence of intelligent, sapient life elsewhere might be problematic for one who is of the position that salvation is only possible if one is a believing Christian.

Aside from this, there's also an entirely different approach to the topic as explored in C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy.

-CryptoLutheran

ViaCrucis · Aug 5, 2019

Radagast said:
We've looked quite seriously (remember SETI?), and heard nothing. The most likely explanation for that is that there's nothing to hear.

Space is big though. Really big. SETI was only founded in 1984, and while some small measure of attempts have been going on for much of the last century, it's only been a century.

The first radio signals are only now 110 light years away at the very edge of our radio bubble, and from what I understand at that point those signals are unlikely to be recognized as much against the general background noise of the universe.

Alternative hypotheses for why we haven't heard anything yet:

1) No civilization capable of broadcasting electro-magnetic signals has been capable of doing so long enough for their signals to have reached earth as of yet.
1b) Or our equipment isn't sensitive enough to differentiate such signals from general background noise, much as is happening with our own radio bubble.

2) Any sufficiently nearby civilizations have not achieved a level of technological progress to broadcast anything. Human civilization has been going on since the Agrarian Revolution thousands of years ago, but have only been able to broadcast signals for a little over a century now.

3) Advanced civilizations are out there, but simply haven't noticed our existence yet. Perhaps they're doing what we're doing and are just as confused as to why they aren't getting any information either.
3b) Or maybe they have noticed us, and they simply don't care enough to say hello.

It's all speculation of course. But we are dealing with insufficient data to actually be able to say anything at all; and so while we can say that there is no evidence for the existence of alien life, we can't say there is no alien life. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

-CryptoLUtheran

SelfSim · Aug 5, 2019

ViaCrucis said:
... It's all speculation of course. But we are dealing with insufficient data to actually be able to say anything at all;

.. and yet, interestingly, you just did!

ViaCrucis said:
.. and so while we can say that there is no evidence for the existence of alien life, we can't say there is no alien life.

That hasn't changed ever since man first conjured up the believed meaning of the term 'intelligent alien life' .. So no news there.

ViaCrucis said:
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

.. and yet there never was testability of the definition of 'intelligent alien life' in the first place ... only testability of intelligent earth-life (aka: human life) .. (for which there is clearly abundant objective evidence).

ViaCrucis · Aug 6, 2019

SelfSim said:
.. and yet, interestingly, you just did!

I haven't made a claim as to the existence or non-existence of life outside of earth.

.. and yet there never was testability of the definition of 'intelligent alien life' in the first place

Well, I tell you what, we can look up what the general definition of those words mean, and see if we can't parse the meaning of those words, when combined as they are, and in the context they were used. Doing that I think we can get a vague idea of the sort of idea being communicated.

-CryptoLutheran

SelfSim · Aug 6, 2019

ViaCrucis said:
I haven't made a claim as to the existence or non-existence of life outside of earth.

Acknowledged ..
My comment however was in response to:

ViaCrucis said:
But we are dealing with insufficient data to actually be able to say anything at all

...

ViaCrucis said:
SelfSim said:

.. and yet there never was testability of the definition of 'intelligent alien life' in the first place

Click to expand...

Well, I tell you what, we can look up what the general definition of those words mean, and see if we can't parse the meaning of those words, when combined as they are, and in the context they were used. Doing that I think we can get a vague idea of the sort of idea being communicated.

The NASA Astrobiology Roadmap 2015 says:

Astrobiology has involved exhaustive study of past and present life on Earth, providing lessons that can be extrapolated to environments on other worlds. This helps focus the community on the environments most likely to harbor Earth-like life and will translate into spaceflight exploration strategies such as “follow the water.” It is also at the heart of how we plan to search those environments for signs of Earth-like life; for example, by looking for the chemistry based on organic carbon.
...
Accordingly, those who propose to search for “weird life” must start by developing viable working models of such life. These models will be essential for developing strategies to investigate the origins and distribution of any “weird life” in the Universe.

The only references to 'Intelligent Life' throughout the entire 236 page document, are made in their only appropriate scientific context: Earth. The term 'alien' doesn't appear anywhere in it.

They ain't lookin for aliens .. they're looking for Earth-'like' life, organic carbon based.

ViaCrucis · Aug 6, 2019

SelfSim said:
The NASA Astrobiology Roadmap 2015 says:
The only references to 'Intelligent Life' throughout the entire 236 page document, are made in their only appropriate scientific context: Earth. The term 'alien' doesn't appear anywhere in it.

They ain't lookin for aliens .. they're looking for Earth-'like' life, organic carbon based.

Okie dokie.

-CryptoLutheran

FrumiousBandersnatch · Aug 6, 2019

ViaCrucis said:
Space is big though. Really big. SETI was only founded in 1984, and while some small measure of attempts have been going on for much of the last century, it's only been a century.

The first radio signals are only now 110 light years away at the very edge of our radio bubble, and from what I understand at that point those signals are unlikely to be recognized as much against the general background noise of the universe.

Alternative hypotheses for why we haven't heard anything yet:

1) No civilization capable of broadcasting electro-magnetic signals has been capable of doing so long enough for their signals to have reached earth as of yet.
1b) Or our equipment isn't sensitive enough to differentiate such signals from general background noise, much as is happening with our own radio bubble.

2) Any sufficiently nearby civilizations have not achieved a level of technological progress to broadcast anything. Human civilization has been going on since the Agrarian Revolution thousands of years ago, but have only been able to broadcast signals for a little over a century now.

3) Advanced civilizations are out there, but simply haven't noticed our existence yet. Perhaps they're doing what we're doing and are just as confused as to why they aren't getting any information either.
3b) Or maybe they have noticed us, and they simply don't care enough to say hello.

It's all speculation of course. But we are dealing with insufficient data to actually be able to say anything at all; and so while we can say that there is no evidence for the existence of alien life, we can't say there is no alien life. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

-CryptoLUtheran

Though I applaud the sentiments behind SETI, it does so far seem rather like the drunk looking for his lost keys under a lamppost because the light is better there...

Ophiolite · Aug 6, 2019

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Though I applaud the sentiments behind SETI, it does so far seem rather like the drunk looking for his lost keys under a lamppost because the light is better there...

And he's not quite sure if it was keys, a wallet, or leaking biro.

SelfSim · Aug 6, 2019

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Though I applaud the sentiments behind SETI, it does so far seem rather like the drunk looking for his lost keys under a lamppost because the light is better there...

SETI is about deep space signal processing (technology) research ..
(At least that's its main contribution, anyway).

FrumiousBandersnatch · Aug 7, 2019

SelfSim said:
SETI is about deep space signal processing (technology) research ..
(At least that's its main contribution, anyway).

Sure, brighter and better torches give ever more capability to find lost things in the dark.

In much the same way, String Theory may not have achieved what it set out to do, but has been a major achievement in theoretical physics and related mathematical tools.

SelfSim · Aug 7, 2019

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Sure, brighter and better torches give ever more capability to find lost things in the dark.

The analogy breaks easily because there is nothing to say that anything 'is lost'. Secondly, I am yet to see how one can specifically 'go looking for' the unknown?

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
In much the same way, String Theory may not have achieved what it set out to do, but has been a major achievement in theoretical physics and related mathematical tools.

What do you mean when you say string theory 'set out to do' something? I'm not aware that it ever had a specific, measurable goal(?)

FrumiousBandersnatch · Aug 7, 2019

SelfSim said:
The analogy breaks easily because there is nothing to say that anything 'is lost'.

The analogy was a drunk looking for lost keys... my follow-up comment was also analogical (SETI don't use torches to look for ETI).

Secondly, I am yet to see how one can specifically 'go looking for' the unknown?

Me too. I suppose The 'Search' in SETI could be the part where they 'go looking for' and 'Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence' is the bit that is unknown. In SETI they do it by making anthropocentric assumptions about the ways some ETI might be expected to behave.

What do you mean when you say string theory 'set out to do' something? I'm not aware that it ever had a specific, measurable goal(?)

Fair enough - I guess the theory itself didn't set out to do anything, it was the theoretical physicists who developed it.

SelfSim · Aug 7, 2019

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
.. (SETI don't use torches to look for ETI).

METI? (.. chuckle, chuckle ..)

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Me too. I suppose The 'Search' in SETI could be the part where they 'go looking for' and 'Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence' is the bit that is unknown. In SETI they do it by making anthropocentric assumptions about the ways some ETI might be expected to behave.

Yep ... the pattern matching algorithms they use would be of interest .. I've never really found much technical info on that aspect ..

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Fair enough - I guess the theory itself didn't set out to do anything, it was the theoretical physicists who developed it.

Yeah .. I wouldn't put it past some of them to have maybe been under 'chemical influences' too .. (when they had their original 'intuitive revelations'!)

FrumiousBandersnatch · Aug 8, 2019

SelfSim said:
METI? (.. chuckle, chuckle ..)

I wouldn't put it past some of them to have maybe been under 'chemical influences' too .. (when they had their original 'intuitive revelations'!)

AIUI, they were investigating the mathematics of how hadrons respond under the strong interaction, and it was realised that the Euler function that described those interactions suggested equations for particle activity that were identical to those of classical vibrating strings. IOW, it wasn't an imaginative leap that they made, but the stringiness leapt out of the mathematics.

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