Yet another possibility for Fermi's Paradox

[Moontanman]

14 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Thank you, very interesting but it seems to confirm my Dickens quote, to which I'll add:

https://dickens.ucsc.edu/resources/faq/religion.html

IOW it's not religion or belief that's at fault, it's want and ignorance.

I have a feeling we will have to agree to disagree on religion, from my perspective religion takes advantage of and promotes want and ignorance... 

14 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

If I can't see it, it doesn't exist; isn't a paradox it's just a lack of information. 

Again the assertion is not it doesn't exist, the question is why can't we see it. 

22 minutes ago, DrP said:

Also, being fair to us  -  we've only just started looking...  what, in the last 50 years or so at a guess?  That's the last 50 years in 4.5 billion years of the earth forming and 14.5 billion years of our universe as we know it forming...  Maybe we are the first civilisation to pop up, maybe we the latest in many that have already been and already gone extinct, maybe we will get a state visit from our nearest neighbours once we unify the planet....  maybe we will get a visit from the Borg sometime in the next few centuries and all be assimilated. Who knows...  lol - Maybe a school of space sharks will invade one day...   I know that is what Moontanman will probably think is the most likely.  ;-) 

I have my doubts about any aliens wanting to visit gravity wells, no need for it to happen... 

[dimreepr]

Just now, Moontanman said:

I have a feeling we will have to agree to disagree on religion, from my perspective religion takes advantage of and promotes want and ignorance... 

 

Quote

'Spirit. are they yours.' Scrooge could say no more.
 
'They are Man's,'

Man is political, man creates religion, man is greedy...

5 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

Again the assertion is not it doesn't exist, the question is why can't we see it. 

Because we lack information.

[Moontanman]

13 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Man is political, man creates religion, man is greedy...

Man created god in his own image no doubt! 

13 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Because we lack information.

Yes, but why do we lack information is the question. 

[dimreepr]

Just now, Moontanman said:

Man created god in his own image no doubt! 

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting religion is necessary to avoid the children; what I suggest is, man creates its own destruction when he refuses to correct his ignorance, which includes religion and whatever wisdom it includes. 

 

[DrP]

8 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

Yes, but why do we lack information is the question. 

Because we are not that technologically advanced yet and have only been looking a very short while? In my lifetime alone we have seen incredible advances in being able to look further away and to be able to tell more about what is going on. 30 years ago we had never detected other earth like planets before and though that we would have no means of doing so or that it might not even be possible as we were a goldilocks planet just right for life.  Now we know of many.   Give it a century or 2 Moontan and I'm sure we'll know more.... 

Give a 3 year old boy a snorkel and tell him to find an octopus. Chances are he will fail.

 

 

[dimreepr]

14 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

Yes, but why do we lack information is the question. 

 

Because we have yet to see...

[Moontanman]

1 hour ago, dimreepr said:

Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting religion is necessary to avoid the children; what I suggest is, man creates its own destruction when he refuses to correct his ignorance, which includes religion and whatever wisdom it includes. 

 

I would say if religion contains any wisdom such wisdom is accidental and would probably been more wise had it been less accidental...  Would you label yourself a theist dimreeper? 

1 hour ago, dimreepr said:

Because we have yet to see...

But we know that under our current understanding we should see some evidence, my problem with this is that I think our current understanding is somewhat flawed but since my opinions on this are far from educated I must put them down as speculation. 

The original premise was that a civilization should be quite a bit brighter than our sun is in light but in radio waves. Everything we do that is electrical in nature gives off radio waves. From the 60 cycle hum of transmission lines to TV and radio broadcasts. But The premise has been shown to be increasingly flawed due to natural interstellar interference. Only a powerful direct signal, like radar scanning an object, or military radar type transmissions would be "visible" above the background noise. Such signals if we intercepted them would not be likely to repeat, a prerequisite for considering them as artificial. However, such signals have been picked up and no they did not repeat and so did not qualify as  a possible hit. 

1 hour ago, DrP said:

Because we are not that technologically advanced yet and have only been looking a very short while? In my lifetime alone we have seen incredible advances in being able to look further away and to be able to tell more about what is going on. 30 years ago we had never detected other earth like planets before and though that we would have no means of doing so or that it might not even be possible as we were a goldilocks planet just right for life.  Now we know of many.   Give it a century or 2 Moontan and I'm sure we'll know more.... 

Give a 3 year old boy a snorkel and tell him to find an octopus. Chances are he will fail.

 

 

So you expect new technological breakthroughs that will make radio or lasers obsolete? 

[Airbrush]

3 hours ago, Moontanman said:

.....The idea that we could detect aliens any place in the universe is based on the idea that aliens want to be detected... 

That is what I thought.  Intelligent aliens have nothing to gain by being detected.  So they may use a cloak of invisibility through advanced technology to avoid being detected by equal or more advanced aliens.  And in the event they came to Earth, they would be capable of removing any undeniable evidence of their presence here using their superior technology.  But why would they have lights on the OUTSIDE of their flying saucers?

[dimreepr]

26 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

I would say if religion contains any wisdom such wisdom is accidental 

 

Evidence, please.

33 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

Would you label yourself a theist dimreeper? 

A realist, perhaps, a theist nope...

[Moontanman]

16 minutes ago, Airbrush said:

That is what I thought.  Intelligent aliens have nothing to gain by being detected.  So they may use a cloak of invisibility through advanced technology to avoid being detected by equal or more advanced aliens.  And in the event they came to Earth, they would be capable of removing any undeniable evidence of their presence here using their superior technology.  But why would they have lights on the OUTSIDE of their flying saucers?

They have lights on the outside of their flying saucers? Astounding! 

15 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Evidence, please.

Give me evidence that theism contains wisdom, then we can talk about where it came from... 

15 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

A realist, perhaps, a theist nope...

I consider myself to be a apistevist, evidence is required, faith doesn't cut it.. 

[beecee]

I'm a firm "believer" that we certainly are not alone in the universe, despite any real empirical evidence to support that belief. I believe most cosmologists are also of the same opinion.     The sheer enormity, scope and near countless numbers of galaxies and stars in our observable universe, plus the fact that the stuff of life being everywhere we have looked, supports that general belief. We are situated on a small terrestrial planet, orbiting a humdrum dwarf star, situated in the outer suburbs of an average size galaxy, among many billions of other galaxies in the observable universe.

[Moontanman]

12 minutes ago, beecee said:

I'm a firm "believer" that we certainly are not alone in the universe, despite any real empirical evidence to support that belief. I believe most cosmologists are also of the same opinion.     The sheer enormity, scope and near countless numbers of galaxies and stars in our observable universe, plus the fact that the stuff of life being everywhere we have looked, supports that general belief. We are situated on a small terrestrial planet, orbiting a humdrum dwarf star, situated in the outer suburbs of an average size galaxy, among many billions of other galaxies in the observable universe.

I can't say that, while I consider it to be unlikely we are alone that in of itself says nothing about the facts or lack thereof. I would be amazed if there is no other life in the universe, in fact I would be amazed if there is no life in our own solar system other than us but at this time I can't see how a belief says anything about the facts... 

[beecee]

2 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

I can't say that, while I consider it to be unlikely we are alone that in of itself says nothing about the facts or lack thereof. I would be amazed if there is no other life in the universe, in fact I would be amazed if there is no life in our own solar system other than us but at this time I can't see how a belief says anything about the facts... 

If in that very unlikely chance that we were alone, it would certainly raise far many more questions then the more likely alternative.

[tuco]

"Unlikely" is probabilistic terminology. Indeed, the so-called Fermi Paradox is said to be based on probabilistic argument: Drake equation - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation

Lets have a look how the probability in question is calculated. From wiki:

Quote

 

{\displaystyle N=R_{*}\cdot f_{\mathrm {p} }\cdot n_{\mathrm {e} }\cdot f_{\mathrm {l} }\cdot f_{\mathrm {i} }\cdot f_{\mathrm {c} }\cdot L}
where:

N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible (i.e. which are on our current past light cone);
and

R∗ = the average rate of star formation in our galaxy
fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets
fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point
fi = the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life (civilizations)
fc = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space
L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space

 

We can see immediately, or we can read it in wiki, that number of parameters are speculative with ranges varying greatly.

Then the question to me is, how useful such estimation of probability is and if its possible to base any sound argument, the so-called Fermi Paradox in particular, on it.

[Moontanman]

2 hours ago, tuco said:

"Unlikely" is probabilistic terminology. Indeed, the so-called Fermi Paradox is said to be based on probabilistic argument: Drake equation - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation

Lets have a look how the probability in question is calculated. From wiki:

We can see immediately, or we can read it in wiki, that number of parameters are speculative with ranges varying greatly.

Then the question to me is, how useful such estimation of probability is and if its possible to base any sound argument, the so-called Fermi Paradox in particular, on it.

Let's try this again! Lost it all last time... Exactly! We have one data point, you cannot deal in probabilities with one data point. To me the Fermi Paradox is more an admission of ignorance than a genuine attempt at determining the probability of life on other planets. We should get used to saying "We don't know" no shame in not knowing, the shame lies in saying you do know when you cannot know... 

3 hours ago, beecee said:

If in that very unlikely chance that we were alone, it would certainly raise far many more questions then the more likely alternative.

Again, we have one data point, a curve cannot realistically be drawn from one data point. Until we get more data saying that one alternative is more probable than another is nothing but baseless speculation.  

Now if we find life in our solar system, life that points to a second genesis of life, then we will have reason to at least be hopeful. But if we find a second genesis of complex life here in our own system then all bets are off... 

[Ten oz]

8 hours ago, Moontanman said:

 So you expect new technological breakthroughs that will make radio or lasers obsolete? 

Why wouldn't there be? 

5 hours ago, Moontanman said:

I can't say that, while I consider it to be unlikely we are alone that in of itself says nothing about the facts or lack thereof. I would be amazed if there is no other life in the universe, in fact I would be amazed if there is no life in our own solar system other than us but at this time I can't see how a belief says anything about the facts

I don't think we (humans) have a definition for life which could be applied beyond earth. All life on Earth has the same number of DNA base pairs. We only know of one type of life and any thing which deviates from earth life would possibly be either unrecognizable or classified as some sort of autonomous chemical machine. 

2 hours ago, Moontanman said:

Now if we find life in our solar system, life that points to a second genesis of life,

This is a point which has always stuck me. Why hasn't there be other genesis of life here on earth? If we are truly in a "Goldilocks" zone and "Earth-like" planets are most ideal places life might form than why has it only happened once here on earth? This points to  one of your arguments; no shame in admitting we don't know.  

[DrP]

15 hours ago, Moontanman said:

So you expect new technological breakthroughs that will make radio or lasers obsolete? 

No, but they might mean we can better resolve the information we obtain from our current telescopes or the current ones could be improved. We still look at the light from the stars like we did 30 years ago, but now we are more sophisticated in the way we interpret the data, looking for planetary bypasses and things.. things we didn't do back then. We couldn't detect black holes...  we have no new tech to surpass the telescopes we used then (although they are probably better) - we just know how to spot them now by looking at the images they warp and what orbits them.    

You are probably better informed than I am with regard to what currently goes on.  I am a lay observer of what gets reported. imo we have only just started looking... in terms of the 3 year old boy searching for the octopus, we have just put on our snorkel and have waded out up to our knees, have stuck our head under the water a few times and declared that there are no octopussies.   I could be wrong, but I think we have only just begun our searching and I think we will improve our techniques over the next few centuries.

[Ten oz]

2 hours ago, DrP said:

No, but they might mean we can better resolve the information we obtain from our current telescopes or the current ones could be improved. We still look at the light from the stars like we did 30 years ago, but now we are more sophisticated in the way we interpret the data, looking for planetary bypasses and things.. things we didn't do back then. We couldn't detect black holes...  we have no new tech to surpass the telescopes we used then (although they are probably better) - we just know how to spot them now by looking at the images they warp and what orbits them.

Why no? After centuries of people like Leonardo da Vinci and Sir George Cayley working on human flight man final accomplished it in 1904 just over a hundred ago. Since then we've broken the sound barrier and left Earth's atmosphere. Motion picture camera's were invented in 1890. The first movies people watched were black and white and lacked sound. Today we watch movies which integrate motion picture in color with computer generated images which the average person isn't capable of distinguishing from reality. My grandmother passed in 1996 at 87yrs of age. She has been born just after the turn of the century in Nebraska. She literally grew up without running water or electricity in her home. At the time of her death she had running water, electricity, cable TV, and dial up internet.

Technology has the ability to out pace any individual humans wildest projections. I bought my first cell phone in 2000. At that time cell phones did nothing; they just made phone calls. Putting a camera on a phone was consider a major step back then. In my opinion I see no reason to assume that in another hundred years society wouldn't have change and new technologies replaced old technologies. 

[DrP]

8 minutes ago, Ten oz said:

Why no? After centuries of people like Leonardo da Vinci and Sir George Cayley working on human flight man final accomplished it in 1904 just over a hundred ago. Since then we've broken the sound barrier and left Earth's atmosphere. Motion picture camera's were invented in 1890. The first movies people watched were black and white and lacked sound. Today we watch movies which integrate motion picture in color with computer generated images which the average person isn't capable of distinguishing from reality. My grandmother passed in 1996 at 87yrs of age. She has been born just after the turn of the century in Nebraska. She literally grew up without running water or electricity in her home. At the time of her death she had running water, electricity, cable TV, and dial up internet.

Technology has the ability to out pace any individual humans wildest projections. I bought my first cell phone in 2000. At that time cell phones did nothing; they just made phone calls. Putting a camera on a phone was consider a major step back then. In my opinion I see no reason to assume that in another hundred years society wouldn't have change and new technologies replaced old technologies. 

I hear you and tend to agree...  but we can't just assume we will discover something totally new which will enhance our ability to see across the universe. I was answering Moontan's question about whether I think there will be something so amazing it replaces what we currently use (as an alternative to light and radio). I think, that as we are looking at light, the tech we use will be light based and not something hithero undefined or discovered. i.e.  better telescopes and better interpretation of the data they give us - rather than a futuristic space ray that penetrates across the universe further.

[dimreepr]

36 minutes ago, DrP said:

I hear you and tend to agree...  but we can't just assume we will discover something totally new which will enhance our ability to see across the universe. I was answering Moontan's question about whether I think there will be something so amazing it replaces what we currently use (as an alternative to light and radio). I think, that as we are looking at light, the tech we use will be light based and not something hithero undefined or discovered. i.e.  better telescopes and better interpretation of the data they give us - rather than a futuristic space ray that penetrates across the universe further.

1

Probably both (radio telescopes didn't replace optical ones) even if something radically new did appear; but I can't imagine that happening because what, other than light traverses intergalactic distances?

Edited December 15, 2017 by dimreepr

[Ten oz]

44 minutes ago, DrP said:

I hear you and tend to agree...  but we can't just assume we will discover something totally new which will enhance our ability to see across the universe. I was answering Moontan's question about whether I think there will be something so amazing it replaces what we currently use (as an alternative to light and radio). I think, that as we are looking at light, the tech we use will be light based and not something hithero undefined or discovered. i.e.  better telescopes and better interpretation of the data they give us - rather than a futuristic space ray that penetrates across the universe further.

It isn't merely an empty assumption to acknowledge the historical trend. Human have moved from the discovery of fire to Nuclear Fusion. There is no reason to assume invention and discovery will stop or has reach any sort of natural limit. The technology you are referencing has only been used for the last 80yrs or so which in perspective in a blimp on humanities timeline. Without exception every century of human existence has brought with it change. It is only logical to assume the next century will as well.

9 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Probably both (radio telescopes didn't replace optical ones) even if something radically new did appear; but I can't imagine that happening because what, other than light traverses intergalactic distances?

"Quantum entanglement is a physical phenomenon that occurs when pairs or groups of particles are generated or interact in ways such that the quantum state of each particle cannot be described independently of the others, even when the particles are separated by a large distance—instead, a quantum state must be described for the system as a whole.

Measurements of physical properties such as position, momentum, spin, and polarization, performed on entangled particles are found to be appropriately correlated. For example, if a pair of particles are generated in such a way that their total spin is known to be zero, and one particle is found to have clockwise spin on a certain axis, the spin of the other particle, measured on the same axis, will be found to be counterclockwise, as to be expected due to their entanglement. However, this behavior gives rise to paradoxical effects: any measurement of a property of a particle can be seen as acting on that particle (e.g., by collapsing a number of superposed states) and will change the original quantum property by some unknown amount; and in the case of entangled particles, such a measurement will be on the entangled system as a whole. It thus appears that one particle of an entangled pair "knows" what measurement has been performed on the other, and with what outcome, even though there is no known means for such information to be communicated between the particles, which at the time of measurement may be separated by arbitrarily large distances."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

Edited December 15, 2017 by Ten oz
formatting

[dimreepr]

19 hours ago, Moontanman said:

Give me evidence that theism contains wisdom, then we can talk about where it came from... 

 

Fair point.

19 hours ago, Moontanman said:

I consider myself to be a apistevist, evidence is required, faith doesn't cut it.. 

The realist in me acknowledges that we all have faith, for instance, I don't fully understand physics, so when I post a physics question, I have faith that the experts here provide knowledgeable answers.

16 minutes ago, Ten oz said:

"Quantum entanglement is a physical phenomenon that occurs when pairs or groups of particles are generated or interact in ways such that the quantum state of each particle cannot be described independently of the others, even when the particles are separated by a large distance—instead, a quantum state must be described for the system as a whole.

Measurements of physical properties such as position, momentum, spin, and polarization, performed on entangled particles are found to be appropriately correlated. For example, if a pair of particles are generated in such a way that their total spin is known to be zero, and one particle is found to have clockwise spin on a certain axis, the spin of the other particle, measured on the same axis, will be found to be counterclockwise, as to be expected due to their entanglement. However, this behavior gives rise to paradoxical effects: any measurement of a property of a particle can be seen as acting on that particle (e.g., by collapsing a number of superposed states) and will change the original quantum property by some unknown amount; and in the case of entangled particles, such a measurement will be on the entangled system as a whole. It thus appears that one particle of an entangled pair "knows" what measurement has been performed on the other, and with what outcome, even though there is no known means for such information to be communicated between the particles, which at the time of measurement may be separated by arbitrarily large distances."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

1

I remember reading something on this site saying that it's not what it appears, in that it doesn't really travel, I do get your point but I  also remember watching a Sean Caroll lecture, in which he explained just how much the physics community does know about the universe and how few gaps there are.

[DrP]

20 minutes ago, Ten oz said:

It isn't merely an empty assumption to acknowledge the historical trend. Human have moved from the discovery of fire to Nuclear Fusion. There is no reason to assume invention and discovery will stop or has reach any sort of natural limit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

I am not disagreeing with you, I think you are right. I think we will continue to make further breakthroughs and fast too. Which is also why I still have 'faith' that, although it has always been quoted as a nominal 50 years away, we will solve the issues around energy production using fusion safely eventually. There have been such advancements in my lifetime with regard to looking deeper into space that it has been totally amazing to watch. I expect much more.  

[Ten oz]

57 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

I remember reading something on this site saying that it's not what it appears, in that it doesn't really travel, I do get your point but I  also remember watching a Sean Caroll lecture, in which he explained just how much the physics community does know about the universe and how few gaps there are.

That is my point. We don't know what we don't know and every century for 10,000 years our knowledge base has collectively increased. So I see no reason to assume it is anymore likely that something will exceed our use of radio than it is something won't. Radio has existed through all of humanity yet it took humans hundred of thousands of years to notice it. Why assume there are other things also hidden in plain view all around us?

[dimreepr]

23 minutes ago, Ten oz said:

That is my point. We don't know what we don't know and every century for 10,000 years our knowledge base has collectively increased.

 

But that is my point, we are approaching an asymptote.