Where are the aliens?

Thanks to Kepler and Co. we can say that the majority, if not all, stars in our galaxy host planets. Extrapolating the available data a considerable number of the planets is in the habitable zone, 300 of 1800 confirmed planets so far.

We know that life is possible and can evolve to intelligent life. By our own experience technological advancement of intelligent life is exponential. Estimates using the hypothetical example of self replicating probes, aka von Neumann probes, show that the total colonization of our galaxy should only take about 4 million years.

So where is everybody?

I'd like to present a collection of speculative ideas from the following paper: arxiv.org...

Solipsist solutions:
- UFOs: Aliens are already here. Pick your favorite alien conspiracy theory, to explain the absence of testable evidence.
- Directed panspermia: We are the von Neumann probes.
- Galactic zoo: Any form of contact with lesser civilizations is prohibited, including broadcasting signals.
- Planetarium: Our astronomical observations are an illusion created by advanced civilization(s).
- Simulation: Our reality is an illusion, computer simulation.

The problem with this solutions is that they are very hard to test or even completely untestable. Most of them also suffer from the causality dilemma, apply to the alien creators as well.


Catastrophic/suppressing solutions:
- Natural hazards: Comets, asteroids, supervolcanos, supernovae, gamma-ray bursts.
- Self-destruction: The classic. Possible options are nuclear war, ecological holocaust, misuse of bio/nanotechnology.
- Deadly probes: (Von Neumann) probes destructing/resetting life.
- Transcendence: Advanced civilizations transform into something else, not recognizable as life as we know it.
- Isolationism: Civilizations choose to avoid any contact, due to external or internal stress/threat.

This group should be testable by looking for traces of precursor civilizations.


Rare earth solution:
- The idea is that we are special, the result of a chain of very improbable events. So even if there are plenty habitable worlds, the chance for intelligent life might be astronomically small. Thus the density of life in the universe is very low, making any contact pretty much impossible.

This is another testable hypothesis, making it attractive for scientific research.


What is your favorite and why?

The aliens are a few years into the future when we get to the tecnology level to find them.

a reply to: moebius

Which is my favourite of the "solutions" above?

None of them.

That list leaves out an incredibly huge other possibility and that possibility is that life also does exist and are advanced, but not so advanced that they can leave their own planet and visit another.

Look at us humans, we have advanced and capable technology and we are currently in the stages of trying to take that extra huge leap of being able to leave our own planet and visit others, but that could be centuries, millennia or even never.

Our current telescopic capabilities also only leave us with the ability to "speculate" about the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations elsewhere.

So there is also the possibility that there is life out there as advanced as us and haven't found us yet either!

So until a race is able to make it to another world and actually CHOOSES to make contact, we may never know for sure.

So "Isolationism" is the closest up there if I were forced to make a choice; but that is entirely different as if ET aren't capable of leaving their planet; then they haven't got a choice to ignore us!

My opinion is that they are visiting here already and have been for generations.

This is based on several personal experiences that are not relevant to the thread however

ETA: As to the reason why I believe they are visiting and have made no contact?

They don't mean us any harm and are not here to interfere. If they day comes where we as humans become advanced enough to leave the earth for interstellar travel, then contact will be made (To "discuss" our human intentions). We are not advanced enough yet to be a threat to them.

I also think this is vaguely relevant to what I am saying as well, so I will just put it out there.

There is a plan for a "One World Government; New World Order". But the TRUE purpose of this order is for a ONE WORLD ARMY (Not that depopulation BS "Truthers & Christians" would have you misinformed about)!

"- UFOs: Aliens are already here. Pick your favorite alien conspiracy theory, to explain the absence of testable evidence."

One does not need to resort to conspiracy theories in order to explain what YOU seem to believe is an absence of evidence that is testable. By mentioning the word "conspiracy" in the same breath as "aliens", you are disparaging this explanation, which makes your analysis biassed and subjective. BTW, by adding the word "testable", you slyly manage to ignore an encyclopaedic volume of evidence of varying quality that has accumulated since 1947, the year of Kenneth Arnold's sightings. By doing this, you beg the question that genuine evidence of alien presence should be testable in order to count as scientific evidence. But this misunderstands the very nature of this evidence. The UFO phenomenon is NOT amenable to the methodology of science - it cannot be controlled or repeated at will. To argue that it should be is to be completely unrealistic. In that sense, you are asking for the impossible. All scientists can do (if they are brave enough to get involved in this subject!) is to eliminate all known natural/conventional explanations. They can never prove UFOs are driven by aliens. This can only be a hypothesis that they will never entertain, of course, because doing so would be damaging to their academic reputations and career.
The awkward fact is that a HUGE volume of evidence exists for UFOs NOT being natural phenomena. But none of it is testable in the narrow sense of scientific research.
Science should NOT be about examing only those possibilities that are straightforward to test and ignoring those that are too hard to examine. Science should examine ALL possibilities, however they may threaten its cherished presuppositions. The problem is that certain paranormal and paradigm-defying phenomena cannot be studied scientifically because their causation lies OUTSIDE the current paradigms of science, whilst their observation is not repeatable under controlled, laboratory conditions.
None of your listed alternatives to the intelligently-directed origin of UFOs has any relevance whatsoever. They are nothing more than the pathetic suggestions that science journalists and debunkers of the paranormal dream up to dupe naive people into thinking that viable alternatives to this origin exist. And demanding that the evidence should be testable is a laughable, dishonest way of ignoring the elephant that is standing in the room. Dishonest because it is unscientific to evade uncomfortable possibilities by re-defining your way out of the problem! It's like asking your mother whenever she walks into the room to provide her passport, otherwise you won't accept her assertion that she is your mother. Intrusion of non-human intelligence into the Earth's atmosphere is not a phenomenon that can ever be proved scientifically. So stop pretending that it does not happen because of your totally inadequate reason that it is hard to test the evidence for it.

None of them.

Only 4% of the Universe is normal matter, and of that 75% of
that is the element hydrogen.

By pure ratiometric probability, I'd look in that other 96%
for where the majority of life exists, if any does at all.

Add onto the fact that it took 4 billion years for our type
of life to evolve on Earth, and that planets with our combination
are likely rare (oxygen atmosphere, liquid water, moon to
stabilize our seasons, easily accessible metals & resources, etc).

We MAY be the only technologically sophisticated organic
life in 1000 galaxies.

We also can't fall to wishful thinking; it's possible that technology
can't cover those vast distances (of 1000 galaxies apart).

For example, I read a paper the other day which expressed that
relativistic speeds may break down quantum mechanics. If that's
the case, then only simple technologies like generation ships
between very close systems (which are probably devoid
of interesting organic life) and things like bracewell probes..
would be possible.

Nuts and bolts 'UFOs' would be pretty much precluded.

Kev

Intelligent life like ours is not pre-destiny. If it were not for the KT impact, and the already devastating changes in our environment before the impact, we would still have dinosaurs roaming our planet and we'd be nothing but small mammals. It was the demise of the dinosaurs that opened up the path (lack of predators, ample food and territory) for our development. That, by any measure, is fluke, not destiny.

Maybe we are the last Planet capable of life as we know it. Maybe all the others have died long ago.

You only have to look here on this Earth to see how this can happen. We, us Humans, in 200 years have raped this Planet and depleted a vast % of it resources. Shocking, absolutely Shocking.

originally posted by: 321Go
Intelligent life like ours is not pre-destiny. If it were not for the KT impact, and the already devastating changes in our environment before the impact, we would still have dinosaurs roaming our planet and we'd be nothing but small mammals. It was the demise of the dinosaurs that opened up the path (lack of predators, ample food and territory) for our development. That, by any measure, is fluke, not destiny.

Of course.

Organic life may be a fluke.

And 'conscious organic life' one google-plex times more a fluke.

Science fiction films have been misleading.

Kev

originally posted by: Soloprotocol
Maybe we are the last Planet capable of life as we know it. Maybe all the others have died long ago.

You only have to look here on this Earth to see how this can happen. We, us Humans, in 200 years have raped this Planet and depleted a vast % of it resources. Shocking, absolutely Shocking.

Definitely.

Survival of the fittest leave one supreme predator.

When all other life has been decimated, that supreme predator has
only itself to prey upon.

That's the stage we are at now.

It doesn't look good..

Kev

a reply to: moebius

- Galactic zoo: Any form of contact with lesser civilizations is prohibited, including broadcasting signals.

Prohibited? Or impossible with our tech. Like listening for radio signals through a conch shell. Or vegetables in a garden arguing the presence of gardeners.

- Transcendence: Advanced civilizations transform into something else, not recognizable as life as we know it.

What we call the spirit realm. We become 'advanced' when we die.

The idea is that we are special, the result of a chain of very improbable events. So even if there are plenty habitable worlds, the chance for intelligent life might be astronomically small.

We are 'special'; each of us is singularly unique in all of the Universe. And just another crop of humans, like any group of recruits in boot camp or freshmen on campus. Not all of us will 'graduate'.

The Universe is infinite so plenty of place to expand. This outpost earth may be in a remote corner, ripe for settlement. All we need is people to populate it.

No shortage of those here. What is it with cultures that pump them out into impoverished societies, seemingly without consideration where the money is going to come from to raise, clothe and educate all of them?

a reply to: Soloprotocol

Maybe we are the last Planet capable of life as we know it. Maybe all the others have died long ago.

Thats like never been out of your yard but saying maybe my garden is the last one on Earth.

Not likely.

a reply to: KellyPrettyBear

Only 4% of the Universe is normal matter, and of that 75% of
that is the element hydrogen.

By pure ratiometric probability, I'd look in that other 96%
for where the majority of life exists, if any does at all.

You say that living in this biosphere filled with life? Why, Kelly Pretty Bear, I am surprised at you.

Life is the difference. This planet swarms with it, it procreates, fills every nook and cranny. It follows that should occur everywhere.

For instance, I get in my car and leave town, I may drive a hundred or hundreds of miles through mountains and desert and then arrive at another city, or thousands of miles across the ocean, finding more cities, each outposts for conglomerates of life.

Let alone all the natural world in between. I may not find a diamond in my back yard, they are pretty rare, But the world as a whole is filled with millions of them.

As below, so above?

originally posted by: intrptr
a reply to: KellyPrettyBear

Only 4% of the Universe is normal matter, and of that 75% of
that is the element hydrogen.

By pure ratiometric probability, I'd look in that other 96%
for where the majority of life exists, if any does at all.

You say that living in this biosphere filled with life? Why, Kelly Pretty Bear, I am surprised at you.

Life is the difference. This planet swarms with it, it procreates, fills every nook and cranny. It follows that should occur everywhere.

For instance, I get in my car and leave town, I may drive a hundred or hundreds of miles through mountains and desert and then arrive at another city, or thousands of miles across the ocean, finding more cities, each outposts for conglomerates of life.

Let alone all the natural world in between. I may not find a diamond in my back yard, they are pretty rare, But the world as a whole is filled with millions of them.

As below, so above?

THIS planet swarms with organic life.

To assume it's that way universally is selection bias.

Now, simple organic life may be a number of places in the Universe.

But it's a big Universe.

The gulf between pond scum and races flying around 'Enterprises'
is quite another thing.

And that said.. my personal theorem is that the Universe IS
swarming with intelligent life.. but it's not organic.

We may well be the odd man out.

"As above so below" has never been verified I'm afraid!
It's more like wishful thinking.

Kev

Simulation hypothesis is the one that's been rattling around my brain for a while now.
What makes it attractive, despite it's horror, is that we are apparently making headway towards testing the theory.

If it does turn out to be a likely scientific truth of our existence, I predict a new renaissance of study in areas like UFOlogy (not to mention spirits, the occult, psychic abilities, MIB experiences and everything else in that broad field). Things that don't fit into the matrix, as it were, could be studied by established academia as hints of what is really going on.
And then to see a post-Physics scientific paradigm (perhaps already started with our early success with quantum theory applications) could make humanity and the world at large completely unrecognizable within a mere hundred years.

To focus back to the topic though, simulation theory explains many of the bizarre attributes reported by so-called aliens, if not putting a definite "no" stamp on the "are there intelligent life forms from other worlds" question.
But it completely fails so far to make any headway about whether the lights in the sky are merely glitches or caretaker programs or even some sort of avatar for the "real" people controlling the world (who may in turn be simulations, ad infinitum).

a reply to: moebius

Interesting, you see things from your human point of view.

If i was an Alien and i had technology you could only dream about, i'd be living here with you for a time. Get a jist of who/what you are, what you're capable of....

If i stayed here with others' of my kind i'd need somewhere to conceal us.....somewhere uninhabitable to humans.

a reply to: KellyPrettyBear

The gulf between pond scum and races flying around 'Enterprises'
is quite another thing.

Like you said, selection bias. Our own perspective here in this third dimension is what limits our exploration of the cosmos. We can see afar, but can't get there from here.

We have to pass to do that. Then we are everywhere.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Maybe your cultural heritage has an equivalent tale? Don't mean to offend in any way…

a reply to: intrptr

That my friend is one of my favorite books...

I'm talking possibilities and probabilities
here...

none of us in this thread 'know' anything
for certain and that definitely includes
you and I.

Kev

a reply to: Unresponsible

Definitely possible.

Much more likely than nuts and bolts
craft.

Any super intelligence would be much
more likely to deploy safer technologies
such as singularity tech than to dodge
black holes, micrometeorites and hard
radiation of infinite space..,

and come visit deranged chimpanzees
with delusions of grandeur.

Kev

Maybe there aren't any

You would have thought that considering that the universe could be colonized in a few tens of millions of years and the visible universe is about 14billions years old, it could have been colonized hundreds of times over.

Maybe its a case of Occam's razor and instead of coming out with wild theories on where are all the Aliens, it could just be there aren't any.

And if there aren't any, then the question becomes why are we the only ones and then any answer is going to be a wild theories from Gods to simulated realities.

One thing I think we can all agree on, is that the whole topic is one massive mind fck

They are here in various degrees, some more advanced than others, and some others maybe not so much.

Some would be able to function at higher energetic states and would be likened to supernatural creatures like Jesus or Buddha, then there are those with even higher energies, and others with not so high energies but still above humans, then there are others who are pretty much on our energy level or even lower meaning sickly or diseased. Now each group may use a different type of technology as well some energy based 3d printing types while others may be very materialistic. We would most likely deal with the lower energy sickly materialistic types due to our own low energy and materialism.

The other higher energy one would seem likened to gods to us capable of creating countless worlds by sheer thought, they are around just we arent really seeing eye to eye with them, as our weapons wont really work on them. They would be considered type 4-6 civilizations meaning multi dimentional.