Stephen Hawking says Aliens exist

Why are a few people making a fuss about Prof. Hawking's conclusion that ET's are hostile?

If he said they would all be peaceful would there be an argument that he is ignorant for stating that?

The truth is always going to be what you want it to be. Prof. Hawking's belief is just as plausible as your belief or my belief.

When I read through this thread, I see a lot of cry babies talking about how Prof. Hawking is now thought less of because of his documentary. What this really means is 'your thoughts don't match my thought's so blah...I've got no time for you'.

I could point out a few flaws here and there against my own opinion, but I still enjoyed it and look at him in the same light as I did before the documentary, even if I don't agree with some of his thoughts.

I'd like to have seen more balance in it with the hostile and peaceful scenarios.

Just because I never got what I wanted doesn't give me the urge to call him naive or ignorant.

I think Prof. Hawking was trying to achieve something more than just stating 'They are all hostile'. I think he had a message to the world and I think he had good intentions for the human race.

I believe his message was 'prepare for the worst because failing to prepare is preparing to fail'.

As much as I dislike this idea, it is better to be realistic and expect the worst, than to proceed blissfully ignorant and expecting the best.

Originally posted by SeekerofTruth101

Originally posted by 11118

Awareness is far more powerful than play toys such as technology.

My deepest respect to you for coming out with that phrase. Only you and a handful realizes this truism. Only can the truth set us free. From awareness will all things beget

To both Seeker and 11118..

So do the rest of us that are not on the "inside" of all this just sit back and read your cryptic posts and say "wow, aliens are here!"

Your posts have no substance or meaning other than how you view your world around you. The whole point to being a skeptic is to prove something with enough empirical evidence and repeatable experiments to say it is a fact.

For us laymen, we have seen that 4000 years ago we had eyewitnesses and drawn pictures, then in the 1800s we had eyewitnesses and finally a few photos from new technology, and now today we have eyewitnesses, photos, video etc but all of it does not push the proof positive any further than what we had 4000 years ago.

If you guys have seen dead bodies, or had tea with them it means little and you are categorized right with the old lady who says an alien impregnated her cat…

So instead of acting like the all knowing ones, and the rest of us are ignorant sheep, show your proof beyond all doubt, and oh Googling aliens with a few cut and pastes is not proof.

Originally posted by killer4281
hello ats members dont redicule me please but i have been to some places that are well known while i can't give you alot of information i can give you some like he fact i have seen bodies mind you not live aleins but bodies and they were picked up by the u.s. goverment. the goverment has known for many years that aleins have exsisted and been to earth [...]

Well, thanks for the input. But you know, of course, that we just can't take the word of an anonymous poster on an Internet board. If you've seen this stuff, and know it to be true, good for you. But that really doesn't help us in any way.

Oh, and if you hit that key on your keyboard that says "Shift," it makes capital letters.

Originally posted by Schaden

Originally posted by Bob Sholtz
"Astrophysicist Hugh Ross has calculated the probability that these and other constants (122 in all) would exist today for any planet in the universe by chance (I.e., without Divine design). Assuming there are 10^22 planets in the universe (a very large number: 1 with 22 zeros following it), his answer is shocking; one chance in 10^138, that’s one chance in one with 138 zeros after it. There are only about 10^70 atoms in the entire universe."

do i believe that life exists elsewhere? meh, i'm not sure. but to claim that the odds are in favor of life existing elsewhere is silly when the chances of life existing on our own planet is so slim.

If he calculated the odds as greater than all of the atoms in the universe, and yet humans are here, his estimate appears severly flawed and invalid.

My personal guess is there are perhaps dozens of planets with advanced life, in our galaxy alone. It could be in the hundreds of thousands, millions even, considering the size of the entire universe.

Agreed, thank god (ha ha), I thought I read the above numbers incorrectly and started to doubt that I existed.

Hugh Ross's 122 constants is an assumption by him as to what constitutes the parameters for life. One thing is absolutely certain: those parameters are getting ever wider as we discover ever more niches for life.

The latest is this : chemists have now found that the building blocks for life (amino acids, RNA etc) actually reproduce WITHOUT the need for a catalyst. In fact the production of self replicating proteins is a "normal" process. WOW. The implications are that if basic proteins exist you are practically guaranteed to have life evolving. No need to invent a mythical creature called "god".

In addition, don't forget a considerable number of those 122 constants exists throughout the known universe otherwise it wouldn't exist in its current form.......DUH!

Originally posted by RWM88
Why are a few people making a fuss about Prof. Hawking's conclusion that ET's are hostile?

I think they have just as much chance of being hostile as being friendly scientific explorers. Assuming an alien would grow and evolve in a natural environment kind of like ours, then what you're looking at is some creature that has been either smart enough to avoid being eaten, or nasty enough to eat everything else. Take a look at any of the series on the various science channels, and you see that Earth is just a big smörgåsbord, with everything eating everything else, and when they're not eating, they're breeding.

Now imagine the same eat or die scenario being played out across the galaxy, which could be possible. An alien is going to have to be pretty tough and bad and smart to survive a galaxy-wide feeding frenzy. So when they show up on our doorstep, with armor-covered bodies the size of houses and brains the size of cars, it might not be a very happy day for humanity.

I think it would be fun for scientists to discover an alien radio signal far, far away. I could live with that. But as old as I am, I don't think I'm going to live long enough to see actual aliens show up en masse in broad daylight. Maybe I'm lucky in that regard.

[edit on 29-4-2010 by Blue Shift]

Originally posted by Bob Sholtz
reply to post by Matrix Rising

 

do i believe that life exists elsewhere? meh, i'm not sure. but to claim that the odds are in favor of life existing elsewhere is silly when the chances of life existing on our own planet is so slim.

WHAT? This guy is serious?? Okay, so hundreds of billions of stars, galaxies...whatever...and "meh, i'm not sure." and it's "SILLY" to think that way??

I'm sorry but "HIS" (Hawkins) logic is flawed? Have you taken a step outside of your box lately?

Originally posted by malcr

In addition, don't forget a considerable number of those 122 constants exists throughout the known universe otherwise it wouldn't exist in its current form.......DUH!

Well I think first we need to prove were life can exist in just our own galaxy first. This gives us a finite number of stars to work with and then we can determine if there is a finite number of ways for life to exist in our neck of the woods.

Our first step is to see if or find life on Venus, Mars, Saturn and Jupiter. If we can find life on these planets it will open up the vast environments for life to exist. If we find nothing more than extremely simple life at best or none at all then we can start to determine that advance life most likely will need earth life environment to evolve.

Next we need to determine if life can exist near a Sun that is not roughly 6000 degrees as is our sun. A hotter sun and we have X-ray/Gamma ray energy for that life to use and cooler temperatures we would have a giant microwave. So can life flourish and evolve to advance life with x-rays or microwaves as their “light” source?

If we find no life or limited simple life then that would serious reduce the number of stars (200-300 billion) and planets in our galaxy to have the chance for advance life. Now even on a planet with earth life it doesn’t mean that intelligent physical capable life will evolve and with us being unique in earth 4.5 billion years of evolution it is not common to say the least.

So unless some serious evidence shows otherwise our galaxy might be very sparse in space faring aliens…



[edit on 29-4-2010 by Xtrozero]

I think Mr. Hawking's message is the same as it's always been...

Listening is ok, but if we broadcast ourselves, not only do we announce it to potential friends, but to potential enemies as well, and since there is no way to "take it back", we should be careful in making such an announcement to the Universe...

(Although, I'd argue that it's already too late...)

If I were an intelligent alien race, scanning the Universe for signs of sentient life, with a tech level enough to spot from space, what would I look for? Hmm...maybe a sentient-made atomic explosion, where none should occur naturally? I suppose this could also be triggered by meteorite impacts, but still...we have already sent that smoke signal...

reply to post by Gazrok


Unless of course they deploy secret space weapons first so we have defence?
Yeah right.
Seems fitting if you ask me. X-37B for instance, oh almost forgot has anything else been sent up by anyone else?????

Originally posted by Xtrozero

Originally posted by SeekerofTruth101

Originally posted by 11118

Awareness is far more powerful than play toys such as technology.

My deepest respect to you for coming out with that phrase. Only you and a handful realizes this truism. Only can the truth set us free. From awareness will all things beget

To both Seeker and 11118..

So do the rest of us that are not on the "inside" of all this just sit back and read your cryptic posts and say "wow, aliens are here!"

Your posts have no substance or meaning other than how you view your world around you. The whole point to being a skeptic is to prove something with enough empirical evidence and repeatable experiments to say it is a fact.

For us laymen, we have seen that 4000 years ago we had eyewitnesses and drawn pictures, then in the 1800s we had eyewitnesses and finally a few photos from new technology, and now today we have eyewitnesses, photos, video etc but all of it does not push the proof positive any further than what we had 4000 years ago.

If you guys have seen dead bodies, or had tea with them it means little and you are categorized right with the old lady who says an alien impregnated her cat…

So instead of acting like the all knowing ones, and the rest of us are ignorant sheep, show your proof beyond all doubt, and oh Googling aliens with a few cut and pastes is not proof.

I never stated that you, or anyone else for that matter, are ignorant sheep. The matter is that you think that I am expressing such a label in my statements and, in turn, you manifest a personal perspective that makes it so. Your literally putting your own meanings behind my words, even though I had no such goal.

I'm not a skeptic, nor do I need candid evidence for you to stand behind my knowing of non-earthly entities and their irrefutable existence.

I find it humorous that you categorize me with, "the old lady who says an alien impregnated her cat…".

[edit on 29-4-2010 by 11118]

I don't think this is a thread for outspoken replies. It is a thread where you can express a theoretical opinion, which can only be debated and not contradicted. Our knowledge at this point in time is restricted, we have not got to the point of knowing unequivocally how life can exist elsewhere, just that it makes no sense that there is no life elsewhere. So we have Spephen Hawking a scientist, and the current Pope publicly enbracing the idea of extraworldy life in their own ways, amongst others. Thanks to the OP, you have a thread, open to everyone to speculate.

reply to post by Matrix Rising

First, you are trying to debate something that was never said. Pseudoskeptics always try to debate against an absolute. Hawking didn't say there was unequivocal proof, he said based on the evidence he laid out in the documentary, that it's "rational" to talk about Aliens because it's "almost certain" they exist.

As should be plain to any non-toddler who isn't dyslexic or otherwise mentally handicapped, it is just this premise that I have been discussing. All along I have spoken of the probability of extraterrestrial intelligence, just as Prof. Hawking did. Nowhere have I accused him of claiming unequivocal proof of alien visitation. You are talking nonsense.

The debate shouldn't be about their existence, because it's "almost certain" they exist.

It is almost certain they exist somewhere in the vastness of the cosmos. It is almost certain they have never visited Earth within the lifetime of our species. How many times must this be repeated before it penetrates?

The debate should be about whether they have visited us? Are they hostile? What type of technology do they have? and more.

Are you claiming that these questions are not debated? On the contrary, popular culture is obsessed with them.

It's not "wishful thinking" or like talking about "Santa, tooth fairy, trolls and vampires."

If the subject is aliens visiting Earth, then the accurate comparison is not to children's myths and old folk tales but to miracle cures by TV preachers, levitating Hindu godmen and apparitions of the Virgin Mary in peanut-butter sandwiches.

reply to post by 11118

Extraterrestrials comprehend the pure simple and powerful truth. Everything, including them, and us, is the Creator creating of itself in perpetuity.

Is this a statement of fact, or just conjecture on your part? To me it looks like you are presenting a statement of fact….

I can assure you they have been here before, they are benevolent.

Another statement of fact on your part…
What privities do you have of these facts, a higher level of conscience? That is why I suggest the rest of us are ignorant.

Not only that but there is a quarantine like I said, ancient civilizations were given such advanced information that lead to self-destruction and thus the quarantine was set in place.

Another factual statement on your part that aliens have been here before, how do you know?

I’ll go back to my post in saying how do you present such undeniable facts with what evidence we have available? So this means you either have more, or you have as much as the old lady has about her cat….hehe




[edit on 29-4-2010 by Xtrozero]

remove post

[edit on 29-4-2010 by PhotonEffect]

reply to post by RWM88


The way I see it, we have 2 options:

a) We can discontinue sending messages out into the universe for fear that it might be received by some sort of hostile alien race that will fly over here to destroy us for our resources, or kidnap us for experiments, or perhaps they're bored and a bit cranky after their interstellar flight and just want to kill things.

In this case we'll all just sit here on our little planet fighting and warring with each other and stealing each others money until we've used up all our resources and die. We'll turn our backs on the single most important discovery in the history of this planet...why? because we're a'scared...

or

b) we continue to send messages out into space in the hopes of connecting with another intelligent life form. We're human- we're curious and we need to satisfy our curiosity... We make contact... Perhaps this life form is quite similar to us, or perhaps they're not. There's a good chance that they'd be peaceful, but of course there's the chance that if they're like us, hostility could very well run through their blood (if they have blood). But forget that, lets think positive here...

In this case we may learn quite a bit about the universe, and it's purpose. Perhaps we learn more about ourselves and what we are. New types of energy sources, FTL space travel, visit other planets, other galaxies, who knows...

Point is, the time is now. We have the technologies to search for other life and perhaps make contact with it. And we're just going to sit here and do nothing? Right, because anyone who ever accomplished anything in life never took risks...

I'm going to go with option b.

reply to post by PhotonEffect


Thanks for the reply PhotonEffect.

Situation A) made me chuckle
Our worst nightmares come true.

It's a good sign that people have good intentions and they would want to reach out in peace, such as yourself PhotonEffect.

So I'm going with option C)

We can still be curious and search for life without announcing our presence.
(Telescopes, planet searching, probes etc...)
We can still survey the galaxy and universe.
We can still develop technology and strive for bettering ourselves.

We've been doing all this since our early days and we will continue to do so. ET life shouldn't be a reason why we should change. Change should come from an inside source, not and outside influence.

I don't think now is the time to send messages in to space for two reasons

1) If ET received our messages and appeared today, we would have no means of defending ourselves if worst came to worst.
2) The ET's would arrive and see that planet Earth is the civic equivalent of a retarded bird with no wings that can barely communicate with itself.

It's not the kind of state you want to be in when engaging with advanced lifeforms.

I'd rather engage with advanced lifeforms when we are advanced and developed enough to ensure our place among the stars.

I take this extra caution because there is only one human race and we only have one ship we sail on at the moment. I believe we can't afford to take risks until we are quite highly advanced and developed, socially, culturally and technologically.

Then think of this, do you think ET would let us know the location of their homeworld?
Is there a reason space is so quiet and not buzzing with artificial signals?
If ET is around our cosmic neighborhood, they have taken a protectionist approach for a reason, what reason could that be

Only time will tell. Take it easy PhotonEffect.

Edited for spelling.

[edit on 11232009 by RWM88]

I don't think the human brain can truly comprehend what we don't know about space. The probability is definitely in favor of life on other planets, but we don't completely know. We have no idea if they are friendly, or hostile, advanced or simple. We don't know if they are aware of our presence, or even visited the planet billions of years ago and found it barren and lifeless and has check it off the list. We do not know if they have any use for the minerals on this planet or if they can even survive on a planet like Earth. They may have different catalyts for life and could just be billions of foreign particles that live off the dark matter of space. I mean heck, who's not to say that aliens in other world didn't grow some bacteria in labs then dumped it off on multiple planets to see if life would evolve and we're actually the product of alien experiments?

It's crazy to assume that we know anything at all about alien life, when it's truly impossible to even wrap our human minds around the vast amount of information we don't understand. Science seems to be jumping the gun a bit here, before we try and reach out towards alien life we should focus on exploring our largely unexplored solar system and then worry about intergalactic travel.

reply to post by Blue Shift


Thanks for the reply Blueshift.

Exactly, life just seems to eat everything around it where ever you look.

All possibilities are on the table when it comes to a matter like this.

So it's best to keep an open mind.

Larry King tomorow CNN talking regarding what Stephen Hawking said?
Interesting........1st May? Anyone?

Well when someone like Stephen Hawkins says that aliens are real,it sounds different to the common people who usually laugh with the idea.

Not to try to contact them because they will destroy us....tooooooooo Hollywood.By the way we don't need aliens to destroy us.....we can do it ourselves