[HN Gopher] Have we already been visited by aliens?
___________________________________________________________________
Have we already been visited by aliens?
Author : elorant
Score : 140 points
Date : 2021-01-20 14:43 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newyorker.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newyorker.com)
| yters wrote:
| If not, where did our dna come from?
| vmception wrote:
| I'm willing to disagree with most things I read here.
|
| Entertaining, but way too many assumptions.
|
| He* started with Oumaumua, which I am willing to entertain, and
| then went way off in other "thought leadership" directions that
| should all be their own articles.
|
| *Avi Loeb, he. Not Elizabeth Kolbert the author.
| unnouinceput wrote:
| *She
| itisit wrote:
| *They
| Horba wrote:
| She'
| vmception wrote:
| Avi Loeb wrote the book and who I am talking about. There
| isn't ambiguity about whether I was talking about the article
| writer or the person the article was talking about. Read the
| article again, there is a particular person talking about
| Oumaumua and then assumptions about alien natural selection.
| Xcelerate wrote:
| Tangential to the article, but I'm not sure why more isn't
| mentioned about what I consider to be the most likely reason we
| haven't been visited by aliens: they probably exist somewhere due
| to the sheer size of the universe, but the speed of light is
| indeed the fundamental limit to classical information transfer as
| our current understanding of physics predicts, and therefore we
| are simply too far away from any sort of intelligence that exists
| out there to contact or reach us.
|
| It's a simple and boring explanation but from my perspective also
| the most likely.
| cgriswald wrote:
| The solution to distance isn't energy; it's time. Even at
| speeds much lower than the speed of light, a civilization could
| have spread across or explored the Milky Way in a few millions
| of years. These needn't have been biological creatures. Von
| Neumann probes, "Genesis" machines, or just flinging rocks with
| sensors on them to tour the stars would do the trick.
| blueblisters wrote:
| What would motivate a civilization to undertake such an
| experiment? A probe a 50,000 light years away would take
| 50,000 years to send back any meaningful information. Unless
| alien life-spans are significantly longer than humans, I
| would think this would probably not be funded by their
| science department.
| GoblinSlayer wrote:
| They spent 50000 years exploring space, we spent 50000
| years waging wars. Who spent their time better?
| RobertoG wrote:
| A probe of the sophistication of a Von Newman machine, that
| can reproduce, would be the alien in itself. A network of
| such probes would be a civilization.
| sterlind wrote:
| Von Neumann probes would be great at asteroid mining. If
| you just let the probes keep going rather than limiting
| their distance, they'd cover the 50k light years easily.
| Not much overhead on the civilization.
| avz wrote:
| I don't find the argument that distances are too great for
| intelligence to meet particularly convincing. At its core lies
| unjustified extrapolation that the ratio of average lifespan to
| typical interstellar distance - a pure accident of Earthly
| biology - somehow extends to the whole universe.
|
| The key quantity on which the argument hinges is
| T * c / D
|
| where T is the average lifespan of the intelligent being in
| question, c is the speed of light and D is a typical separation
| between stars in a region of interest.
|
| In our stellar neighborhood there are about 0.004 stars per
| cubic light year [1], so if we choose to measure D as the
| reciprocal of the cubic root of stellar density then D is about
| 6.3 light years which is of the same order of magnitude as the
| distance to Proxima Centauri (~4.2 ly). This quantity varies
| somewhat, e.g. global clusters have about 0.4 stars per cubic
| parsec [2] which is more than 0.01 stars per cubic light year
| for D of 4.4 ly.
|
| In case of humans, T is about 79 years. We don't know anything
| about any alien lifeforms, but even among lifeforms on Earth T
| varies significantly. For example, Bowhead whales can live more
| than 200 years [3]. Traveling 4 ly at 5% of the speed of light
| is a possibility for such creatures. Moreover, entities with
| artificial intelligence could live (function?) significantly
| longer. Possibly forever.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_density
|
| [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Globular_cluster
|
| [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowhead_whale
| at_a_remove wrote:
| This has been my basic take on it.
|
| However, if you want a point of concern, I'll throw out some
| alternatives. I'm going to ignore generation ships, because
| those seem a trifle unlikely (too complex, rather cruel to the
| inhabitants), but let's imagine some embryo-laden carriers,
| freeze-dried aliens, and von Neumann probes.
|
| Now, again, that's still a long way for very little gain.
| There's nothing physical you could bring back to your
| civilization that would be "worth" the trip, but what about
| some _irrational_ civilizations? Religious zealots, or just a
| large enough portion of a technologically advanced society that
| says, "Screw it, let's hurl some madly self-replicating probes
| out into the spiral arm." Ninety-nine percent of their
| civilization might think that is a terrible idea (or pick your
| proportion), but there only needs to be a few to pull it off.
|
| Why are we not seeing the von Neumann probes? I will admit that
| the other scenarios are less likely. But where are they? Even
| at a ten thousandth the speed of light they would have swarmed
| the galaxy, replicating down one spiral arm, into the core, and
| back out along the remaining arms.
| GoblinSlayer wrote:
| The solar system is between arms.
| cronix wrote:
| > but the speed of light is indeed the fundamental limit to
| classical information transfer as our current understanding of
| physics predicts
|
| I used to think that as well, but with all of the recent proof
| of quantum entanglement, I'm not so sure anymore.
|
| https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/295013-scientists-captur...
| scythmic_waves wrote:
| My (relatively uninformed) understanding was that you
| couldn't transfer information via quantum entanglement. Is
| that not correct?
| cronix wrote:
| This is not my field, but it seem if you can spin 1
| particle in a known direction and the entangled "partner"
| particle spins the exact opposite direction, then why not?
| Basically everything would just be reversed with a 1 being
| a 0 and a 0 being a 1 on the receiving end. I know both the
| Chinese and American governments are working on quantum
| entanglement as a communication mechanism and the Chinese
| have had some success between satellites. Basically a real
| time wireless internet.
|
| Edit: better link for Chinese experiments from Science Mag.
|
| https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/02/quantum-internet-
| clo...
|
| https://finance.yahoo.com/news/chinas-experiment-quantum-
| com...
|
| https://newatlas.com/telecommunications/us-government-
| bluepr...
| matmatmatmat wrote:
| As others have said, the fundamental problem is that all
| you can deduce is that whatever the spin of your particle
| is, the other particle has the opposite spin. You cannot
| determine the spin of your particle in order to affect
| the spin of the other particle.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| Because you don't get to choose which way the particle
| spins when creating an entangled pair.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| Moreover you can't transfer information faster than the
| speed of light.
|
| As for QE: I first I need to send you a particle at
| sunlight speeds. Then I measure my particle and get the
| value N, which means I immediately know that your particle
| must be -N. Great for key exchange: I can send you let's
| say 2048 of these particles and then we instantly know each
| other's keys/have a shared key, while also knowing if the
| transmission has been tempered with in transit. But I can't
| send you a message I choose.
| standardUser wrote:
| On this of all days, I say let's double down on facts instead of
| crafting our own imaginary worlds.
| cronix wrote:
| Lex Fridman had a really good interview with Avi Loeb about
| Oumuamua, among other things, about a week ago. Highly recommend!
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plcc6E-E1uU
| TacoToni wrote:
| Fantastic episode.
| libertine wrote:
| Very interesting, and it gives a really good highlight of the
| whole Oumuamua event, which got a bit distorted in the media.
|
| The things that stood out were:
|
| - Our range of vision to spot such objects is narrow;
|
| - We don't have much "resolution" of the object, and we have to
| work with limited data;
|
| - that fact that we managed to get that data was already really
| good and it's enough to theorize about a lot of stuff, but not
| enough to tell precisely what it was.
|
| - the object behavior as it approached the sun doesn't match
| the type of object that we perceived at the beginning;
|
| - the object could have been stationary;
| [deleted]
| dfsegoat wrote:
| Having watched the vid, he goes into specifics of why he thinks
| Oumuamua is 'not a rock' based on geometry and reflectivity. It
| was quite fascinating.
| tiborsaas wrote:
| Prof David Kipping did a point-by-point analysis of Loeb's
| claims:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qX_Bj7064Ms
|
| TLDW: most likely a natural object.
| floatrock wrote:
| Thanks for the link. Always good to hear the other side,
| especially after listening to the Lex interview a while back.
| Here's the summary:
|
| Loeb's argument for Ouamuamua being aliens rests on 6 observed
| anomalies. All but 1 or 2 have pretty reasonable rebuttals.
|
| [1]: _Anomaly: There are too few interstellar asteroids to
| expect something like this, so it must have been aimed at us._
| The brand new telescope that discovered this was designed to
| look for interstellar rocks like this, but the fact that it
| discovered one so quickly is absurdly lucky.
|
| _Rebuttal:_ Most models for interstellar rocks could be wrong.
| There are some models for interstellar rock ejection however
| that would put this observation right in the zone of reasonable
| probability.
|
| [2]: _Anomaly: Ouamuamua is flying in a vector called the Local
| Standard of Rest (LSR)_ -- it 's not "flying" through space,
| but rather looks like a stationary beacon or 'buoy' (aliens
| speculation: comms or navigation station). The LSR is basically
| average orbit around the galactic core -- all local stars are
| bouncing in all directions, but if you zoom out, on average,
| everyone's orbiting the galactic core. This average is the LSR,
| and it's weird that Ouamuamua is right in the LSR range.
|
| _Rebuttal: LSR is exactly what you would expect for an
| interstellar asteroid._ Interstellar asteroids are formed early
| in solar system development, when gas clouds are still
| condensing into stars and planets. Those gas clouds are
| traveling around the galaxy in the LSR range, so anything
| ejected during that time should be in the LSR range.
|
| [3]: _Anomaly: Ouamuamua had an unusual orbit and flew close to
| Earth, so it must have been aimed at us._
|
| _Rebuttal: Observational bias._ Had it not passed so close to
| us, we wouldn 't have seen it. Given that within only a few
| weeks it all but disappeared from detection capabilities while
| still well within the solar system, it could be there's lots of
| other objects like this currently in the solar system that we
| just haven't detected yet.
|
| [4]: _Anomaly: Ouamuamua is too reflective to be a comet or
| asteroid._
|
| _Rebuttal: Straight up disagreement._ Other scientists to
| point to comets and asteroids that could have that level of
| reflectivity.
|
| The last two arguments are the interesting ones where the
| rebuttals are a bit weak.
|
| [5]: _Anomaly: Shape is too strange to be natural, but could be
| a thin solar sail_ , tumbling perhaps due to being derelict. It
| was too small to resolve with any telescopes, but by curve-
| fitting brightness shifts, models suggest it's either cigar-
| shaped (popular depiction) or pancake-shaped (the solar sail
| hypothesis).
|
| _Rebuttal: It does have an anomalous 6:1 brightness shift
| every 8 hours, but a tumbling solar sail should have an even
| higher contrast ratio._ If it was a solar sail, it would have
| to be gently wobbling, not completely tumbling. This is
| actually what we 'd expect from a solar sail (keep it more or
| less pointed at the sun), but if that was true, we would have
| expected the brightness fluctuations to even out as it got
| further from the sun (angles and geometry). This was not
| observed, so it probably kept tumbling, therefore not solar
| sail.
|
| [6]: _Anomaly: It exhibited acceleration that couldn 't be
| explained by gravitational forces._ Comets have this
| acceleration because a comet's tail is outgassing of the ices
| that make up the comet, acting as a rudimentary thruster. But
| Ouamuamua didn't have any observed tail, therefore, solar sail.
|
| _Rebuttal: Basically some kind of new comet chemistry that
| would have prevented us from observing the comet tail._ Some
| gasses would have been hard to observe, or the outgassing was
| lagged so it started after we would have been able to observe
| it. Basically, "we haven't seen this before, but there are
| hypothetical ways to explain this." Science, and astronomy
| specifically, is filled with those kinds of "we haven't seen
| this before" discoveries.
|
| -----
|
| This is my summary of the youtube video, which is a summary of
| a few papers... to go deeper, should probably read the primary
| sources. I'm also just a youtube watcher, not an astronomer.
|
| In the Lex podcast, Loeb kept quoting Sherlock Homes: "If you
| exclude all other possibilities, whatever remains, however
| improbable, must be the truth." My take is all of these
| rebuttals do seem to include other more prosaic possibilities,
| so Loeb hasn't really excluded all the other possibilities that
| warrant the jump to the improbable.
| networkimprov wrote:
| After I watched that (love Dr. Kipping) I watched Event
| Horizon's interview with Loeb, and it raises a cpl items that
| Kipping didn't address (e.g. the shape is a pancake, not
| cigar).
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D24E4F90HTo
| princekolt wrote:
| As soon as the article mentioned von Daniken in a serious light I
| stopped reading. von Daniken is a fraud and embezzlement convict
| and has admitted to fabricating lots of his fantastical stories
| and has no place in serious scientific research. I should have
| expected less from a lifestyle magazine, I guess.
| johnisgood wrote:
| Of course. Even PubMed is ridden with ridiculous stuff. PubMed!
| To give you an example:
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3068791/
|
| Thankfully we can do our own research, see by whom it has been
| cited, in what journal it has been published, and so forth. You
| can easily tell that this is quite an unimportant and
| incredible one. Of course you could tell it yourself after
| having read it that it is nonsense.
| jwally wrote:
| Are there any guides / heuristics on how a layperson can
| evaluate technical literature?
|
| For example my mother-in-law is starting to micro-dose
| lithium and cited this article as evidence:
| https://www.lifeextension.com/magazine/2020/12/lithium-
| and-a...
|
| Which cites 19 medical journals. The website itself reeks of
| bullshit, but how can I tell if the journals it cites are
| valid or just woo?
| johnisgood wrote:
| I am currently working on redesigning the entire academic
| publishing system which is not an easy task and since
| because I am alone, it may take an entire lifetime of mine,
| and it is on hold sadly. I wish someone could take it up
| with me. I was "squatting" on a domain which is about to
| expire because I cannot even pay for it. :/ I have no time
| to work on the design itself, let alone the implementation,
| because I have to survive on shitty money. I did work on
| the design quite a lot a year ago when I could afford it,
| but it has been a while. It would be quite easy to filter
| out nonsensical articles the way it would work in my case,
| among other features. I cannot really talk about it on
| here.
|
| That said, there are lots of "may" in the article. As to
| why someone is telling you this, well, in this case it is
| to sell you their products. She could consult a doctor
| about it. What form is the lithium in? How much of the
| product (which they sell) is actual lithium? Should look at
| the studies mentioned where they say "may", so that you
| would actually have something to base your beliefs on,
| because "may" is not a claim of "will", and "may" is not
| "evidence", it is just speculation; they are merchants of
| hope. The article also does not go very in depth with the
| comparisons of dose. How much lithium do people get daily
| and from which sources? Might it turn out that micro-dosing
| is actually a mere 1/10th of what people already get
| normally in a day? Keep also in mind, that some regions
| have lithium in their tap water already. Plus, people
| believe the news too, because it _sounds_ believable, but
| this is not about technical literature alone. People do
| need to get educated about how to critically comb articles.
|
| By the way: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11838882/
|
| > Lithium is commonly found in drinking water and various
| foods, with dietary intake estimated at 0.6 to 3.1
| milligrams per day in the United States in 1985. Lithium
| supplements are sold as pills, liquid capsules, solutions,
| and syrups of lithium orotate or lithium aspartate.
| deeeeplearning wrote:
| Looking at the Impact Factor of a Journal can help but it's
| not perfect. For example Nature and Science, generally
| considered the most prestigious journals in the world, have
| impact factors around 1000 and smaller but still quality
| niche Physics journals might be in the low hundreds.
|
| The bottom line is that as a Layperson it would be
| extremely difficult to vet the validity of any given paper
| let alone whole journals.
|
| https://www.scimagojr.com/journalrank.php
| jwally wrote:
| Bookmarking that. Thank you!
|
| I think I was starting to draw that conclusion.
|
| If a claim is in the Lancet, NEMJ, Nature, etc; its
| probably pretty credible.
|
| If a claim is in another journal; it shouldn't have much
| bearing on my decision (positive or negative) since I
| don't have the expertise to evaluate it.
| SuoDuanDao wrote:
| I've long thought the starseeder hypothesis was a good bet from
| purely statistical grounds. What are the odds of intelligent life
| arising ex nihilo? We'd assume infinitesimal.
|
| Given that it happened once, what are the odds that life will
| successfully expand to other planets? I at least would assume
| better than it happening independently again, we've never seen
| autogenesis but we have sent tardigrades to the moon.
| cgriswald wrote:
| I'm imagining two paths for life to spread between star
| systems.
|
| The first is via intelligent life actively exploring those
| systems--the purpose or mechanism of that exploration doesn't
| really matter; life could get there either way. So now you're
| comparing the statistical probability of abiogenesis against
| the product of the probabilities of a half dozen unlikely
| events (roughly, first abiogensis -> cells -> animals ->
| intelligence -> civilization -> technological civilization ->
| society stable enough to spread life amongst the stars). This
| isn't clear cut, but my best guess is that abiogenesis
| happening twice is rather more likely.
|
| The second is via some form of microbial life leaving the star
| system and spreading to other stars by accident (whether
| evolutionary accident or 'act of God'). I think it's possible
| life could leave the star system by some mechanism and with a
| ridiculous number of individuals and time could hit other star
| systems rather than floating in between systems forever. Then
| it has to land on a planet that not only doesn't kill it, but
| allows it to thrive. (Tardigrades aren't going to populate the
| moon.) I'm not sure how possible or likely this would be, but
| I'm guessing it requires a ton of time (that the universe may
| not have experienced yet) and, if it were likely, we'd have
| already found evidence of life on Mars.
| mrec wrote:
| > _What are the odds of intelligent life arising ex nihilo? We
| 'd assume infinitesimal._
|
| Why would we assume that? We've been seeing biologically
| interesting chemicals appear from much simpler ones for well
| over a century.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis#Chemical_synthesis...
|
| Also, your "starseeder hypothesis" sounds a lot more deliberate
| than panspermia theories, but correct me if I'm
| misunderstanding you there.
| [deleted]
| acvny wrote:
| How many times has this story been presented over different names
| and titles?
| hchz wrote:
| Regardless of the truth in this specific case, Avi has some very
| interesting ideas such as the habitable early universe.
|
| https://arxiv.org/abs/1312.0613
| excitom wrote:
| Such an object would function as a sail--one powered by light,
| rather than by wind. The natural world doesn't produce sails;
| people do.
|
| What about jellyfish that move about the oceans pushed by wind?
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| It's a weird statement that confuses the purpose of an object
| with what an object does. Purpose exists only in our heads;
| natural objects don't have one. There is no <purpose="sail">
| tag attached to atoms.
|
| In other words, anything that behaves as a sail would, can be
| called a sail. And there are plenty of objects around us that
| behave as sails, not made such by humans, or made so
| unintentionally.
| sgt101 wrote:
| Or even more fun the idea than some pterosaurs were in fact
| sailers!
|
| https://phys.org/news/2009-10-ancient-pterosaur-seas-video.h...
| hchz wrote:
| I think finding space jellyfish would also be a monumental
| discovery.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| (Specifically: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velella)
| leblancfg wrote:
| s/natural world/inorganic matter/
| InitialLastName wrote:
| There are also rocks that do this:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailing_stones
| mig39 wrote:
| Yeah, I can think of a lot of examples of sails in the natural
| world. Dandelion seeds, winged tree seeds, etc.
| scott_s wrote:
| Ballooning spiders as well.
| beamatronic wrote:
| Even some spiders
| biryani_chicken wrote:
| Flying Squirrels?
| flatiron wrote:
| I think the comment was poorly worded with "people" and
| should be "life" which is still an interesting thought.
| BruceEel wrote:
| In the linked chat with Lex Fridman, Loeb also mentioned how such
| objects are likely to be zipping by essentially all the time.
| It'd be great if by the time we spot the next one (of whatever
| nature) we had a probe/robot/something able to catch up with it
| (or better, catch it!)
| sjcoles wrote:
| If you can figure out how to generate that much delta V you've
| solved solar system level space travel.
| flatiron wrote:
| You can at least put something in its way and if it nopes
| around it to avoid a collision that's pretty freaking
| interesting.
| brians wrote:
| And if it shoots back, that's briefly interesting too.
| DennisAleynikov wrote:
| closest thing I read was one of these flying right between
| two fighter jets narrowly missing both, but also seemingly
| not course correcting or changing behaviour apparently.
| eloff wrote:
| Again, if we had the technology to do that it would be
| amazing.
|
| We can't generate even within a couple orders of magnitude
| of the acceleration needed to do that.
| mcbits wrote:
| We probably do have the technology (money is the hard
| part) to build a telescope array that spans the solar
| system, and to keep some rockets in standby orbits beyond
| Neptune. That would provide for earlier detection of an
| approaching object and a better chance of having a rocket
| close enough to intercept it.
| eloff wrote:
| The volume of space beyond Neptune is absolutely insane,
| and the speeds of interstellar objects (theoretical
| speeds that is, we don't have a large enough sample size
| to draw conclusions about how well that matches actual
| velocities) are also insane. We're very far from being
| able do this.
| GoblinSlayer wrote:
| AFAIK, Japan conducted an experiment of asteroid
| exploration by collision and it revealed chemical
| composition. But if it's not an asteroid, it might be
| seen as rude.
| AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote:
| > Loeb, though, explicitly rejects the Sagan standard--"It is not
| obvious to me why extraordinary claims require extraordinary
| evidence," he observes--and flips its logic on its head:
| "Extraordinary conservatism keeps us extraordinarily ignorant."
| So long as there's a chance that 1I/2017 U1 is an alien probe,
| we'd be fools not to pursue the idea. "If we acknowledge that
| 'Oumuamua is plausibly of extraterrestrial-technology origin," he
| writes, "whole new vistas of exploration for evidence and
| discovery open before us."
|
| Uh... this isn't at all clear to me. I don't think very many
| people are saying it is impossible that Oumuamua was an alien
| construct and actively discouraging science based on the idea it
| could be, its just that it is a pretty big fallacy to say "we
| don't understand it, therefore it was aliens". Recall that the
| scientific community has gotten its hopes up about aliens several
| times in the past with scientist proffering alien explanations
| for "canals" on mars, pulsars, GRBs, and FRBs to name a few.
|
| If we assume that Oumuamua is an alien construct, what "new
| vistas of exploration for evidence and discovery" open up that we
| are not already pursuing?
| AlexB138 wrote:
| > ... proffering alien explanations for "canals" on mars,
| pulsars, GRBs, and FRBs to name a few
|
| For those out there who, like me, don't know these acronyms:
|
| GRBs == Gamma-Ray Bursts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma-
| ray_burst
|
| FRBs == Fast Radio Bursts:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_radio_burst
| Retric wrote:
| Yea, the actual fallacy is thinking you must identify what
| something is before you have enough information. 1I/2017 U1 is
| an unknown object and that's perfectly ok. It didn't display
| any radio signals, unusual thrust, or extreme velocity
| requiring it to be an alien probe. But, that doesn't prevent it
| from being a probe either.
| eloff wrote:
| Or even just a piece of debris of unnatural origin. I'm not
| saying that's what it is, or even is likely to be, but it's
| in the possibility space.
| jonathankoren wrote:
| While it's true that it didn't produce any detectable radio
| signals, it have an unexplained force acting on it. It was
| this acceleration away from the sun that spawned the theories
| of undetected outgassing or light pressure. As for "extreme
| velocity", that's a bit a canard. It's traveling at
| interstellar speeds, and humanity has already has five
| interstellar probes today. Now none of these indicate that
| it's probe -- working or otherwise -- but these aren't the
| reasons against it. (Well, no radio emissions is a reason
| against a working probe.)
|
| The big unknown for me about the object is that we don't
| actually have a good idea about its shape. Drawings show it
| has a cigar shaped rock, which is only one possible
| configuration compatible with the radio reflections. If only
| we could have actually seen the object, a lot of this
| uncertainty would have been eliminated.
| Retric wrote:
| I chose _unusual_ as it had thrust consistent with comets.
|
| _After ruling out solar-radiation pressure, drag- and
| friction-like forces, interaction with solar wind for a
| highly magnetized object, and geometric effects originating
| from 'Oumuamua potentially being composed of several
| spatially separated bodies or having a pronounced offset
| between its photocentre and centre of mass, we find comet-
| like outgassing to be a physically viable explanation,
| provided that 'Oumuamua has thermal properties similar to
| comets._ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29950718/
|
| PDF: https://csnbiology.org/rw_common/plugins/stacks/armadi
| llo/me...
|
| PS: At to extreme velocity, something large traveling 0.1+
| c or even 0.01c is very likely to be aliens. This was fast,
| but a long way from those kind of speeds.
| eloff wrote:
| > I don't think very many people are saying it is impossible
| that Oumuamua was an alien construct and actively discouraging
| science based on the idea it could be.
|
| Actually yes. You'll be laughed out of the virtual room, not
| get funding, and potentially damage your career.
|
| As he points out in his interview with Lex (linked elsewhere in
| the comments here) is fine to propose a multi billion dollar
| experiment to detect oxygen on exoplanets, which is not
| conclusive evidence of life, but to search for industrial
| pollution is a non starter for exactly this reason. But that
| would yield much more interesting results (both for negative
| and positive results.)
| bostonsre wrote:
| Ridiculing scientists for plausible hypothesis seems very
| unscientific.
| eloff wrote:
| This is very common in science. New theories are usually
| rejected and ridiculed until/if they develop enough
| evidence behind them to sway people.
|
| Some careers are destroyed. Some scientists are only
| vindicated posthumously. The process can take many decades.
|
| Scientists, like most humans, are not that open-minded and
| are subject to the same group-think blind spots. I think if
| we could get better at being open-minded as a species, we'd
| make faster progress and better ideas would win out more
| often. This is as much true in society at large, or
| business, as it is in science.
| itronitron wrote:
| _Bretz defended his theories, and this kicked off an
| acrimonious 40-year debate over the origin of the
| Scablands. Both Pardee and Bretz continued their research
| over the next 30 years, collecting and analyzing evidence
| that led them to identify Lake Missoula as the source of
| the Spokane flood and creator of the channeled
| scablands._
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missoula_floods
|
| Also Plate Tectonics...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_development
| _of...
| eevilspock wrote:
| Time to break out Thomas Kuhn.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| And they are careerist...
|
| My Post-doc colleague during my PhD@MIT was explaining
| this trick he does to get his system working that he
| never publishes (one very small step of 100 steps). He
| was concerned that if he published the step, it would
| hurt his chances at getting a professorship.
|
| It's exactly the same logic behind why code is not
| published.
|
| Because ethically you can 'hand wave it away' as obvious
| to other experts and not worth publishing.
| benibela wrote:
| How can you be a post-doc without publishing?
| remexre wrote:
| I read that as, one step of his experimental procedure
| isn't published.
| galkk wrote:
| I think what was meant could be described by a joke:
| "professor writes a theorem proof on 6 pages, removes
| pages 3 and 4 and writes 'trivially leads to'"
| ntsplnkv2 wrote:
| This is a good thing. If we entertained every crackpot
| theory we would waste tons of time. it's good for there
| to be some gatekeeping. Of course sometimes they're wrong
| - but so what? That will come out if there is actual
| evidence.
| openasocket wrote:
| It's not just science, I can think of an example from
| pure mathematics. Cantor's work showing the
| uncountability of the real numbers was derided by
| prominent members of the mathematical community for
| decades. This despite the fact that he was able to boil
| down his argument into a proof so simple it's taught in
| introductory undergraduate classes. Now, this was at a
| time when mathematicians were still trying to rigorously
| define set theory and ground mathematics on a foundation
| of logic, but still it's a relatively simple and
| understandable proof. I think the moral of the story is
| that people are stubborn and are capable of disagreeing
| about just about everything.
| resource0x wrote:
| Bad example. Cantor's theory is controversial to this
| day.
|
| "Classical logic was abstracted from the mathematics of
| finite sets and their subsets .... Forgetful of this
| limited origin, one afterwards mistook that logic for
| something above and prior to all mathematics, and finally
| applied it, without justification, to the mathematics of
| infinite sets. This is the Fall and original sin of
| Cantor's set theory."
|
| -- Hermann Weyl
| Joeri wrote:
| Ah, but my sister always says I'm not open-minded because
| I won't read all her antivaxer info. If we give all ideas
| equal credence, better ideas will not win out.
| anamexis wrote:
| I think antivax claims have been given equal credence,
| they've just been found false.
| sli wrote:
| A better example is that equal time is frequently given
| to both sides of the climate change debate despite the
| actually numbers showing that calling it a "debate" is
| journalistic laziness. Equal credence would mean the
| deniers only get about 3% of the allotted time to make
| their crackpot case, because that's the closest they come
| to being a "side" in this non-debate against the other
| 93% that also have 100% of the data and research.
| xattt wrote:
| The most recent event that comes to my mind is the lead
| up to the discovery of H. pylori causing gastric ulcers.
| hntrader wrote:
| Another: Many World's Interpretation of QM. Not known to
| be true but less ridiculed and more widely subscribed.
| eth0up wrote:
| Append Ignaz Semmelweis to this important list, which is
| a plump one.
| sterlind wrote:
| Tectonic plates was another big one.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| This is a current fun topic with some controversy related
| to tectonic plates: do solar flares cause earthquakes?
|
| https://astronomy.com/news/2020/07/powerful-eruptions-on-
| the...
| Enginerrrd wrote:
| Despite being a really stupid-sounding premise, that is
| actually kind of interesting.
| treeman79 wrote:
| Peoples position on that one shifted very slowly.
| DyslexicAtheist wrote:
| sir, may I see your dad license please?
| eloff wrote:
| Yeah that's a good one.
|
| Another is recommending trans-fat based margarine over
| butter. That was counter-productive health advice that
| took decades to reverse - even although the evidence it
| was based on was extremely flimsy.
|
| Once the group-think machine gets going in a direction,
| it has a tremendous amount of inertia.
| rtx wrote:
| Yet we find this to be a recurring theme, I wonder when
| this switch happens. From a curious boy/girl who becomes a
| scientist to a conservative.
| irrational wrote:
| Grad school.
| voldacar wrote:
| Yes, it is. And it has also been happening for the whole
| history of anything recognizable as "science."
|
| The nice, pretty scientific method we learn about in school
| is largely an idealized myth
| 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote:
| There seems to be a giant mismatch about what side is open
| minded. People who think its most likely aliens think it's
| closed minded to assign that low probability, presumably
| because we're this tiny corner of the universe. People who
| think it's most likely not aliens Think it's closed minded to
| assign everything else low probability, presumably because
| aliens are a tiny corner of everything else.
|
| Is it a misapplication of the anthropic principle to say there
| are probably gazillions of advanced aliens, given that we
| appeared and therefore life probably is common? Or is it a
| misapplication to say it's probably just another of the
| gazillions of non-alien things we've seen?
|
| It's all differences of opinion over which claim is the
| extraordinary one. It is bold to claim confidence about the
| impossibility of FTL travel, or bold to claim confidence about
| the possibility of it? Is it bold to say we're a freak
| occurrence or bold to say we aren't? Most generally, is it bold
| to say we know a lot or bold to say we don't?
| ncmncm wrote:
| Their best future course is to stop sniping at one another.
|
| It is _possible_ that it 's aliens. It is _possible_ that it
| 's not. We don't have enough evidence even to estimate
| probabilities, so anything further is pure speculation.
| Speculation is a look that wears no better on conservatives
| than on radicals.
|
| There is hardly a field to be found where young radicals are
| not promoting evidence for what the tenured consider
| anathema, waiting for the latter to retire or die and get the
| hell out of the way. As Max Planck said, "Science advances
| one funeral at a time."
|
| It is common to insist that the right idea wins in the end,
| but there is no reason to believe it: every case you can cite
| in its favor amounts to confirmation bias. The frequency of
| such examples that first languished for decades, with the
| original proposer driven from the field, would properly make
| us suspect that the majority of their also-correct peers
| remain unvindicated, however many false leads have been
| exposed. (Hypotheses promoted by women driven from a field
| make a rich vein of ideas to vindicate.)
|
| Loeb is right about one thing: the notion of "extraordinary
| evidence" is very destructive. Evidence is evidence. It is
| _always_ easy to make greater demands on evidence you don 't
| like than on evidence you do, and always easy find excuses to
| discount evidence incompatible with the consensus of the
| moment. Every field, to be considered legitimate, should
| maintain an officially taught compendium of "damned facts",
| evidence that seems to be incompatible with one or more
| leading theories. Even when a consensus theory is largely
| correct, the damned evidence will be the basis of any
| progress.
|
| Nature doesn't play favorites: it is possible for a consensus
| theory _and_ all its challengers to be wrong. Evidence
| against one of the latter is not evidence in favor of the
| former.
| 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote:
| > Loeb is right about one thing: the notion of
| "extraordinary evidence" is very destructive. Evidence is
| evidence.
|
| I agree with pretty much everything you're saying except
| this. Though I still do agree with this a bit. It seems
| like a shorthand for "be bayesian" that's unfortunately
| taken too far too frequently. But if I have a strong prior
| one way or another, I will need stronger evidence to turn
| me around.
|
| +1 on your main point though. Why can't more people be more
| comfortable in a state of uncertainty ;_;
| ncmncm wrote:
| Few things in science are more subjective than the
| relative importance of a piece of evidence.
|
| It is not at all unusual for a key measurement to be
| wrong, but also not unusual to trust the wrong one.
| gfxgirl wrote:
| I thought the idea that there are gazillions of advanced
| aliens has been pretty much disproven by the fermi paradox.
|
| If there are gazillion, at least one out of all the diversity
| out there should have already colonized the entire galaxy and
| evidence should be plentiful.
| 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote:
| There's a nice analysis of the Fermi paradox out there
| somewhere that takes into account uncertainties in each of
| the parameters. As you multiply them together, the
| uncertainties compound each other. The end result is a big
| old who knows, rather than a paradox. Our observations are
| compatible with a really wide variety of realities, many of
| which include lots of aliens and many of which don't.
| shrimp_emoji wrote:
| A possible chink is that civilizations just don't do that
| -- carpet colonize the whole galaxy, or fill it with their
| probes to the extent that we seem them all over the place.
| The Fermi paradox relies on material (probes, colonies) and
| light (signals).
|
| With the material explained away, the lack signals is much
| easier to explain in that we haven't listened long and we
| can only hear very loud signals. (Or maybe advanced civs
| don't use light and use gravity waves or tachyon beams or
| whatever, but you don't even need to go that far.) The only
| way we hear a signal is if it's:
|
| 1. loud (high energy) and aimed directly at us, like a
| tight beam
|
| 2. EXTREMELY LOUD and aimed everywhere, isotropically
|
| 1 is unlikely since they'd have to know where we are; 2 is
| unlikely since you're talking about an _insane_ level of
| energy. If it 's the case that civs don't seem to be making
| Dyson spheres or harvesting whole galaxies for energy,
| being able to throw around that kind of power is
| prohibitively expensive. In both these cases, the inverse
| square law applies (for every unit x of distance, the
| light's x2 less bright). Ironically, that means we're more
| likely to detect signals from an improbably close
| civilization (like 4 light years next door, in Alpha
| Centuari), than from farther away -- and even then, by a
| chance sweep of an umodulated asteroid scanning beam[0] or
| something, if we happened to be paying attention at the
| time.
|
| 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLC1
| jrumbut wrote:
| Do you know if about any simulations of what it would
| look like if there were alien radio operators?
|
| If there were 50 other Earths scattered around the galaxy
| (ones that have been broadcasting like us but for longer)
| should the first television have imnediately picked up
| interstellar "I Love Lucy" or would it be faint anomalies
| from SETI? Somewhere in between?
| stretchcat wrote:
| Every advancing civilization will eventually create an
| internet. Once they do that, interstellar travel is off the
| table. Advanced civilizations stay closely packed because
| they cannot tolerate latency once they get a taste for near
| instant communication.
| PoachedSausage wrote:
| Maybe there has been some sort of accident of scale, like
| the intergalactic fleet in Hitch Hiker Guide to the Galaxy
| that arrives to destroy Earth but is eaten by a dog.
|
| There could be a banging ET party going at the Planck scale
| and we would never know, they might as well be on the other
| side of the universe.
| godelski wrote:
| The problem with this is that mechanics is not scale
| invariant. This puts bounds on creatures. Unless there's
| some crazy different way to compute I wouldn't expect a
| being to be able to have strong cognitive functions and
| be the size of a fly. They would also have a difficult
| time building advanced machinery to get to galactic
| travel scales. Similarly I wouldn't expect a creature the
| size of a Brontosaurus to become space faring. Because of
| their sizes they would have to consume significantly more
| resources to build simple things. A two story house
| probably couldn't be created out of wood or other basic
| biological materials making it difficult to transition
| into even the stone age. They also require higher food
| because energy requirements aren't linear. But think how
| much it costs to send a pound to space. Their first to
| space would be significantly more expensive.
|
| This doesn't mean these things are impossible because
| maybe there are ways around them, but it certainty shifts
| the probabilities by quite a bit. Given our current
| understanding of biology _and_ mechanics it makes it much
| more probable for creatures to be within the ballpark of
| our size (let 's say crow to elephant?).
| gfodor wrote:
| Paradoxes are paradoxes precisely because they fail to
| disprove two contradictory claims.
|
| For the Fermi paradox, the paradox is that the immensity of
| the universe leading to life seems obvious, yet the
| complete absence of that life around us seems to show it's
| not there. So it disproves nothing, but actually highlights
| the difficulty of disproving either claim given the other.
| sli wrote:
| I never much liked this being called a paradox since it
| has so many built in assumptions, most of them centered
| around any given, theoretical alien civilization
| resembling a human civilization in any way. It's a
| limitation of what we know for sure, since there's
| certainly no rule that civilization elsewhere should
| resemble civilization on Earth. That's an acceptable
| limitation, it's difficult to notice things you don't
| know you should notice, but it's a limitation
| nonetheless.
|
| Of course, it's also possible for civilizations to be so
| far away that we will like never detect them due to the
| inverse square law. They could even be in parts of the
| universe we can't observe.
| mtts wrote:
| According to the Chinese science fiction author Liu Cixin
| the Fermi paradox is solved by the certainty that if an
| alien civilization announces its presence to the rest of
| the universe, one of the gazillions of other advanced alien
| civilizations is sure to destroy it. So they keep quiet.
| phkahler wrote:
| The Killing Star.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| That would imply the laws of physics somehow dictate the
| self-manifestation or creation of intelligent clouds of
| elements (e.g. humans) who by their vary quantum waveform
| / nature are violent and want to destroy other clouds of
| elements even if the cost involves harvesting energy from
| your only local star.
| emteycz wrote:
| Not necessarily - the laws of physics might merely make
| it likely enough to be common.
| yoz-y wrote:
| The books and all are nice but the Dark Forest Theory
| doesn't hold agains much scrutiny. Among other reasons
| because if that were true we would be already dead.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmCTmgavkrQ
| galkk wrote:
| I mean - it's called Dark Forest, but if you will look at
| any documentary, even dark forest is full of life. You
| will hear crickets, you will hear owls, you may see
| fireflies.
|
| The theory has catchy name, but even the earth's nature
| disproves it.
| lambda_obrien wrote:
| If you read the three books, you realize that the true
| message is that if you're considered a possible threat to
| an advanced species, they'll annihilate you, otherwise
| you'll be left alone. Maybe every other species which
| knows about us knows we can't even leave our own
| planet/moon right now, the most we can do is send useless
| robots to other planets over 30 years.
| y-c-o-m-b wrote:
| > If we assume that Oumuamua is an alien construct, what "new
| vistas of exploration for evidence and discovery" open up that
| we are not already pursuing?
|
| I think what he's trying to convey is that thinking of this
| object under the assumption of "aliens" pushes us to develop
| experimental technology to prove it. This could then lead to
| future advances (whether intentional or accidental) potentially
| helping us detect alien technology where we otherwise wouldn't
| be able to had we not begun that pursuit. He's looking at it
| from a very long-term perspective.
| jonny_eh wrote:
| Also infuriating since Sagan was a proponent of long-shot
| science like SETI and the golden disc on Voyager. He proved
| that we can be scientifically rigorous and still take chances
| to explore.
| jzer0cool wrote:
| We should plan for another such event should Oumuamua (or
| another) arrives again. I would find it fascinating to land on
| such a device where we can place a beacon on it and watch it
| through space. This may also help Oumuamua (should it be a probe)
| to also detect a friendly landing on its ship for the remote
| alien to detect.
| [deleted]
| syshum wrote:
| I watched Ancient Aliens so clearly the answer is Yes
|
| /s
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.is/AyFjv
| mrbonner wrote:
| I just started to watch the 1993 series Star Trek new generation.
| The show has some interesting ideas regarding advanced
| civilizations vs the primitive ones. One of which is called the
| prime directive prohibiting any star fleet from intervening with
| the evolution of primitive people.
|
| In one of the episodes "who watches the watcher" the USS
| enterprise travels to planet Minkita 2 for a rescue mission and
| encounters a primitive species of humanoid. By accident, they
| exposed themselves and their technologies to the people there.
| Now, those people consider star fleet personnel as god. Without
| spoiling much, Jean Luc idea to refuse them this thought is
| interesting and worth thinking when it comes to our scenario
| here, don't you think?
|
| (I have to say that I am now big fan of the Star Trek series with
| Sir Patrick. How could I miss it all those years?)
| t-writescode wrote:
| What's the spoiler-filled version of what happened?
| postalrat wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_Watches_the_Watchers#Plot
| StavrosK wrote:
| You should try DS9 when you're done with TNG. It's very
| different, but still great. I think they're some of the best
| shows ever made, especially because they didn't tiptoe around
| ethical dilemmas, they made them a main part of each episode's
| plot.
| _Microft wrote:
| ,,Computer - erase that entire personal log"
|
| This is from the DS9 episode ,,In the pale Moonlight". Check
| Memory Alpha if you want to know more but be aware that
| reading about this episode would be a massive spoiler if you
| haven't watched DS9. Either way DS9 is absolutely
| recommended.
| mrbonner wrote:
| Ann, the episode about Commander Data being asked to be
| dissected for the study of his body? Jean Luc brilliantly
| relates this idea of cloning the entire android to serve
| human as a tread toward slavery. They are way ahead of us in
| time.
| StavrosK wrote:
| The one with the court to determine whether Data is
| sentient/human or property? Yeah, that's one of my favorite
| episodes, and where I realized how amazing the show was.
| floren wrote:
| "The Measure of a Man", s2e9
| throwanem wrote:
| After DS9 (or maybe before it), also take a look at Babylon
| 5, the show that arguably inspired DS9 and certainly did a
| lot of things that no Trek show to date has been bold enough
| to try. It's a bit camp by today's standards, and the first
| season struggles a bit in places - but the same can be fairly
| said of TNG, and the depth of B5's narrative and
| characterization remains in many ways unequaled since its
| original run in the mid-90s.
| 7thaccount wrote:
| B5 is arguably the best scifi show ever in my opinion.
| Amazing story, acting, ship battles, and philosophy
| mrec wrote:
| Agree 100%. What always struck me most about it was the
| sheer _ambition_ of it - not just the raw scale of the
| drama, not just setting things up in Season 1 that wouldn
| 't pay off until the very end of Season 5 (if Michael
| O'Hare hadn't needed to be written out), but getting
| compelling long-term character arcs (especially for Londo
| and G'Kar) into small-screen SF for the first time.
|
| If I have one major gripe about the show, it's the way it
| was constantly padded out with filler eps at a time when
| JMS's ability to get the core storylines finished was still
| in doubt. The threat to S5 and resulting hasty
| rearrangement of S4 meant that the final season didn't hit
| with the weight it could have done; it felt like an
| afterthought rather than a climax.
| StavrosK wrote:
| I remember watching Babylon 5 when I was young, but I was
| probably too young to grasp all the meanings. I will
| rewatch it, thanks!
| throwanem wrote:
| Oh, do! I also saw a few early episodes as a kid, but
| didn't really have a chance to get what they were trying
| to do; it wasn't until years later, when I had a chance
| to watch the full series straight through thanks to a
| friend's carefully made VHS tapes, that any of what I was
| seeing really made sense to me. Nothing since then has
| even come close to replacing B5 at the head of my SF TV
| affections.
|
| Reflecting on that experience, I think the major flaw of
| B5 is that, in structure and intent, it was twenty or
| more years ahead of its time. Given the handicaps under
| which the creators then had to labor, it's even more
| remarkable how much they accomplished - B5 might have
| been the very first example of what we today call the
| 'binge-worthy show', made on a shoestring in a time when
| syndication and time slots and missed episodes were still
| problems that a show could have. This show overcame them
| admirably - even so, I can't help but wish a little for
| the chance to see what the same people could've
| accomplished today, with the kind of resources available
| for something like _Stranger Things_.
|
| That won't happen, of course, not least because the show
| is niche even by comparison with something like Firefly.
| For the same reason, even a Trek-style HD remaster is
| unlikely - a shame in its own right, since the then-
| revolutionary CGI space effects are by far the part of
| the show that's aged most badly, and a shame all over
| again because the creators were looking far enough ahead
| to shoot in 16:9 and 5.1 surround throughout, which would
| give an HD remaster the kind of payoff that, if we're
| being honest, the ones done for old Trek shows never
| really have.
|
| In any case, it's a small miracle the show got made at
| all, and another that it ended up being so close to what
| JMS intended it to be. Anyone who can enjoy TNG or DS9
| today can, I think, enjoy B5 at least as well, and on
| that basis I recommend it without the slightest
| reservation.
| StavrosK wrote:
| I'll definitely watch then, thank you. As a sidenote, I
| _think_ that the TNG I watched has remastered CGI. I
| remember remarking how good the CGI looked for the 90s,
| and realized /heard later than they redid all the CGI.
| The new CGI was definitely not out of place, if not
| fairly good, but I'm not _entirely_ sure that what I 'm
| saying is true. Just mentioning it in case you wanted to
| look into it.
| throwanem wrote:
| I saw the originals when they were first broadcast, and
| have since seen the remasters. The latter definitely
| improve on the look of the series, but incrementally, and
| they also suffer from some of the same problem that led
| the makers of Generations to underlight scenes on, and
| finally blow up, the Enterprise-D: while TNG's space
| effects were on par with movies of their time, its sets
| and props were decidedly _not_ , having been designed
| with the understanding that SD TV quality would hide a
| lot of imperfections that would be visible otherwise.
| Beside that, the pillarboxing necessary to render 4:3
| content on a 16:9 display feels really obtrusive these
| days, or so at least I've come to find it since 16:9
| became the standard.
|
| The thing about B5 is that few of its space scenes
| involve much compositing, since they were all CGI from
| the start and compositing was hard back then. For that
| reason, I think a space-effects redo would be unusually
| feasible for that show, albeit still too expensive for
| anyone to actually _do_ one.
|
| A harder, if smaller, remastering issue would be that
| they shot practical effects on video and special effects
| on film, largely due to that being the cheapest option
| for both. In standard definition you can't really see the
| difference, but watching the show today you definitely
| do.
| BugWatch wrote:
| TMK very little of its effects are strictly new: almost
| all are digitally re-composited, color-corrected and
| slightly enhanced high-resolution scans of the original
| film footage (which used physical models and optical
| effects), since they were still available. IIRC, planets
| - as seen from space - are a notable exception (and
| better for it). It was a major remastering process, with
| beautiful results. (Although major, remastering cost less
| (for the whole series) than a single episode of the (IMO)
| abomination called "Discovery".)
|
| Sadly, such an approach is impossible for the majority
| parts of the latter series (DS9, VOY) since their effects
| were mostly CGI, and rendered directly to standard
| definition video. Further more, many of the 3D models and
| scenes have been lost, so it would probably require a
| total effects re-do from scratch (on top of film stock
| scans), which is "a very costly proposition with
| questionable (financial) returns".
| nobody9999 wrote:
| >You should try DS9 when you're done with TNG. It's very
| different, but still great.
|
| I'm going to recommend Babylon 5 for this as well. It's not
| nearly as utopian as Star Trek and focuses on many of the
| issues interacting with other people/groups/alien species
| that ST (DS9 does do this, in some respects) generally
| ignores.
|
| It also doesn't ignore capitalism, greed and general bad
| behavior like ST mostly does.
| kenny87 wrote:
| Those that like this episode would also very much enjoy VOY,
| Episode 6x12, Blink of an Eye [1]. Fascinating premise,
| essentially a pre-warp society views Voyager as a sky deity,
| eventually Voyager becomes the raison d'etre for the scientific
| progress of an entire civilization.
|
| [1] https://memory-
| alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Blink_of_an_Eye_(episod...
| GoblinSlayer wrote:
| Don't people in Star Trek have our culture? But our culture is
| that of a primitive civilization, which means they are
| primitive too.
| yoz-y wrote:
| Star Trek definition of primitive is "no warp drive tech".
| cpuguy83 wrote:
| You're in for a great ride! Enjoy!
| flycaliguy wrote:
| I can't say I've ever seen a post on the internet go ahead and
| explain what the prime directive is before.
| itronitron wrote:
| Yes, having the prime directive explained on the internet
| almost seems 'alien'
| bierjunge wrote:
| S03E04 for everybody who want's to watch it.
|
| Star Trek and especially TNG is one of the best SciFi series
| made. The technological point of view is very interesting, but
| the philosophical issues are even more intriguing and up to
| date.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Great shows though TNG doesn't hit its stride until the third
| season. Don't give up early. The main problem is too many
| episodes per season; several are "phoned in" per season.
|
| I loved watching the remastered version on Netflix, it looked
| better than new.
|
| Second on the Babylon 5 recommendations, it is one of the best
| sci fi shows ever. Was hooked
| silicon2401 wrote:
| by 1993 series do you mean the 1993 season? I was confused at
| first because I thought it was from the 80s and just confirmed
| that it came out in 87.
|
| Anyway, definitely an excellent show. I watched it a bit as a
| kid when it aired on G4 and I've been meaning to get back into
| it.
| mrbonner wrote:
| I watch it on Netflix and the title shows 1993. I am confused
| as well but I realized that 1993 is the last season. The show
| itself was in the 80s.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| That's one of the biggest problems I have with Star Trek. If we
| were literally gods by comparison to some fledgling species,
| the only ethical approach would be to elevate them and cure
| their diseases and advance their knowledge as quickly as
| humanly possible.
| cpuguy83 wrote:
| The ideals behind the Prime Directive were from Vulcan
| influence. The theory behind it is they tried to do exactly
| that and it led to disaster in every case.
| 7thaccount wrote:
| A lot of scifi shows have been influenced by this. In
| Stargate SG-1 (spoilers):
|
| The Tollan civilization were humans taken from earth
| millennia ago that developed science faster than us and
| ended up being one of the most advanced races in the
| galaxy. They gave a source of limitless energy to more
| primitive aliens on a nearby planet in their solar system
| (think Mars versus Earth) and those aliens weaponized it
| and blew up part of their own planet. It messed up the
| Tollan's own planer's orbit, so they had to find a new
| planet and now don't share any technology.
| Coriolis3 wrote:
| Check out Iain M. Banks's "Culture" novels for a sci fi
| society that takes that approach to other civilizations. The
| Culture tries to raise up every lesser species of aliens to
| their own level of hedonist, post-scarcity wealth and
| technology. "The Player of Games" is both a good introduction
| to the series and an example of their cultural outreach at
| work.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| Thanks a ton, will definitely check those out as I've not
| yet seen any writing that explores this idea.
| readmodifywrite wrote:
| There are TNG episodes that specifically deal with that, and
| the problems it causes. I think ENT had a few as well,
| instances which led them to the creation of the Prime
| Directive.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| I will have to check those out since I've not seen them.
| I'm open-minded to it, but also pretty confident that the
| weight of the logic will eventually fall on the side of
| being good and helpful to others if we ever make it to the
| stars.
| Xelbair wrote:
| but were we, humanity, gods?
|
| There is always a chance that the Higher Civilization missed
| something - culturally, scientifically or artistically
| speaking. Letting such civilization emerge, and help them
| ascend when they reach certain level seems to be saner and
| safer approach.
|
| The Higher Civilization might've been stuck in local maxima,
| adding such random element might let the Higher Civilisation
| absorb the best parts and move towards another, better local
| maxima.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| You raise good points, but what you're missing in my
| opinion is that life is precious and finite. And if we can
| elevate ourselves and other species to a higher state of
| life and consciousness and even longer life spans, I
| believe we have a moral obligation to do it. It'd certainly
| be wise to do it, even if only to have allies against the
| vast darkness and whatever lurks in it that might hate us
| or our friends.
| JackFr wrote:
| "Higher" indicates an ordering. How do you rank
| civilizations? If we replace "higher" with "more advanced"
| it's still not an obvious thing.
| cbozeman wrote:
| Imagine a race of ultra-advanced aliens were to give us
| technology that keeps us not only alive indefinitely, but
| robust and healthy, without disease. Just that one piece of
| technology. Not even weird weapons like antimatter bombs,
| etc.
|
| Do you think humanity would suddenly come together in
| understanding and peace to explore the stars and advance
| ourselves... or do you think people who already have enormous
| wealth and power would keep themselves positioned such that
| their influence and control grows?
|
| Yeah...
|
| We're not fucking _worthy_ of that kind of technology.
| Neither are any other species.
|
| Its the struggle to acquire knowledge and power that gives
| you the wisdom to use it for beneficial purposes. This is the
| whole core of Ian Malcolm's speech to John Hammond in
| _Jurassic Park_ (the book), but also to a lesser extent, the
| movie.
| rmah wrote:
| Well no, but people would be robust and healthy, without
| disease. And IMO, that's a positive even if all our other
| failings are still there.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| And it would certainly be an improved platform for us to
| build upon and advance even more.
| stocknoob wrote:
| For the individual, yes, but for society? Death is
| nature's term limit. Without it we'd be under a Pharaoh
| with bronze-age ethics.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| Unless we figure out how to drastically extend our
| lifespans or do away with death altogether, although who
| even knows if it's possible...
| trhway wrote:
| >Imagine a race of ultra-advanced aliens were to give us
| technology that keeps us not only alive indefinitely, but
| robust and healthy, without disease. Just that one piece of
| technology. Not even weird weapons like antimatter bombs,
| etc.
|
| I think that exactly what happened 2000 years ago.
| Unfortunately we just failed to understand most of the info
| and it got lost "in translation" due to communication
| barrier. The good thing is they did promise to return and
| try again when hopefully our development and ability to
| understand would get a bit more advanced.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| We've never experienced this or had the chance to do it, so
| all we have to go off of are parallels to how we interact
| with each other. If we did this for others, we'd need to
| mentor and guide them into the future. If others did this
| for us, they'd need to do the same rather than just boost
| our tech and then abandon us.
|
| I'm optimistic that if it happened to us, even in the
| limited hypothetical you presented, we'd rapidly transform
| as a species for the better. Now, if that would've happened
| 50 years ago or longer...not so optimistic.
| mrlala wrote:
| Aren't there some amazon tribes that have basically had no
| contact with the modern world? By your logic, we are under an
| ethical obligation to go in and "modernize them".
|
| So, you have an example right in front of you.. it's no
| longer hypothetical.
| Retric wrote:
| It's reasonable to try it, but that could also fail quite
| spectacularly which was the actual justification. Further,
| their where many examples of such failures. Honestly, I found
| the idea quite refreshing as it suggests Star Fleet
| incompetence was the root issue rather than pure ethics. And
| really understanding the culture, biology, politics, etc of
| an alien species well enough to be a net positive across
| generations is an extremely difficult task.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| I do appreciate this nuance. If it was primarily because
| Star Fleet was afraid to mess up, that's understandable.
| But if I were to see a fledgling species being struck down
| by some disease or natural calamity, I think in reality
| it'd make more sense to at least try to save them and
| elevate them than to just life extinguish that way.
| GoblinSlayer wrote:
| Already done for indians. Impossibility of FTL travel just
| saved all life in universe from you.
| sterlind wrote:
| What wiped out most of the Indians was plague and genocide
| while seizing territory and resources.
|
| I don't think plague would be an issue - viruses require
| proteins to be similar to attach and reproduce, and
| bacteria require nutrients to be the same. And as for
| resources? Asteroid mining will get you more water,
| minerals and metals.
|
| But territory - terraforming might be really difficult or
| take too long. If aliens need an oxygen/CO2/nitrogen
| atmosphere and liquid water, Earth could be tempting, even
| if the plant/animal life is useless to them.
|
| If territory isn't an issue, maybe we'd just be friends or
| anthropological curios.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| The trend of our species has been to become more moral and
| nice to one another. Read up on how humans viewed one
| another 1,000 years ago or 10,000 years ago and see the
| trend. There's no reason to believe or to ONLY believe that
| we'd be a violent and evil species if we became space-
| fairing and had FTL travel. In such a far future, I'd like
| to choose to work towards and to think about having a
| society that is even more moral than what it is now.
| JackFr wrote:
| > as humanly possible
|
| There's some post-colonial baggage to unpack there.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| Only if you choose to read that into my comment or to be
| negative about the future.
| clort wrote:
| see also David Brin's Uplift novels, which deal with this by
| having more advanced species engage with undeveloped species
| and be responsible for their upbringing, as it were.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| Huge thank you for the recommendation, I love the concept
| and will check out those novels for sure.
| ErikVandeWater wrote:
| Humans can't manage that on earth.
| notahacker wrote:
| Not even for other humans, and not just because we can't or
| won't foot the bill for more education and medication, but
| also because encouraging relatively primitive tribes to
| abandon their traditions and join the modern world is
| widely seen as unethical.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| I see no issues with telling tribes or ancient cultures
| or fledgling species if their beliefs about reality are
| incorrect. Otherwise those faulty beliefs could lead the
| species to extinction.
| sterlind wrote:
| There's education and then there's coercion. The Amish
| know that technology and modern society exist, and they
| even participate some for work, but they don't bring it
| back home, and they haven't altered their way of life.
|
| Coercion is like the Indian boarding school programs in
| the Pacific Northwest. Taking Indian children away from
| their parents and beating them if they spoke their native
| languages, with the goal of wiping out the culture and
| forcing assimilation.
|
| I'm cool with the Amish method but not the boarding
| schools.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| I'm okay with not coercing someone into something. As
| long as it's a choice, I see no harm in that. Although
| ultimately we need to make sure that people are actually
| educated enough to make an informed choice, and aren't
| instead so steeped in their incorrect views of reality
| that they can't make any progress...
|
| What I'm saying can definitely be abused or
| misinterpreted if someone wants to justify atrocities,
| but that's their negative interpretation and their
| choice. The positive interpretation here would be that
| I'd prefer a choice for anyone who wants to be Amish, as
| long as being Amish doesn't mean that you're completely
| trapped in that society if you're born into it. Some
| ideologies trap the mind.
| wait_a_minute wrote:
| Not yet, but we can and I believe we will. That's been the
| trend of history since we've existed.
| bigmattystyles wrote:
| Reading TNG described as a 30 year old series (which it is),
| but being seen as novel by op has made me feel real old. (I'm
| just about 40) It's like when I'm with interns and bring up
| back to the future....
| lo_fye wrote:
| Many people have seen them so near that there's no possible way
| it's a misidentification. For example, standing in the same room,
| indoors, in their homes... or outside in groups with many other
| corroborating witnesses (Google "Ariel School Zimbabwe mass
| sighting"). They're not all lying. In fact, if even just 1 is
| true, then yes we are being visited by aliens.
| bsder wrote:
| The problem is that in the past you had corroborating evidence
| for gods, demons, angels, witches, etc. until "aliens" became
| the socially acceptable "unexplained thing."
|
| If those "interpretations" weren't correct, there is very
| little evidence that "aliens" is a correct interpretation and
| that future generations won't have a different one.
|
| In addition, the one thing that we now know scientifically is
| that "first hand observation" is notoriously unreliable.
| johnisgood wrote:
| I did not search for it yet, but "Mass psychogenic illness"[1]
| is a thing. From Wikipedia: "Mass psychogenic illness (MPI),
| also called mass sociogenic illness, mass psychogenic disorder,
| epidemic hysteria, or mass hysteria, is the rapid spread of
| illness signs and symptoms affecting members of a cohesive
| group, originating from a nervous system disturbance involving
| excitation, loss, or alteration of function, whereby physical
| complaints that are exhibited unconsciously have no
| corresponding organic aetiology.".
|
| There also have been mass hysteria cases:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_hysteria_cases
|
| I would also like to mention "Folie a deux"[2]. From Wikipedia:
| "Folie a deux ('madness for two'), also known as shared
| psychosis or shared delusional disorder (SDD), is a psychiatric
| syndrome in which symptoms of a delusional belief, and
| sometimes hallucinations, are transmitted from one individual
| to another.".
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_psychogenic_illness
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folie_%C3%A0_deux
| runjake wrote:
| Many people genuinely believe they have seen Bigfoot, the Loch
| Ness monster (almost entirely disproven at this point), magic,
| and miracles happen before their eyes.
|
| It doesn't make it true.
| higerordermap wrote:
| They visited, saw Golang and left.
| vorpalhex wrote:
| and they're planning to return with a new generics proposal...
| philip142au wrote:
| The answer is no
| trestenhortz wrote:
| It's not aliens.
|
| Nothing can convince me that there's any practical way to travel
| the distances between the stars.
|
| If you don't agree then I think you fundamentally don't grasp how
| incomprehensibly vast those distances are.
|
| I absolutely believe in life in other worlds but there's no way
| to travel from star to star.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| And yet, stuff does all the time. We see wandering objects
| enter and leave our solar neighborhood.
|
| It's just a matter of time - perhaps on human timescales its
| inconceivable. But that's a problem with humans, not with
| interstellar travel.
| xtracto wrote:
| Angels vs Viruses.
|
| About 20 years ago I read an interesting theory about how
| theoretical aliens would look to us if we happen to find them.
| The theory was that the assuming that there is life other than
| earth's in the universe, the probability of it being within
| +-10,000 years of current human development (i.e being similar
| to us now +- 10,000 years) is very very small. Most likely,
| life outside the earth will be 20k, 30k or even 50k, or more
| years in the future technologically, socially and medically
| advanced.
|
| Think about, how a human now would look like to a human 50,000
| years ago. Or how humanity would look like in 50,000 years. For
| all I know, we will be able to replace every organ (lab tissue
| growing), live for a LONG time (Hyperbaric oxygen therapy,
| metformin) and other unimaginable things.
|
| So, if we encountered "space traveling" aliens, their frame of
| reference would be completely out of our understanding.
| time0ut wrote:
| I doubt that this was anything but a natural object.
|
| That said, our civilization already has the technology to send
| a probe to another star system. It may take 100k years to get
| there, but it could be done if we wanted to. Theoretically,
| sending a tiny probe within a human life time isn't that far
| out of reach.
|
| I don't think we can discount the general possibility based on
| our own capabilities, limitations, and motivations. If we were
| not constrained by our biology, maybe spending thousands of
| years in transit wouldn't be a big deal. Or maybe a few gram
| payload is all we need to explore the neighborhood.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-01-20 23:01 UTC)