"Sponges grow in the ocean. That just kills me. I wonder how much deeper the ocean would be if that didn't happen."
--Steven Wright
Astronomy / Space Aliens!
- Thread starter ethelred
- Start date
--Steven Wright
This discussion recently overran in the thread about Steam Keys with a discussion that somehow Thargoids are unrealistic.
Evolution was discussed, as was biomass.
So - here's a dedicated thread to discuss the important questions:-
1. Are humans or humanoid species the only ones capable of reaching Space Travel?
2. If not, what would Aliens look like?
3. <late edition> What is needed for a species to develop space travel?
To get you started, I reckon that it's a big stretch that dinosaurs in over 100m years of existence didn't evolve some brains. I've no evidence, except that episode of ST:V.
Also someone else mentioned insectoid biomass not being as much as our. According to some rudimentary google-fu and Wikipedia it turns out that termites do. So there.
I'll be patrolling this thread with the Stick Of Logical Fallacies, the Grammar and Spelling Police have had their funding cut and therefore will not be present.
Sophistry is right out.
GO!
1. no
2. Mostly humanoid I guess.
3. A living environment
Technollogy and a peaceful society
A big brain
That depends.
We are made from the same stuff as the rest of the 3-dimensional universe. Our neurons are as well, and it can be argued that our self-aware conciousness is also "similar" to what other self-aware being might have.
By that logic we should be capable of imagining them, by using our (limited) knowledge of the physical laws of nature and chemistry.
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But if we expand the topic to include WSFM, especially if we consider other dimensions, things take a freaky turn which may very well be far beyond our physical minds capability to imagine, as you said.
But when you speak of just imagining a physical 3d alien physiology, our minds certainly DO have the capacity to imagine it, since we have the capacity to investigate the laws of nature, thermodynamics, chemistry and biology. Even if we can only examine our OWN world, we can still extrapolate and imagine different compositions of the same universal elements and chemicals.
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It is likely however that true Alien interstellar life is in the WSFM realm, where our imagination simply cant comprehend it if we limit our thinking to merely the physical world.
I like to girst imagine the environment the alien species would evolve in.
I assume different gravity, different atmosphere, different light.
this translates to different if any skeletal arrangement or density. Why not a hydrostatic skeleton!?
Different consumption to create energy. Do they breathe gas? Photosynthesize? Absorb nutrients through their "skin?"
what is the exterior of this creature like, and how does it protect itself from UV, weather etc?
is this a single oganism or a symbiotic relationship between more then one organism, like the bacteria in the abdomen of a termite, which digests the wood?
Example:
In a high gravity, dense atmosphere planet with harsh gas.. the creature is an invertibrate, hydrostatic skeleton, which moves by inching around, and absorbs smaller organisms from the surface by passing over them.
The surface of the skin facing up is a colony of tiny symbiotes with armor on their backs, nursing on the body of the "slug" and providing protection.. a mutualism.
Also, a crablike, insectoid creature which is a "neural predator" attaches to the slug and controls it. This creature is a parasite whichslowly comsumes the armored slug and uses its chiliscerate limbs to manipulate objects. Then it departs and finds a new host..
Whaaaat!
I assume different gravity, different atmosphere, different light.
this translates to different if any skeletal arrangement or density. Why not a hydrostatic skeleton!?
Different consumption to create energy. Do they breathe gas? Photosynthesize? Absorb nutrients through their "skin?"
what is the exterior of this creature like, and how does it protect itself from UV, weather etc?
is this a single oganism or a symbiotic relationship between more then one organism, like the bacteria in the abdomen of a termite, which digests the wood?
Example:
In a high gravity, dense atmosphere planet with harsh gas.. the creature is an invertibrate, hydrostatic skeleton, which moves by inching around, and absorbs smaller organisms from the surface by passing over them.
The surface of the skin facing up is a colony of tiny symbiotes with armor on their backs, nursing on the body of the "slug" and providing protection.. a mutualism.
Also, a crablike, insectoid creature which is a "neural predator" attaches to the slug and controls it. This creature is a parasite whichslowly comsumes the armored slug and uses its chiliscerate limbs to manipulate objects. Then it departs and finds a new host..
Whaaaat!
I don't know... no wait... wait...
No, I still don't know.
Wait, wait... I've got something.... No... no... nothing.
All kinds of stuff, but especially that one thing.
To get any kind of civilisation going, I'd say:
1. Evolve from pack animals. They have to have to basic need to work together and communicate.
2. Hands or other appendages for manipulating objects.
3. Vision or other means of sensing objects in detail.
For space travel:
4. Oxygen rich atmosphere. Really, it's hard to see anyone getting very far without fire. Accessible metals, minerals, hydrocarbons, etc would probably be necessary. So I'd probably rule out anything coming from a vastly different world to ours.
1. Evolve from pack animals. They have to have to basic need to work together and communicate.
2. Hands or other appendages for manipulating objects.
3. Vision or other means of sensing objects in detail.
For space travel:
4. Oxygen rich atmosphere. Really, it's hard to see anyone getting very far without fire. Accessible metals, minerals, hydrocarbons, etc would probably be necessary. So I'd probably rule out anything coming from a vastly different world to ours.
Not only is evolution a factor but there is also the possibility that our universe is a giant "petri dish" created by a super advanced alien species in an alternate dimension. We may also be the product of a simulation. Where to even begin with that?!
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I would not be so sure about that. Sure, fire is what essentially made human civilization, but under different conditions, a civilization could develop along entirely different pathways. For example, just recently Athena Andreadis argued in favour of the possibility of technological civilizations that could develop in conditions like the subsurface oceans on Europa, which wouldn't involve fire as the main motor, but biotech right from the start:
(source)Athena Andreadis said:
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What about a sentient virus or microbial life form that could manipulate its environment through recombination and other chemical processes? It could effectively be immortal and quite resistant to many of the hazards of space travel. Likewise its time scales would be both minute and measured in eons. The space ships and propulsion systems would be unlike anything we could imagine. There wouldn't even need to be language if the being was essentially a singular "brain." Communication might not even occur to it, and assuming it could conceive of larger organisms as being sentient, it might recognize our bodies as "space suits" for our gut microbiome, and if it did try to communicate with us, it would probably try to "speak" with our viral and bacterial dna, which is actually most of the dna in our bodies. Human dna is only roughly 10% of the dna in the human body after all.
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My standard answer to this is that a perfect simulation is indistinguishable from reality, therefore it doesn't matter.
Just don't get started on Free Will...
A species that achieved space travel would need to be one that had at least some members that:
- valued attempting difficult things rather than just choosing the easiest option,
- had no moral or religious objections to space travel,
- could achieve and maintain the sort of balance between intellectual cooperation and competition that makes science and engineering advances possible,
- had a political system in at least some societies where the powerful (whether many or few) valued this as a goal.
To put it more generally, as well as biological conditions there would need imo to be a lot of social and cultural conditions met (over considerable periods of time) for any species to achieve space travel.
- valued attempting difficult things rather than just choosing the easiest option,
- had no moral or religious objections to space travel,
- could achieve and maintain the sort of balance between intellectual cooperation and competition that makes science and engineering advances possible,
- had a political system in at least some societies where the powerful (whether many or few) valued this as a goal.
To put it more generally, as well as biological conditions there would need imo to be a lot of social and cultural conditions met (over considerable periods of time) for any species to achieve space travel.
1. No. Not the only ones. There's endless possibilities as far as I'm concerned. If space is endless and expanding that is.
2. If there is no end - there's a possibility for everything to happen somewhere sometime. There can be civilization of humans that walk backwards, there can be actual world with everything we imagine Elite:dangerous to be. Everything might be possible.
3. Define space travel. Can you consider way of distributing life through means of Panspermia as such?
I will try to elaborate.
TL;DR our concept of aliens, space travel, sentience and technology is limited. We are our own aliens for now only because we can't "see" "far" enough. Once we develop further I'm sure there will be plenty of "aliens" out there.
///
Time is a tricky concept. As life, conscience, sentience, intelligence, self-awareness, space and everything around us. We perceive it through our prism of comparison and understanding but it's so tiny and outside world is limitless. To simply put it we created some labels to mark things of our interest but it doesn't make them so. Labeling time as "time" doesn't define it in the ways we are want it to be. It is what it is no matter what we see and want it to be.
Our progress been marked by rather enormous achievements in late centuries. We developed senses and organs outside of ourselves, we harnessed science and technology to serve our needs, we expanding our understanding. But we are still overwhelmingly limited by our perception and nature. We are so limited that it blinds us, letting only small fraction of the outside world to be recognized and processed. There's planet teeming with life beneath our feet. What if it sentient? What if some of it alien? Yet we never consider it to be so. Because it's not like us, because it's too different and we are blinded by our own image. To truly understand an alien and get it recognized we should percieve time on the same scale, be moderately on the same scale of size, have similar logic behind our actions/development process and more importantly posess similar senses. Eyes to see, nose to smell, hands to manipulate objects. At least something that we can regognize as means of interaction. And such alien should be on development scale close to us. Otherwise it's animal or "godlike" and we can't consider it equal, we can't interact with it. We can try to exploit it in our limited ways but that's all interaction there is. Dolphin is an animal and Sun is godlike star that many of our ancestors worshipped. We exploit both of them and can interact with them very little for various reasons. We try to understand them better, we study both of them for a while but there's no real interaction there. Not that we can hope for. Because they are different than us and to understand them better we need to change ourselves. And thus we change.
As pointed above we have very little common with bacterial life forms. Those can be quite sentient, self aware and capable of interstellar space travel in our book yet we hardly get the chance to even recognize them as such. And even if we will - we can hardly agree to because of our limited nature. And that's just one example. Possibilities are endless.
We got on the right track though. We are changing and adapting in ever increasing ways and next millennia humans might not even look like we do. If we got the chance to and not reduce ourselves by our actions/inactions to new set of fossils in our planet crust.
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I've replied to quite a few posts in this topic, so I kept many of my answers relatively short.
Thanks for starting a thread like this. I love discussing these things
1. As long as a species can build and manipulate tools accurately, I think non-humanoids can make it to space.
2. Your guess is as good as mine
3. A species must be able to imagine, build, communicate, and persist in the face of failure.
I think that preserving the physically weak isn't harmful to the evolution of a species. In fact, the smartest humans often aren't the fastest, strongest, or fittest in terms of sexual reproduction. A species can be as physically fit or "superior" as possible, but if one member of the species doesn't think "hey, we need to get off this rock or all our progress will come to an end", the all the physical fitness in the world won't save your species from the inevitable death of the planet and sun.
As for being bipedel, I think the advantage isn't sexual as much as it is being able to traverse complex terrain that isn't always flat and easily navigated. In fact, iirc the human foot is more suited to running across and over rocks and fallen trees and such than the padded feet or paws of quadrupeds. A planet with higher gravity I think would cause it's creatures to still favor two legs and human-like feet, assuming the terrain of that planet is as complex and as challenging to navigate as ours. The idea of having four feet on a planet with higher gravity would seem like a good idea and perhaps more natural, but after a certain point gravity can become too strong and no amount of legs can keep you from caving in to the weight of your own body. A life form, I'd think, would have to have an extremely complex and efficient muscle and skeletal structure (or something similar) to progress in their evolution than anything on the Earth due to that gravity.
And vision is particularly tricky from my perspective, especially considering that so many species survive and thrive without our exact type of vision. Some species make up for vision with excellent hearing, to the point of having a natural sonar. And I'm sure there are many other ways of making up for poor vision or the lack thereof. Is excellent vision necessary for a species to become space faring? I don't think so, but I'd imagine it would make space flight and overall progress much more challenging.
I remember when I visited the Okeefenokee State Park here in south Georgia I learned that alligators can actually run up to 35 miles an hour, which is much faster than a human, especially from the start. But alligators can't run at that speed for long because reptiles are unable to breath when running at that speed, and those muscles have to have oxygen to keep working (iirc muscle cramps are often due to a lack of sufficient oxygen).
I agree with you on this point. I do believe life exists throughout the universe, but sentient life may be on the scale of one per galaxy, if we're lucky. If sentient life were more abundant SETI should have heard something by now, and not just a brief "WOW" signal, but something far more substantial. Even if sentient, space faring species only uses radio for a brief period, it's still an inevitable step in technological advancement, and if there were an abundance of space faring species in our galaxy, there should be ancient radio waves flying around in abundance. So, from my perspective, the lack of alien radio signals shows sentient life is rare, at least in our own galaxy.
From what I remember, the size insects can grow depends on the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere. IIRC, insects don't breath like we do but acquire oxygen only while flying or moving. If that is the case, then insects are poorly designed for sentience (in other words, poorly designed for the docile nature of studying, recording information, building and inventing, flying trough space in small ships, etc). And, from what I understand, the evolutionary strength of insects is their ability to rapidly reproduce and not necessarily in the functionality of their physical bodies. Just to be clear, though, I'm pretty rusty on what I remember about insects, their physiology, and their evolution, so please forgive any inaccuracies here and by all means point them out
I think the greatest factor in the overall development of a sentient species is the ability to imagine, to understand that things can exist without you being able to physically see them or readily perceive them. Germs and viruses are impossible to see individually with the naked, unaided eye. When we discovered the existence of a world we couldn't see (the world of microbes), it completely changed how we perceived the universe and the nature of disease. But even before we discovered the world of microbes and atoms, others speculated and theorized on the existence of such things. Of course, imagination can also hurt a species when taken to fanatical and unreasonable extremes. But without the ability to imagine new and naturally imperceptible parts of reality, it would be quite a challenge for a species to advance very far in medicine, spaceflight, or pretty much any technological and scientific fields.
There have actually been other species to evolve into sentient, intelligent beings. They were the descendants of primates, like us, but different species nonetheless.
We haven't stopped evolution, and honestly I don't think it's possible. We've merely changed course in our evolution. Even organs that seem to be worthless evolutionary leftovers are being adapted to improve our current bodies' functionality. Dr. Carl Sagan did an excellent job explaining this concept, also known as respecialization. In fact, human evolution may end up becoming more rapid as our medical technology and ability to manipulate our genes improves. Plus, with all the chemicals we subject our bodies to there's no telling how our genetics will mutate, or at what pace, at least with any high degree of accuracy.
You're right, actually. Many folks from a pessimistic point of view say that war, death, and suffering is our destiny or is necessary for evolution to progress in a way that improves us. This is true but only to a certain degree. Adversity can certainly put genetic adaptations to the test, but it's not the end all be all of evolution, especially pertaining to a sentient species. Humans started as a communal species, whose individual members greatly relied on others to survive and thrive. With greater cooperation (evolving from roving bands, to tribes, to villages, to cities, to states, to grand international alliances) came more rapid and meaningful technological and cultural advancement as a species. The more we cooperate and work together, the better and more meaningful life becomes. We would have never made it to space without great nations competing, but if the USSR and USA were ever to heat up their cold war, we'd be back to the stone age or outright extinct. Humanity's progress is greatly dependent on greater and greater cooperation, so long as there's a peaceful, competitive spirit in the mix.
Indeed, if we've spent the majority of our resources to make the Earth a utopia instead of killing each other, the Earth still wouldn't be perfect but the Earth would be a much better place I think.
War, however, does have it's place as a beneficial part of progress. As horrible as it is that we kill each other, if we ever encounter another species as violent as us then all our research into killing might be the thing that saves us. I still lean toward cooperation being more beneficial for our species, but adversity has its place, as well.
Yikes, now we're getting into philosophy and the insanity that QM seems to insist is reality. The universe does seem to be like a huge collection of experiments under many, many different circumstances, under which very few result in life. Everything seems to have a reason or purpose in the universe. But why life? Why existence as opposed to non-existence? Wouldn't it be far simpler to be nothing than to be something? To me, the concept of God makes much more sense than the "alien simulation" concept. But that's just me, based on my life experience, knowledge, and how I feel about that body of knowledge and experience. That's a whole different school of thought, though
I believe strongly in free will. If you've ever made a decision that ran against your instincts, you've exercised free will.
Agreed, straight-up
The idea of infinity is debatable. But I'm convinced our universe is but one universe in a larger universe. No proof of this yet, though. It's based more on my belief in God, but that's yet again another debate altogether.
Essentially, I believe alien life will appear very different from our own. We know that our form of life is possible because it happened here, so it's not impossible to encounter alien humanoids or aliens that are of a species we are familiar with. But there are so many different conditions and circumstances from solar system to solar system that there are likely many different ways for life to form and evolve. If indeed our type of life is the only way for life to exist, then we'll probably exist in a traditional sci-fi universe, with humanoids and reptiles and insects being commonplace. But I believe life doesn't necessarily have to exist under Earth-like conditions in order to exist and survive. And in any case, I think life will be rare due to the catastrophic nature of much of our universe. But whatever form life assumes, they got to be able to build tools, imagine, accept challenges, and cooperate.
This discussion recently overran in the thread about Steam Keys with a discussion that somehow Thargoids are unrealistic.
Evolution was discussed, as was biomass.
So - here's a dedicated thread to discuss the important questions:-
1. Are humans or humanoid species the only ones capable of reaching Space Travel?
2. If not, what would Aliens look like?
3. <late edition> What is needed for a species to develop space travel?
To get you started, I reckon that it's a big stretch that dinosaurs in over 100m years of existence didn't evolve some brains. I've no evidence, except that episode of ST:V.
Also someone else mentioned insectoid biomass not being as much as our. According to some rudimentary google-fu and Wikipedia it turns out that termites do. So there.
I'll be patrolling this thread with the Stick Of Logical Fallacies, the Grammar and Spelling Police have had their funding cut and therefore will not be present.
Sophistry is right out.
GO!
Thanks for starting a thread like this. I love discussing these things
1. As long as a species can build and manipulate tools accurately, I think non-humanoids can make it to space.
2. Your guess is as good as mine
3. A species must be able to imagine, build, communicate, and persist in the face of failure.
copied from other thread
So long as a being has intelligence, as well as either opposable thumbs or some convergent equivalent I see no reason why an alien race should be anything like us. I believe completely in alien life, indeed, my view is it is actually the conservative view to believe in them. The "out there" view to me is to think we are some how super special and unique.
Whether in reality we will ever meet them is another thing entirely however...unless some new way to travel is invented which elite and the likes of star trek make up ever happen, the enery requirements as well as time to travel are astronomical... elite does a good job of really putting the sol system into perspective..
indeed when it comes to weird and wonderful aliens, hypothetically, the beings which created the ship need not be the ones flying it either. in theory the pilot of an alien ship could just be a brain attached to the controls via computers (or just a race of AIs).
the creatures which build the ships could just be some sort of worker with little intelligence but that has the ability to build "stuff".
I think it is crazy to assume that "we" are the pinnacle of evolution, that every blueprint is striving to reach. indeed, 20 million years from now I suspect what ever our distant cousins look like, it will NOT be like us!.
In short we are a fluke!.
Its true that evolution generally leads to survival of the fittest, but if anything "intelligence" screws that up (this may not be a politically correct thing to say, and I may be on thin ice, but civilised society weakens our genome not the other way around....... Take me... I am an over weight athsmatic with serious allergies and eczema..... modern medicine allows me to do ok, and marry as well as possibly have kids. My genes however are unlikely to strengthen the gene pool and in nature I would (should??) probably be weeded out) . it is also predicted that my generation can have a very good chance of living to 90 years old, but despite that I will probably stop being a positive influence on our race a good 20 years or more before then. (not that I am complaining... I have not given up the dream of early retirement at 60 and 30 years of lazy bliss )
this is actually a topic that I am really interested in. We are what we are due to a random asteroid causing huge climate chance. All it takes however is some freak thing to happen, an unfortunate mutation where say the HIV virus picks up some features from the flu virus and goes airbourne (or more likely some idiot presses the red button and starts a nuclear war) and then the whole pack will be shuffled again.
really cool stuff, and a bit scary when you think too much about it.
PS we are bipedal iirc because on average it is more efficient to have sex this way so after a few random mutations it stuck..... but on another planet with different gravity etc who is to say what would be best?.
There were thoughts that it was due to advantageous vision from a higher vantage point, but iirc this theory is largely debunked now. I could cheat and google to know I am right, but where is the fun in that.
I think that preserving the physically weak isn't harmful to the evolution of a species. In fact, the smartest humans often aren't the fastest, strongest, or fittest in terms of sexual reproduction. A species can be as physically fit or "superior" as possible, but if one member of the species doesn't think "hey, we need to get off this rock or all our progress will come to an end", the all the physical fitness in the world won't save your species from the inevitable death of the planet and sun.
As for being bipedel, I think the advantage isn't sexual as much as it is being able to traverse complex terrain that isn't always flat and easily navigated. In fact, iirc the human foot is more suited to running across and over rocks and fallen trees and such than the padded feet or paws of quadrupeds. A planet with higher gravity I think would cause it's creatures to still favor two legs and human-like feet, assuming the terrain of that planet is as complex and as challenging to navigate as ours. The idea of having four feet on a planet with higher gravity would seem like a good idea and perhaps more natural, but after a certain point gravity can become too strong and no amount of legs can keep you from caving in to the weight of your own body. A life form, I'd think, would have to have an extremely complex and efficient muscle and skeletal structure (or something similar) to progress in their evolution than anything on the Earth due to that gravity.
And vision is particularly tricky from my perspective, especially considering that so many species survive and thrive without our exact type of vision. Some species make up for vision with excellent hearing, to the point of having a natural sonar. And I'm sure there are many other ways of making up for poor vision or the lack thereof. Is excellent vision necessary for a species to become space faring? I don't think so, but I'd imagine it would make space flight and overall progress much more challenging.
I remember when I visited the Okeefenokee State Park here in south Georgia I learned that alligators can actually run up to 35 miles an hour, which is much faster than a human, especially from the start. But alligators can't run at that speed for long because reptiles are unable to breath when running at that speed, and those muscles have to have oxygen to keep working (iirc muscle cramps are often due to a lack of sufficient oxygen).
I agree with you on this point. I do believe life exists throughout the universe, but sentient life may be on the scale of one per galaxy, if we're lucky. If sentient life were more abundant SETI should have heard something by now, and not just a brief "WOW" signal, but something far more substantial. Even if sentient, space faring species only uses radio for a brief period, it's still an inevitable step in technological advancement, and if there were an abundance of space faring species in our galaxy, there should be ancient radio waves flying around in abundance. So, from my perspective, the lack of alien radio signals shows sentient life is rare, at least in our own galaxy.
From what I remember, the size insects can grow depends on the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere. IIRC, insects don't breath like we do but acquire oxygen only while flying or moving. If that is the case, then insects are poorly designed for sentience (in other words, poorly designed for the docile nature of studying, recording information, building and inventing, flying trough space in small ships, etc). And, from what I understand, the evolutionary strength of insects is their ability to rapidly reproduce and not necessarily in the functionality of their physical bodies. Just to be clear, though, I'm pretty rusty on what I remember about insects, their physiology, and their evolution, so please forgive any inaccuracies here and by all means point them out
I think the greatest factor in the overall development of a sentient species is the ability to imagine, to understand that things can exist without you being able to physically see them or readily perceive them. Germs and viruses are impossible to see individually with the naked, unaided eye. When we discovered the existence of a world we couldn't see (the world of microbes), it completely changed how we perceived the universe and the nature of disease. But even before we discovered the world of microbes and atoms, others speculated and theorized on the existence of such things. Of course, imagination can also hurt a species when taken to fanatical and unreasonable extremes. But without the ability to imagine new and naturally imperceptible parts of reality, it would be quite a challenge for a species to advance very far in medicine, spaceflight, or pretty much any technological and scientific fields.
There have actually been other species to evolve into sentient, intelligent beings. They were the descendants of primates, like us, but different species nonetheless.
Yes! That's the whole damn point!!!!!!
Well, that and the fact that there are many, many improvements which could be made for specific purposes. It would start as specialisation up to the point where a standard set of base improvements are settled upon - that then becomes the new baseline.
It's the same as any technological advancement. You don't have to have a mobile phone, but most people do because it's advantageous and convenient; the same may well be said for bodily improvements a few hundred years into the future. As has already been mentioned, we've effectively stopped human evolution in its tracks with the development of technology and the desire to help everybody overcome their genetic flaws (which, ordinarily, would prevent them passing on the flaws); if we're to continue evolving, we'd have to either build it ourselves or employ a eugenics programme.
Ask the Swedish government how the latter worked out for them
We haven't stopped evolution, and honestly I don't think it's possible. We've merely changed course in our evolution. Even organs that seem to be worthless evolutionary leftovers are being adapted to improve our current bodies' functionality. Dr. Carl Sagan did an excellent job explaining this concept, also known as respecialization. In fact, human evolution may end up becoming more rapid as our medical technology and ability to manipulate our genes improves. Plus, with all the chemicals we subject our bodies to there's no telling how our genetics will mutate, or at what pace, at least with any high degree of accuracy.
You're right, actually. Many folks from a pessimistic point of view say that war, death, and suffering is our destiny or is necessary for evolution to progress in a way that improves us. This is true but only to a certain degree. Adversity can certainly put genetic adaptations to the test, but it's not the end all be all of evolution, especially pertaining to a sentient species. Humans started as a communal species, whose individual members greatly relied on others to survive and thrive. With greater cooperation (evolving from roving bands, to tribes, to villages, to cities, to states, to grand international alliances) came more rapid and meaningful technological and cultural advancement as a species. The more we cooperate and work together, the better and more meaningful life becomes. We would have never made it to space without great nations competing, but if the USSR and USA were ever to heat up their cold war, we'd be back to the stone age or outright extinct. Humanity's progress is greatly dependent on greater and greater cooperation, so long as there's a peaceful, competitive spirit in the mix.
Indeed, if we've spent the majority of our resources to make the Earth a utopia instead of killing each other, the Earth still wouldn't be perfect but the Earth would be a much better place I think.
War, however, does have it's place as a beneficial part of progress. As horrible as it is that we kill each other, if we ever encounter another species as violent as us then all our research into killing might be the thing that saves us. I still lean toward cooperation being more beneficial for our species, but adversity has its place, as well.
Yikes, now we're getting into philosophy and the insanity that QM seems to insist is reality. The universe does seem to be like a huge collection of experiments under many, many different circumstances, under which very few result in life. Everything seems to have a reason or purpose in the universe. But why life? Why existence as opposed to non-existence? Wouldn't it be far simpler to be nothing than to be something? To me, the concept of God makes much more sense than the "alien simulation" concept. But that's just me, based on my life experience, knowledge, and how I feel about that body of knowledge and experience. That's a whole different school of thought, though
I believe strongly in free will. If you've ever made a decision that ran against your instincts, you've exercised free will.
Agreed, straight-up
The idea of infinity is debatable. But I'm convinced our universe is but one universe in a larger universe. No proof of this yet, though. It's based more on my belief in God, but that's yet again another debate altogether.
Essentially, I believe alien life will appear very different from our own. We know that our form of life is possible because it happened here, so it's not impossible to encounter alien humanoids or aliens that are of a species we are familiar with. But there are so many different conditions and circumstances from solar system to solar system that there are likely many different ways for life to form and evolve. If indeed our type of life is the only way for life to exist, then we'll probably exist in a traditional sci-fi universe, with humanoids and reptiles and insects being commonplace. But I believe life doesn't necessarily have to exist under Earth-like conditions in order to exist and survive. And in any case, I think life will be rare due to the catastrophic nature of much of our universe. But whatever form life assumes, they got to be able to build tools, imagine, accept challenges, and cooperate.
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The dinosaur Saurornithoides have had a lot of potential, though. Drake was speculating that this species might have evolved into the first intelligent being on Earth, if only they were given more time. But they weren't - they went extinct due to (most likely) a cosmic catastrophe.
So - here's a dedicated thread to discuss the important questions:-
1. Are humans or humanoid species the only ones capable of reaching Space Travel? I don't see why, That said I do think there will have some physical features that are...physical requirement for "tooling". Of course hands, eyes, ears. How many / where could be pretty variable.
2. If not, what would Aliens look like? Again back to physical constraints, I believe our "form" is a "goldilocks" shape. I would guess skin would be very variable, hair cover/color, eye color; basically phenotype would be quite variable...but the "core features" I think would almost always be the same. For example cell structures rely on the physics of the carbon atom. It can easily bond to itself making long molecules, I think silicon can also do this easily but to a lessor degree (not sure if electrical conductivity plays a role) so my point is it's most likely if the being has much of a size at all it'll be carbon based....maybe silicon.
3. <late edition> What is needed for a species to develop space travel? I'll make some assumptions first. If the species can talk, it will "build on" that knowledge. Education is an other way to say it. Basically learn something...pass it on to the next generation to "expand" on. The environment has the required minerals, molecules ect to allow intelligent life, so mining minerals is possible. The escape velocity isn't some ridiculous speed.
That said all I think that's needed is time. If they communicate and build on those ideas (effectively a "scientific method" of sorts) eventually space travel will come about.
What is required for interstellar travel? .....Magic!
1. Are humans or humanoid species the only ones capable of reaching Space Travel? I don't see why, That said I do think there will have some physical features that are...physical requirement for "tooling". Of course hands, eyes, ears. How many / where could be pretty variable.
2. If not, what would Aliens look like? Again back to physical constraints, I believe our "form" is a "goldilocks" shape. I would guess skin would be very variable, hair cover/color, eye color; basically phenotype would be quite variable...but the "core features" I think would almost always be the same. For example cell structures rely on the physics of the carbon atom. It can easily bond to itself making long molecules, I think silicon can also do this easily but to a lessor degree (not sure if electrical conductivity plays a role) so my point is it's most likely if the being has much of a size at all it'll be carbon based....maybe silicon.
3. <late edition> What is needed for a species to develop space travel? I'll make some assumptions first. If the species can talk, it will "build on" that knowledge. Education is an other way to say it. Basically learn something...pass it on to the next generation to "expand" on. The environment has the required minerals, molecules ect to allow intelligent life, so mining minerals is possible. The escape velocity isn't some ridiculous speed.
That said all I think that's needed is time. If they communicate and build on those ideas (effectively a "scientific method" of sorts) eventually space travel will come about.
What is required for interstellar travel? .....Magic!
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I like this idea.
A cosmic catastrophe is over pretty quickly in evolutionary terms though and I can't see for the life of me why the dinosaurs didn't develop "intelligence" - surely the same pressures affected them as early hominids. We speculate that they hunted in packs and were social.
The Cretaceous period lasted 79 million years. That's 79 million years of continued evolution.
If in all that time they didn't evolve intelligence (which I think is unlikely - to clarify intuitively I think is unlikely as I've no evidence), then this is surely a good indication that space-faring life is incredibly rare?
Questions:-
1. If a dinosaur species did develop "intelligence" (and I define this as communal living to reach shared goals, maybe writing, limited engineering) what structures or evidence would be left after 100m years?
2. What pressures affected early pre-humans that over the course of 79 million years did not affect dinosaur species?
Let's not focus on my very limited definition of intelligence, as someone else posted almost all definitions are problematic!
Well, mammals have been living on Earth for at least 150 million years, yet the first evidence of (debatable) intelligent mammal stretches no further than ~2 million years into the past.
Space faring life is extremely rare in my opinion. If it wasn't, Milky way should have been mostly colonized by civilization(s) much older than ours by now.
After 100 million years? None. In TV shows like 'Aftermath: Population Zero' and 'Life After People', it is theorized that 25.000 years after the human race went extinct almost nothing from our civilization would remain. Except for some plastic stuff buried deep into the ground, and the equipment from lunar expeditions left on the Moon. Add few million years, and there would be absolutely nothing to serve as testimony that Earth has been a home of technical civilization: nature would erase all traces.
I myself have seen a village built of modern solid materials (concrete, bricks) abandoned in war just 20 years ago. It was hard to tell that people were living there. All houses were reduced to sad piles of rubble and thick vegetation was literally swallowing everything.
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I'm sure something of our civilization would be around several million years after our extinction. We still find fossils of creatures from millions of years ago. Of course, after millions of years you couldn't just briefly look over the planet and find our leftovers. But an alien archaeologist with an eye for detail would surely find something if it looked long enough.
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It would be my guess that there are distinct "paths" as at the start there were single cell organisms...which maybe still are around today....but aren't so smart. I'm sure you see where this is going....well just note humans are easily the most intelligent...and arguably one of the more recent distinct species, if not the most.
Assumed in the idea dinosaurs may have evolved to be smart because they were around for "a long time" is evolution "evolves" towards intelligent beings. Which is nonsense.
Humans haven't gotten more (well not by much) intelligent since our caveman days. It's communication that allows knowledge and eventually "advanced life forms" doing things like "...shared goals, maybe writing, limited engineering".
For me Earth history demonstrates that intellegent life is serendipitous even on an "Earth like" planet. Our level of communication & dexterity is unequivocally unmatched. I'd suspect our spatial intelligence is also God-like superior to other animals on Earth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences It's a great read if for anyone interested in trying to get a better understanding of "intelligence"
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Can you explain your 1st paragraph - I don't understand your point. Are you saying that humans are the most intelligent because they are the most recent? Single celled organisms aren't intelligent? That there are pre-defined paths, or that there aren't?
I don't think I have an unstated premise in the 79m years idea, but I am mixing two separate ideas. My assumptions are:-
-there were social groups of dinosaurs (by this I mean pack hunters) I don't have references but I don't think this is controversial. If it is Google fu can help.
-early hominids were also pack hunters.
-this assumes rudimentary communication in both groups
-evolutionary pressures led one group - early hominids - to us.
-question - were these pressures unique in that they never affected the pack hunting dinosaurs in over 79 million years?
so really it's comparing two similar groups with assumed similar pressures and asking why the result was different.
I agree that the root of the type of intelligence assumes communication, sorry that wasn't clear.
So my points are:-
1. If Dinosaurs DID NOT develop intelligence defined as above why not? Again assuming the evolutionary pressures were similar & if they weren't why?
2. If dinosaurs DID NOT develop intelligence in 79m years because of something unique I haven't thought of, but we did in 2 million years, does that then mean that intelligent life is very difficult and/or unique?
3. How do we know that dinosaurs DIDN'T if there is no evidence, and very small chance of finding any evidence due to the 100m year difference between then & now. Burden of proof is on me for this ofc, just a nice brain fart.
I don't think I have an unstated premise in the 79m years idea, but I am mixing two separate ideas. My assumptions are:-
-there were social groups of dinosaurs (by this I mean pack hunters) I don't have references but I don't think this is controversial. If it is Google fu can help.
-early hominids were also pack hunters.
-this assumes rudimentary communication in both groups
-evolutionary pressures led one group - early hominids - to us.
-question - were these pressures unique in that they never affected the pack hunting dinosaurs in over 79 million years?
so really it's comparing two similar groups with assumed similar pressures and asking why the result was different.
I agree that the root of the type of intelligence assumes communication, sorry that wasn't clear.
So my points are:-
1. If Dinosaurs DID NOT develop intelligence defined as above why not? Again assuming the evolutionary pressures were similar & if they weren't why?
2. If dinosaurs DID NOT develop intelligence in 79m years because of something unique I haven't thought of, but we did in 2 million years, does that then mean that intelligent life is very difficult and/or unique?
3. How do we know that dinosaurs DIDN'T if there is no evidence, and very small chance of finding any evidence due to the 100m year difference between then & now. Burden of proof is on me for this ofc, just a nice brain fart.
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