General / Off-Topic Good news. We are probably alone in the universe. (Maybe, most likely, err)

Han Zulu

Han Zulu
Just to point out a tiny detail, our galaxy isn't the whole known universe. We all tend to accidentally and unintentionally conflate "galaxy" with "universe", so if we conclude there's no other intelligent life form in our galaxy, that's not to say there isn't one in the other 100 billion+ galaxies.
 

shreddog

shreddog
I'm pretty much sure they mean the entire observable universe(as stated in headline of article).

But yeah that one quote does seem confusing.
 

Manticore

Manticore
I had a look at the article and the actual research paper.

It's an interesting exercise in statistical analysis of the question but it is not conclusive...
 

Han Zulu

Han Zulu
shreddog said:
I'm pretty much sure they mean the entire observable universe(as stated in headline of article).

But yeah that one quote does seem confusing.
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Yet in the article they occasionally refer to what can be observed in our galaxy, so the writer of the article didn't pay attention to wording.
 

Han Zulu

Han Zulu
Manticore said:
I had a look at the article and the actual research paper.

It's an interesting exercise in statistical analysis of the question but it is not conclusive...
Click to expand...
Consider that one of the foundations for the paradox is that we haven't heard from the aliens, but how is that possible to hear from galaxies where the first light is just now arriving here. Also, the galaxies in between or even Andromeda, can we really say that we have exhausted all the possible abilities to hear any signal from an intelligent species over there from some hundred million years ago? Personally, I think the paradox only can apply (at best) to our galaxy, and not to the whole universe.

And yes, there are alternative explanations, even mentioned in the article.
 

Han Zulu

Han Zulu
Arry said:
Any model that states we are intelligent; is flawed from the start. :D
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So true. Perhaps the real reason we haven't heard from any other intelligent life form is because they're more intelligent than us.

Besides, how can we be so sure we haven't heard from them? Maybe we did but didn't hear it or understand that it was.
 

Lucifera Danzig

Lucifera Danzig
Looking at the article, they quote the paper as saying "the probability that we are alone in the galaxy is 30%!" Which means the probability we aren't is 70%...which makes me question the title of the thread.

The article further admits "In the end, the team’s conclusions do not mean that humanity is alone in the Universe, or that the odds of finding evidence of extra-terrestrial civilizations (both past and present) is unlikely." And yet they go right back to saying we are, in the same paragraph.

I wonder if the writer of the article read the paper...

While we're at it, the fact we haven't detected life yet can be far more easily explained. We haven't yet perfected finding planets, and we're still refining the process of cataloging all the stars in our own galaxy, let alone the universe. We *just* had an announcement about the most distant star yet discovered.

Add to this our own proven shift from radio communication to things like fiber/high-speed internet and (very) short-range wireless, and it's not surprising we haven't detected anything from a more advanced civilization.
 

Zak Gordon

Zak Gordon
Apart from the confusing mistakes in the article (not the paper it was based on) two things come to mind.

1. The Fermi Paradox really seems to unsettle people more than it really needs too.

2. Does any kind of religious belief have the possibility to influence the debate here?

For me the real 'prize' is to find life outside of earth. It does not have to be intelligent life, but that first discovery will pretty much solve the bigger question over intelligent life.
 

verminstar

Banned
verminstar
Heres a thought...why is it we think of intelligent life as space faring aliens? Are we space faring? No...so why does another intelligent species have to be? They could be just as stuck to their mudball that we are...we could be a few systems apart and never hear from each other. They might not even want to or have taken steps to ensure we dont find them based on our history...we havent exactly built up a glowing track record with integrating new civilizations.

We spent centuries wiping them out, using them as slaves, trampling all over their beliefs...now imagine a peace loving and tolerant alien society would be looking at that and thinking...nah humans need to grow up so lets just leave them to it shall we?
 

Whitehair

W
Conrtrary to popular belief there have been attempts from Aliens to contact humans.

Unfortunately the lowest form of their technology they could find that was compatible with ours restricted them to attempting contact via 'The Internet'.

They gave up on the attempt due to the lack of comprehensible replies to their posts.......
 

shreddog

shreddog
Lucifera Danzig said:
Looking at the article, they quote the paper as saying "the probability that we are alone in the galaxy is 30%!" Which means the probability we aren't is 70%...which makes me question the title of the thread.

The article further admits "In the end, the team’s conclusions do not mean that humanity is alone in the Universe, or that the odds of finding evidence of extra-terrestrial civilizations (both past and present) is unlikely." And yet they go right back to saying we are, in the same paragraph.

I wonder if the writer of the article read the paper...

While we're at it, the fact we haven't detected life yet can be far more easily explained. We haven't yet perfected finding planets, and we're still refining the process of cataloging all the stars in our own galaxy, let alone the universe. We *just* had an announcement about the most distant star yet discovered.

Add to this our own proven shift from radio communication to things like fiber/high-speed internet and (very) short-range wireless, and it's not surprising we haven't detected anything from a more advanced civilization.
Click to expand...

I just quickly browsed the original report and found these interesting bits(though most of the language in that report is beyond my -very limited- intellectual abilities :p)

"We can thus state our first main conclusion. While using point-estimates inthe Drake equation frequently generates estimates of N that would produce aFermi paradox, this is just an artefact of the overconfidence implicit in treating them as having no uncertainty. When our uncertainty is properly accounted for in the model, we find a substantial prior probability that there is no other intelligent life in our observable universe, and thus that there should be little surprise when this is what we see. We find this when using the variation in parameter estimates in the literature as a proxy for our state of uncertainty and when generating our own summaries of the current state of uncertainty in the scientific literature. Note that this conclusion does not mean that we are alone (in our galaxy or observable universe), just that this is very scientifically plausible and should not surprise us. It is a statement about our state of knowledge, rather than a new measurement"

"When we take account of realistic uncertainty, replacing point estimates by probability distributions that reflect current scientific understanding, we find no reason to be highly confident that the galaxy (or observable universe) contains other civilizations, and thus no longer find our observations in conflict with our prior probabilities."

"When we update this prior in light of the Fermi observation, we find a substantial probability that we are alone in our galaxy, and perhaps even in our observable universe (53%–99.6% and 39%–85% respectively). ’Where are they?’— probably extremely far away, and quite possibly beyond the cosmological horizon and forever unreachable."

So basically, nothing is certain. But based on current knowledge the chances are we are alone.
 
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