Aliens - Why we won't find them...

Jandau

Smug Platypus
Dec 19, 2008
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...at least any time soon.

Whenever there is talk about alien contact, the same argument gets dragged out - "It is possible!". It relies on the universe being vast and that somewhere life should happen - that we can't possibly be alone. This argument is (IMO) sound. Yes, the universe is vast, and it is quite probable that we won't be the only ones to evolve in it. However, this same argument is also (again IMO) the reason why YOU won't get to meet those aliens.

The universe IS vast. Heck, it's humongous. You have no idea how damn big it is. You also have no idea how mind-staggeringly long it's been around and how much longer it's going to be around. This is a clear case of Lack of Scale [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale], both spatially and temporally. Also, life itself is a somewhat unlikely occurence that requires specific conditions to happen (otherwise we'd have all over the Solar system). And let's face it, when we're talking about alien contact, we don't want a few bacteria or some lichen; we want spaceships and teleporters!

So, let's see what needs to happen for alien contact to take place.

1. Life - Fairly unlikely, since it requires specific conditions to occur. A planet has to be just right and if any of a number of factors is off, the whole thing is out the window (and not just carbon based, oxygen breathing life).

2. Technology - Again, this requires the conditions to be even more specific. Not only does the planet have to meet the requirements to create life, it has to provide resources and environment suitable for technological development.

These two, while not likely, are bound to happen. As we stated, the universe is DAMN big so statistically there should be at a number of such planets around. However...

3. Location - It has to happen somewhere in our general area. Like, say, our Galaxy. They need to get here and they need to find us first. We have a bubble of radio waves going out into space for the last century, but that's a VERY small bubble. It's like a pinprick on the galactic map (even more insignificant in the universe as a whole). They need to stumble across that pinprick to even have a chance of finding us. Beyond that, they'd have to stumble across us, which is even less likely seein how DAMN BIG the Universe is...

4. Time - And here comes the biggest kicker! This alien civilization has to take place at exactly the same time as ours! This is trickier than it seems since it's again a matter of scale. The universe is 13 billion years old. We've had written history for what, 5-6 thousand years? That means that the entire existance of the human race is less than an eyeblink by universe's standards. Galactic Empires could have risen and fallen over and over again while dinosaurs roamed the Earth. The entire Star Trek saga could have played out hundreds of times just in the time it took us to evolve from monkeys to humans. And 10 thousand years from now, when the last human dies in whatever disaster we concoct, a space fish might be clambering for the first time to the shore of some distant world to begin the evolution into a technological race. We would have "just missed them"...

Also, we need to catch our aliens at the "sweet spot" between "Developed Advanced Interplanetary Space Flight" and "Nuked themselves into extinction"...

So, to recap the whole thing - We need an unlikely planet (Life) with unlikely circumstances (Technology) to be somewhere near us (Location) at the same fraction of time we happen to occupy (Time).

The point I'm trying to make is that while life on other planets can happen, will happen and probably HAS happened, YOU aren't going to see it. You have better chances of spontaneously turning into a tapdancing chipmunk... ;)

Thank you for reading and if you managed to get through the whole rambling rant...

EDIT: Clarification! Since many people seem to be skipping my post and reading only the title - I'm not saying we are alone in the universe. I'm not saying God made us and only us. Heck, I'm not bringing God into it at all. I firmly believe that other species exist!
 

Dragon_of_red

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Dec 30, 2008
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Jandau said:
Gooooooood created us and only us!
That is all i read from that...

Ok to be serious, im going to use a quote that i have no idea where i got it from, "In an infinte universe full of infinte possibilities, anything you can imaging is possible, nay probable, that it can happen somewhere."

Going through that Logic, w can see that no matter how unlikly something is, it cna still happen, another thing from the Matrix "No matter how many times you drop a stone and it falls down, you neve know that the next time you will it will fall up" Im paraphrasing of course.

But yeah, im an optimist, im sure that eventually we will see some form of alien race somewhere, whether we become the aliens for them and go to their primitave home planet, or they come to us with the blasters and ray guns.
 

TriggerHappyAngel

Self-Important Angler Fish
Feb 17, 2010
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+1 awesomeness and a cookie to you sir, for your magnificent logic :]

what you say is true, people say that the universe is big, so there must be life somewhere, but they never think about the things that you just talked about.
 

Jandau

Smug Platypus
Dec 19, 2008
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dragon_of_red said:
Jandau said:
Gooooooood created us and only us!
That is all i read from that...

Ok to be serious, im going to use a quote that i have no idea where i got it from, "In an infinte universe full of infinte possibilities, anything you can imaging is possible, nay probable, that it can happen somewhere."

Going through that Logic, w can see that no matter how unlikly something is, it cna still happen, another thing from the Matrix "No matter how many times you drop a stone and it falls down, you neve know that the next time you will it will fall up" Im paraphrasing of course.

But yeah, im an optimist, im sure that eventually we will see some form of alien race somewhere, whether we become the aliens for them and go to their primitave home planet, or they come to us with the blasters and ray guns.
If that's what you read from my post, I suggest you read it again, since that's the one thing I DIDN'T say. I never mentioned God. And I stated that I belive that other alien races existed, exist and will exist in the future. In fact, considering the scale of the universe (both in time and space), I consider it almost certain.

However, that same scale, which practically guarantees other life, works against us when it comes to us meeting that other life.
 

Rathy

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Aug 21, 2008
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I find your last argument to be the most intriguing, and very much the main limiting factor. In theory at least, we can find a finite size the universe at any given moment, in terms of the speed in which the particles move apart. There is a limit at a moment, that just keeps changing and getting larger. At least following the train of thought of the Big Bang Theory. There is a universal zero, AKA the creation of the universe, and an end point, that being the statistical size at any given moment.

On the other hand, time lacks these static points. For a species, both time zero and the limit of said time are a variable which are capable of never overlapping with another species variables. Even occupation of a certain area of space is a very limited value, also affected by time in this case. So really, time is the biggest deal in the end as I see it, being the one major variable that lacks proper reference points out of all the factors.

And your cookie makes great substanence for my incoherent brain tonight.
 

Dragon_of_red

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Jandau said:
If that's what you read from my post, I suggest you read it again, since that's the one thing I DIDN'T say. I never mentioned God. And I stated that I belive that other alien races existed, exist and will exist in the future. In fact, considering the scale of the universe (both in time and space), I consider it almost certain.

However, that same scale, which practically guarantees other life, works against us when it comes to us meeting that other life.
Heh, i said that as a joke.

Yeah, it does seem bery unlikley that our civilisation will ever meet them, but what? we have searched like 8 planets for life maybe? It actually may not be such a rare phenominom.

So, life has been around for several million years correct? Its takes us roughley that amount of time, minus a few years, to get to space. Our civilisation will continue, for a good long time (Hopefully). So with the amount of time that we spent developing into out current forms, maybe, just maybe another organism is being created somewhere. Since we dont know what the probablity is of life being created (to the extent of my knowledge there isn't, feel free to prove me wrong), we could actually ahve a quite high chance of finding life somewhere.

I love a good non flameing argument :D
 

Z(ombie)fan

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Mar 12, 2010
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in my oppinion, there are versions of the universe, all aliens are in there more likely.
 

Lullabye

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Oct 23, 2008
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*two thumbs up for logic*
*0ne thumb down for being obvious*
@OP: Did you get in an argument with an idiot and are just letting off steam now?
 
May 27, 2008
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RedMenace said:
Your logic is sound. At least to me.

The only sure-fire way to truly find some intelligent life form is to fulfill the following requirements:

1) Invent a form of instantaneous travel (any distance in 1 moment)
2) Invent a way to transmit information using same method as above
3) Invent a scanner that can cover AT LEAST an entire solar system
4) Build billions upon billions of probes that utilize aforementioned tech
5) Start sending them out all over the place systematically

Why steps 4 and 5 are necessary you ask? Why not just stop at 3 and send out a signal? Because chances are that whatever intelligent technological civilization MIGHT exist they most likely will either be not advanced enough to get the signal, so advanced that they'll miss the signal as static, or use an entirely different signal system. Only feasible choice is to check manually.

Even than it would probably take a few thousand of years. Because, lets face it, chances of having another intelligent life form in THIS particular galaxy, at THIS point of time are beyond slim. I would even go as far as to say that at best there's 1 intelligent life form per galaxy (I repeat AT BEST).
when you look at human history so far, I can't help but think that WE aren't intelligent enough to do any of this! (see George W. Bush)
 

Jandau

Smug Platypus
Dec 19, 2008
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dragon_of_red said:
Jandau said:
If that's what you read from my post, I suggest you read it again, since that's the one thing I DIDN'T say. I never mentioned God. And I stated that I belive that other alien races existed, exist and will exist in the future. In fact, considering the scale of the universe (both in time and space), I consider it almost certain.

However, that same scale, which practically guarantees other life, works against us when it comes to us meeting that other life.
Heh, i said that as a joke.

Yeah, it does seem bery unlikley that our civilisation will ever meet them, but what? we have searched like 8 planets for life maybe? It actually may not be such a rare phenominom.

So, life has been around for several million years correct? Its takes us roughley that amount of time, minus a few years, to get to space. Our civilisation will continue, for a good long time (Hopefully). So with the amount of time that we spent developing into out current forms, maybe, just maybe another organism is being created somewhere. Since we dont know what the probablity is of life being created (to the extent of my knowledge there isn't, feel free to prove me wrong), we could actually ahve a quite high chance of finding life somewhere.

I love a good non flameing argument :D
Well, we are of course working off assumptions whenever we talk about such things. However, I'd say it's safe to assume that life isn't THAT common. If it were, we would have found it in our solar system already.

As for life developing on other planets - I'm certain it IS! I said as much. However, they might be getting around to starting their Dinosaur phase. Another planet might be in the final stages of their planet-wiping nuclear war. And the advanced Warp-travelling civilization might be five Galaxies away.

Even if they are in our Galaxy and zipping around, they'd have to hit a target the size of a pinprick to catch our radio signals and notice us, and Earth is a bit out of the way as far as our placement in the Galaxy goes.

I do not dispute the existance of other life - I'm merely stating that YOU won't get to meet them. The endless nature of the Universe guarantees life will happen over and over again. It also practically ensures that we won't meet that life, that's all ;)
 

LogieBear

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Mar 19, 2010
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Great Knowledge you have, good is cookie =P
I love the 'Time' part, makes perfect sense. Thank you my good sir ;)
 

Timotei

The Return of T-Bomb
Apr 21, 2009
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In all the infinite trillions of light years that the universe is wide, every star in the sky being another galaxy or system, I find it very self-centered and egotistical to believe that some all-seeing, all-knowing, all gentle entity created us from Playdoh and magic and ONLY US.

The same people who stated that were also the same people who said that Eurasian and African continents was all there was of Earth and the rest a vast ocean. They also thought that getting sick was by the will of said entity, only to find out may years later that indeed it was caused by bacteria.

On an almost consistent basis religious explanations and beliefs are being shattered by science and a simple curiosity. This is all done by those with a sense of discovery and finding that taking a pre-prepared answer given to you by a man in a white robe doesn't advance us any further.

Also, on your explanation of time. Basic chances an statistics state that if you roll a 20 sided die enough times you'll eventually roll a 20 at some point. So long as humanity is able to explore space we'll be rolling the proverbial dice every time a ship sets out for a new world or a leaves a station. The more we expand our reach in the universe the higher the chance we'll discover something or be discovered.
 

Jandau

Smug Platypus
Dec 19, 2008
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Timotei said:
In all the infinite trillions of light years that the universe is wide, every star in the sky being another galaxy or system, I find it very self-centered and egotistical to believe that some all-seeing, all-knowing, all gentle entity created us from Playdoh and magic and ONLY US.

The same people who stated that were also the same people who said that Eurasian and African continents was all there was of Earth and the rest a vast ocean. They also thought that getting sick was by the will of said entity, only to find out may years later that indeed it was caused by bacteria.

On an almost consistent basis religious explanations and beliefs are being shattered by science and a simple curiosity. This is all done by those with a sense of discovery and finding that taking a pre-prepared answer given to you by a man in a white robe doesn't advance us any further.
I agree entirely with what you say, though it has little to no bearing on what I posted. I already stated that I belive there are other species in the universe. No offense, but I don't think you read further than the title and just posted a stock response...
 

Canus

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Feb 15, 2010
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A while ago I was writing a sort of space opera, and decided to research universal scale, to appeal to fans of hard science fiction. I don't recall exact numbers, but things I found were basically along these lines: Humanity has been giving off significant signals for maybe 100 years. While estimates vary, there are probably around 15000 stars within 100 light years of Earth. Maybe a tenth of these have a planet still orbiting them. To say that a percent of these planets could EVER support a form of life is optimistic to the point of foolishness. So... 15 planets. 15 rolls of the dice. 15 lottery tickets filled in at random, hoping that NOT ONLY do you get two that match, but that those numbers happen to win on that specific day. Depressing concept.
 

Snow Fire

Fluffy Neko Kemono
Jan 19, 2009
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RedMenace said:
From what I have read, it is estimated there are possibly billions of solar systems in the Milky Way alone, humans living in the Sol System of the Milky Way. The fact that humans haven't even made it past the moon, it would be more likely that there are hundreds, if not thousands of sentient species in the different solar systems of the Milky Way Galaxy suffering from the same dilemma as us.