[Excelsior]

Why is it that every time that people have a discussion about the possible existence of life on other planets there is an assumption that said life is intelligent?

We're talking about the possibility of that life contacting us or wiping us out (with humanity playing the native american to their european). Who says that any life that exists elsewhere is necessarily intelligent? And who says that any intelligent life that may exist is intelligent enough to threaten humanity and get beyond a stone-age level of advancement?

Even in the off-chance that life does exist elsewhere (and keep in mind that it may very well not and we on Earth may very well be it), we should be fully prepared for the strong possibility that it is not at our intellectual or technical level. When it comes to our notions of potential contact with alien life we tend to assume that we are going to be the ones facing a more technically competent foe, but there's nothing saying that the reverse isn't even more likely. We could end up with a scenario that looks much more like Avatar than Skyline, Battle:LA, War of the Worlds, or Halo.

[Slim Shady]

^ Excelsior,

Obviously our first guess is that life that we find is not going to be at a higher evolution than us.

First we look at how long it would take since the birth of the universe for it to cool down and planets to start forming.

Then we look at how long it would take such a planet to cool down enough to sustain life.

Then we look at how long it would generally take for life to evolve to a sentient level.

We look at the age of the Universe [~13.7 Billion years] and the age of the Earth [>4.5 Billion years]. Humans in some form have been around for 6 million years only, and in the modern form for 200,000 years only. Civilization has been around for 6000 years at our present knowledge. So essentially let us assume it takes 4.5 Billion years for civilization to evolve to our level on any planet.

People have mentioned the Fermi paradox earlier which an important principle to discuss here. Regardless, we used to think that habitable planets only started forming 6-7 Billion years ago, but now we realize that they could have formed 10 or even 12 Billion years ago. We have only formed in the last third of cosmic history, and almost the last third of "habitable planet history". It is therefore more likely that a life carrying planet is more advanced than we are, especially given that there was a much greater rate of star formation [and thus planet formation] earlier in the universe's history than there is now. That is a scary thought. Even if we give a planet a measly 1 Billion year head start on us, and even consider that they evolved slower and only have a 500 million year advantage on us evolutionarily... they could be well beyond Star Trek.

There are so many things to consider. What if the dinosaurs had not gone extinct and had evolved into sentient lizard beings [a bad theory because we have birds]? Did this other planet not suffer such a mass extinction...or maybe it suffered more and got wiped out. Maybe these people have been around for so long that their planet and star itself died out. Then did they become advanced enough to make it out and find another planet? Or did they die with their planet?

Are they siphoning off energy from black holes and actually designed or helped out us humans and are our overlords in a science experiments?

I think the fact that noone has revealed themselves to us helps us be secure that most likely these people are either around our level of intelligence or lower, but it is statistically much more likely that they are more evolved than us.

Here is a decent read on the matter of habitable planet formation, etc.

http://www.space.com/17441-universe-heav...ation.html

[speakeasy]

^^^ It's my belief that aliens have been visiting earth for a long time. UFO like phenomena has been reported in the skies going back to ancient times.

They probably have some pact of non interference with developing species. The Fermi paradox only means we can't detect alien civilizations using our available technology. A civilization a billion years ahead of us would probably be invisible to us. Just like ants have no idea when we're watching them.

[Truth Teller]

So the Starfleet Prime Directive is real?

I think there's good reason to believe that intelligent life is rare, if not non-existent. Based on a recent article in (I think) Space or Scientific American (don't quote me on those; I really don't remember) it seems as though gamma ray bursts may prevent intelligent life from forming in 80%+ of galaxies.

[Slim Shady]

(01-22-2015 08:50 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

Just like ants have no idea when we're watching them.

Or DO they?!?!?!

I again implore all of you to read the whole Hitchhiker's Guide series, all of Asimov's Robot-Empire-Foundation series', and the Dune series.

Comic, social, and political.

[Yatagan]

There's still the possibility of finding alien life in own solar system in places like Europa and Enceladus(even if just bacterial in form).

[speakeasy]

(01-22-2015 09:37 PM)Seboist Wrote:  

There's still the possibility of finding alien life in own solar system in places like Europa and Enceladus(even if just bacterial in form).

Wouldn't it be cool if there were two habitable planets in one solar system? Imagine if instead of Mars, there was another Earth-like planet in the same place that developed a civilization completely independently. We'd be able to build shuttles with current technology and trade back and forth...or fight each other.

[Yatagan]

(01-22-2015 09:41 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

(01-22-2015 09:37 PM)Seboist Wrote:  

There's still the possibility of finding alien life in own solar system in places like Europa and Enceladus(even if just bacterial in form).

Wouldn't it be cool if there were two habitable planets in one solar system? Imagine if instead of Mars, there was another Earth-like planet in the same place that developed a civilization completely independently. We'd be able to build shuttles with current technology and trade back and forth...or fight each other.

What about three habitable planets with Mars and Venus? We could've had them fight over the Earth, like in this TZ ep.

[Paracelsus]

(01-21-2015 08:57 AM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

We probably live in out the boonies. Bum Fuck Egypt in the Milky Way. The distances between solar systems alone is ridiculous. Planets like Kepler 22B are just too far away. No one would live long enough to get to it, even if you could technically. Other systems have more earth like-ish planets in their same solar system but we are too far from even the closest one, it basically becomes futile.

That actually is a really interesting thought. In Freakonomics, the authors argue that technological advancement is heavily correlated with urbanisation for no other reason than that the people with the constituent ideas and resources to build a given technology are closer together, so the chances of their meeting and the means with which to make the advancement happen are much greater and much more easily assembled, respectively.

Admittedly the distances between stars even in the heavily-packed centre of the Milky Way are gargantuan, but note how on Earth the cultures and civilisations that were in contact with several others thrived via trade and exchange of ideas (see: most of the Mediterranean and throughout Central Asia) while rough monocultures that were geographically isolated (Aboriginal, Indian, South American to some extent) stagnated and died out. Perhaps we're disadvantaged by living out in the boonies; we've not encountered any other civilisations because who could be bothered to come out here to the edge of the galaxy when they probably have abundant resources closer to the centre?

[speakeasy]

(02-04-2015 12:17 AM)Paracelsus Wrote:  

Perhaps we're disadvantaged by living out in the boonies; we've not encountered any other civilisations because who could be bothered to come out here to the edge of the galaxy when they probably have abundant resources closer to the centre?

The earth has been getting visited for a long time. Take a look at Project Bluebook. Our government admits the existence of UFOs. Our government was forced to investigate the UFO phenomenon due to the sheer number of Air Force pilots that reported them, both visually and on radar.

Google "The battle of Los Angeles".




The stars are distant, but distance is relative. If you'd asked people 500 years ago whether humans will walk on the moon, they'd have said no because it's impossible for a boat to fly. We'll figure out a way to cross these distances in reasonable time. I have no doubt in my mind. It'll come from some technology and physics that we just aren't aware of at the present moment.

[RexImperator]

I wonder though if being closer to the center exposes your planet to more risks of a gamma-ray burst or other deadly phenomena. Some astrophysicists theorize that there are certain "habitable zones" within galaxies more likely to support life than others.

[Paracelsus]

(02-04-2015 12:37 AM)speakeasy Wrote:  

(02-04-2015 12:17 AM)Paracelsus Wrote:  

Perhaps we're disadvantaged by living out in the boonies; we've not encountered any other civilisations because who could be bothered to come out here to the edge of the galaxy when they probably have abundant resources closer to the centre?

The earth has been getting visited for a long time. Take a look at Project Bluebook. Our government admits the existence of UFOs. Our government was forced to investigate the UFO phenomenon due to the sheer number of Air Force pilots that reported them, both visually and on radar.

Google "The battle of Los Angeles".




The stars are distant, but distance is relative. If you'd asked people 500 years ago whether humans will walk on the moon, they'd have said no because it's impossible for a boat to fly. We'll figure out a way to cross these distances in reasonable time. I have no doubt in my mind. It'll come from some technology and physics that we just aren't aware of at the present moment.

Honestly I think it's going to take another 500 years to figure that technology out, if we ever figure it out at all. There's a hell of a difference between the distance between the Earth and the Moon and Earth and the nearest star. Breaking the speed of sound was just a matter of time, but breaking the speed of light is pretty much required for crossing the vast gulfs of space in anything but a generation ship or centuries-long hibernation sleep. Even what I find the most beautiful theoretical model for getting around the speed of light -- the Alcubierre Drive starship that bends space around it -- is freely admitted by the guy who imagined it as a really, really big longshot that just about requires a form of Unobtainium to function.

Don't get me wrong, I believe fully in colonisation and exploration of space. Leaving all your breeding pairs in one place subject to an asteroid extinction event is a retarded way to run a species. And I think the species all but needs borders and territories to push against: the first colonists to other worlds in our solar system will, I hope, have a lot in common with their ancestors who went in covered wagons.

RexImperator Wrote:

I wonder though if being closer to the center exposes your planet to more risks of a gamma-ray burst or other deadly phenomena. Some astrophysicists theorize that there are certain "habitable zones" within galaxies more likely to support life than others.

Probably - since the stars are packed closer together there's more chance of one of them blowing up in a supernova wiping out your civilisation. On the other hand, if you've started in one of the galaxy's 'sweet spots' and develop the technology required to shift spacetime around your ship such that you can beat lightspeed, you'd think that rerouting radiation around your planet in the event of a disaster would be a snap. Or indeed rerouting a particular band of electromagnetic energy while still allowing visible light through like a piece of coloured cellophane.

...in fact I wonder if that's why we don't see or hear other civilisations: if they're using the sort of technology that allows them to warp spacetime around their ships, we wouldn't be able to detect them. Light would pass around them as if they had an invisibility cloak -- albeit there might still be slight signatures where space ripples or is folded around the ship, just as gravity distorts light's movement around stars.

[Handsome Creepy Eel]

Doesn't having an atmosphere protect against gamma ray bursts?

[speakeasy]

(02-04-2015 02:54 AM)Handsome Creepy Eel Wrote:  

Doesn't having an atmosphere protect against gamma ray bursts?

No. A gamma ray burst is unbelievably powerful. The atmosphere protects against cosmic rays however.

[TravelerKai]

There are very large human skeletons in the ground, but not a shred of evidence there are or were any aliens. Anyone saying there are aliens inside any UFO event, needs to take off the tinfoil hat. Most UFOs are just experimental spy planes or weather machines.

Paracelus makes a good point about the benefit of not being near any Supernova capable stars. That would be bad indeed. Rex too when he mentioned gamma radiation, something that can come off supernova and other exotic stars.

Even with light speed travel guys, where can you go if you would die long before reaching it? Nothing worth traveling to, is close enough to reach in a lifetime at that speed. Figure out a way around that problem first then it might make some logical sense.

Edit: I kinda take that back some. There is a list here, of stars that are <50 or so light years, that if you could travel that fast, you could try to find out what planets they have orbiting them.

Any ship driving that fast better have a good suspension to avoid running into shit. Would make a curb smash a massive understatement.

[speakeasy]

(02-04-2015 11:22 AM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

There are very large human skeletons in the ground, but not a shred of evidence there are or were any aliens. Anyone saying there are aliens inside any UFO event, needs to take off the tinfoil hat. Most UFOs are just experimental spy planes or weather machines.

Some are, some clearly are not.

Have you ever really looked into this topic or are you just reacting with knee-jerk skepticism because you don't like the subject matter?

Did you not see what I wrote above? Our own government officially acknowledged the UFO phenomenon. If these were spy planes and weather balloons they'd have known about it, why would they have opened up an investigation for something they already knew about?

Read that incident I mentioned above that happened over Los Angeles during WWII and witnessed by tens of thousands of people with photos in the L.A. Times: http://www.sott.net/article/132795-Eyewi...os-Angeles

I know some of you will laugh that this is a link to that ancient aliens show, but just put that aside for a moment, basically it's just an interview with some of the people who witnessed the account with a bit of re-enactment of the incident.

Please don't tell me that this was a weather balloon, because no "balloon" made on earth is impervious to thousands of rounds of anti-aircraft fire. And certainly no secret spy plane would be tested over one of the most populated cities in the country, let alone have an inability to be shot down.

So were all those people who saw this just having a mass hallucination? Were all those gunners with anti-aircraft weapons wearing tinfoil hats too? Occam's Razor says whatever the fuck that was, it did not come from this world.

If you take the time to look, there's lot of solid reports from reliable people in the air force. They don't let crackpots become air force pilots. During WWII, pilots on all sides, American, German and Japanese reporting seeing UFOs following their planes. At the time, the pilots referred to them as "foo fighters". Strange objects that would follow their planes that could not be shot down or outmanuevered. During the time, they thought it was an secret weapon by the other side. It was after the war that we found out that wasn't the case.

Check this out too: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/a...nglia.html

Many airline pilots once retired and under no threat of losing their jobs by being called "crackpots" will admit to have seen UFOs during their career. Some of the descriptions being vivid to the point that it can't be explained away with the usual weather balloon nonsense. These are lifetime aviators that take their jobs very seriously, they know better than anyone else what an anomaly is in the sky. These stories are easily found if you want to read about the accounts yourself. I don't believe all these air force and commercial pilots are "mass hallucinating" or wearing tin foil hats.

[TravelerKai]

(02-04-2015 01:07 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

(02-04-2015 11:22 AM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

There are very large human skeletons in the ground, but not a shred of evidence there are or were any aliens. Anyone saying there are aliens inside any UFO event, needs to take off the tinfoil hat. Most UFOs are just experimental spy planes or weather machines.

Some are, some clearly are not.

Have you ever really looked into this topic or are you just reacting with knee-jerk skepticism because you don't like the subject matter?

Did you not see what I wrote above? Our own government officially acknowledged the UFO phenomenon. If these were spy planes and weather balloons they'd have known about it, why would they have opened up an investigation for something they already knew about?

Read that incident I mentioned above that happened over Los Angeles during WWII and witnessed by tens of thousands of people with photos in the L.A. Times: http://www.sott.net/article/132795-Eyewi...os-Angeles

I know some of you will laugh that this is a link to that ancient aliens show, but just put that aside for a moment, basically it's just an interview with some of the people who witnessed the account with a bit of re-enactment of the incident.


Please don't tell me that this was a weather balloon, because no "balloon" made on earth is impervious to thousands of rounds of anti-aircraft fire. And certainly no secret spy plane would be tested over one of the most populated cities in the country, let alone have an inability to be shot down.

So were all those people who saw this just having a mass hallucination? Were all those gunners with anti-aircraft weapons wearing tinfoil hats too? Occam's Razor says whatever the fuck that was, it did not come from this world.

If you take the time to look, there's lot of solid reports from reliable people in the air force. They don't let crackpots become air force pilots. During WWII, pilots on all sides, American, German and Japanese reporting seeing UFOs following their planes. At the time, the pilots referred to them as "foo fighters". Strange objects that would follow their planes that could not be shot down or outmanuevered. During the time, they thought it was an secret weapon by the other side. It was after the war that we found out that wasn't the case.

Check this out too: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/a...nglia.html

Many airline pilots once retired and under no threat of losing their jobs by being called "crackpots" will admit to have seen UFOs during their career. Some of the descriptions being vivid to the point that it can't be explained away with the usual weather balloon nonsense. These are lifetime aviators that take their jobs very seriously, they know better than anyone else what an anomaly is in the sky. These stories are easily found if you want to read about the accounts yourself. I don't believe all these air force and commercial pilots are "mass hallucinating" or wearing tin foil hats.

I am a trained Historian and I know better than to take what the "govt" says like that, especially with that poor of context. http://www.foia.gov/ cannot give you everything. Extensions and National Security exceptions are given all the fucking time. It's sooooo frustrating, every year waiting to see what new and juicy stuff is going to be made available only to get a shit load of black bars all over the documents.

Prior to 9-11 most govt. agencies never collaborated. Even today not all parts of the US military divulges all information with each other. Most JSOC/Joint Operations stuff is mostly for Special Forces operations, SOG/Delta/DevGRU, stuff and very little to do outside of that. In other words they concentrate on fighting and not RnD.

In plain English what that means is that the US Air Force or Navy is not going to share stuff cross-branch with other branches. Then when the 50 years passes and Joe Blow Historian at University of xxxx wants to do some digging for a project with his professors, requests documents about stuff, they get black bars all over it and sometimes flat out denied. FOIA is bullshit. If you are tremendously lucky you can find clues in some stuff, but it's not enough. There has been enough given out that show that early spy drone experimentation had confirmed many UFO sightings. The SR71 Blackbird is another one.

So basically I bring up all this FOIA stuff to say that, this would be the closest thing to actual proof you could get, yet you cannot obtain any physical proof or records of alien caused UFO activity because of US government political maneuvering around the FOIA law.

50 years from now, you probably won't get anything hardly on F-22s and Stealth bomber testing and research either. They will get heavy redaction.

Also an eyewitness from the Airforce does not mean that they should know what those things are. Certain divisions within are very secretive with the rest. The groups that handle the ICBMs know stuff the rest will never know. Everytime someone asks a pilot for his 2 cents in an interview, I shake my head. So what? His division is not in the know! Big deal! They would get more information if they hacked Lockheed Martin or Grumman's servers and stole their Intellectual Property like the Chinese does. Not by asking a retired pilot.

[speakeasy]

So what do you think was witnessed over Los Angeles during WWII?

[TravelerKai]

(02-04-2015 01:26 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

So what do you think was witnessed over Los Angeles during WWII?

I have no idea. The military said the problem was that they opened fire on weather ballons. That could have been one branch of the military shit testing another's readiness. Who knows.

It wasn't a real battle though. A battle would imply fighting between two sides. This was a one sided thing as far as I know.

You could not convince me that it was aliens in UFOs though. You would need some kind of physical evidence to substantiate that. Something UFO conspiracy hunters can never get.

[Old Fritz]

(02-04-2015 01:41 PM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

(02-04-2015 01:26 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

So what do you think was witnessed over Los Angeles during WWII?

I have no idea. The military said the problem was that they opened fire on weather ballons. That could have been one branch of the military shit testing another's readiness. Who knows.

It wasn't a real battle though. A battle would imply fighting between two sides. This was a one sided thing as far as I know.

You could not convince me that it was aliens in UFOs though. You would need some kind of physical evidence to substantiate that. Something UFO conspiracy hunters can never get.

What do you think happened at Roswell?

[speakeasy]

(02-04-2015 01:41 PM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

(02-04-2015 01:26 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

So what do you think was witnessed over Los Angeles during WWII?

I have no idea. The military said the problem was that they opened fire on weather ballons. That could have been one branch of the military shit testing another's readiness. Who knows.

It wasn't a real battle though. A battle would imply fighting between two sides. This was a one sided thing as far as I know.

You could not convince me that it was aliens in UFOs though. You would need some kind of physical evidence to substantiate that. Something UFO conspiracy hunters can never get.

But surely even a skeptic has to see the strong possibility that the default weather balloon explanation is thrown out so that civilians don't panic. Common sense says it clearly couldn't be a weather balloon because no weather balloon can survive thousands of rounds of anti-aircraft fire. Anyone that really believes that was a balloon sounds like the one that needs to be wearing the tin foil.

We know it wasn't the Japanese. They have no records of any aircraft flying over the west coast. And at that time, the only aircraft that could silently fly over a city at very low speed was a zeppelin and that would've been destroyed instantly in the barrage of fire. Not to mention it would probably not have flown all the way across the Pacific unnoticed.

One branch of the military testing the readiness of the other branch with a secret spy plane? A saucer shaped craft that can fly without the use of jets or propellers and can't be shot down? I don't believe one branch would do something like that against the other branch. Especially over a major city where shrapnel is likely to get civilians killed. And if we had this type of technology in the 1940s, why are we still in 2015 using fighter jets? Wouldn't this have been handy to use in Vietnam or the Gulf Wars?

I don't buy any of the government's explanations, they are so transparent that they really insult anyone's intelligence.

[TravelerKai]

(02-04-2015 02:48 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

(02-04-2015 01:41 PM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

(02-04-2015 01:26 PM)speakeasy Wrote:  

So what do you think was witnessed over Los Angeles during WWII?

I have no idea. The military said the problem was that they opened fire on weather ballons. That could have been one branch of the military shit testing another's readiness. Who knows.

It wasn't a real battle though. A battle would imply fighting between two sides. This was a one sided thing as far as I know.

You could not convince me that it was aliens in UFOs though. You would need some kind of physical evidence to substantiate that. Something UFO conspiracy hunters can never get.

But surely even a skeptic has to see the strong possibility that the default weather balloon explanation is thrown out so that civilians don't panic. Common sense says it clearly couldn't be a weather balloon because no weather balloon can survive thousands of rounds of anti-aircraft fire. Anyone that really believes that was a balloon sounds like the one that needs to be wearing the tin foil.

We know it wasn't the Japanese. They have no records of any aircraft flying over the west coast. And at that time, the only aircraft that could silently fly over a city at very low speed was a zeppelin and that would've been destroyed instantly in the barrage of fire. Not to mention it would probably not have flown all the way across the Pacific unnoticed.

One branch of the military testing the readiness of the other branch with a secret spy plane? A saucer shaped craft that can fly without the use of jets or propellers and can't be shot down? I don't believe one branch would do something like that against the other branch. Especially over a major city where shrapnel is likely to get civilians killed. And if we had this type of technology in the 1940s, why are we still in 2015 using fighter jets? Wouldn't this have been handy to use in Vietnam or the Gulf Wars?

I don't buy any of the government's explanations, they are so transparent that they really insult anyone's intelligence.

You make it sound like their rounds actually hit anything at all. Where is the proof of that? No confirmed kills, hits, etc. Eyewitnesses talking about a saucer shape does not equate to any real proof.

How do you know that whatever was shot down was not picked up by the USAF afterwards? There are several documented UFO sightings/events where government people came ad retrieved things.

If you want to talk about flight technology, do not mistake "saucer shape" for "advanced technology". Something without wings is not automatically better than something without wings. An entire field of advanced aeronautics and ballistics (Rocket Science basically) exists to improve flight of objects without wings.

Have you ever heard of the U-2 spy plane project? The prototypes of the many U-2 types have caused many sightings. Some of this did not become somewhat official until pretty recently. The U-2 projects was also older than many think they are.

NASA was a front for ICBM missile technology and Star Wars initiatives, in order to defeat the Soviet Union. Exploration was always second. They toyed with many prototypes in the skies. Since ICBMs are perfected more or less, and companies like Raytheon provide the bulk of the research, NASA isn't needed as much. Everyone thinking it was just a fight between Republicans and Democrats are falling for the okeydoke.

If aliens existed, why do they only seem to interact with the government? Why do people who claim they were visited often recall their experiences in dreams or during sleep? I cannot analyze stuff like this as a historic or factual record of evidence. I won't call it bullshit, but I cannot say it has any weight.

The sheer amount of tangible pieces of evidence of alien existence that no one can produce is staggering. Few other topics in human history have anywhere near the amount of vagueness that UFO/alien claims do. I cannot think of anything else off the top of my head. Even evidence of ghosts and spirits have tons of evidence that can be looked at and studied. Especially in the past 5 years. Aliens? Nothing. Just low resolution saucer shape photos in the sky with no distance references at best.

When the US govt. is the only entity that fully knows what is UFO/alien or not, that should set off your bullshit alarm that they are playing with toys they do not want you to know about. If you think about it, putting flashing lights and shiny round metal on flying things makes it harder for your enemies to see what it really is and makes eye witnesses look like idiots for telling anyone what they just saw.

I live in Houston. Ellington Air Force Base is very close by. They on rare occasions fly a ton of Apaches out at night and scare the shit out of everyone. Sometimes they are not painted black either. Sometimes during the daytime you see stuff. I have seen silver bullet looking objects flying as fast as a missile with rainbow like lights. There are many other places in the US that are near bases that run strange ops all the time. Doesn't mean it's extraterrestrial. It just means the military industrial complex is still running strong.

[Giovonny]

We can only observe a tiny fraction of whats out there.

That's what I see in this beautiful photo.

(01-22-2015 12:47 PM)Excelsior Wrote:  

Even in the off-chance that life does exist elsewhere

The off chance?

Mathematically speaking, isn't there a higher probability of life existing somewhere else in the universe rather than NOT..?

Basically, there are so many millions, billions, and trillions of universes out there -- that the probability of life existing somewhere else is actually quite high. In fact, it's higher than the probability of life NOT existing somewhere else.

Right?

***

I don't know if life aliens exist or not.

But, if you want to talk about "chance". The "chances" that they exist are actually better than the "chances" that they don't exist, statistically speaking.

Keep in mind that we believe the universe is constantly expanding and adding new planets, etc.

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

[speakeasy]

(02-04-2015 03:42 PM)TravelerKai Wrote:  

You make it sound like their rounds actually hit anything at all. Where is the proof of that? No confirmed kills, hits, etc.

14,000 rounds and not a single hit on low-flying craft traveling at the speed of a blimp? I guess that means our military must've really sucked.

Quote:

Eyewitnesses talking about a saucer shape does not equate to any real proof.

If thousands of unrelated witnesses said they saw you shoot someone, most courts would take that as sufficient evidence that you did it, even if they don't have the actual gun you used as physical evidence.

The photo taken that appeared in the LA Times corroborates that it was a saucer shaped object. Looking at the negative film version, you can clearly see the shape(caught in the spotlights):

Quote:

How do you know that whatever was shot down was not picked up by the USAF afterwards? There are several documented UFO sightings/events where government people came ad retrieved things.

Nobody said the craft was shot down. Nobody knows what happened to it. Witnesses said it moved south from the Pacific Palisades area down toward the south bay and then out over the ocean. It was night time.

Quote:

Have you ever heard of the U-2 spy plane project? The prototypes of the many U-2 types have caused many sightings. Some of this did not become somewhat official until pretty recently. The U-2 projects was also older than many think they are.

Yes, I'm familiar with the U-2 plane. But that was no U-2 those cannons were shooting at.

Quote:

If aliens existed, why do they only seem to interact with the government? Why do people who claim they were visited often recall their experiences in dreams or during sleep? I cannot analyze stuff like this as a historic or factual record of evidence. I won't call it bullshit, but I cannot say it has any weight.

I don't make any claims of who they may or may not interact with. Evidence for that kind of stuff is much more spotty. But I think given the aerial incident above Los Angeles and all the reports from military and commercial pilots, I think there's something to this UFO phenomenon that can't be swept under the rug with claims of hallucinations.

Quote:

I live in Houston. Ellington Air Force Base is very close by. They on rare occasions fly a ton of Apaches out at night and scare the shit out of everyone. Sometimes they are not painted black either. Sometimes during the daytime you see stuff. I have seen silver bullet looking objects flying as fast as a missile with rainbow like lights. There are many other places in the US that are near bases that run strange ops all the time. Doesn't mean it's extraterrestrial. It just means the military industrial complex is still running strong.

I have no doubt that some of the UFO sightings are of craft made by our own air force. I just don't think all of them are. I've seen strange things in the sky myself, but if they are at a distance then I don't make any assumptions. But in some cases pilots see these things at pretty close range or they are caught on radar accelerating at speeds that defy any human technology(like the inertial force alone would kill human occupants).

[TravelerKai]

I get what your trying to say. Logically it is correct that even circumstantial or no evidence does not automatically mean we have not been visited.

I just think the evidence is stacked much higher against alien visitation. The lack of any physical evidence is just too much of an issue to even give that thought any serious validity, in my opinion. If there was ever a good time for one of those past aliens to visit, now would be it. Everyone has a fairly high resolution device to record something. We could find use of a nonhuman enemy to force us to drop our internal squabbles against one another.

I think what Excelsior has said is more realistic. There is probably life on other planets from bacteria to probably bi pedal walking creatures. Maybe there are advanced ones somewhere we might meet in Heaven if we get there. The sheer craziness of the distances between objects in space is just ridiculous. If it were not for the lightyear distance problem, we would know alot more than we do now obviously.

In other news, this summer should be badass. In case you guys forgot: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons

The probe will be near Pluto and it's moon in July. We should put up a Pluto watch party thread when the time comes.