Question Why We Haven’t Met Any Aliens Yet?

[Catastrophe]

do they even exist

Astronomers estimate that the universe could contain up to one septillion stars – that's a one followed by 24 zeros. Our Milky Way alone contains more than 100 billion, including our most well-studied star, the Sun.

If we just take 1 planet per star (and we have 8 major planets around ours) then that gives a rough estimate of the numbers of planets.

We should allow for the fact that simple life is probably extremely common - just look at the diversity of life on our planet. The number of species is estimated:

Some more recent studies estimate that this figure is as much as one trillion. One of the most widely cited figures comes from Camilo Mora and colleagues; they estimated that there are around 8.7 million species on Earth today.

Intelligent life will be less common, but 1 in a billion planets with intelligent species in the Milky Way could total 100 . One in a million could total 100 million.

Would you give me a £1 bet with odds of a million to one in my favour (that there is even one other planet in the Milky Way with intelligent life, or on which remains of intelligent life might be found? I think not!

Cat

 

[Catastrophe]

There are difficulties in proving intelligent life exists in the Universe, or just in the Milky Way, but all it would take is just one alien satellite in orbit around Earth (and I get my million).

Improbable, but not impossible. 'Unmanned' satellites could be sent over vast distances at very high speeds (compared to vessels containing living beings) and put into orbit by intelligent machines. Astronomers today use more sophisticated equipment than slide rules.

Cat

 

[Macrocompassion]

We haven't yet met any aliens because there are none. However the participating life-forms that have visited our planet are seeking friend-ship not alien-ship. Also they are a bit shy of starting trouble with our military forces because the way we behave is strange to them and vice-versa. From the many reports that we get of such encounters, it appears that even when they occasionally crash-land or get into difficulties, we are unable to understand how to help them, and so the situation between them and ourselves gets more difficult.

It has been suggested that past human civilization here on earth did meet and get help in engineering projects from such visitors who were able to establish more satisfactory relationships. This may have been because those civilisations were less well developed technically and faded out later after the help was unable to keep up with the other changes that were happening, like warfare, disease and political rivalry. We don't seem to have learned anything from these unfortunate experiences, but don't blame the extra-terrestrials for it!

 

[Catastrophe]

We haven't yet met any aliens because there are none.

I have the greatest respect for those who know everything.

Cat

Wiki definition:

In law, an alien is any person (including an organization) who is not a citizen or a national of a specific country, although definitions and terminology differ to some degree depending upon the continent or region. More generally, however, the term "alien" is perceived as synonymous with foreign national.[5]

 

[billslugg]

Extraterrestrial visitors are more properly defined in federal law as "inadmissable aliens" since they are not US nationals and are not in possession of a valid US entry visa.

 

[Catastrophe]

I was doubting the accuracy of this statement:

We haven't yet met any aliens because there are none.

Does anyone disagree?

Cat

See #104 for definitionn:

In law, an alien is any person (including an organization) who is not a citizen or a national of a specific country, although definitions and terminology differ to some degree depending upon the continent or region. More generally, however, the term "alien" is perceived as synonymous with foreign national.[5]

 

[billslugg]

The absence of extraterrestrial intelligence can only be disproven, not proven. Those who make the claim there is no extraterrestrial intelligence can never be proven right, only proven wrong.

I believe there is abundant intelligence out there, but I also believe the distances are too great for us to be able to detect it with current equipment.

 

[Catastrophe]

It is correct to say "We know of none".

It is not correct to say "We know that there is/are none".

If you have no information about a particular occurrence,

it is correct to say "We do not know that it happened today".

It is not correct to say "We know that it happened today".

It may be correct for a person to say "I know of no gold in the human body".

It is not correct for a person to say "there is no gold in the human body".

The human body is composed of many elements, including Gold in trace amounts. According to the technical treatise, The Elements Third Edition, written by John Emsley and published by the Clarendon Press, Oxford in 1998, the average person's body weighing 70 kilograms would contain a total mass of 0.2 milligrams of gold.

This is just about semantics. There may be a difference between what one person knows and what many people (think that they) know.

I stated that the following statement (Macrocompassion) is inaccurate.

We haven't yet met any aliens because there are none.

You stated

I believe there is abundant intelligence out there, but I also believe the distances are too great for us to be able to detect it with current equipment.

and I agree with you.


Cat

 

[Classical Motion]

I would call those statements probability bias.

 

[Catastrophe]

Probability and randomness biases refer to a range of cognitive biases that affect how people perceive, evaluate, and respond to probabilities and uncertainty. They can cause people to make errors in judgment and decision-making when trying to assess the likelihood of events and outcomes.

I agree, but that does not prevent one from saying that

We haven't yet met any aliens because there are none.

this statement is inaccurate/incorrect.

Page 2 - are we alone in this totality?

Page 2 - Seeking answers about space? Join the Space community: the premier source of space exploration, innovation, and astronomy news, chronicling (and celebrating) humanity's ongoing expansion across the final frontier.

forums.space.com

Cat

 

[Classical Motion]

I think it would be more probable to say that there is none. That’s based on a ~14 BLY existence. And the area of it.

My probability is based on EM detection, not a guessed inventory. EM detection ignores inventory. It covers area and time with out an inventory. Or any other conditions. And an EM detection does not require intelligent life.

So, for me, this is right until it’s proved wrong. I use the evidence we have.

 

[Catastrophe]

We haven't yet met any aliens because there are none.

The "are" refers back to "aliens".

It would be incorrect to say "We haven't yet met any aliens because there is none."

The test is whether
"We haven't yet met any aliens because there is no aliens." or
"We haven't yet met any aliens because there are no aliens."
sounds correct.

Cat

 

[Catastrophe]

"English language grammarians debate whether “none” is singular or plural, but the simple answer is that it can be both. This is because “none” can mean both "not one" and "not any," and depending on the context of the sentence, a singular or plural verb might be a more natural fit."

Cat

 

[Atlan0001]

The more "all-life-in-one-basket" a life species becomes, the higher in the pyramid it becomes (the apex of the pyramid), the more complex the species (singularly plural) becomes, the more chaotic it becomes, the more "alien" (alienated) it becomes. Which means nothing more nor less than the more revolutionary "evolutionary" it becomes!

We are the walking, talking, tree of branching evolution, the whole branching forest of branching trees in fact, in one dangerous basket un-born as yet to the wider universe we mass-energy-body of dividing cells are supposed to be birthing up and out to. Divide out (more benignly in an opening frontier system). . . or divide within (energies crunching more virulently malignantly in a more closed and closing system)!

 

[Macrocompassion]

What makes us think that extra-terrestrials are alien to our ways? Perhaps they find us so similar to themselves that they are simply not interested!

 

[Catastrophe]

What makes us think that extra-terrestrials are alien to our ways? Perhaps they find us so similar to themselves that they are simply not interested!

Sorry, this is just IMHO playing with semantics.

We were not discussing "alien to our ways".
You are suggesting a different meaning to "alien".

Google "definition of alien"

adjective

1. 1.
   belonging to a foreign country.
   "an alien culture"
   
   2.
   unfamiliar and disturbing or distasteful.
   "principles that are alien to them"
   
   

noun

1. 1.
   a foreigner, especially one who is not a naturalized citizen of the country where he or she is living.
   "an enemy alien"
   
   2.
   a hypothetical or fictional being from another world.
   "she discovers that the alien's spaceship has crashed"
   
   

 

[Catastrophe]

Note the difference between adjective and noun.

As an adjective, it can just mean unfamiliar.
It is as a noun, that a meaning is foreigner.

Note the derivation:

How did the word alien originate?


The first records of the word alien come from around 1300. It ultimately comes from the Latin word aliēnus, meaning “foreign,” which itself comes from the word alius, meaning “other.”

Ultimately, it comes back to different.

Foreigners are "other", before coming from a different place/planet.

Anyway, this is getting beside the point.

My criticism was with suggesting that there are no aliens. We just don't know.


Cat

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

A case for definition of terms: Before we can have true communications, you must first absolutely know what I am saying, I must absolutely know what you are saying. and we must be able to absolutely tell each other what the other one has said. Else that word map on which we rely will steer us in the wrong direction.

 

[Atlan0001]

A case for definition of terms: Before we can have true communications, you must first absolutely know what I am saying, I must absolutely know what you are saying. and we must be able to absolutely tell each other what the other one has said. Else that word map on which we rely will steer us in the wrong direction.

Never going to happen! Language doesn't deal in absolutes. Babel, babel, babel! And, as Winston Churchill famously said about the English language, "We are separated by a common language." A word can have several, even opposed, meanings. Aussie English, to me, the worst example (more so than my own American English, or even the terrible Britisher's English).

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

Never going to happen! Language doesn't deal in absolutes. Babel, babel, babel! And, as Winston Churchill famously said about the English language, "We are separated by a common language." A word can have several, even opposed, meanings. Aussie English, to me, the worst example (more so than my own American English, or even the terrible Britisher's English).

Too bad, because in the end, the common language barrier just makes for a good debate ...without having to expect real progress.

 

[billslugg]

"Alien" is a general term for anything unfamiliar. In our case we are interested in a sub-class known as "extraterrestrial", or "not of this Earth". They can be identified, unambiguously, with 100% certainty, able to withstand the highest level of scientific scrutiny, by a simple test can be run at any univerity with a physics program. Laser ablation mass spectrometry can detail the isotopic composition and allow us to specify where in the Solar System or from which star near us, the aliens came from.
The amount of material needed to make such a slam dunk conclusion is equivalent to the amount in a grain of salt. Given the multitude of claims of being abducted, it seems strange no one has come back with as little as a match book cover from a UFO waiting room.

 

[Atlan0001]

"Alien" is a general term for anything unfamiliar. In our case we are interested in a sub-class known as "extraterrestrial", or "not of this Earth". They can be identified, unambiguously, with 100% certainty, able to withstand the highest level of scientific scrutiny, by a simple test can be run at any univerity with a physics program. Laser ablation mass spectrometry can detail the isotopic composition and allow us to specify where in the Solar System or from which star near us, the aliens came from.
The amount of material needed to make such a slam dunk conclusion is equivalent to the amount in a grain of salt. Given the multitude of claims of being abducted, it seems strange no one has come back with as little as a match book cover from a UFO waiting room.

Bill, I'm pretty sure you couldn't identify an alien lifeform from the far reaches of the universe if you stepped in it.

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

Bill, I'm pretty sure you couldn't identify an alien lifeform from the far reaches of the universe if you stepped in it.

Bill has a point. Although no one ever agreed that we would be speaking about extra-terrestrials (aka beings not of this earth) the premise which in my opinion is readily identifiable; is and has been about just that kind of alien. So, perhaps we should agree that the term alien as it is used in this particular thread should at minimum have at its core an extra-terrestrial connotation.

 

[Catastrophe]

A case for definition of terms: Before we can have true communications, you must first absolutely know what I am saying, I must absolutely know what you are saying. and we must be able to absolutely tell each other what the other one has said. Else that word map on which we rely will steer us in the wrong direction.

Arturo,

You are preaching to the converted.

If you have not read "Science and Sanity" by Alfred Korzybski, I believe that you (like most others, also) would benefit from it. I first read (all of) it decades ago.

Korzybski, a renowned philosopher and semanticist, delves into the intricacies of human thought and perception, laying the foundation for General Semantics—a discipline that challenges conventional notions of language and cognition. 'Science and Sanity' has become a cornerstone reference in the world of null-a, with its profound insights resonating across various intellectual realms.

Rather than the entire book (about 950 pages), there is now a shortened version:
Selections from. (The original can be upwards of £60!)

Google Search

Prices are all over the place and need careful checking.

Cat

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

Arturo,

You are preaching to the converted.

If you have not read "Science and Sanity" by Alfred Korzybski, I believe that you (like most others, also) would benefit from it. I first read (all of) it decades ago.

Rather than the entire book (about 950 pages), there is now a shortened version:
Selections from. (The original can be upwards of £60!)



Prices are all over the place and need careful checking.

Cat

I haven't read the book. I was paraphrasing what an instructor once said to me a while ago (when I was still a young buck in the military) about the need for true Commnications and the only real way to be sure it has been achieved. If I remember correctly, he concluded by saying "when you and whoever you are talking with have reached the same conclusion about what the other says. Then, and only then, you have been able to communicate.

But hey I'll look up the book see what else I can learn.