To be fair physicists studying things such as the start of the universe don't normally schedule long haul flights, most of which are twin jets now. They are just theories. I remember studying GCSE Chemistry and then going on to A Level and being taught that the stuff we learned at GCSE was bobbins because generally at that age you couldn't get you head around it.
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Is there life out there?
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To be fair physicists studying things such as the start of the universe don't normally schedule long haul flights, most of which are twin jets now. They are just theories. I remember studying GCSE Chemistry and then going on to A Level and being taught that the stuff we learned at GCSE was bobbins because generally at that age you couldn't get you head around it.
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Most scientists will actively proclaim that they do not know everything. Science is about filling in these gaps in our knowledge. And whenever we do fill the gaps, we often find that we create many more in the process. Most of what we know has huge gaps in it, and we should recognise that. But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to work out what's happening until we know everything, because we never will know everything. And we won't know anything if we don't at least know where we are now.
Some people say that science can't explain everything. Of course science can't explain everything. If it could, we wouldn't need to do it.
Some people say that science can't explain everything. Of course science can't explain everything. If it could, we wouldn't need to do it.
DynamicSpirit
Established Member
I agree with that, the great thing with science is that it tends to admit there are holes in the theory even when it largely seems to add up. Makes a lot more sense than to just say "It was God". As science fills in more and more of the holes where does religion go? That is not directed at anyone in particular Dynamic Spirit just in case it looked that way because I replied to you.
No problem. God vs science would certainly make for another interesting discussion
GrimsbyPacer
Established Member
Me123,
On your very good post earlier you made one mistake.
That it would take ages to get to the next star system 4 lightyears away with current tech.
In the 1970s the British Interplanetary Society studied the possible of going the 6 lightyears to Barnards Star in the opposite dirrection. The trip was to take 50 years for an unmanned probe. It had a max speed of 12% lightspeed. The problem with this fusion rocket is that it would need very very large amounts of helium-3 from Jupiter to work so Project Daedalus never happened.
The idea of interstellar travel didn't end there.
In the 1980 the USA's Nasa decided to design a ship using solely current tech to get to Alpha Centauri with Project Longshot.
This practical and clever starship was to be built at the Freedom Space station. As it was a nuclear fission ship rather than the fusion of the faster Daedalus above it would have taken 100 years at 4.5% light speed max.
In 2009 the study of the Daedalus resulted in Project Icarus which is still ongoing.
My favourite of the planned interstellar rockets is however the 1950s Project Orion. This would simply have blown nuclear bombs up behind the ship with the energy hitting a plate until a max 3% light speed was achieved. Slower designs were planned for Mars trips too, but, nuclear explosions in space are banned under international treaty.
The first ship to get to Alpha Centauri is launched in 2048 in Star Trek, the Enterprise XCV 330 which is also sub light speed. Hence why so many later ships bear that name.
I'm sure in the next century speeds will increase and don't forget warp is possible in the theory of relativity as are wormholes. So aliens might have them.
On your very good post earlier you made one mistake.
That it would take ages to get to the next star system 4 lightyears away with current tech.
In the 1970s the British Interplanetary Society studied the possible of going the 6 lightyears to Barnards Star in the opposite dirrection. The trip was to take 50 years for an unmanned probe. It had a max speed of 12% lightspeed. The problem with this fusion rocket is that it would need very very large amounts of helium-3 from Jupiter to work so Project Daedalus never happened.
The idea of interstellar travel didn't end there.
In the 1980 the USA's Nasa decided to design a ship using solely current tech to get to Alpha Centauri with Project Longshot.
This practical and clever starship was to be built at the Freedom Space station. As it was a nuclear fission ship rather than the fusion of the faster Daedalus above it would have taken 100 years at 4.5% light speed max.
In 2009 the study of the Daedalus resulted in Project Icarus which is still ongoing.
My favourite of the planned interstellar rockets is however the 1950s Project Orion. This would simply have blown nuclear bombs up behind the ship with the energy hitting a plate until a max 3% light speed was achieved. Slower designs were planned for Mars trips too, but, nuclear explosions in space are banned under international treaty.
The first ship to get to Alpha Centauri is launched in 2048 in Star Trek, the Enterprise XCV 330 which is also sub light speed. Hence why so many later ships bear that name.
I'm sure in the next century speeds will increase and don't forget warp is possible in the theory of relativity as are wormholes. So aliens might have them.
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But then again don't forget that a species that could harness a warp drive or wormholes may view us as mere parasites!
DaveNewcastle
Established Member
For me, the interesting consequence of this question isn't the instantiaion of life elsewhere - I'm not going to be very surprised if someone can tell me that a particulary remote planet has lichen, holly or even shrimps.
It is the follow-on from what philosophers call 'the hard problem' - the questions of "experience" and "consciousness". If there is an instance of things/ persons/ beings/ anything somewhere other than planet-earth which is subject to "experience" and which also 'experiences' "consciousness", then I would probably want to know about it. And if that instance of whatever-it-is which exibited "consciousness" also managed to so so collectively, through something resembling a language, then I would be very interested.
But until we can grasp the missing link (if indeed there is one) between physical life and "consciousness", "experience" and "language", then I'm stuck - it remains as plausible to me that old rocks or a thermostat are 'conscious' but simply choose not to, or cannot, reveal it to our own consiousness, as it is to suppose that creatures on another planet would necesarily be conscious language-users and that that might somehow be apparent and intelligible to us.
None of us have a clue why consciousness and language is exhibited by, and only by, brains in living animals which are alive and awake -and not even by all of them all the time. If we can understand that, then I'd be happier in knowing what the question suggests that it is that we would be looking for elsewhere.
It is the follow-on from what philosophers call 'the hard problem' - the questions of "experience" and "consciousness". If there is an instance of things/ persons/ beings/ anything somewhere other than planet-earth which is subject to "experience" and which also 'experiences' "consciousness", then I would probably want to know about it. And if that instance of whatever-it-is which exibited "consciousness" also managed to so so collectively, through something resembling a language, then I would be very interested.
But until we can grasp the missing link (if indeed there is one) between physical life and "consciousness", "experience" and "language", then I'm stuck - it remains as plausible to me that old rocks or a thermostat are 'conscious' but simply choose not to, or cannot, reveal it to our own consiousness, as it is to suppose that creatures on another planet would necesarily be conscious language-users and that that might somehow be apparent and intelligible to us.
None of us have a clue why consciousness and language is exhibited by, and only by, brains in living animals which are alive and awake -and not even by all of them all the time. If we can understand that, then I'd be happier in knowing what the question suggests that it is that we would be looking for elsewhere.
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GrimsbyPacer
Established Member
Ae you saying rocks maybe sone kind of inactive life for all we know?
Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
Once again, delving into the deepest recesses of my memory, I can state that in 1940, in the third Flash Gordon cimematic serialised series of films, an appearance of the Rock People was made.
GrimsbyPacer
Established Member
Also in Star Trek: The Original Series some non-humanoid silicon based rock lifeforms were not realised as life until the Enterprise arrived and sorted it out with Spock's mind meld abillity.
Splendid post! Of course we do not really know "whether" these attributes are exhibited solely in those circumstances either.
DaveNewcastle
Established Member
Well I don't think that for a moment.
But the difficulty question is how could we be sure that rocks are incapable of 'consciousness' and 'experience'?
If we simply say that it is because they don't have brains, then that presupposes that only brains can be conscious. And that is far from certain - and anyway, not all brains are conscious, and those that are, aren't conscious all the time.
The same difficulty applies to any other attempt to answer the question, so ultimately we are driven to say that, unless we can know what the neccesary conditions are for conscious experience, then we don't know what we'd be looking for "out there".
Much the same problem arises with language. Without knowing what the neccesary conditions are, then we don't know what to look for.
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DynamicSpirit
Established Member
I think you can go a bit further than that. You can associate the known instances of consciousness with certain observable processes - in particular, things like neurons in the brain firing. I don't know too much about the field but my very crude understanding is that scientists are even starting to be able to show that certain groups of neurons being stimulated is associated with certain conscious experiences. That association is at the very least suggestive of those kinds of events being a requirement for consciousness (although obviously it's nowhere near being a proof), which in turn rather suggests that - say - rocks - cannot be conscious because they don't contain anything capable of comparable physical processes.
DaveNewcastle
Established Member
Sorry, but logically defective - it't the conflation of correspondence with causality.
We really don't need to look into the complexities of what we know to be the true conditions which correspond with life, interesting as they are.
The challenge is in identifying those conditions which must always be necessary in every possible instantiation of conscious experience.
The 'correspondence vs causality' error leads us to conclusions such as 'traffic jams are caused by spark plugs' because they always co-exist.
I will remain unconvinced that consciousness is confined to brains, neurons, silicon or anything else until / if it becomes clear why any physical property should emerge with conscious experience. As a further illustration of the chalenge, can we think of any formula (scientific or populist) which contains an product which represents conscious experience?
No, we can't.
Neurons may well be the only necessary requirement for consciousness, but we're nowhere near a proof of that necessity. And if it is true, then our interest in "life out there" is going to be a very much narrower search than it could be.
GrimsbyPacer
Established Member
Artificial life such as Commander Data in Star Trek (androids in the future will exist) is proof brains and neurons aren't needed. Even experimental current Androids can learn, are aware of surroundings and can respond independently. Isn't that what consciousness is?
DynamicSpirit
Established Member
No, I don't agree, I'd be fairly sure it's not logically defective. If I'd said something like that the association proves the link, then that would have been logically defective. If I'd said something like the association gives strong evidence for the link, then that would also have been very questionable and requiring of much more information to substantiate the assertion.
But I didn't say either of those things. I said That association is at the very least suggestive of ....
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