• Voyager1 Encounters New Region in Deep Space
    127 replies, posted
[QUOTE=smeismastger;38698344]We were a lot more optimistic back then when it was launched. I think we seriously should cut any and all attempt at making contact with anyone until we have colonized Sol and have some capability to defend ourselves. Because I doubt any race would be so nice to suddenly give us technologies the moment they meet us.[/QUOTE] The universe is 13.75 billion years old. Humans have existed for 250,000 years. Civilization has existed for maybe 5,000 years. And our existence in the era of space, maybe sixty years. Even if every single star in the sky had a planet and every planet had life and every life-bearing planet produced intelligent life, the chance of our existence overlapping with the existence of another space-faring race is astronomically low. Humans as a species have existed for 0.0018% of the life of the universe. Humans with society have existed for 2% of that 0.0018%. We could go to Alpha Centauri and [i]even if[/i] we knew for certain that it had a planet that contained life, it is overwhelmingly likely that we would find either ancient ruins or pond scum. And that's assuming there's life there in the first place. Science fiction almost always uses parallel technological development because otherwise the story is much less interesting, but it's almost fantasy to think that we'll find alien life at all, let alone life within a few thousand years developmentally of us. We'd be 'defending ourselves' against apes or angels. The idea that we should stop what is pretty much an entirely symbolic attempt at contacting nonexistent extraterrestrial life because we need to build defenses that would only be effective against aliens at roughly our technological level is dumb.
[QUOTE=catbarf;38701174]The universe is 13.75 billion years old. Humans have existed for 250,000 years. Civilization has existed for maybe 5,000 years. And our existence in the era of space, maybe sixty years. Even if every single star in the sky had a planet and every planet had life and every life-bearing planet produced intelligent life, the chance of our existence overlapping with the existence of another space-faring race is astronomically low. Humans as a species have existed for 0.0018% of the life of the universe. Humans with society have existed for 2% of that 0.0018%. We could go to Alpha Centauri and [i]even if[/i] we knew for certain that it had a planet that contained life, it is overwhelmingly likely that we would find either ancient ruins or pond scum. And that's assuming there's life there in the first place. Science fiction almost always uses parallel technological development because otherwise the story is much less interesting, but it's almost fantasy to think that we'll find alien life at all, let alone life within a few thousand years developmentally of us. We'd be 'defending ourselves' against apes or angels. The idea that we should stop what is pretty much an entirely symbolic attempt at contacting nonexistent extraterrestrial life because we need to build defenses that would only be effective against aliens at roughly our technological level is dumb.[/QUOTE] Basically this. If we every encounter 'intelligent' life in the universe they'll either be cavemen or gods to us. The odds of them being at any kind of comparable technological level are obscenely low. If they were on the 'more advanced' side and they wanted to wipe us out in a second, then they probably would, and there's not much we could do to stop them.
[QUOTE=catbarf;38701174]The universe is 13.75 billion years old. Humans have existed for 250,000 years. Civilization has existed for maybe 5,000 years. And our existence in the era of space, maybe sixty years. Even if every single star in the sky had a planet and every planet had life and every life-bearing planet produced intelligent life, the chance of our existence overlapping with the existence of another space-faring race is astronomically low. Humans as a species have existed for 0.0018% of the life of the universe. Humans with society have existed for 2% of that 0.0018%. We could go to Alpha Centauri and [i]even if[/i] we knew for certain that it had a planet that contained life, it is overwhelmingly likely that we would find either ancient ruins or pond scum. And that's assuming there's life there in the first place. Science fiction almost always uses parallel technological development because otherwise the story is much less interesting, but it's almost fantasy to think that we'll find alien life at all, let alone life within a few thousand years developmentally of us. We'd be 'defending ourselves' against apes or angels. The idea that we should stop what is pretty much an entirely symbolic attempt at contacting nonexistent extraterrestrial life because we need to build defenses that would only be effective against aliens at roughly our technological level is dumb.[/QUOTE] To me the whole idea of Aliensalways was a projection of our fears and hopes as well as a tool to conduct thought experiments, just like asking someone "who would you rescue if you could rescue one person only" doesn't mean that you or the guy asking the question will ever be in that situation.
[QUOTE=JeanLuc761;38696931] [t]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bd/Voyager_Golden_Record_fx.png/598px-Voyager_Golden_Record_fx.png[/t] I'm somewhat surprised they included Earth's location on the disc. Here's hoping whatever intelligent life out there is not looking to subjugate.[/QUOTE] It's unlikely that a truly alien form of life could decipher it, or would even [I]care[/I].
Damn! That's 123 times the length of our Earth to the Sun. That's crazy.
[QUOTE=Saber15;38701236]It's unlikely that a truly alien form of life could decipher it, or would even [I]care[/I].[/QUOTE] I think it's more unlikely that they find it at all. It's a small object that looks like almost any other bit of space debris. Assuming another species found it, I'm pretty sure they'd care. Finding other intelligent life in the universe is usually a pretty big deal.
[QUOTE=Saber15;38701236]It's unlikely that a truly alien form of life could decipher it, or would even [I]care[/I].[/QUOTE] Intelligent life finds a foreign space craft and uses enclosed gold disc with deliberate markings and music as a beer coaster.
facepunch: alien experts
Wasn't there an article not too long ago stating that there are a lot more of solar systemless planets wandering out there than previously thought? imagine if voyager 1 just by random chance entered the orbit of one of these :v:
[QUOTE=Nutt007;38700874] Everyone's forgotten about [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons]New Horizons?[/url][/QUOTE] Provided it survives that far out, New Horizons is likely to follow the Voyager probes in exploring the outer heliosphere and mapping the heliosheath and heliopause. Even though it was launched far faster than any outward probe before it, New Horizons will never overtake Voyager 1 as the most distant man-made object from Earth. Close fly-bys of Saturn and Titan gave Voyager 1 an advantage with its extra gravity assist. When New Horizons reaches the distance of 100 AU, it will be travelling at about 13 km/s (29,000 mph), around 4 km/s (8,900 mph) slower than Voyager 1 at that distance. :suicide:
[QUOTE=vizard38;38700697]If my rudimentary of knowledge of chemistry is correct then even long after its death, Voyager will still be there in space, within the abyss of darkness and stars, to rest within the deep recesses of space perhaps far after humanity has died. And then, one day, a young alien race has made its foothold in the means of interstellar travel and they discover the remnants of Voyager and within it the golden disk. The race becomes jubilant, happy at the idea that they are not alone, and as they race for our planet to make contact, they thank little Voyager. And yet, as they approach Earth, it is desolate, empty, and this race would but think to themselves, "What an amazing society, what great people, and yet now gone and lost into the tomes of the past."[/QUOTE] Ever single thread about space degenerates into ~so deep bra~
[QUOTE=smeismastger;38698344]We were a lot more optimistic back then when it was launched. I think we seriously should cut any and all attempt at making contact with anyone until we have [B]colonized Sol[/B] and have some capability to defend ourselves. Because I doubt any race would be so nice to suddenly give us technologies the moment they meet us.[/QUOTE] Why would we want to colonise the sun?
[QUOTE=Coffee;38720008]Why would we want to colonise the sun?[/QUOTE] lol can't believe I missed that.
Why would an alien race go through the trouble of subjugating us for our resources...? There are literally billions of other, better sources of anything we have available to a species with interstellar capability. If they deliberately made contact with us I'm absolutely certain it'd be to make friends.
[QUOTE=OvB;38697524]Imagine if we found some other species version of Voyager.[/QUOTE] Can you imagine how it must feel to find an alien voyager with a description we can understand of where this alien race is located but being unable to go there or make any contact with it? We would be left wondering if this race got extinct or is out there doing space shenanigans in some galaxy, who knows...
There was a theory that I saw which said that any alien contact would probably consider us lowly animals and even eat us seeing as they would most likely require energy as well. [video=youtube;Vee4HUvi5GQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vee4HUvi5GQ[/video]
[QUOTE=elite3444;38720891]There was a theory that I saw which said that any alien contact would probably consider us lowly animals and even eat us seeing as they would most likely require energy as well. [video=youtube;Vee4HUvi5GQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vee4HUvi5GQ[/video][/QUOTE] Didn't watch the video, but why would their biology be adapted to digesting humans? That doesn't make much sense.
[QUOTE=Falubii;38720982]Didn't watch the video, but why would their biology be adapted to digesting humans? That doesn't make much sense.[/QUOTE] Its not really adapted to eating humans. You could technically use this argument to why we are able to digest exotic things such as deep sea shellfish or something similar. I wouldn't say that we naturally have them as prey but it doesn't mean we can't digest the form of meat. I'm not saying I agree with the theory but it does seem somewhat plausible.
[QUOTE=elite3444;38721013]Its not really adapted to eating humans. You could technically use this argument to why we are able to digest exotic things such as deep sea shellfish or something similar. I wouldn't say that we naturally have them as prey but it doesn't mean we can't digest the form of meat. I'm not saying I agree with the theory but it does seem somewhat plausible.[/QUOTE] Not really the same thing, they aren't even from the same planet.
[QUOTE=teh pirate;38720173]Why would an alien race go through the trouble of subjugating us for our resources...? There are literally billions of other, better sources of anything we have available to a species with interstellar capability. If they deliberately made contact with us I'm absolutely certain it'd be to make friends.[/QUOTE] or eat us
[QUOTE=Falubii;38721038]Not really the same thing, they aren't even from the same planet.[/QUOTE] It's based off the assumption that other intelligent life would require energy from a food chain. My example is that we just digest a bunch of weird shit that we are most likely not naturally meant to eat.
[QUOTE=elite3444;38720891]There was a theory that I saw which said that any alien contact would probably consider us lowly animals and even eat us seeing as they would most likely require energy as well. [video=youtube;Vee4HUvi5GQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vee4HUvi5GQ[/video][/QUOTE] The idea here is that they're more likely to be aggressive predators if they're intelligent. And therefore more likely to be aggressive in general. Not necessarily that they'd eat us, that's ridiculous.
[QUOTE=theevilldeadII;38721071]or eat us[/QUOTE] If you have interstellar space travel, you probably have a reliable food source for the long journeys already.
[QUOTE=catbarf;38701174]The universe is 13.75 billion years old. Humans have existed for 250,000 years. Civilization has existed for maybe 5,000 years. And our existence in the era of space, maybe sixty years. Even if every single star in the sky had a planet and every planet had life and every life-bearing planet produced intelligent life, the chance of our existence overlapping with the existence of another space-faring race is astronomically low. Humans as a species have existed for 0.0018% of the life of the universe. Humans with society have existed for 2% of that 0.0018%. We could go to Alpha Centauri and [i]even if[/i] we knew for certain that it had a planet that contained life, it is overwhelmingly likely that we would find either ancient ruins or pond scum. And that's assuming there's life there in the first place. Science fiction almost always uses parallel technological development because otherwise the story is much less interesting, but it's almost fantasy to think that we'll find alien life at all, let alone life within a few thousand years developmentally of us. We'd be 'defending ourselves' against apes or angels. The idea that we should stop what is pretty much an entirely symbolic attempt at contacting nonexistent extraterrestrial life because we need to build defenses that would only be effective against aliens at roughly our technological level is dumb.[/QUOTE] I'm very depressed now.
Even though I posted that video, I would expect that if they could have interstellar travel then they are most likely much more benevolent than us. I mean, we aren't getting anywhere with fighting and I guess I assume that another intelligent species would figure that out. Besides, why fight humans who have almost no ability to fight back?
[QUOTE=elite3444;38721092]It's based off the assumption that other intelligent life would require energy from a food chain. My example is that we just digest a bunch of weird shit that we are most likely not naturally meant to eat.[/QUOTE] No, you're completely wrong. For a start, the chirality of proteins and other molecules in our body could very conceivably make us anywhere between troublesome to deadly to attempt to digest. If they don't have the exact enzymes necessary to break down certain molecules in us that they'd be attempting to digest after eating us... a whole host of things would go wrong for them (however I can't be fucked giving a biochemistry lesson right now, so... read up about it). All animals on Earth are descendant from a common ancestor, and our biochemistry is fairly similar allover meaning that we don't have too much trouble in digesting most animal meat. An alien would have NO common ancestor with us (unless it turned out some other alien species in the distant past had seeded planets throughout the galaxy with life, or we were a product of natural panspermia). Even if they DID by some chance develop down almost identical paths to us (the necessary amino acids that life is built on, plus some others that aren't used, do occur naturally (see the Miller–Urey experiment), so it's not a huge stretch to imagine that they might be, at a fundamental level, built very similarly to us), there's still no guarantee that the stereoisomerism of their proteins and enzymes is in line with ours. Futhermore, there's no guarantee that an intelligent species HAS to be carnivorous or omnivorous to be spacefaring. They might be herbivorous. Hell, the concept of 'animals' might not even exist with some hypothetical alien species. The line between what we consider 'plant' and 'animal' and... maybe some other distinct areas of life that we're unfamiliar with might be completely blurred with an alien species. They might move around like animals, look like animals, but act like a plant in that they suck dirt up from the ground for raw minerals and use photosynthesis to gain energy.
Again, I'm just sharing the theory even though I don't agree with it. I see that there are big problems with it and that we base our expectations of alien life too much off of life on Earth.
[QUOTE=Neo Kabuto;38721215]If you have interstellar space travel, you probably have a reliable food source for the long journeys already.[/QUOTE] I dunno, if I were them I would want a little taste.
[QUOTE=Mindtwistah;38698485]Or perhaps you are just blinded by what you see as morally right and wrong. I already told you why they would hypothetically attack us. Because we'd be a threat. Any species that has survived to the point of reaching interstellar travel [B]will [/B]have a survival instinct in one form or the other, as well as the capabilities of wiping another species out. There is no reason for there to be some form of higher interstellar order, most likely it's just a battle for survival with the surviving species being those who were either isolationist or the aggressors.[/QUOTE] I'm quite sure that the aggressiveness of a species would be inversely proportional to their lifespan. Something that lives for a thousand years won't see the worth in fighting over such small things, however, as we humans have short lives, we may be more prone to fight over small things, as smaller things seem more important to us than they do to the hypothetical millennial species. Basically, a shorter lifespan leads to being shortsighted, whereas a longer lifespan naturally gives more time to "live and learn," yielding a wiser species. Wisdom and a Warlike nature are mutually exclusive.
[QUOTE=laserguided;38700910]Why are they so slow? Seems as if we could get something to go a fuck load faster then 15Km/s[/QUOTE] it's moving at about 360KM/ a day
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