We're probably not alone in the universe: One in Five Stars May Have Earth-Size, Potentially Habitab - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;42764898]There are other reasons for going to war beyond resources. Honor and Fear, to name two of them. If they deem us dangerous our find our presence insulting...[/QUOTE] So basically a Eugenics war, where they just kill off races that they deem inferior?

[QUOTE=snookypookums;42764905]So basically a Eugenics war, where they just kill off races that they deem inferior?[/QUOTE] Hitler thought it would be a good idea. Why not some shithead alien? But what I meant by honor was just all around blood lust.

[QUOTE=snookypookums;42763202]Imagine, what if we finally visit some planets to find out that the aliens are idiots? We'd be the invading aliens with the fancypants technology. We always assume, all the time, that aliens by their very definition are smarter, more intelligent than us. But what if a great deal of them are,well, idiots?[/QUOTE]what if the tech of the invading aliens has taken a path different from ours? let's say they have anti-gravity and FTL tech, but their weaponry is somewhere around the 16th century level they come here boasting their military might with muskets and then get shot in the face with .30 cal machine guns

[QUOTE=Joazzz;42764924]what if the tech of the invading aliens has taken a path different from ours? let's say they have anti-gravity and FTL tech, but their weaponry is somewhere around the 16th century level they come here boasting their military might with muskets and then get shot in the face with .30 cal machine guns[/QUOTE] That's almost on par with War of the Worlds (super duper technology, defeated by air) or Signs (Super duper space travel technology, fucked over by water)

I think that one of the few ways that we'd be in a galaxy where there are multiple races on our tech level would be if there was some bored "precursor" who seeded worlds with sentient "experiments" simultaneously so that the races would be on similar levels by the time FTL is a big thing.

[QUOTE=Lycanthorph;42762520]So, this data tells us that there are planets out there that 'may' support life ? Honestly, I thought we already knew this.[/QUOTE] We guessed at it, now we have more supporting evidence. Seriously does this need to happen in every science thread?

[QUOTE=Joazzz;42764924] they come here boasting their military might with muskets and then get shot in the face with .30 cal machine guns[/QUOTE] They land their great ship in Detroit, splinter a tree to show their strength and disappear forever.

[QUOTE=snookypookums;42764954]That's almost on par with War of the Worlds (super duper technology, defeated by air) or Signs (Super duper space travel technology, fucked over by water)[/QUOTE] Any species intelligent enough to master FTL travel would probably do a little research before invading us

[QUOTE=Jund;42765073]Any species intelligent enough to master FTL travel would probably do a little research before invading us[/QUOTE] They were looking for trade routes to glorp and hit this place by mistake.

I just want to fuck alien orifices.

[QUOTE=snookypookums;42763202]Imagine, what if we finally visit some planets to find out that the aliens are idiots? We'd be the invading aliens with the fancypants technology. We always assume, all the time, that aliens by their very definition are smarter, more intelligent than us. But what if a great deal of them are,well, idiots?[/QUOTE] Slightly late, but I doubt they'd outright be idiots. Less advanced, sure, but they could very well have an equal or greater mental capacity to us. They may end up having less advanced technology, but better biological traits (stronger, larger, smarter, maybe even psychic or capable of other "impossible" feats) as well. Likewise, we might encounter a more technologically advanced species that's pathetic compared to us physically/mentally. Or they could be both less advanced [I]and[/I] dipshits like you say. No way to know until we get out there and look, really.

I still see the main limiting factors of an alien invasion to be that as far as we know, FTL travel is impossible, and that Earth resource wise is not special in any way. In fact, an alien civilization might find Mars more useful because they won't have to deal with us, and the atmosphere has just %0.6 of Earth's atmospheric pressure

[QUOTE=Psychokitten;42762514]-How many of those planets actually formed life? -How much of that life is sapient? -How much of that sapient life is civilization-building? -How many of those civilizations are industrialized? -How many of those industrial civilizations have reached the point of space flight? -How many of those space-faring civilizations would be willing to cooperate with us rather than go to war?[/QUOTE] The answer is 42.

[QUOTE=SeamanStains;42763425]The Fermi Paradox. Humans have been around what, 200,000 years? Civilisation in some form for around 20,000? We've had simple cell life on earth for 3,500,000,000 years? It would take 100,000 years for us to cross the galaxy. We aren't just separated by distance, we are separated by time. The first time we find evidence of alien life it could be long dead, some orbital debris over a planet with barely a hint that it was ever inhabited. Human civilisation has only been rapid in the past 3000 years and we already have weapons of mass destruction, antibiotics have started to stop working, we could be decimated by asteroids, solar flares, climate change, supernovae. Maybe the galaxy is teeming with life on a cosmic time scale, but how many of them are around right now or within the next say, 100,000 years that we will come into contact with? We might get out there and basically just find a graveyard and infants. Maybe some day the first aliens to visit earth will walk over our bones millions of years down the line.[/QUOTE] See [URL="http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/aliens.php#id--The_Fermi_Paradox--The_Killing_Star"]this[/URL] and [URL="http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/spacegunexotic.php#id--Relativistic_Weapons--The_Killing_Star"]this[/URL] for background. Also, a probe on a star's focal point (550 AU for the Sun) can use gravitational lensing to send signals across interstellar space using as little as 40 watts of power. Interstellar civilizations could communicate quietly, completely undetected. And 40 watts is something you can get off of an RTG. Maybe you could detect the probe on an infrared telescope, but I doubt it, unless you were looking for it.