Has first contact already happened?

[Screet]

Has first contact already happened?

I'd rather suggest to forget roswell and think about these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foo_fighter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_rockets

According to those reports, WW2 pracitcally started the UFO sightings and at last one has been shot down.

Practically, I do believe it's impossible that we are the only planet with sentient life. I do not know how much physical restrictions would prohibit travelling to other planets, though.

I am not really an ufo believer as "ufo equals aliens". I am highly skeptic to most reports. However, my grandparents did see UFOs shortly after WW2 and I did see UFOs two times in the 90s, and I suggest to read UFO literally as the unidentified, not as the alien version. However, the speed observed in one case was about that of a shooting star and it was able to make a visually perfect 90 degree turn without slowing down. The other thing...that was "docking" with a speed that loocked like an earthly missile...and then both objects vanishing together with an impressively higher speed. I just wish I had a good explanation for these sightings...

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[Cmd. Cheyd]

With the recent results of the WMAP-data-based test showing our own universe is of infinite size, it pretty much guarantees life exists elsewhere in our universe. If life occurs only on 1 out of every googolplex of planets, you still end up with life on other planets because the universe is INFINITE. (Sorry if I sound like an @$%, but the true concept of that is hard for many people to really grasp.)

Now, given that same issue that the universe is infinite, and the energy / time required to cross incredible vast distances (ignoring theortical shortcuts like wormholes), the odds of another civilization even FINDING Earth is impossible high. If they did go through all that trouble, got lucky enough to find another civilization (us)... Do you REALLY think they're going to be content with cattle mutilation, extracting DNA from a few random people's teeth, and just generally existing on the edge of discovery?

Me, I'd be setting my UFO down in the White House lawn, pop the hatch and screaming, "HOWDY NEIGHBOR!!!!!"

[Screet]

If they did go through all that trouble, got lucky enough to find another civilization (us)... Do you REALLY think they're going to be content with cattle mutilation, extracting DNA from a few random people's teeth, and just generally existing on the edge of discovery?

No...and such ideas really are strange...however, would they really think of us as a contact worthy species? We do kill sentients just because we like to eat them! So tell me, where's the big difference between the wraith in Stargate and the humans? The wraith could NOT survive without killing, the humans could become vegetarians (I am not)...so who's worse?

Me, I'd be setting my UFO down in the White House lawn, pop the hatch and screaming, "HOWDY NEIGHBOR!!!!!"

Unless you noticed the human behaviour to fear/kill what is different. Many even do because of the skin color and stuff like that! I'd say humanity is practically barbarians with highly evolved weaponry...and if they DID see Star Trek, they even might employ their "first contact" rules.

Probably the best idea would be to write scripts for SciFi stuff that opens the poeples minds, have the earthlings produce those movies and change their attitude before showing up

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[Frame]

No...and such ideas really are strange...however, would they really think of us as a contact worthy species? We do kill sentients just because we like to eat them! So tell me, where's the big difference between the wraith in Stargate and the humans? The wraith could NOT survive without killing, the humans could become vegetarians (I am not)...so who's worse?

The Wraith, while we can survive without or substituting our diet, they cannot.. But they are Science Fiction, I don't think such a species would ever make it through evolution...

And we (the industrialized ) western world, has not eaten other even marginally abstract thinking creatures for centuries. here I'm thinking of monkeys and apes.. I know some cultures still eat these, but its less and less.

The creatures we eat, don´t even know they exist... they can´t think abstract thoughts.. they are not able to think: I am, therefore I exist, they don't fear for their species as a whole.... In fact, they do not care about other species.. A gorilla, or chimp wouldn't think twice about eating you if it meant surviving starvation...

A human would however have 2nd thoughts.

[Sarin]

Consciousness is a difficult, not yet really explained subject. It has been proved that, given correct stimuli, chimpanzee are capable of abstract thinking, even understanding of simple language. Even wild living chmpanzee are able to lie, they can insult and apologize...
Other animals have such capabilites, more or less, too. So please, stay away from this subject....

You mentioned vegetarianism...well, plants are alive too. In a different way, maybe, but they are. You can't stay alive withou taking a life, you can only sometimes choose what life. Either you believe that humans are the only really selfconscious beings, and then it is okay to eat meat, or you accept that every living thing has its own rights, and then, it's you or them.

And for Frame...when faced with dilemma cannibalism or death, in those few cases that happened during 20th century, most people ultimately chose their survival. And I doubt they'd think twice when it comes to eating an ape. And actually...there are well known cases in nature when parents sacrifice themselves to ensure survival of their children...they DO care about their whole species. And caring about other species is mostly invention of 19/20th century, when we realized that extinction of one species can have serious impact on ecosystem.

[Frame]

And I want to write a lot, but my opinion is still the wraith, which is what I answered to.

[FSOneblin]

[quote ]"Me, I'd be setting my UFO down in the White House lawn, pop the hatch and screaming, "HOWDY NEIGHBOR!!!!!"[/quote]

Do it in front of the entire white house administration. maybe they would all die of a heart attack, and they would let Obama start early. my country would be great again. I hope bush does not send me to the bay for saying this.

FSOneblin

[CptnEcho]

Does the possibility of life (from other planets) exist? I think the answer is yes.

Does the possibility of space-faring life visiting or living on earth and among our population exist? I think the answer is yes.

Has it been proven to be happening as we discuss this topic here on the forum? Well, I'm willing to listen.

If life can traverse the galaxy freely, especially in faster than light conveyances, they'll probably be able to operate covertly as much as they want and visibly joy-ride like teenagers whenever they want just for laughs.

There is a long list of Science-Fiction movies and television series which offer glimpses of what life could be like while space-faring beings interacted with the people of Earth. If nothing else, the subject has proven to be entertaining.

[LittleBear]

Isn't the main problem just time? Earth's a middle-aged planet and out of 4 billion years of life on earth for the first 95% of it life was pretty much single celled. Intentigent life with the capacity to even send out radio waves has been around a century or so. My own guess would be life of some type almost certainly, maybe even multi-celled life, but life with a technology that exists in the same time frame as we happen to exist and finds us, pretty unlikley. Aliens in the equivient of SETTI would need very patient beings from the treasurey to avoid having their projects cancelled :- "You've been pointing that thing at the western spiral arm for 3.9 billion years and you haven't picked up a single mesage! There's obviously nobody there!"

[wenlock]

I have it on good authority that the governments of the world cover these visits up to keep control of the masses.

My source told me that a visiting dignitory from the Altair system painstakingly tracked down the leader of the Earth's most powerful country to establish a diplomatic outpost here. When he offered the galactic universal greeting (no it wasn't bah weep granah weep ninni bong) of throwing his two shoes at the president of that most powerful country recently he was promptly arrested.

[Commander McLane]

Isn't the main problem just time?

I agree on that, and it could be worse. I remember one intruiging and disturbing thought by Stanislaw Lem (the SF-writer I feel the most respect for, even above Arthur C.), which limits time not only in one, but in both directions.

The basic idea is that the urge to explore space is only a short phase in the history of a species, before they turn to completely different undertakings, or, more likely--Lem was a pessimist--destroy themselves.

So we can establish contact only in the tiny window of time, when both we and them are advanced enough to have developed the means for establishing contact (at least radio astronomy), but haven't yet blown ourselves (or themselves) to smithereens.

If you add the vast distances in space to that, it becomes very likely that any species whose signal we may pick up has ceased to exist long before their communication could have reached the earth.

[Erai]

If you add the vast distances in space to that, it becomes very likely that any species whose signal we may pick up has ceased to exist long before their communication could have reached the earth.

One positive side to that though: long after we have gone, some future civilisation may still pick up proof for our existance.

Which does not make any difference for us, of course, but somehow I like the thought of there being a slight chance of us leaving even a tiny mark on the universe.

[Disembodied]

What SETI is looking for is "intelligent life that's pretty much like us and which is actively trying to be found using technologies we can cope with". As LittleBear pointed out, we've had radio for slightly more than a century. Radio waves, or EM emissions of any kind, might be the galactic equivalent of smoke signals.

There is the question of how alien an alien might be. Maybe, convergent evolution will tend to produce tool-using technological species who have similar mental constructions, who have certain things in common, e.g. curiosity, a theory of mind, etc. Or maybe it won't. Or maybe we're not "intelligent" at the right speed or on the right scale. A termite mound is a much more of an "intelligent organism" than an individual termite is: maybe "intelligent" life out there operates on a scale we can't partake in or even see.

Here's a link to some information on my favourite UFO story. I remember when this happened, and it's still one of the weirdest things I've heard of. At the time, my dad worked for the Glenrothes Development Corporation in Fife. He was told by a colleague in Livingstone that Robert Taylor, the man involved, was a stable and responsible individual, and perhaps the least likely person to invent something like this.

Nothing about it makes any real sense. Why would anyone travel across the light-years or through the dimensions to ham-fistedly harass some old guy in Lothian? Alternatively, why would a 61-year-old forester concoct such a ludicrous story, and stick to it so completely? If it was a lie to cover up e.g. a (sudden, uncharacteristic, mid-morning) alcoholic binge, why not go for something like "I got attacked by a bunch of neds?"

Personally, the only thing that makes even the slightest sort of sense to me is the sudden epileptic fit or hallucination. But for a hallucination, it seems to have been a bizarrely creative and interactive one.

[Cmd. Cheyd]

Unfortunately for SETI and many other theories, we're recently been able to show that our radio / television signals are indecipherable after about 3 LY.

[Frame]

Unfortunately for SETI and many other theories, we're recently been able to show that our radio / television signals are indecipherable after about 3 LY.

Hmm damn, there goes the plot of many Sci fi novels/movies....

Interesting though, and a reason to shut down SETI(smells of consipracy

Got a link to some information on that ?...