Why has no one ever contacted earth?

[junior]

What stargate and startrek are not REAL

[LukeSkywatcher]

What stargate and startrek are not REAL

Where do you think the producers of SG got their ideas from?.

Human history.

That's why the show is so convincing.

[mikeknowle]

Happy St patrick's day.

[rabbithutch]

Following up on this point there's a famous quote by Ludwig Wittgenstein "if a lion could speak, we would not be able to understand him." Basically its experiences, life and culture would be so vastly different from ours, even if it spoke using English it would be full of references we just could not comprehend. If we ever received a signal from an extraterrestrial race, it's quite probable it would just be nonsensical other than perhaps something universal like mathematics.

Remember the 5 tones in Close Encounters of the Third Kind? (Hard to believe that movie was release more than 30 years ago.) Spielberg recognized that a language or some means of communications would be the most problematic issue; ergo the 5 tones that might be universal (of course, that presumes hearing or some sense being common to the differing species).

I definitely believe in extraterrestrial life of some kind. Microscopic for sure and somewhere there must be life on the scale of mammals for example. Intelligence though is complicated. Consciousness, intelligence and the compacity for technological advancement could just be something that developed by complete almost impossible luck thanks to certain events that occurred thoughout earths history. Whatever the answer I still like to think that somewhere in the universe someone or should I say something is pondering these very same questions!

'Believing' in extraterrestrial life without evidence is an act of faith (just not a widely known professed faith). Is that any different than religious faith? Hmmmm.

I wonder if our efforts to contact something 'out there' include recursive signals to account for the hypothesis that on first encountering another 'world' it might not have the technology to recognize and react to our outreach? Probably not enough in the budget - and the end result not considered worthy enough - for the pols.

Also ergeht die Saga. Eh?

[Mr Spock]

Why are people assuming there is intelligent life on Earth?

[spaceboy]

Well come on its an old joke,

They Came, They saw, They left.

"Bunch of nutters down there"

Took the word right out of my mouth!!

If they are intelligent enough to travel the vast expanses of space they would have to have taken a dumb a** pill to want to make contact with us!! We are all the same at the end of the day colour, gender, language, origin of birth etc, etc makes no difference! We all breath the same air, sht the same sht, sleep, eat, drink, we are all born and will all die, we are even made of the same carbon element but do you think we can get on with each other ????? Look at the middle east, WWI, WWII the list goes on. If we had ET & his buddies ever visit us I can guarantee within 3 months we would be complaining about them claiming income support, moaning they are taking all our jobs and some fruit case some where would be plotting civil unrest against them. Human nature is the cause of so many deaths and upset in the world that it's no wonder they keep a wide berth.

You also have to consider that there is a slim possibility we are ET visiting this planet and we caused the original occupants to become extinct. We are doing it now with every other animal on the planet including our selves by polluting the very air we need to breath. It is a theory that the building blocks of our genetic make up came to earth on a comet/asteroid. Who can say that our DNA was not sent to earth by our alien race many years ago to populate the earth. Could NASA have already considered this? and this is why probes are being crashed in to asteroids and other planets. Who's to say they aren't dropping vials of our DNA in these orbiters?

I think we need to learn to get on with ourselves before we consider why ET hasn't rang the door bell. But we all have opinion and as long as we do we will never be able to become a collective and get on.

SPACEBOY

[Teddy]

I like the thought that we could have been put here as an experiment or to be cultivated ?? Do ants know there in an ant farm ??

the whole of the life on this planet could be from an experiment that went wrong and abandond ??

[spaceboy]

Why I suggested this was because like it or not one day our sun will envelope us and humans will be no more. This sort of phenomenon has been going on for billions of years but we are an example that life can exist. An easy way for nature to preserve life is to cocoon it. A poor but common example would be water. Even those of us who aren't physicists can manipulate this element with relative success. We can boil water to become steam and the cool it again to become a body of water once more. We can freeze it to become a solid structure. The brave amongst us can even create it's bare elements Hydrogen & oxygen by separating them with electricity. Water can become water again despite numerous ways of manipulating its core structure. One day our planet will suffer the same fate as so many other planets have suffered but I would guess that our building blocks of life can become separate elements that will one day become re-fused and life will be re-born. We need only look at the universe to see this going on all the time. There are constant deaths of stars only to create the building blocks for births of new stars. It may not have been an asteroid sent by our ET ancestors but merely debris from our original planet after a comet/ asteroid hit and destroyed it, or our then sun going super nova.For those of you who hate the idea of theories with out hard proof! I would like to point out I would have no way of proving my thoughts and it is purely skepticism.

SPACEBOY

[Pakmoto]

Took the word right out of my mouth!!

If they are intelligent enough to travel the vast expanses of space they would have to have taken a dumb a** pill to want to make contact with us!! We are all the same at the end of the day colour, gender, language, origin of birth etc, etc makes no difference! We all breath the same air, sht the same sht, sleep, eat, drink, we are all born and will all die, we are even made of the same carbon element but do you think we can get on with each other ????? Look at the middle east, WWI, WWII the list goes on. If we had ET & his buddies ever visit us I can guarantee within 3 months we would be complaining about them claiming income support, moaning they are taking all our jobs and some fruit case some where would be plotting civil unrest against them. Human nature is the cause of so many deaths and upset in the world that it's no wonder they keep a wide berth.

You also have to consider that there is a slim possibility we are ET visiting this planet and we caused the original occupants to become extinct. We are doing it now with every other animal on the planet including our selves by polluting the very air we need to breath. It is a theory that the building blocks of our genetic make up came to earth on a comet/asteroid. Who can say that our DNA was not sent to earth by our alien race many years ago to populate the earth. Could NASA have already considered this? and this is why probes are being crashed in to asteroids and other planets. Who's to say they aren't dropping vials of our DNA in these orbiters?

I think we need to learn to get on with ourselves before we consider why ET hasn't rang the door bell. But we all have opinion and as long as we do we will never be able to become a collective and get on.

SPACEBOY

I couldn't agree more, as a human race we have to put aside our destructive nature, because if there's anything we are good at it's crudding in our own back yard,

There's many theory's that suggest our race originally spawned from Mars until we destroyed that planet and fled to the nearest life supporting rock (not my theory)

So even if ET is out there and knows we are here, they could be waiting for us to finally destroy our selfs with only a few survivors then make contact.

[Karen]

Perhaps they have. Some say they have made contact with aliens but nobody believes them. And your reputation as a sane person nosedives.

[solo]

I reckon they have already been here. They saw Jordan on telly and legged it pronto.

[Pakmoto]

I think Jordan is the ET...lol

[mikeknowle]

Extra T.

very funny

[Slangers]

Interstellar travel is either impossible, or is so slow that it is not worth the effort. That's why they've not turned up to say hello.

[Fija]

They could have already but they could be so far away that we wont recieve their hello message for another million years.

[calibos]

We Andromedans only visited yesterday and all we found were chimp like creatures wandering the grasslands of Africa getting all excited about how good that smoldering Proto elephant tasted after it was chargrilled by lightning. We go home for tea only to come back a few hours later and find you lot? This relativistic speed travel is blumming confusing!

[spaceboy]

This is the point I was trying to get at earlier. We assume aliens are so intelligent that they would visit us in their space craft after traveling many years across the universe. If you have the intelligence to manipulate the core structure of ET's form to the point their DNA can be refused together given the right circumstances then what would be the point trying to beat the inevitable restrictions due to the laws of physics. What I am trying to say is it is highly unlikely the speed of light is possible for anything containing mass. To even travel across our own galaxy would take xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx amount of years so even if we had the fuel cells to allow it we would age and die within 80 or so years of starting the journey. Many factors restrict space travel. Food for the astronauts, air, life span, fuel, decay of the space craft, degeneration of the body due to 0 gravity etc, etc, etc. Back to my point.... if you can manipulate DNA and fossilize it into a big old rock shoot it out in to space gathering momentum as it goes through the vacuum of space it will travel vast expanses requiring noting more than the ability not to bump into any thing other than its intended target. (Not that there would be any "life" lost if it did bump in to the wrong target). I saw a documentary once where they shot rocks at high speed and impacted them to simulate asteroids entering our atmosphere. The experiment proved that due to the forces & heat involved that some of the rocks core ingredients actually changed from their original to some thing completely different. Is it possible if you have the knowledge to manipulate a DNA, ET or other wise to survive the traveling through space to be reactivated when under great friction and pressure. I doubt very much "Independence day" would ever become a reality but something similar to "Evolution" could be a possibility if you have the intelligence to manipulate the building blocks of life. It's not so wild an idea given when you think if the same asteroid enters a life giving planet like earth that the atmosphere will create the energy needed to change the core ingredients. The same could not be said if it hit a baron rock like the moon where there is no atmosphere (no way to support life) to reactivate the DNA embedded in the asteroid. We have ourselves have proven that it is possible to manipulate DNA when we play god and clone animals. My theory is not so science fiction that huge space craft are roaming the universe in the search for someone to invade.

[Catanonia]

Ok food for thought.

We have had radio technology for about 100+ years and have been pumping out into space all sorts of signals.

Now as technology increases, our use of radio waves decreases to much short distance communications at lower power.

In another 100 years we won't be pumping out so much into space. Infact it is decreasing rapidly.

So one could say that with higher technology becomes lower radiation leakage from a civilised society and hence harder to think.

we in 200 - 300 years could almost be silent to radio listeners.

So 300 years in 14 billion = very small window.

Also we might be looking at the wrong thing, perhaps we need to be looking at other forms of communication we have not invented yet.

My thoughts, I don't personally think SETI will find anything.

[RobH]

Absolutely right Cat.

There is only going to be a tiny window of time where a technologically based civilisation uses high power radio transmissions....it will very rapidly move on to using other means such as optical technology for most TV etc.

Although I applaud the intent of the SETI researchers, I do rather think that they're wasting their time.

There could also be loads of highly intelligent life out there that hasn't developed technology, and maybe never will. Assuming thast all other intelligent life has our type of psyche is making a very big assumption.

Also, the more that is discovered about the other life we share our planet with, the smarter it becomes......what about the white mice in the 'Hitchikers Guide'

[Defender]

Most SETI scientists believe we're around 20yrs off making contact (but of course their going to say that), fact is there's inteligent life out there, it's a mathematical fact, but theorys like bending space time may be fictional limiting any civilizations to their own neighborhoods.

[beamish]

cos wander past and realise there is no intelligent life ????

[Catanonia]

Absolutely right Cat.

There is only going to be a tiny window of time where a technologically based civilisation uses high power radio transmissions....it will very rapidly move on to using other means such as optical technology for most TV etc.

Although I applaud the intent of the SETI researchers, I do rather think that they're wasting their time.

There could also be loads of highly intelligent life out there that hasn't developed technology, and maybe never will. Assuming thast all other intelligent life has our type of psyche is making a very big assumption.

Also, the more that is discovered about the other life we share our planet with, the smarter it becomes......what about the white mice in the 'Hitchikers Guide'

Yup the white mice

Ok lets do some numbers

A. Age of universe = 14 billion years so lets say give it 8 billion years to give time for star systems and planets to develope.

B. Out of all the stars, which have planets in the Goldilocks area

C. Which of those are carbon based and have water (ok big assumption there of carbon)

D. Which of those have developed life

E. Which of those have developed intelligent life

F. Which of those have searched and used radio signals

G. Which of those are close enough to make the signal strong enough

and the biggest problem

H. Which of those has managed to do it exactly at the time that the speed of the signal (speed of light) equallying their distance from us in light years, at the same time we are searching bearing in mind our short 200 - 300 year window ?

Ok so there are billion and billions of possible planets out there, but when you start to plug in these numbers, the possibilities become very very small of finding anything yet alone replying.

And we are missing the most important fact

If there was intelligent lifeforms out there communicating, why would they use radio signals as they would have no chance of even recieving a reply across hundreds of lightyears.

Edit : Very similar to the Drake equation, but the Drake equaton misses completely the two major factors TECHNOLOGY PROGRESS and DISTANCE TO COMMUNICATE. That said the Drake equation only estimates the number of civilizations, NOT the number we could possibly talk to.

[saturn5]

Excellent points there Catatonia.

I think the chances are pretty slim that we would be talking on the same wavelength, unless,like in that terrible Hollywood junk movie Independance Day,a technologically advanced civilisation just happen to be using a computer system so insecure and outdated that it can be given a virus by Windows 7,or windows 95 as it would have been back then.

One things for sure,they wont be using Vista....

If we are on the same wavelength then,as you pointed out,time and distance make the chances of a wee chat with E.T a bit of a long shot.

[Tadakun]

The movie District 7 gives a little good insight on a possible scenario about alien contact. Why "aliens" would want to come into contact with a warring and disease infested civilization I don't know.

Which leads me to another thing. What happened to native American "Indians" when the Spanish and others came into contact? Disease ravaged them. Think about if two species from other worlds came into contact. What's the likelihood of our and their versions of the common cold leaving both of us in ruins?

[turbotim]

They probably have contacted earth, we just don't know about it or someone hides the truth. But if we keep destroying the earth and polluting space. They will soon see us as a threat to there universe, and destroy us all. It takes a certain kind of a civilization to travel vast distances in space so do u think those aliens act like us, or live like us, i am sure they dont, because they know if they were like us there civilization wouldn't be around for very long, if you think about it. were newborns in space.