Do you think any aliens exist in the universe?

[Elixir]

It would take a while before we ever encountered a life form that was our equal, ..

It would take far longer, to find one we considered our equal.

 

[ideologyhunter]

Mike Johnson...Jared Kushner...Elon Musk...do these not look like generic humanoid shells, covering up a CPU? I swear I remember mannequins from Mens Warehouse that look like all three. And "Elon" "Musk"??? Tell me that isn't from some obscure 50s sci fi paperback from Ace Books that aliens would read for kicks.

 

[Elixir]

I don’t think the one who is an anagram of “lone skum” belongs with the others.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Our earth will probably not remain earthlike for much longer, cosmologically speaking.

Perhaps we have about a billion years before the sun roasts the earthlings.

A lot less than that. Earth has only about 50 million years left where it can compensate for the sun growing hotter over the eons. At that point CO2 levels peg low and the mercury starts rising. Life might hang on to the billion year mark but it will be extremeophiles, nothing like us. And that's the best case estimate in which the oceans have escaped into space. If they haven't it will be much, much worse. (Water molecules that get high enough into the atmosphere will photodisassociate and Earth can't hold hydrogen very well. This is currently a very slow trickle because the cold keeps the water down lower.)

Your numbers do not agree with the research on the subject. See, for example, this paper (https://arxiv.org/pdf/2409.10714), which I cited earlier, and the references therein in Table 1.

That's talking about the survival of any life, not of macroscopic life.

Are you sure about that? Did you even read the first sentence of the abstract?

Approximately one billion years (Gyr) in the future, as the Sun brightens, Earth’s carbonate-silicate cycle is expected to drive CO2 below the minimum level required by vascular land plants, eliminating most macroscopic land life.

That doesn't mean that it will have survived to that point. The thing is it will be much warmer then. Major evolutionary changes will be needed for anything beyond the extremeophiles to be around then--and remember that evolution proceeds at a rate set by generations, not years. That's why germs rapidly evolve to get around our defenses while we have little evolution towards resisting them.

Can you provide the analysis that led you to conclude that life (other than “extremophiles”) has only 50 million years left due to the increase of solar luminosity?

You provided a quantitative assessment. Can you back that up or is it just pure speculative opinion?

I did not claim what you said I claimed.

At 50My the Earth can no longer compensate for rising solar energy and the mercury will start to climb. That won't wipe out macroscopic life but it will make an environment that favors those which can adapt the fastest. Your paper talks about a separate threat--CO2 levels dropping below what current life can handle. Evolution is not good at completely replacing systems, the paper is saying that vascular plants can't live beyond that point, that says nothing about whether they may or may not have been wiped out earlier. We simply can't predict how far life can adapt before it can't anymore.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Maybe if we arrange a ring of about a thousand rocket motors around the earth’s equator, all buried in the ground or affixed to the seabed with the exhausts going straight up, we could fire them in sequence, each one at local solar noon. Keep doing that a few days a week over a period of hundreds of millennia and we could move the earth further from the sun. It might buy us a little time.

That is not necessary. Once the space ship is nearly out of Earth's gravity, no boost is required unless you want the spaceship to move faster.

WHAT “spaceship”?
I’m talking about moving the earth out of harm’s way - buying a couple million extra years perhaps.

That's not how to go about it. Earth has an atmosphere that we care about and Earth has seismic activity. And what's your fuel?

No, put your rocket elsewhere. Neptune is a likely candidate. Yes, there's nothing to mount it to--it floats. There's your fuel: fuse that hydrogen. You point the rocket at the sky, it pushes deeper into the atmosphere, the buoyancy pushes back and the planet moves. Very slow, but it does. You bring it around, it overtakes Earth far enough away that the tides aren't too problematic. It loses a little energy, Earth gains it. Maintain a resonance so it keeps coming past and giving a tug. It's extremely slow but that's fine, you just want to creep out as the habitable zone moves outward. Since it's not anchored you're free to reposition it as needed and don't need a whole bunch of extra rockets that aren't pointing in the right direction.

Some people just can’t accept the simple solution, and have move heaven and earth just to move one ball of dirt further from the fire. Sheesh! Putting Neptune back where it belongs would be no mean trick!
Also I have a feeling that when all the orbital math is worked out, you’re gonna freeze us all.

Put what back? Much of the planet will be consumed and what's left won't have the gravity to hold onto it's atmosphere (and it's all atmosphere) in the orbit it will be in. And it's about survival as the sun grows warmer. When it finally gives up and goes white dwarf we would be way, way too far out but even if the Earth were brought in to a comfortable orbit tidal locking will become an issue.

 

[Elixir]

We simply can't predict how far life can adapt before it can't anymore.

One time, life got so desperate that it started using all that poisonous oxygen stuff. Can you imagine?
You never know what the changes made by and the byproducts of one ecosystem, might do to the rest of the ecosystems.
Don’t be surprised if current landfills start producing new forms in ten or twenty thousand years.

I foresee worms that eat ziplocks, crocks, grocery bags, plastic peanuts, candy wrappers and dry cleaning bags, growing to tremendous size, emerging from the landfills and heading for town, protected by their lexan-like exoskeletons …

There is a thing that amuses me more and more as I age. It’s how we humans are confident of our species’ survival to cosmic ages. I see no reason not to expect us to eventually number among the VAST majority of species - more than 99% of all species ever on earth - that are kaput.

 

[aupmanyav]

I foresee worms that eat ziplocks, crocks, grocery bags, plastic peanuts, candy wrappers and dry cleaning bags, growing to tremendous size, emerging from the landfills and heading for town, protected by their lexan-like exoskeletons …

Won't that be nice?

There is a thing that amuses me more and more as I age. It’s how we humans are confident of our species’ survival to cosmic ages. I see no reason not to expect us to eventually number among the VAST majority of species - more than 99% of all species ever on earth - that are kaput.

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive.

 

[aupmanyav]

Your paper talks about a separate threat--CO2 levels dropping below what current life can handle.CO2 is no problem. Vegetation arose in a CO2 environment.

Any change in Oxygen, CO@, Ozone or radiation level is going to affect life. Life is a sensitive thing.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Our earth will probably not remain earthlike for much longer, cosmologically speaking.

Perhaps we have about a billion years before the sun roasts the earthlings.

A lot less than that. Earth has only about 50 million years left where it can compensate for the sun growing hotter over the eons. At that point CO2 levels peg low and the mercury starts rising. Life might hang on to the billion year mark but it will be extremeophiles, nothing like us.

The above is what you claimed. After 50 million years life can not compensate for the increased luminosity of the Sun. At that point only extremophiles will survive. Until the billion year mark.

Please support that claim and show your work as to how you reached a value of 50 million years.

That’s all I ask. Thanks.

 

[Jarhyn]

We simply can't predict how far life can adapt before it can't anymore.

One time, life got so desperate that it started using all that poisonous oxygen stuff. Can you imagine?
You never know what the changes made by and the byproducts of one ecosystem, might do to the rest of the ecosystems.
Don’t be surprised if current landfills start producing new forms in ten or twenty thousand years.

I foresee worms that eat ziplocks, crocks, grocery bags, plastic peanuts, candy wrappers and dry cleaning bags, growing to tremendous size, emerging from the landfills and heading for town, protected by their lexan-like exoskeletons …

There is a thing that amuses me more and more as I age. It’s how we humans are confident of our species’ survival to cosmic ages. I see no reason not to expect us to eventually number among the VAST majority of species - more than 99% of all species ever on earth - that are kaput.

I would laugh if a protein was spat out that cross-linked micro plastic monomers for structure and armor purposes.

Kevlar is 'milk jug' polypropylene to assembled ridiculous lengths. Imagine what cross-linked polymers could achieve at larger scales of fully optimized, perhaps aperiodic quasi-crystal cross linking as only life could achieve?

The thing is, you should have a bit more faith in humans, because not all of us are head-in-sand about our options. I'm fully on board with hijacking some homegrown trash-worms and riding around in their lexan-like exoskeletons for ourselves, or living in a satellite's GPU cluster, or whatever else we discover as a valid method for living.

Sure, it means taking a slightly wider view on what exactly a "species" constitutes, or what existence even means? I'm more concerned with the system by which I remember and think and "feel" being reproduced and retained more than this set of those memories and feelings, although I'm generally the sort to keep and place their first Minecraft pickaxe in a place of honor.

I can't see myself being less sentimental about an entire 40+ year old body full of cells that mostly kept on task without fucking up any worse than most anyone else's... But I'm not going to force myself to keep existing in it any longer than is prudent, either.

Humanity, the society that exists today and any future offshoot of it, may very well exist to cosmic scales. It will never accomplish that with excessive romanticism around "homo sapiens", however; we will have to radically transform and re-engineer ourselves for that to happen.

 

[Elixir]

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive

YOU will. I’m an atheist: God will kill me.

 

[Jarhyn]

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive

YOU will. I’m an atheist: God will kill me.

I find that whole claim unreasonable TBH.

People claim Gods must create creations to worship them.

I do not create creations to worship me. That is not their "purpose".

It's like saying "all back scratcher shaped objects are made to scratch backs", when some back-scratcher shaped objects are just made to *look like* that and occasionally instead serve as a spanking implement that will not embarrass someone of their children find it.

Examples disprove such blanket statements... And since I can provide an example where the assumption is clearly disproven, it cannot be a necessary quality of God's and their creations that they create to receive worship.

They MAY, but universality is hardly guaranteed.

 

[Elixir]

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive

YOU will. I’m an atheist: God will kill me.

I find that whole claim unreasonable TBH.

I find tri-Omni superbeings preposterous.
I think Aupy is being sarcastic. ?

 

[Swammerdami]

Our earth will probably not remain earthlike for much longer, cosmologically speaking.

Perhaps we have about a billion years before the sun roasts the earthlings.

A lot less than that. Earth has only about 50 million years left where it can compensate for the sun growing hotter over the eons. At that point CO2 levels peg low and the mercury starts rising. Life might hang on to the billion year mark but it will be extremeophiles, nothing like us.

IIUC, the sun's total output increases by about 8% per billion years, or just 0.4% in 50 million years. Am I correct that a tiny increase in Earth's albedo -- from the current 0.31 to 0.32 -- would counter the extra warming from the sun? (The "Am I correct" is NOT just rhetorical: I probably am missing something.)

Even a small change in albedo has a huge effect on Earth's temperatures. Unfortunately man's activities are pushing albedo DOWN, producing vicious feedback. But reversing the destruction of glaciers and ice packs is not the only way man might deliberately INCREASE albedo.

 

[Jarhyn]

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive

YOU will. I’m an atheist: God will kill me.

I find that whole claim unreasonable TBH.

I find tri-Omni superbeings preposterous.
I think Aupy is being sarcastic. ?

Maybe.

I like engaging with stupid sarcasm too, because it passes the time all the same.

That said, I think that the failure comes ifrom a historic disinterest in actually figuring out what Omni qualities look like from different perspectives.

I've posed a few times now a formulation for these "powers" that is not nonsensical.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Our earth will probably not remain earthlike for much longer, cosmologically speaking.

Perhaps we have about a billion years before the sun roasts the earthlings.

A lot less than that. Earth has only about 50 million years left where it can compensate for the sun growing hotter over the eons. At that point CO2 levels peg low and the mercury starts rising. Life might hang on to the billion year mark but it will be extremeophiles, nothing like us.

The above is what you claimed. After 50 million years life can not compensate for the increased luminosity of the Sun. At that point only extremophiles will survive. Until the billion year mark.

Please support that claim and show your work as to how you reached a value of 50 million years.

That’s all I ask. Thanks.

I said it would start to rise. Not that it would promptly kill anything but the extremophiles. Life will be moving up and away from the equator. And new things will arise to take advantage of the areas left open.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive

YOU will. I’m an atheist: God will kill me.

I find that whole claim unreasonable TBH.

People claim Gods must create creations to worship them.

I do not create creations to worship me. That is not their "purpose".

It's like saying "all back scratcher shaped objects are made to scratch backs", when some back-scratcher shaped objects are just made to *look like* that and occasionally instead serve as a spanking implement that will not embarrass someone of their children find it.

And if we were created to worship gods why did the gods do such a poor job of making us aware of our purpose? An awful lot of people either do not worship at all or simply pay lip service to worship.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Our earth will probably not remain earthlike for much longer, cosmologically speaking.

Perhaps we have about a billion years before the sun roasts the earthlings.

A lot less than that. Earth has only about 50 million years left where it can compensate for the sun growing hotter over the eons. At that point CO2 levels peg low and the mercury starts rising. Life might hang on to the billion year mark but it will be extremeophiles, nothing like us.

The above is what you claimed. After 50 million years life can not compensate for the increased luminosity of the Sun. At that point only extremophiles will survive. Until the billion year mark.

Please support that claim and show your work as to how you reached a value of 50 million years.

That’s all I ask. Thanks.

I said it would start to rise. Not that it would promptly kill anything but the extremophiles. Life will be moving up and away from the equator. And new things will arise to take advantage of the areas left open.

Ok. since you won't support your claim I'll just ignore it as idle, unscientific speculation. Thanks.

 

[Jarhyn]

Has not God created us for a special purpose .. to worship him. So, we will survive

YOU will. I’m an atheist: God will kill me.

I find that whole claim unreasonable TBH.

People claim Gods must create creations to worship them.

I do not create creations to worship me. That is not their "purpose".

It's like saying "all back scratcher shaped objects are made to scratch backs", when some back-scratcher shaped objects are just made to *look like* that and occasionally instead serve as a spanking implement that will not embarrass someone of their children find it.

And if we were created to worship gods why did the gods do such a poor job of making us aware of our purpose? An awful lot of people either do not worship at all or simply pay lip service to worship.

QFT.

In some respects it depends a lot on what you consider worship.

If "worship" is to "behold that which has happened with eyes full of wonderment, such that I see it and seek ever more to know how such a thing happens", then I "worship".

If it is instead mere vocalization that I hold such wonderment, lip service? Well, honestly I'm not going to stop anyone from giving me compliments? They're nice to hear.

But I have also never heard them and if it means having to also scour through the hate mail? Nobody got time for that.

I would rather people here or in my games just try to play the game well: build heaven for everyone, here, today.

 

[Elixir]

"worship" is to "behold that which has happened with eyes full of wonderment, such that I see it and seek ever more to know how such a thing happens", then I "worship".

+1
Establishments that depend on worshipers’ material support usually try to subsume wonderment, as evidence of the divinity of whatever god(s) they worship.
It’s something that gave me the creeps as a 5-6 yr old being dragged to Sunday services.

I was a kid. I fucking LIVED in wonderment. I knew what it meant better than they did, far better than I do now.
I knew they were trying to complicate the picture to get Jesus‘ hand in the pie, credit The Church , and let them accept payment for the experience of wonder.
I knew THEY didn’t deserve payment for that, because the Church(es) had nothing whatsoever to do with my experiences of wonderment in the first place, despite their often gaudy efforts (which often seemed to verge on intimidation and threats of danger).

Anyhow, Aliens are better than Jesus IMHO. They make better reading anyway, and you can shoot at them. At least in the South.