Do you think any aliens exist in the universe?

[Kylie]

Can you propose any mechanism which would prevent evolution happening on another planet the way it does on Earth?

I am not proposing anything. I am saying we should remain agnostic on the matter.

We have one data point, life on earth. Even here, we do not fully understand the origin and development of life. We do not know how life began. As noted in a science paper, it may even be the case that some mutations are not random with respect to the environment, but may occur in response to the environment. If that were true, it would require a significant revision to evolutionary theory.

I don’t know. I know nothing about life on other worlds, or even if it exists. I suspect it does. If it does, I do not know how it develops, because it remains possible that evolution, as we understand it, is not universal. My point is that while we can observe gravity to be universal, we cannot do the same for evolution or life.

You are missing my point.

We KNOW evolution works here.

You are suggesting that we be open to the idea that it doesn't work somewhere else, despite there being no evidence for it not working differently.

That's like saying that even though my toaster works by using electricity to heat wire elements to cook the bread, it doesn't prove that ALL toasters work that way, and so we should be agnostic about the idea that maybe there are toast fairies that make toast in other countries.

Do you see how ridiculous that is?

Yes, we know evolution works here, but there is dispute over how it works. There are debates over how much influence natural selection vs. genetic drift has. As mentioned, we now have a scientific study that suggests not all mutations are random with respect to the environment.

I can imagine worlds in which Lamarckism holds or something else we cannot even imagine. I can imagine no world at which gravity fails to hold because of empiricism, but I can imagine logically possible worlds at which gravity fails to hold.

There's no real debate about the mechanisms, only which is more influential than which in specific situations. But there is no debate when it comes to what natural selection is, or what sexual selection is.

Please, give me details about how Lamarckian evolution could work. Don't just say you could imagine that it could work, because I could imagine lots of things myself and that doesn't make them real. I want actual evidence that it could work in the real world. What would have to be different in order for it to work? Can y ou show that these differences can actually exist? Until then, all you have is your imagination.

 

[Kylie]

We can see that gravity works everywhere and at all times.

How do we know that the “laws” of physics are laws at all?

You literally just went from saying that laws of physics are universal to wondering if maybe laws of physics were NOT universal.

 

[steve_bank]

By inference we can assume our science models of reality(aka laws) apply in what is to us the observable universe.

Spectral analysis of light from stars show stars of different types have the same elements. We can infer that stars similar to ours might have planets with similar distributions of elements.

From there you can infer the potential for an Erathlie envrnment.

The Goldilocks zonein or system is roughly the area between Earth and Mars, where liquid water can exist.

Habitable zone - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

A galaxy has a Goldilocks zone. As you get closer towards the center radiation goes up.

Galactic habitable zone - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[bilby]

And since such societies can leave traces on skeletons (for example, signs of broken femurs that have healed, a wound that is fatal without treatment), surely we would see indications of similar things.

Surely we would, if we had lots of skeletons to examine. But we don't. Fossilisation is extremely rare, and many dinosaur species are known from one example (or even less).

Many an extinct species has no complete skeletons that survive (and have been found); Yalkaparidon*, for example, is known from a single skull, and a handful of teeth - for two distinct species, (probably), out of an entire Order (and possibly Family) of marsupials that lived half as long ago as the dinosaurs.

If a future paleantologist working in the year eighty million CE were to find a fossilised human, he might be unsurprised, because there were billions of them. But up until a couple of thousand years ago, there had only been a few million, and had H. Sap gone extinct back then, fossil humans would likely be few and far between.

We'd also surely see fossil dinosaurs that show evidence of having been buried in a ritualistic way, with bodies arranged in a specific way, and with artifacts, such as shells or bone tools. And yet we don't see this.

Again, given the rarity of fossilisation, and the degradation of grave goods and difficulty of interpreting ritualistic burials from only a few thousand years ago, much less millions (and even though those are from our own species) there's no "surely" about it.

We could stumble upon such evidence tomorrow; But if it ever existed, there's a very good chance that it has been destroyed, or simply not discovered yet. We haven't looked at much of the lithosphere, and seventy million years is enough for a lot of destruction.







* Originally known, due to the only evidence being a single marsupial tooth with utterly different morphology from any other known marsupial, as "Thingodonta" - the Mount Isa tourist information office is to this day called "Thingodonta's Lair", because not much happens in far North West Queensland, so when it does, they milk it for all it's worth.

 

[bilby]

How do we know that the “laws” of physics are laws at all?

By observation. A law, in physics, is is a generalization, based on empirical observations of physical behavior. It describes how systems are observed to always behave, within specified limits.

The First Law of Thermodynamics, for example, says that mass/energy cannot be created or destroyed in a closed system.

The limits are "closed system", and "mass/energy". The latter used to be just "energy", and there was a separate Law of Conservation of Mass, until we discovered radioactivity, which breaks both laws, but does not break the new first law, when Einstein's famous equation is used to equate mass with energy.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics is a statistical observation of complex systems; It is possible for entropy to decrease in a closed system, but the odds against it are staggering - there are just too many ways for order to decrease, and too few ways for order to increase. Even small systems are highly unlikely to exhibit decreasing entropy within the lifetime of the universe.

The Second Law is clearly a generalisation; The First is less clearly so. But nobody is going to arrest you if you break either law (in fact, they will likely give you a Nobel prize in physics - or at least an inaugural FIFA Physics Prize, if you know the right people).

 

[pood]

We can see that gravity works everywhere and at all times.

How do we know that the “laws” of physics are laws at all?

You literally just went from saying that laws of physics are universal to wondering if maybe laws of physics were NOT universal.

No, not at all.

My view is that there are no “laws” of physics, which I believe is a hangover from the idea that there is a “lawgiver,” i.e. God.

I think that the so-called laws of physics are descriptions, and not prescriptions, of how the world goes.

My view depends on a correspondence theory of truth, in which truth inheres in true propositions.

Some propositions describe universal regularities, like gravity.

Some describe statistical phenomena, like thermodynamics.

Some describe quantum random phenomena, like particle decay.

Some describe unpredictable situations, like human free will.

 

[pood]

Can you propose any mechanism which would prevent evolution happening on another planet the way it does on Earth?

I am not proposing anything. I am saying we should remain agnostic on the matter.

We have one data point, life on earth. Even here, we do not fully understand the origin and development of life. We do not know how life began. As noted in a science paper, it may even be the case that some mutations are not random with respect to the environment, but may occur in response to the environment. If that were true, it would require a significant revision to evolutionary theory.

I don’t know. I know nothing about life on other worlds, or even if it exists. I suspect it does. If it does, I do not know how it develops, because it remains possible that evolution, as we understand it, is not universal. My point is that while we can observe gravity to be universal, we cannot do the same for evolution or life.

You are missing my point.

We KNOW evolution works here.

You are suggesting that we be open to the idea that it doesn't work somewhere else, despite there being no evidence for it not working differently.

That's like saying that even though my toaster works by using electricity to heat wire elements to cook the bread, it doesn't prove that ALL toasters work that way, and so we should be agnostic about the idea that maybe there are toast fairies that make toast in other countries.

Do you see how ridiculous that is?

Yes, we know evolution works here, but there is dispute over how it works. There are debates over how much influence natural selection vs. genetic drift has. As mentioned, we now have a scientific study that suggests not all mutations are random with respect to the environment.

I can imagine worlds in which Lamarckism holds or something else we cannot even imagine. I can imagine no world at which gravity fails to hold because of empiricism, but I can imagine logically possible worlds at which gravity fails to hold.

There's no real debate about the mechanisms, only which is more influential than which in specific situations. But there is no debate when it comes to what natural selection is, or what sexual selection is.

I did not say that there was. I am not talking about life on earth.

Please, give me details about how Lamarckian evolution could work. Don't just say you could imagine that it could work, because I could imagine lots of things myself and that doesn't make them real. I want actual evidence that it could work in the real world. What would have to be different in order for it to work? Can y ou show that these differences can actually exist? Until then, all you have is your imagination.

I am not talking about life on earth. I am talking about hypothetical life on other planets.

We have one data point — earth. We cannot extrapolate from this one example how life, or life-like things, would behave or develop on other worlds. Such life could be quite different from own experience.

I don’t know. You don’t, either.

 

[pood]

Can you propose any mechanism which would prevent evolution happening on another planet the way it does on Earth?

I am not proposing anything. I am saying we should remain agnostic on the matter.

We have one data point, life on earth. Even here, we do not fully understand the origin and development of life. We do not know how life began. As noted in a science paper, it may even be the case that some mutations are not random with respect to the environment, but may occur in response to the environment. If that were true, it would require a significant revision to evolutionary theory.

I don’t know. I know nothing about life on other worlds, or even if it exists. I suspect it does. If it does, I do not know how it develops, because it remains possible that evolution, as we understand it, is not universal. My point is that while we can observe gravity to be universal, we cannot do the same for evolution or life.

You are missing my point.

We KNOW evolution works here.

You are suggesting that we be open to the idea that it doesn't work somewhere else, despite there being no evidence for it not working differently.

That's like saying that even though my toaster works by using electricity to heat wire elements to cook the bread, it doesn't prove that ALL toasters work that way, and so we should be agnostic about the idea that maybe there are toast fairies that make toast in other countries.

Do you see how ridiculous that is?

Yes, we know evolution works here, but there is dispute over how it works. There are debates over how much influence natural selection vs. genetic drift has. As mentioned, we now have a scientific study that suggests not all mutations are random with respect to the environment.

I can imagine worlds in which Lamarckism holds or something else we cannot even imagine. I can imagine no world at which gravity fails to hold because of empiricism, but I can imagine logically possible worlds at which gravity fails to hold.

There's no real debate about the mechanisms, only which is more influential than which in specific situations. But there is no debate when it comes to what natural selection is, or what sexual selection is.

Please, give me details about how Lamarckian evolution could work. Don't just say you could imagine that it could work, because I could imagine lots of things myself and that doesn't make them real. I want actual evidence that it could work in the real world. What would have to be different in order for it to work? Can y ou show that these differences can actually exist? Until then, all you have is your imagination.

Here on earth, epigenetics suggests a mild form of Lamarckism, though not a driver of evolution. I’ve no idea how this would work on other worlds, and neither do you. Maybe on other worlds, Lamarckism, or something we have not even thought of, would drive the development of living things or life-like things (we do not even have a clear definition of life or how to differentiate it from non-Iife. Is a virus alive?).

Hence agnosticism, or perhaps more apposite, philosophical skepticism.

 

[pood]

To reiterate my original point, we can observe that gravitation universally holds, without having to believe that there is some god-given “law” that mandates this.

We have only one example of life, however that is defined, here on earth. We therefore cannot reliably extrapolate how life or life-like structures would develop on other worlds.

 

[excreationist]

My view is that there are no “laws” of physics, which I believe is a hangover from the idea that there is a “lawgiver,” i.e. God.

Yes that last part seems to be true:

The very phrase laws of nature emerged in medieval and early‑modern Europe, where thinkers assumed that if God was rational, orderly, and consistent, then the universe He created would also be rational, orderly, and consistent. This theological worldview made it reasonable to expect:

- stable, universal physical laws

- mathematical regularity

- predictability in nature

This belief was widespread among early giants like Newton, Kepler, Boyle, and Descartes.

 

[Kylie]

We can see that gravity works everywhere and at all times.

How do we know that the “laws” of physics are laws at all?

You literally just went from saying that laws of physics are universal to wondering if maybe laws of physics were NOT universal.

No, not at all.

My view is that there are no “laws” of physics, which I believe is a hangover from the idea that there is a “lawgiver,” i.e. God.

I think that the so-called laws of physics are descriptions, and not prescriptions, of how the world goes.

My view depends on a correspondence theory of truth, in which truth inheres in true propositions.

Some propositions describe universal regularities, like gravity.

Some describe statistical phenomena, like thermodynamics.

Some describe quantum random phenomena, like particle decay.

Some describe unpredictable situations, like human free will.

Then you can't say things like:

We can see that gravity works everywhere and at all times.

 

[Kylie]

Can you propose any mechanism which would prevent evolution happening on another planet the way it does on Earth?

I am not proposing anything. I am saying we should remain agnostic on the matter.

We have one data point, life on earth. Even here, we do not fully understand the origin and development of life. We do not know how life began. As noted in a science paper, it may even be the case that some mutations are not random with respect to the environment, but may occur in response to the environment. If that were true, it would require a significant revision to evolutionary theory.

I don’t know. I know nothing about life on other worlds, or even if it exists. I suspect it does. If it does, I do not know how it develops, because it remains possible that evolution, as we understand it, is not universal. My point is that while we can observe gravity to be universal, we cannot do the same for evolution or life.

You are missing my point.

We KNOW evolution works here.

You are suggesting that we be open to the idea that it doesn't work somewhere else, despite there being no evidence for it not working differently.

That's like saying that even though my toaster works by using electricity to heat wire elements to cook the bread, it doesn't prove that ALL toasters work that way, and so we should be agnostic about the idea that maybe there are toast fairies that make toast in other countries.

Do you see how ridiculous that is?

Yes, we know evolution works here, but there is dispute over how it works. There are debates over how much influence natural selection vs. genetic drift has. As mentioned, we now have a scientific study that suggests not all mutations are random with respect to the environment.

I can imagine worlds in which Lamarckism holds or something else we cannot even imagine. I can imagine no world at which gravity fails to hold because of empiricism, but I can imagine logically possible worlds at which gravity fails to hold.

There's no real debate about the mechanisms, only which is more influential than which in specific situations. But there is no debate when it comes to what natural selection is, or what sexual selection is.

I did not say that there was. I am not talking about life on earth.

And I am talking about anywhere in the universe.

Please, give me details about how Lamarckian evolution could work. Don't just say you could imagine that it could work, because I could imagine lots of things myself and that doesn't make them real. I want actual evidence that it could work in the real world. What would have to be different in order for it to work? Can y ou show that these differences can actually exist? Until then, all you have is your imagination.

I am not talking about life on earth. I am talking about hypothetical life on other planets.

So am I.

We have one data point — earth. We cannot extrapolate from this one example how life, or life-like things, would behave or develop on other worlds. Such life could be quite different from own experience.

I don’t know. You don’t, either.

I'm asking you what would be required in order for Lamarckian evolution to work on another planet.

 

[Kylie]

Can you propose any mechanism which would prevent evolution happening on another planet the way it does on Earth?

I am not proposing anything. I am saying we should remain agnostic on the matter.

We have one data point, life on earth. Even here, we do not fully understand the origin and development of life. We do not know how life began. As noted in a science paper, it may even be the case that some mutations are not random with respect to the environment, but may occur in response to the environment. If that were true, it would require a significant revision to evolutionary theory.

I don’t know. I know nothing about life on other worlds, or even if it exists. I suspect it does. If it does, I do not know how it develops, because it remains possible that evolution, as we understand it, is not universal. My point is that while we can observe gravity to be universal, we cannot do the same for evolution or life.

You are missing my point.

We KNOW evolution works here.

You are suggesting that we be open to the idea that it doesn't work somewhere else, despite there being no evidence for it not working differently.

That's like saying that even though my toaster works by using electricity to heat wire elements to cook the bread, it doesn't prove that ALL toasters work that way, and so we should be agnostic about the idea that maybe there are toast fairies that make toast in other countries.

Do you see how ridiculous that is?

Yes, we know evolution works here, but there is dispute over how it works. There are debates over how much influence natural selection vs. genetic drift has. As mentioned, we now have a scientific study that suggests not all mutations are random with respect to the environment.

I can imagine worlds in which Lamarckism holds or something else we cannot even imagine. I can imagine no world at which gravity fails to hold because of empiricism, but I can imagine logically possible worlds at which gravity fails to hold.

There's no real debate about the mechanisms, only which is more influential than which in specific situations. But there is no debate when it comes to what natural selection is, or what sexual selection is.

Please, give me details about how Lamarckian evolution could work. Don't just say you could imagine that it could work, because I could imagine lots of things myself and that doesn't make them real. I want actual evidence that it could work in the real world. What would have to be different in order for it to work? Can y ou show that these differences can actually exist? Until then, all you have is your imagination.

Here on earth, epigenetics suggests a mild form of Lamarckism, though not a driver of evolution.

Source please?

I’ve no idea how this would work on other worlds, and neither do you. Maybe on other worlds, Lamarckism, or something we have not even thought of, would drive the development of living things or life-like things (we do not even have a clear definition of life or how to differentiate it from non-Iife. Is a virus alive?).

Hence agnosticism, or perhaps more apposite, philosophical skepticism.

So you think that if we can't rule something out, it must be equally likely?

 

[pood]

Then you can't say things like:

We can see that gravity works everywhere and at all times.

Why, yes, I can. We have descriptive propositions about universal regularities, statistical regularities, and quantum random occurrences. And?

 

[pood]

I'm asking you what would be required in order for Lamarckian evolution to work on another planet.

I already told you. There is here on earth a mild form of Lamarckism in epigenetics. I have no idea how life on other worlds would work, and nor do you.

 

[pood]

Here on earth, epigenetics suggests a mild form of Lamarckism, though not a driver of evolution.

Source please?

Look it up for yourself. Google is your friend, except for Google AI.

I’ve no idea how this would work on other worlds, and neither do you. Maybe on other worlds, Lamarckism, or something we have not even thought of, would drive the development of living things or life-like things (we do not even have a clear definition of life or how to differentiate it from non-Iife. Is a virus alive?).

Hence agnosticism, or perhaps more apposite, philosophical skepticism.

So you think that if we can't rule something out, it must be equally likely?

No I did not say anything of the kind. Where did you get that idea?

I have explained that with one data point (life on earth) we cannot establish probabilities of how many other planets are inhabited or how life or life-like structures develop there.

 

[pood]

We can observe that gravity operates the same at all places and all times to the best of our observational abilities.

We know nothing about life on other worlds, if it exists, and thus cannot say anything about it beyond speculation.

Is this hard to understand?

 

[pood]

So you think that if we can't rule something out, it must be equally likely?

No, I did not say that. This would mean that everything is 50/50, so far as I can tell from your comment.

I am saying that with one example of anything, we cannot estimate probabilities at all.

 

[excreationist]

I am saying that with one example of anything, we cannot estimate probabilities at all.

If it can one day be determined how life evolved from non-life (RNA, amino acids, etc) they might be able to replicate a lot of that in a laboratory or computer physics simulation and estimate the probabilites for each part of that process. Those probabilities would mostly apply to exoplanets that resemble the Earth.

 

[pood]

I'm asking you what would be required in order for Lamarckian evolution to work on another planet.

Some acquired traits can be passed on, if only to a small extent.

On other planets? We do not know. But this is a fact on our planet.

Note also that I cited a scientific study suggesting that not all mutations here on earth are random with respect to the environment.

We have no idea how any of this would work on other inhabited worlds. I suggest a certain level of uncertainty in talking about any of this.