Extra-Terrestrial Life : Are we Alone?

[littlea53]

The existence of other beings has been debated for some time now. We have all probably heard accounts of abductions, crop circles, sightings, and other paranormal occurrences. Most of these have gone unnoticed by all but a few.

Now I ask you this. Do you believe there are other life-forms in the universe? If so, why? If not, why not?

I believe in the existence of other intelligent life in the universe and that they have attempted to contact us. If you open your mind and look at the evidence in the world, you can see that (I'm just going to say aliens for the sake of my fingers) Alien life does exist and has made contact even if unreported or reported incorrectly. I find the best way of showing evidence is through crop circles. I know a couple drunk idiots have said that they create these elegant creations with plank and rope, but riddle me this. How could a few humans create a formation twice as long as the titanic flawlessly in a matter of minutes? It's physically impossible for any living human to be able to plan and create something of that magnitude within such a short amount of time. The man-made Firefox Crop Circle took weeks to plan and create by OSU students. I have a couple of videos that can further explain my point.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4CYcp5wObs&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ql1PPkZiHl8

Now Crop circles aside, what about personal experiences? My father is the most intelligent man I know personally. Here is his story from his mouth. (I won't say his name so don't ask.)

I lived with my Grandfather and Grandmother in Edgerton, Wisconsin for about 1 year (1966). I recall my Aunt who lived in Milton talking a lot about seeing UFOs over their homes (I was 9 at the time).


I lived in a then wooded area on the bank of the Rock river (Rock County) where there were many Indian mounds. I awoke one evening after being asleep for some time. I donned my coat and remember heading out the door (10:00 P.M. or so). I was afraid of the dark woods at the time, so this was unusual for me... I recall I was not under my own control. The next thing I remember, I was back in the cottage, took off my coat, and went into my Grandparent's room to tell them I was back. My Grandfather recalls it was about 2:00 A.M.

I had dreams (lucid) for several nights after that where I was a member of a bee colony. I knew I had a role to play and I was indeed a part of a mass conscienceness... Heavy thoughts for a 9 year old... After this episode, I acquired psychic abilities (precognition) which were very accurate.

I believe I may have been abducted, but cannot be certain...

Perhaps there are others who have had similiar happenings, let me know if this is the case.

I saw a noted psychic last year and mentioned I had an episode in Wisconsin in 1966. Without further comment, she stated I was indeed abducted. She said I was one of them (Starseed) and they took me aboard for a checkup. This may be the reason I do not have memory of any painful probing and why I have memories of kind nurturing females (Take it away Freud!)

Now I'd like to hear from you. Do you believe in Extra-Terrestrial Life?

 

[Pinkle]

I believe that somewhere out there there are planets with life, some may be less developed than us, and some may be more developed than us.

The universe is so big, with billions of galaxies with billions of stars in them that there HAS to be somewhere where life also exists, I don't believe that we are alone.

I also believe billions of years ago, that there was life on Mars, (and Possibly Venus as we know that it wasn't always superheated like it is now.) I believe that there was some form of life, plants animals maybe. If there was sentient life, I believe they either died out as the climate changed, or that they managed to find somewhere else to live.

 

[Guywhoiam]

The FBI declassified this.

 

[Malanu]

Gosh, I hope we are not alone. Otherwise, I want my own planet to raise my family on!

Seriously, I rather doubt we are alone in the universe.

 

[ShadowKyogre443]

Maybe if it's just micro-organisms, otherwise no. It would be pretty awesome if the universe was Super Mario Galaxy style though

 

[#chelloressurection]

To be honest, all those myths are 100% false, considering other planets dont have any nescessary living devices, and considering these "aliens" are human like, means they couldnt live.

 

[Mister_SGG]

There is life, that has been proven, but as of yet there's no solid evidence of intelligent life.

But when you think "We are alone in the universe," then it's kind of a depressing picture, isn't it? I want there to be live out there.

 

[Pinkle]

Nearly every star has an area around it called the 'habitable zone', so theoretically every star could hold a couple of planets that would be capable of having lifeforms exist on them.

However that doesn't mean every planet will have life. There's many other factors too.

Scientists say all life needs oxygen, but what if on another planet life evolves to breathe different gases, like Neon, Helium or Argon?

There must be something out there, be it sentient or nonsentient. The universe is just too big.

 

[PokeJustice]

There is life, that has been proven...

This is news to me.

 

[Titan500]

The observable universe has a radius of 441 yottametres. That is equivalent to 28 billion parsecs, or 93 billion light years. Now a light year is slightly under 10 trillion kilometres.

Our observable universe is a spherical volume centred on the Earth. This means the universe is probably much bigger than what I wrote above.

It is highly unlikely for there not to be even the tiniest trace of life out there with such a large plane of existence. I believe that there is life and there, not just because of the fact that the universe is too big to comprehend, but because if it's just us...seems like an awful waste of space.

 

[pinkchomby]

Oh Arceus Yes! I wants to see an aliens spaceshipz! I <3 de paranormal! aliens, ghosts, bigfoot, you name it!

I also believe billions of years ago, that there was life on Mars, (and Possibly Venus as we know that it wasn't always superheated like it is now.) I believe that there was some form of life, plants animals maybe. If there was sentient life, I believe they either died out as the climate changed, or that they managed to find somewhere else to live.

yes, millions of years ago, mars' molten core dried up, causing the planet to lose it's atmosphere, therefore destroying all life on the planet. (the molten core thing is what many scientists think happened, it is unproven that there was ver life on mars. <eugh, factual junk)

 

[sizida]

isn't we are trying to contact them? the satellites are sending radio waves to space in hope to find 'someone' to reply in return.

i do believe there are other smart beings. maybe many light years away from each other who knows?

 

[Pinkle]

Oh Arceus Yes! I wants to see an aliens spaceshipz! I <3 de paranormal! aliens, ghosts, bigfoot, you name it!
yes, millions of years ago, mars' molten core dried up, causing the planet to lose it's atmosphere, therefore destroying all life on the planet. (the molten core thing is what many scientists think happened, it is unproven that there was ver life on mars. <eugh, factual junk)

Yeah Mars is much smaller than earth, this caused it's core to cool quicker. No hot core = no magnetic field. (the field is generated by the mantle and core moving) No magnetic field = no protection from solar flares.. this blew the atmosphere off the planet over millions of years.

How do I know this.

 

[Hejiru]

There very well be life out there. But it's not what people seem to think.

Star Trek is not real life. We're not going to discover some alien civilization that look amazingly similar to humans and have all of the same practices, ideas, and cultural traditions that we do.

Chances are, we wouldn't even recognize it as life. We're not going to start an intergalactic society with Klingons or Na'vi. It could be a form of intelligent fungus that we have no way to communicate with. Our evolution would be so different form them that we wouldn't even think the same way. We couldn't communicate. The chances of another planet evolving a race of human-like animals with the same brains as us is next to impossible. There would have to be a planet out there that is absolutely identical to Earth. Same size, same size sun, same distance form said sun, same gravity and mass, exact same atmospheric conditions, and so on. Do you realize what the odds of that are?

And even if by some miracle there's a human-like alien civilization out there, we'd never know it. Even traveling at the speed of light (the fastest speed possible according to the laws of physics) it would take hundreds of years just to send a message. And another hundred years to receive a reply. Whoever you wanted to send a message to would be dead by the time it got there. Even if the astronomical odds of an alien society capable of understanding us work in our favor, we're too far away to even make our presence known.

There probably is life out there. But we are most definitely alone.

 

[TheFightingPikachu]

Now Crop circles aside, what about personal experiences? My father is the most intelligent man I know personally. Here is his story from his mouth. (I won't say his name so don't ask.)

Your father claims that a psychic told him he's an extraterrestrial? And your father claims to have gained psychic abilities including precognition? I think it would be best to test any alleged precognition abilities for prediction accuracy.

 

[mudkips]

I do believe there is extraterrestrial intelligence out there. All alone in this huge universe?no way

 

[Harpalyce]

Life? Yes.

Intelligent life? That's a lot more iffy.

If extraterrestrial life were guaranteed to be intelligent, I would be a lot less scared of it. But what is to me the most likely is that we'll encounter some very simple form of life along the lines of viruses, bacteria or prions. Either these things will not be able to cope in Earth's environment - at which point we'll curse our bad luck and lament what could have been - or, far more terrifying, they'll flourish.

You can't reason with an infectious agent. You can't pull a prion aside and demonstrate that you're intelligent too. You can't start a dialog with a virus. You can't work to understand a microbe's culture. They just have one drive, and that is to reproduce, often at the expense of other organisms.

Don't fear the little green men... fear the smallpox blankets.

 

[The.Demon.Genome.Project]

There very well be life out there. But it's not what people seem to think.

We're not going to discover some alien civilization that look amazingly similar to humans and have all of the same practices, ideas, and cultural traditions that we do.

Jigglychu, the basic concept of your post was great, but the surety with which you posted it bothered me a little.
The problem I have with discussion on the possibility of extraterrestrial life is that it is almost entirely speculative. There is just far too little we know about the origins of life and the laws it has to conform to to get very deep into it.
Fun though.
The idea most people have of Green-Skinned, but otherwise Caucasian visitors from Jupiter landing near the White House and speaking perfect English is, of course, ridiculous, but not necessarily impossible.
Consider this: Most people in-the-know agree that taking on a two legged stance is one of the most important points in our own evolutionary history in regards to intelligence. Doing this freed up our hands, allowing our ancestors to brachiate (swing through the trees), heavily altering the way our brains work. Later, it freed up our front legs so that we may manipulate our environment, for example to use tools. It even affected the physical development of the brain by changing our centre of gravity, allowing for a new way of balancing our heads, therefore, the basic shape and size of our brains. This is just the tip of iceberg.
This did happen on Earth, but have you ever heard of convergent evolution? Many very unrelated species right here on earth have developed similar physical traits in order to deal with similar environmental pressures. It's at least reasonable to assume that SOME intelligent life elsewhere, on planets of varying degrees of simalarity to our own MIGHT share our own basic physiology, and if they share our own basic physiology, they might share some of our practices, ideas, and cultural traditions too.
For all we know, there may only be one way for intelligent life to be. That doesn't mean there IS only one way, and you may well be 100% correct. I personally prefer the idea that life throughout the universe would present infinite possibilities. But, like I said at the top of my post, there is just far too little we know about the natural constraints on life to get very deep into it.

There would have to be a planet out there that is absolutely identical to Earth. Same size, same size sun, same distance form said sun, same gravity and mass, exact same atmospheric conditions, and so on. Do you realize what the odds of that are?

It wouldn't have to be identical to our own planet, but regardless of that, the odds of there being planets similar enough to earth to house something human enough for the purposes of this discussion aren't as astronomically (pun intended) high as it might seem. The number of planets in the universe has been estimated at 70 sextillion (you can't make stuff like that up), give or take, and when you talk numbers that high the idea of duplication isn't so farfetched. Now I'm tempted to talk about things like the Drake Equation, the Fermi Paradox and the Principle of Mediocrity, but my familiarity with these subjects is only a basic one, and I think I've gone past the tl;dr point, so it's best you look into these things yourself. Convergent Evolution too.
Just trying to broaden some horizons, is all.

 

[Coca Cola]

So I was scanning these forums (It's been awhile) and came across this very interesting topic.

I say "Why not?" - Just because life as we know it on Earth needs a certain set of conditions to exist doesn't mean it's the same across the Universe.
Halomonadaceae a form of bacteria has been known to live, no, flourish in arsenic - Arsenic is a deadly toxic to all known life on Earth other than Halomonadaceae.
So what's to say life out side our solar system doesn't need Oxygen or water, maybe life has adapted to survive in other elements and conditions like the Halomonadaceae.

The Universe is just way too massive for their not to be and anyone who says other wise (Even without evidence) is ignorant.

P.S.: Yes, "life" has been found. A meteor from Mars was found containing a primitive bacterial fossil.
Evidence: http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/marslife.html

The real question is "Is there life in the Universe more advanced than us?"

 

[Byzantine]

Is there life? Almost certainly.

As to intelligent life:

Consider this, if the universe is large enough then it would, in theory, contain an exact replica of earth, with every single detail being precisely the same, including someone with my name and screen name typing this exact message onto their internet, which would be exactly like ours...

If that is true, which may or may not be the case, then the universe almost certainly contains other intelligent life, it is simply a matter of odds. Though, there is no guarantee this life will be anything like us at all, a lot of science fiction has "hive-mind" races, and that is, theoretically, entirely possible, either way life doesn't really have to be organic, that is simply what we are familiar with. Who is to say there can't be forms of "machine" or other metal-based life?