Are We Ready?
Now, as we await confirmation of organic life on Gliese 581d, we have to face the fact that civilizations far in advance of our own exist and they might not be that far away. I compare our current situation to that of a little kid who grew up in a room with but a single window. Everything he knows about himself and the world around him is based on what he sees through that window. Some of his conclusions might be correct. Others might be hilariously wrong. The only way he knows the truth is to leave that room and join the world.
The door to the greater Cosmos beyond Earth has begun opening. Are we ready?
Why do you ass u me that any life found is FAR
in advance of our own??
Is it because the sun burns cooler and has been burning for longer? Giving a longer time for life to develop?
Or is my reasoning completely off here?
Point one: interstellar civilizations leave far larger footprints across the Cosmos, making them much easier to find. One way to find them is to study the atmospheres of exoplanets as we find them, looking for evidence of pollution and/or weather control. Another is artificial constructs large enough to be detected. The fact that our civilization may be thousands of years at the present rate of progress from changing gas giant planets into stars and building planet sized satellites doesn't preclude anyone else from doing it.
Actually, a study of the Industrial Revolution reveals that progress isn't steady but rather seems to be an uneven series of explosions with interludes in between. The realization that we aren't alone and, in fact, are far behind will prompt the greatest and longest lasting industrial explosion in history. It will be a frantic time and lots of fun.
Point two: check out VB 10 and 10b, then reread 2010 by Arthur C Clark. Call the 2001 series Clark's Code.
How does finding indication of organic chemical processes prove the existence of interstellar civilizations?
I realize this is the Science Fiction Group, but you are not posting as such.
Why wouldn't it? Do you know of limits to evolution not found in present texts? As Michio Kaku says, anything not proven impossible, is mandatory.
As for the postings not being sci fi, stories and blogs about the 21st Century seem to be the essence of sci fi. No one precisely knows how the future will play out, one can only explore the possibilities in blogs and stories. In my case, I see a positive future that leads to interstellar travel by the 22nd Century rather than the bleak, end of the earth scenarios so prevalent today. Who knows? I might even be right?
Len,
You are saying that if we fine evidence of organic chemical processes on a planet or moon that proves there is a civilization there. You don't really mean that do you.
The statement "Anything not proven impossible, is mandatory" is poetical. But that's all. It's philosophically inspirational but not scientific.
Where are the limits to evolution? Name one. Scientifically, you can't name a limit because we have only our own planet to study. As my wife, as able a scientist as any I have met, says, 'scientists are forever making mistakes and discovering that they were wrong. It's called research."
Consider the moon, for example. Everyone agrees there never has been life on Luna. But, when was the last time everyone was wrong? Yesterday? Last week? Last month? The discovery of water ice on Luna opens the door slightly to the possibility that organic life existed on Luna at one time. Poly extremophiles make it even more likely. If you include the reality that poly extremophiles can exist in biofilms for millions or even billions of years inside asteroids and micro meteorites, saying Luna has never had life is unscientific. You don't have concrete proof otherwise. All you have is speculation and old wives tales.
That brings me to Kaku's dictum: Anything not proven impossible, is mandatory. Too many otherwise literate people today confuse urban legends with science. Has there been or has there never organic life on Luna? Until NASA discovered water ice on it, the answer seemed to be a slam dunk. Now, anyone who says there never has been organic life on the moon defines unscientific.
The only way to scientifically answer the question of life on Luna where the ice is and look for life, expecting to find something.
An additional thought. Some morons at NASA are touting the idea of flying humans to the orbit of Mars and directing exploration from there. What dweeb nonsense. Microbiologists need to get down and dirty to discover things. Only dweebs in love with their nanotoys could come up with such schemes. One has to wonder if they fear being left out if humans start mucking about on the Martian surface the way any researcher would on this planet.
Consider this: to a cyber nut, the statement: anything not proven impossible, is mandatory sounds quaint, because it requires thinking outside the box. Yet, that is the essence of scientific research.
The asumption that is the basis for the Carl Sagan and I.S. Shklovskii book "Intelligent Life in the Universe" (the basis for SETI) is that the probabliity of life is equally spread across the universe. In fact that is not true. If there is a super nova every 100 million years or so in an individual galaxy the probability of life as we know it, e.g. complex life forms, would go way down.
Space is so hostile that we will probably never go to Mars.
Putting all this together and in reverse - I don't think we have much to worry about when it comes to our being invaded by E.T.s
Tell that to the HARPS team confirming life on Gliese 581d. Like I said, the announcement that they have done it can happen any time. As for sentient life, the jury is out. On one hand, the sentients evolved in a water environment. On the other, they have had three billion years longer than us to evolve. That is, if evolution matters.
As for Sagan and Shklovskii, they were only guessing at a time when no one knew for certain that planets even existed. Sagan died in Seattle in 1996. At least he knew that Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz had detected 51 Pegasi b in October of 1995 and others had confirmed it.
Still, he could only imagine what would follow in the 14 years since. Previously detected HD 209458 b would do a transit of its star that would be recorded in July of 1999, forever ending the controversy as to whether exoplanets were actually being found.
In the beginning only enormous gas giants were found and some astronomers speculated that jovian planets were the only ones to be found. But as our abilities of detection have improved, we have found smaller and smaller planets. Now, it's estimated that smaller rocky planets outnumber the jovian giants by at least 3 to 1.
Probably the biggest discovery is how many planets there are . As Didier Queloz said last May, we can now assume that 'planets are ubiquitous'. They are everywhere and we can assume that at least one planet is found in the goldilocks zone.
Which brings us back to Gliese 581d. It's about as opposite as a planet can be and still be viable for humans. It's a new Cosmos, my friend. Enjoy the ride. It's going to be a long, long, long, long, long one.
