Ok, I used to believe in aliens when I was a kid and then I stopped because the premise of the many cases I read or saw sounded hokey in some way. Then I was very recently watching youtube and was watching a video that linked in to another video about alien abductions from a speaker. Having been quite the fan as a kid and not having entertained myself for a while I watched it and was completely struck by the seemingly purposeful, organized investigation and the presentation of a woman named Dr. Karla Turner. But, I was not simply struck by that but by the unusual information she presented As a kid, the whole abduction scenario took on a repetitive and increasingly lame sounding process. No reasons, no motives, no depth into the matter. Just the usual confrontation, weird and intrusive examinations, and the return with or without a sense of missing time. But Karla Turner provides much more than that. So impressed by the internet speeches she made, I looked up and read two of her three books; Into the Fringe, and Masquerade of Angels. These books truly expanded my concepts of what could be possible in the world. They also reanimated my zeal for looking up now other stronger evidence of UFO's possible existence and the underlying, horrifying possibility of government interaction. All three books can be read on the internet for free with a simple google websearch. Sean Warwick is another interesting character. His views I find rather out there, but I am willing to bounce around the story nonetheless. Even if you don't believe or remain half-speculative (like I) it feels like bouncing around through a bizzare wonderland linking history with these things. Currently listening to this dude called Phil Schneider on you tube. He is kind of brushing against my to strange to believe button, but I'll push on. It's pretty cool. Aside from this, their is no sci-fi that compares. It's like an interactive endeavor into a world of possible fiction with all the thrills and chills that come of the possibilities. So...does anyone else believe in aliens? Oh yeah, Karla Turner, Phil, and Dean Warwick are both dead under very mysterious circumstances. (shiver me timbers )
What you see on television is mostly phony stuff the media tries to manipulate into what could be extraterrestrial but could really be something as simple as a balloon caught on some really bad quality camera that gives a perception of it to look like a UFO or something. I believe that people are gullible and would believe whatever the TV programs show us or half of the posts on the website Unexplained Mysteries. I do, however, believe that intelligent life exist somewhere in the universe. Science has shown that there are planets light years away that hold the possibility to maintain life and it's hard to imagine us being alone in a universe with a size that is almost incomprehensible. But a lot of people would probably figure out ways to tie in religion with controversies such as these and that would just lead into a big unnecessary argument. Also it would take a lot of eerie evidence to prove to anyone that you have been abducted and operated on by aliens. I mean, it's just like a time traveler coming back and saying he is from the future. Who would really believe that?
True. In fact, religion has already been tied in with the phenomenon. Also, about the TV version, it's thought that it is the governments way of downplaying the seriousness or possibility of such a thing could it ever happen. Kind of like those comedians who sound and talk real serious but are actually making jokes. Adding to that, it's not only convincing them they exist, apparently, but that they are already here. And not just flying in and out of the sky, but subterranean. In the earth. Very strange. It seems impossible by my accounts that such a thing could have gone unnoticed, but then. There has been notice. Plenty of it. Many many people attest to it. But it's believed because of movies and social stigma surrounding the subject, all accounts are generally ignored or never heard by people fearing their jobs and reputation. Never heard or witnessed anything about it. Never want to, but the concepts brought up are really terrifying. The Matrix comes to mind except there is no Neo, no Jesus, no savior of that sort. We would, under such a species, be as helpless as any other form of cattle. There are a lot of inconsistencies, though. Like Dan Brown's first book, it does a good job of weaving fact and what may be fiction, but there are inconsistencies. Whether it is the accidental result of these peoples personal guesses, misinformation, or simply flat out deception is the big question. But I hope so.
I believe that intelligent extraterrestrial beings exist in the universe somewhere. I do not believe they have visited Earth. Every account I have heard of such a visitation has big holes in the story, and absolutely zero credible physical evidence to back it up. The vast majority of UFO sightings have been proven to be either erroneous or deliberate hoaxes. The few that haven't are still under investigation, but there is no reason to believe that, simply because they are as yet unexplained, they are alien spacecraft. I can watch a magic trick performed by David Copperfield or Criss Angel and not know how it's done, but that doesn't mean I believe they have real magical powers. Until there's hard physical evidence that is unquestionable, I will remain skeptical.
Sure I believe in the possibility. I mean when you take into account just how big the universe is(I mean have you ever tried to wrap your mind around it?)... it be odd to think that humans are the only intelligent life. But because of the massive size of the universe and as far as we know the inability to travel faster then light, the odds of an advanced civilization coming to our speck of dust? Not likely. Now I guess I wouldn't say impossible. So I am highly sceptical of UFO sightings... But when looking up at the stars its amusing to think that perhaps there are aliens and they are wondering if we exist. That or maybe somewhere they are going through their own version of the Dark Ages or have just discovered how to build a nuclear bomb. Maybe somewhere a world has just started the process of joining together in a complete allied state. Then again maybe they have discovered our rock amongst the stars and feel that one day they may attempt to colonize. Of course what makes us any different then aliens? Well I'll tell you. We come from earth and they don't. But to them we are the aliens because they come from where they live and we don't. Anyways. The universe is a very very large place. We are on just 1 planet revolving around 1 star out of a billions(i hear somewhere close to 100billion?) this is just 1 galaxy in a universe with... well who knows how many galaxies? Millions? Billions? Yeah if we are the only intelligent life out there.
I think the universe would be a very absurd palce if we were its only life. As to what kind of life forms inhabit it is something I'm still pondering.
i can certainly believe it's much more likely for sentient beings to exist elsewhere in the universe, than that any man-conceived god exists in the real world... for those of any intelligence to be convinced that this single planet amid the zillions of others could possibly be the only one where sentient life could have arisen is idiocy at worst, misplaced trust in religion-founders at best, imo [no offense intended to those of a different persuasion]... as to whether or not any have been here as visitors, or residents, or even progenitors of our own species is not provable either way at present, so my mind is open to any/all possibilities... though my heart wishes desperately that there be a kinder, gentler sentient race out there [or on/in/under here], since this one sure ain't doin' the planet/galaxy/universe [or themselves] any good!
Yes. Still I'm skeptical of many of the reported cases, simply because people like to jump on band-wagons & talk out of their arse for exposure/ other reasons. That in itself doesn't discount my belief that, surely, we cannot be the only ones in this vast universe. I find research into this area fascinating. The same goes for the seriously intricate crop circles and those funny ancient cave paintings that profess to being UFOs/ aliens etc etc. As for the extraterrestrial life vs God notion that seem to crop up in such discussions at times, I don't see any conflict there, to my mind. I can happily believe in the existence of both.
RusticOnion said it well; I would feel extremely lonely knowing that in the vastness of the universe we, life on earth, are the only forms of life to exist. That said I'm not convinced, one way or the other, that any other life forms have or will visit earth.
Does other life exist? Yes. Drake's Equation is powerful evidence for intelligent life aside from ourselves in this galaxy, never mind elsewhere in the cosmos. And then there's our own existence. I strongly doubt that on a trillion trillion worlds across the universe we live on the only place where intelligent life has developed. Will we find signs of other life? Yes. With the search for exoplanets being like it is we'll soon develop telescopes which can discern details on planets the size of ours hundreds of light-years away. We'll eventually come across one with something that looks suspiciously like the lights of a city on the dark side... Will we eventually make contact with other life in some form (via long-distance communications, etc)? Yes. Long-distance radio communications already take place with probes sent out into our own solar system. Using similar technology to send radio messages to other civilisations is a possibility. The likelihood is that they'll have some form of radio comms which will pick up the message. It may take them a year or two to crack what we're saying (depending on who's sent the message, anything from 'Hi, we're the US speaking on behalf of mankind' to 'Hi, we're the Isle of Man, God only knows how we became a spacefaring nation' to 'Hi, we're the Chinese. What's that about a terrible human rights record?'), but they might just end up sending us a message back. Alternatively, there's another civilisation already out there who are in the process of sending a message to us across space right now. Unfortunately, the exchange of voicemails might take a century or two. Will we ever meet them face to face? No. To nick a Douglas Adams quote, space is big, really big. You might think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space. Just to get to our nearest start takes four and a bit years travelling at the speed of light. We can't travel at the speed of light and we never will. Even if we attained a respectable fraction of lightspeed (say, 20%) with a ship, it'd still take generations to get across space to say hi.
Life almost certainly exists somewhere. Regarding aliens visiting Earth: I feel really weird saying this because I am naturally inclined to skepticism, but insofar as conspiracy theories go, there is a relatively large amount of evidence that's hard to dismiss off hand. That by no means proves anything, nor does it mean I actually believe aliens have visited Earth, but I do think the idea is not as completely looney as I've been culturally conditioned to believe.
The problem with apparent UFO sightings, and evidence of UFOs is: when they are good, or at least worthy of further inspection, descriptions of these events are almost entirely schizophrenic. The Chiles-Witted case, for example, as little to do with the incident in Nova Scotia, in which something was seen diving into deep water at incredibly high speeds, remained visible for a few moments and then flew away without sound. The famous Green Fireballs are also practically unique in UFO-lore. This discrepancy is, of course, no way conclusive either way, but of all of the cases that I know of and all the differences between them makes me suspect that UFOs are far from extra-terrestrial.
Why not? It's likely there are other lifeforms out there; it'd be foolish to think our planet is the only thing in the entire universe to sustain life. Now, as to why they haven't come visit us? I can think of many reasons, and this is assuming that they're an intellectual species with the ability to reason, process information and build civilizations: #1- We're inferior. What we have is inferior and they don't need it. It'd be like someone on Earth saying, "Hey, let's use these old steam ships of the 1900s instead of our more vastly superior cruise ships for trans-Atlantic crossing." #2- They, too, are trying to communicate with us, but they lack sufficient technology as well. #3- We're too war-like for their tastes. #4- They're racist bigots who think we're all freakish naked apes on two legs and want nothing to do with us. Will they one day make contact with us? Sure. It may not be for a few hundred years though, and, seeing how far we all got with the space exploration thing, they'd better get their little butts in their high and fancy ships and speed their little selves over to Earth to contact us first.
I believe it is almost certain (99.999% or so) that life exists somewhere else in the universe. The Drake Equation, while interesting, isn't really a powerful proof of anything. Most of the variables are nothing but sheer guesswork. There's no way we have any real handle on what numbers should go there, and no way for us to even know how close or far off any set of numbers might be. For example (the first occurrence of "the above" referring to planets that could form life): f[SUB]ℓ[/SUB] = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point f[SUB]i[/SUB] = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop intelligent life f[SUB]c[/SUB] = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space. (from Wikipedia)
This whole question of "Why haven't they come to visit us?" to me is silly. The answer is obvious: they haven't found us. People don't seem to understand how huge the universe is, and how many billions of billions of stars and planets there are in it. We're one small planet in orbit around one small insignificant star in a perfectly ordinary galaxy like a hundred billion others. Some other race out there finding us and taking an interest in us would be like a child finding and taking an interest in one specific grain of sand on a beach. That grain of sand might be thinking (figuratively speaking, of course) "Why haven't any humans found me?" Well, you'd better get used to it, you silly grain of sand. There are trillions like you and you aren't special in any way - why would anybody even notice you? Now imagine that it isn't a child playing on a beach that might find the grain of sand. Imagine that it's another grain of sand, perhaps on a beach a thousand miles away, that might find our grain of sand. How is it even remotely possible to assume that some grain of sand on some distant beach would take an interest in our grain of sand on our beach? In the universe, we're nothing. Aliens are nothing. People who think we're being visited by aliens all the time are suggesting that a speck of nothing is interested in another speck of nothing a long way away. This does not make sense to me.
Or: they can't. Or more even a combination of the two: they don't know about us, and couldn't visit even if they did.
Equations aren't evidence. Equations are models. There's a huge, huge difference. The Drake Equation is no more evidence for extraterrestrial life than the formula for the volume of a sphere is for the existence of the World Series. Don't count on it. Our current methods of detecting exoplanets don't involve actually directly observing those worlds, with 4 or 5 notable exceptions. That's 4 or 5 directly photographed planets (which appear as perfect points, despite being the size of Jupiter) out of ~2500 planet candidates. We can barely resolve features on the surface of Pluto. To resolve even a Jupiter sized world as something larger than a single pixel at optical wavelengths would require a telescope ~1 mile in diameter at a distance of 10 parsecs. For an Earth sized planet, the telescope would have to have a diameter of ~10 miles. To detect a feature on a planet's surface the size of, say, the United States would require a telescope ~30 miles (50 km!) across. And all of this is assuming these are space telescopes, unhindered by the instabilities of the Earth's atmosphere. Direct visual detection of alien infrastructure is a pipe dream. Instead, evidence of alien life will come from analyzing the composition of planetary atmospheres. We can do this already, to a limited extent, by watching as exoplanets pass between us and their parent stars. Life will be indirectly detected on worlds which themselves are indirectly detected long before we have even the slightest sniff of a clue as to what these worlds look like. Unfortunately, it's not so simple as that. Beam coherency is a major problem. We cannot perfectly direct our radio transmissions, and so the radio waves those transmissions are made up of spread out as they travel through space. On interstellar scales, those signals really don't go anywhere at all before they're so weak as to be completely overwhelmed by natural radio background sources. No one can hear us. Not without basically tripping over us, anyway. This. Exactly this.
I see three very different questions here: - Does intelligent life exist on other planets somewhere in the universe? - Have those life forms ever visited here? - Do they kidnap people? The first strikes me as reasonably plausible. I don't find the second and third at all likely. (Edited to add: Though another way to view the first question is, does intelligent life exist on other planets _now_, simultaneous with our existence? If the odds of life coming into existence are incredibly small, and that life exists for only a heartbeat in terms of the life of the universe before the planet or the species is destroyed, what are the odds that multiple planets will have life, much less intelligent life, at the same time? I have no clue.)
Care to elaborate? Personally I think with the size of the universe I think it'd be absurd if there was no other life out there. I don't think any have visited earth however.
I think there's more to it than that, I'm going to have to go with Link I also think that we need to take into consideration how much time, effort and resources it would actually take to reach us and then interact with us in a way to suit their needs, from their point of view, is it really worth it? Also, I think a few posters here are applying human traits to these aliens, do they even care about other life?
