Do you prefer the notion that we are alone with sentience in the universe, or not?

[diddle]

“Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.” - Arthur C. Clarke

This question is not more which you personally believe, but which would you would prefer be true. For example - I personally believe that humans are alone in the universe given the very unlikely and specifically required conditions that gave rise to us. However, I would prefer that we were not alone in the Universe and there were other developed forms of life across the universe. The former just seems so boring.

[Bathory]

Na. Too big to be alone. We aren't special, just probability imo.

[jcheerno11]

“If we are alone in the Universe, it sure seems like an awful waste of space.” ~ Carl Sagan

[Kraenen]

I think I 'prefer' the notion that we aren't alone, that there might be some beings that are greater than us and keep us in line. I want there to be someone better than humanity in the moral, technological, social scope.

[diddle]

Na. Too big to be alone. We aren't special, just probability imo.

But do you prefer that? For example, would you prefer we be alone in the universe? I find the population to be rather few but some would prefer that to completely void any sort of alien invasion no matter how ridiculously infinitesimally it small it. Safety first I suppose.

[Maoli]

I think it's highly likely there are/were other intelligent beings out there. I think it's completely unlikely we'd ever interact with them within the span of humanity. I think you're overrated the requirements to create intelligent live versus the scale of the universe. Seems extremely likely that there are planets that could hold live just like Earth.. and I see no reason why live would evolve quite similar to our planet.

[Adam Jensen]

I don't believe we are alone, but I do believe its a low probability, given the size of the universe, that we'll find them any time soon, if at all.

[Kalis]

Due to how rare abiogenesis has been on our planet, I think life is rare, whether it is so rare as to be unique I don't know, and nobody does.

I hope that other life has existed within our solar system as it is pretty much the only chance of discovering evidence for it in my lifetime. I'd love us to not be alone, those Star Wars dreams I had as a kid may have been true, though the genocide of Ewoks that I perpetrated may have been a bit OTT.

[NewOrleansTrolley]

My preference has nothing to do with it.

[Deleted]

“Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.” - Arthur C. Clarke

This question is not more which you personally believe, but which would you would prefer be true. For example - I personally believe that humans are alone in the universe given the very unlikely and specifically required conditions that gave rise to us. However, I would prefer that we were not alone in the Universe and there were other developed forms of life across the universe. The former just seems so boring.

I dont prefer either. I currently have no evidence to support that there is any other sentience out there, so as far as I am concerned thats how it is, unless or until evidence to the contrary is produced.

As, even if we are not alone, the chance of us ever encountering another sentience species would be infinitesimally small, it matter to me not at all which proves to be true.

“Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.” - Arthur C. Clarke
...both are equally irrelevant is more accurate.

[Zethras]

Due to how rare abiogenesis has been on our planet, I think life is rare, whether it is so rare as to be unique I don't know, and nobody does.

I hope that other life has existed within our solar system as it is pretty much the only chance of discovering evidence for it in my lifetime. I'd love us to not be alone, those Star Wars dreams I had as a kid may have been true, though the genocide of Ewoks that I perpetrated may have been a bit OTT.

Rare is subjective imo. If the entire size of the universe was quantified as the number 1,000,000, and life was 0.1 out of that 1,000,000, it might seem small, but consider then, the total size of the entire universe, then by that logic, life should be throughout the universe.

[Annoying]

Considering that we're most likely not alone with sentience on the planet, much less the massive expanse of the universe, I'm not terribly worried about it. I am, however, worried about the likelihood that we'll ever get out far enough to see anything else.

[DEATHETERNAL]

Angels are sentient, therefore we are not alone in our sentience .

[Deleted]

Na. Too big to be alone. We aren't special, just probability imo.

"probability"....oh dear. No, as we have no way of judging the likelihood of life beginning, achieving multicelluar forms, becomming sentient.....then we really cant judge if probability says there should be more life out there.

If there are 1000000000000000000000000000000000000 planets suitable for life, but the change of life evolving on anyone of them is 1 in 1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 then the chances are we are the anomaly.

And that probability is just as likely as any other at this point, as we have no basis to assign the probability a value.

[rayvio]

I'd like to think there's sentient life out there somewhere
as for what I believe though, it may sound like a cop out but I believe that we don't understand enough yet to do more than guess either way. the leading theory is that the universe if infinite and if that is true then the chances of us being the only sentient life are astronomically minute but the chances of us evolving to the point that we have along the path that we have (ie: the correct circumstances arising to make it possible to happen) are just as unlikely but depending on the actual size of the universe we can't really calculate how likely it is to happen more than once. we've answered a lot of questions that our ancestors could not, many that they didn't understand enough to even ask, but we also know enough to know that there's a lot more we don't know


edit: by the way, if you want an interesting read on the subject there's an excellent work of fiction on the subject by Peter Watts called Blindsight. due to circumstances with his former publishers he's also giving it away for free on his website you can read it on the page or download the ebook

[Deleted]

Well, I'd be thrilled if there was other life out there.

[TZK203]

I think there are other intelligent beings out there. The questions to ask, however, are:

(1) Do these intelligent beings have a way of traversing the great dark cosmos between planets in a timely fashion?

(2) Is the evolutionary disposition of intelligent beings to eventually annihilate themselves? I mean, look at humanity: We have nuclear weapons, and we could easily wipe the entirety of humanity off the face of the planet with enough nuclear weapons.

[Raptor With a Saber]

As a great person once said. We aren't alone but if we are, we are the worst mistake this universe has ever created. Forgot who said it but it sums it up right.

[DEATHETERNAL]

"probability"....oh dear. No, as we have no way of judging the likelihood of life beginning, achieving multicelluar forms, becomming sentient.....then we really cant judge if probability says there should be more life out there.

If there are 1000000000000000000000000000000000000 planets suitable for life, but the change of life evolving on anyone of them is 1 in 1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 then the chances are we are the anomaly.

And that probability is just as likely as any other at this point, as we have no basis to assign the probability a value.

Inbefore they tell you that they actually know the probability of life arrising from lifelessness or can estimate it based on no knowledge of how it occurred in the single example we have of it.

[Nachturnal]

But do you prefer that? For example, would you prefer we be alone in the universe? I find the population to be rather few but some would prefer that to completely void any sort of alien invasion no matter how ridiculously infinitesimally it small it. Safety first I suppose.

What role does preference make in this? It should be left up to probability and mathematical theory. Why would anyone prefer to be alone? It's a large and vast universe, there is a chance, albeit detrimentally small, of life in some distant unknown planet somewhere.