Do you believe in psychics, extraterrestrial life, time travel, other universes?

[Ryzeth]

Psychics, no because I'm not a nutjob.
ET life, yes because I don't believe we're the only sentient species out there.
Time travel, not exactly. Who knows, maybe ET life found a way to do it.
Other universes, is always a possibility, given what we know about matter and our own universe.

[Shadowferal]

We do not know enough to say this. I see this argument a lot, and it is mathematically illiterate bullshit. You are wrong, for the reason I just gave.

If we don't have enough info to say it's possible, then how can you say it's wrong, thereby saying it's impossible? That would imply you have enough info about the structure of reality itself.... Arthur C. Clarke wouldst have a word with you.

[EntertainmentNihilist]

Weird that a lot of people here are repeating the often said lines of "the universe is too big for there to not be aliens" or "it's "statistically" improbable/impossible for there not to be aliens". But...that's not how math works?

We don't actually know most of the variables in the drake equation. It is conceivable that life is so improbable that it's only occurred once in the universe, or once in the observable universe. No matter how big the universe is (unless it's literally an actual infinity - in which case all logic and reasoning is meaningless), if something is improbable enough - it won't occur much, maybe once, or maybe never.

You may think it unreasonable that life is that improbable, but consider what life actually is. Even the most "simple" organisms imaginable are extremely complex self-replicating machines that operate on a molecular level. Think about how crazy that is. Something like that "building itself" through entirely natural & random interactions & fluctuations in chemical muck? Well, maybe that really has only occurred once in the entire observable universe.

On the other hand, maybe the formation of life is actually really easy and will occur inevitably given the right set of conditions. Maybe there are millions of civilizations in our galaxy alone. Or maybe we're alone. We just don't know. Stop pretending to know.

[TheFirstOnes]

Psychics? Not on Earth. Or, at least, that's what I know.

Alien life? Yes. We've literally discovered it already, albeit in the form of micro-organic bacteria, algae, etc. Intelligent Life could possess actual psychics, btw.

Time Travel? Definitely possible, with the right tools.

Other Universes? Don't see why not. We'll never see them in our time though, unless some crazy magic shit happens, or unless other things crazy occur.

[Shadowferal]

You may think it unreasonable that life is that improbable, but consider what life actually is. .

What life actually is...as humans understand it.

[Toxuvox]

Physics allows for the possibility of time travel (in a limited sense), and describes parallel universes quite elegantly, so I can easily get on board with those. ETs, I think, are a given. The absurd arrogance in thinking that in the vastness of the universe, life only appeared here on earth is childishly silly. Psychics on the other hand....absolutely not. In my opinion, they are nothing but money hungry charlatans looking for the next sap they can make a buck out of.

[DechCJC]

Psychics - Not really, no, but maybe? The universe is pretty massive. Probably not.

Aliens - I find it very hard to imagine that we're alone in this universe, it's nearly impossible statistically.

Time travel - You sort of can time travel forward, but I don't believe there will ever be a way to go backwards.

Other universes - Sure why not, I have no strong reason to believe one way or the other, so I'll pick the exciting option.

[Osmeric]

If we don't have enough info to say it's possible, then how can you say it's wrong, thereby saying it's impossible? That would imply you have enough info about the structure of reality itself.... Arthur C. Clarke wouldst have a word with you.

I'm saying the argument is wrong, not the conclusion is wrong. We cannot know right now if there is life elsewhere or not, nor do we know enough to estimate the probability of life elsewhere. The claim that it's highly likely that there is life elsewhere is not justified by the evidence at this point.

[Darththeo]

I did refute it. I showed that when phrased mathematically, your argument was logically incorrect. You are doing the equivalent of insisting that 1 + 1 = 3.



This is a lie. Please stop lying..

It is not a lie and no, you didn't refute it.

You are arguing that the chance life could exist could be near zero, therefore it is bullshit to say it is statistically possible for life to exist.

You are saying if p = 1 / (100*N) where N is the number of visible stars in the known universe. There are 2 trillion galaxies in the known universe averages 100 MILLION stars. So you are saying if p = 1 / (2 x 10^22), then life likely doesn't exist. You are putting a functionally zero odds to argue that it is bullshit because it is possible the odds are that low, but it is highly unlikely that the odds of life are that low.

It isn't a lie, you didn't refute crap. You are just saying there is a chance the odds are so low that life doesn't exist out there. However, that low odds only gets you to the observable universe. There is more to the universe than just what we can see.

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I'm saying the argument is wrong, not the conclusion is wrong. We cannot know right now if there is life elsewhere or not, nor do we know enough to estimate the probability of life elsewhere. The claim that it's highly likely that there is life elsewhere is not justified by the evidence at this point.

You are right, but what we do know suggests it is statistically the case it does. It is accepted by experts in the field that it is statistically unlikely that life does not exist elsewhere. The more we learn about life, the more we realize we have been overly restricted on the requirements for it.

[Surfd]

The existence of extraterrestrial life is pretty much guaranteed

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How can time travel be possible? You need to be faster than the speed of light, meaning your mass would have to be below 0.

Just FYI, but "relativistic travel resulting in temporal de-synch" isn't really Time Travel by most accepted definitions of the concept.

[Darththeo]

Just FYI, but "relativistic travel resulting in temporal de-synch" isn't really Time Travel by most accepted definitions of the concept.

That is because Time Travel include going to the past, therefore it isn't included as going forward without a return isn't considered "time travel."

[Surfd]

I did refute it. I showed that when phrased mathematically, your argument was logically incorrect. You are doing the equivalent of insisting that 1 + 1 = 3.

No, it's not. It's more like presenting the argument that 0.999999 infinitely repeating eventually equals 1. Which has been mathematically proven to be correct.

[Al Gorefiend]

I only believe in ET life. Time travel, psychics (aka magic powers) and multiverse I don't think exist or ever will.

[DarkAmbient]

The vastness of space is cruel. There could be countless civilisations gazing in each others' directions across the void, all doomed to die and pass out of all knowledge without ever having been discovered. For me that's worse than the thought that we're truly alone.

[Shadowferal]

I'm saying the argument is wrong, not the conclusion is wrong. We cannot know right now if there is life elsewhere or not, nor do we know enough to estimate the probability of life elsewhere. The claim that it's highly likely that there is life elsewhere is not justified by the evidence at this point.

You're arguing for an absolute neutral position. I don't believe many astrophysicists would agree but I do understand the position though I disagree with it.

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The vastness of space is cruel. There could be countless civilisations gazing in each others' directions across the void, all doomed to die and pass out of all knowledge without ever having been discovered. For me that's worse than the thought that we're truly alone.

Would it cheer you up to realize that our planet's peoples and respective civilizations therein will likely join those "countless civilizations?"

[Vakna]

Putting science and magic in the same sentence and asking if you believe in them is a bit weird.

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The vastness of space is cruel. There could be countless civilisations gazing in each others' directions across the void, all doomed to die and pass out of all knowledge without ever having been discovered. For me that's worse than the thought that we're truly alone.

Did you ever hear of the Dark Forest theory?

The universe is a vast, dark forest, filled with predators. The predators are too scared to make a noise, lest they become the hunted.

[Darththeo]

You're arguing for an absolute neutral position. I don't believe many astrophysicists would agree but I do understand the position though I disagree with it.

He isn't really arguing a neutral position, imo. He is arguing because we don't know the exact odds and the fact that odds thusly could be near zero, it is not statistically likely that life exists elsewhere. It essentially is ignoring what we do know about life to make the argument.

[DarkAmbient]

Would it cheer you up to realize that our planet's peoples and respective civilizations therein will likely join those "countless civilizations?"

Of course we will. Once the sun has done its thing all that's left will be the Voyagers, which probably will have disintegrated long before that anyway. Good times!

Did you ever hear of the Dark Forest theory?

The universe is a vast, dark forest, filled with predators. The predators are too scared to make a noise, lest they become the hunted.

Yeah, it's a disturbing thought. I'll be ok though *pats flamethrower*

[Shadowferal]

He isn't really arguing a neutral position, imo. He is arguing because we don't know the exact odds and the fact that odds thusly could be near zero, it is not statistically likely that life exists elsewhere. It essentially is ignoring what we do know about life to make the argument.

I think my main issue is an assumption of knowledge of...what we know = to what we don't know. I'm certain our ignorance is far greater...

[Darththeo]

I think my main issue is an assumption of knowledge of...what we know = to what we don't know. I'm certain our ignorance is far greater...

That is likely the case, but also not relevant.

We used to think stars with planets were rare ... now it appears to be more often they have planets than don't.
We used to think rocky planets were rare ... now it appears they are far more common.

In terms of the discussion about life elsewhere in the universe, as time moves on, we are finding that if anything we have been too restrictive on what we feel are requirements for life and those things we thought were rare occurrences appear to be commonplace. Yes, we don't know a lot, but how much we lack in knowledge isn't sufficient to discount what we do know.

And technically, the only thing we know about life is that it exists and there is some divide between life and not life (but not where that line is.) Some people call viruses alive and others don't.