The Futility of the Search For Extraterrestrial Intelligence

While the simulation argument is a skeptical view of reality, and proposes an interesting question regarding nature and technology, there are several problems if it is proposed as a serious hypothesis.First, the simulation argument is completely unfalsifiable as it is impossible to devise an experiment to test the hypothesis and potentially prove it to be false. Even if a hypothetical experiment was devised and turned out negative (that the world was not simulated) it would still be insufficient because there is the potential that this is merely what the simulation wants us to think, or we are living inside a simulation inside a simulation. This, according to widely accepted definitions, places it firmly in the field of pseudoscience. Any serious suggestion that we do live in a simulation (as opposed to discussion of the probabilities, assumptions and the potential technologies involved, which is academically sound) relies purely on faith and argument by assertion. This makes the simulation argument, as an explanation of reality, more like a religion - regardless of the assertions of transhumanists that the maths works out.

https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Simulated_reality

 

There is an ongoing biodiversity crisis in the USA right now. We're losing species at a high rate.

https://www.nwf.org/Magazines/National-Wildlife/2017/Feb-March/Conservation/Biodiversity.

 

It is more fitting to say that we live in a virtual reality. It may not be so far fetched in view of the fact that physicists acknowledge the existence of virtual particles. Our reality can be considered to be a construct that emerges in the transition from subjective fluidity to objective solidity. At every microsecond, the existing reality dissolves and is replaced by a new reality that is at least slightly different than the previous one according to the most probable and consistent outcomes.
Science knows that a certain percentage range of quarks are popping in and out of existence.

The double slit experiment still stands as the undeniable example of mind-alterable subjectivity transition and a master consciousness system that enforces consistent data processing logic. So, whose mind or supercomputer is running the show? If not the mind of God (who is supposedly outside this reality) then his designated supercomputer, or maybe just the so-called universal mind of all intelligent individuals in this domain. At any rate, the programmer is invisible to the program.

Science recognizes the subjective fluidity as the condition at the subatomic level. An electron in its orbit or shell around a nucleus is not really a particle. It is a cloudlike manifestation of an energy field. The solid appearance of an object such as a tabletop is an illusion. You can't poke your hand thru it because of atomic/molecular repulsion at the contact surfaces.

 

RE: The Futility of the Search For Extraterrestrial Intelligence
⁜→ Robert Urbanek, et al,

BLUF: Mathematics is not some sort of religious truth. It is a tool - an invention of man. And the Professor Bostrom is a great lecturer, his analysis is really out there.

(COMMENT)

I am not saying that we absolutely need to spend tay revenue on projects like SETI. But I would like to point out that America is not a modern day Alexandria (a Meca for contemporaty scientists, philosophers and intellectuals). --- I think America has a very poor attitude in promoting education, science and technology.


Most Respectfully,
R

 

Any amount of money spent on the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is worth it if it can answer the question "are we alone in the universe". If we do end up finding another civilization out there, it doesn't matter if we are able to reach or contact them or not. We will know.

 

RE: The Futility of the Search For Extraterrestrial Intelligence
⁜→ harbert, et al,

BLUF: I think yours is the more enlightened view.

(COMMENT)

Every advancement or discovery we make seems to include the new technologies that came along with the scientific investigation. Even if we don't make an advancement or discovery, we still have the ancilliary knowledge in application of techniques used in the search.


Most Respectfully,
R

 

We're a self-aware game of The Sims. There's 'physical' evidence that we're holographic even.

 

All of existance was issued in with vibrations of the Voice Of God.

Here's a scientific fact.. matter would cease to exist if it stopped vibrating. There has never been mass measurable without atomic vibration.. mass can't be measured separately

 

Divine fallacy (argument from incredulity)

 

This reminds me of Bishop Berkeley. He said we were just a dream god was having. He was a famous philosopher of the 1700s.

Every generation gets somebody like that.

If you want my opinion... fahgettaboutit.

 

I had no idea the God of Islam was involved in this stuff??

 

That would be Satan.. and he does try to take credit for it... doesn't he.

 

Also, I think we have to be careful in making claims about how much is spent lookig for extraterrestrial life.

There are lots of things to learn about - going all the way up to the fact that we don't even have a consistent model of physics, and astronomy is about the only way to look for evidence.

Who knows what it would mean to us to have a model of physics that includes both quantum mechanics and Einstein gravity - rather than having two seemingly conflicting models of how our one universe works.

 

You can "know" without even finding one. There are billions of planets in the galaxy and billions of galaxies. Common sense says there should be intelligent life somewhere else. If they exist, though, common sense says we will never find them. The distances are too great even for communication.

 

So your going to ignore advances made in electronics and other fields that have happened.

 

Thus Spake Zarathustra:

 

Most SETI work has been privately funded. It would be interesting to know actual dollars spent by the US government on SETI? Discovering an ET signal might be the most monumental discovery in all of mankind...it would be a very big deal...

 

FYI: https://sites.psu.edu/astrowright/2019/03/13/do-nasa-and-the-nsf-support-seti/

 

Thanks...not surprised. NASA's budget has been $18-22 billion, and since SETI is relatively low priority, there's not much left over for SETI...

 

How unfortunate:

 

Ancient religions talk about aliens coming to earth and creating us, the Abrahamic religions stole much from these religions when re-writing their own

 

Ancient Aliens? Abrahamic religions? I wasn't referring to either of those things.

 

Now THERE'S something that needs to be rebuilt with international support!!!

 

Lots of serious work to do.

Space
An approximation to determine the source of the WOW! Signal
As of October 2020, the WOW! Signal remains the strongest candidate SETI signal. It has been suggested that the signal was produced by hydrogen clouds from Comets 266/P Christensen and P/2008 Y2 (Paris and Davies, 2015). However, this hypothesis has been dismissed by the scientific community, and the source of the signal remains unknown.