Eratosphere Forums - Metrical Poetry, Free Verse, Fiction, Art, Critique, Discussions Able Muse - a review of poetry, prose and art

Forum Left Top

Notices

Reply
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #11  
Unread 12-23-2017, 02:17 PM
Gail White's Avatar
Gail White Gail White is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: Breaux Bridge, LA, USA
Posts: 3,487
Default

Why would beings from another planet want to get in touch with us at all? Judging by our own behavior, the answers would likely be:
1) They want a new conquest to impress a neighboring planet.
2) They need another food source.
3) They need more territory.

An abstract desire for knowledge or friendly interest in what we look like would not come into it. I say the longer we go without contact being made, the luckier we are.
Reply With Quote
  #12  
Unread 12-23-2017, 05:23 PM
R. Nemo Hill's Avatar
R. Nemo Hill R. Nemo Hill is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Halcott, New York
Posts: 9,870
Default

I am an alien.

Nemo
Reply With Quote
  #13  
Unread 12-23-2017, 06:34 PM
Allen Tice's Avatar
Allen Tice Allen Tice is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Brooklyn, NY USA
Posts: 6,119
Default

Gail, anyone who wants to devote resources to contacting any (or many) extraterrestrial life forms should absolutely be anchored with real-world and defensive answers to each of your three hypotheses. To any one of those nice, so nice, people who talk about "getting in touch", I'd say "I think your head is more full of methane than Uranus."

Of course, one could smokily imagine that "if" some hypothetical "altruistic" extraterrestrials judged that humanity was truly verging on self-destruction, these outsiders might want to interfere. That might mean almost anything, including variants of your hypotheses. For example, they (or it) might simply not want an entirely wrecked world. To what end? Maybe they might want our spare thermal neutrons, or something, maybe our spare gamma radiation...

Of course, an inevitable corollary of that "altruistic" line of thought is that there might be ETs that have very nearly experienced virtual annihilation themselves (since physics is the same everywhere), and achingly survived, and, so, having good hearts and some sort of culture or treaties among themselves or what-all, they want us to survive (in an ethical sense).

As you imply, more or less altruistic efforts by some humans to preserve or assist our own planet's less materially advanced peoples have almost always been undermined by other humans who want to exploit anything and everything. Should more scientifically advanced ETs exist, earthlings have no guarantee At All that the same wouldn't happen to them.

Another rose-colored view is that these very hypothetical ETs might want to encourage humans (so unified and non-competitive) to master their own development, solve their own problems, and "grow up" to be as cool as the ETs. They would do that by tickling our geiger counters from afar, winking at us from another galaxy and flashing remote pictures of comic book saucers at Apollo astronauts, while meanwhile they sit at home x-million parsecs away twiddling the dials.

Pie in the sky is not a strategy.

A funny corner of physics these days is the one that deals with "virtual" particles that flash into and then out of existence quite rapidly. I advance the theory that hypothetical aliens such as this thread has considered are "virtual" aliens that flash into and then out of existence again, but that are as annoying as a bad dream, and as insubstantial.

Do I want to believe in extraterrestrials, ethical or otherwise? Absolutely not.

Nemo, I have always known that. How? Takes one to...

Last edited by Allen Tice; 12-23-2017 at 08:36 PM. Reason: hypotheses
Reply With Quote
  #14  
Unread 12-23-2017, 09:10 PM
John Isbell John Isbell is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2017
Location: TX
Posts: 6,630
Default

I stand with Gail.

Cheers,
John
Reply With Quote
  #15  
Unread 12-23-2017, 10:18 PM
Allen Tice's Avatar
Allen Tice Allen Tice is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Brooklyn, NY USA
Posts: 6,119
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gail White View Post
I say the longer we go without contact being made, the luckier we are.
Her words; my thoughts since I was a teenager.
Reply With Quote
  #16  
Unread 12-24-2017, 06:44 AM
Rob Wright Rob Wright is offline
Moderator
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Philadelphia PA, U.S.A.
Posts: 910
Default

Responding as a poet, I'd have to say that what drives my, and indeed other people's fascination in UFOs is the fact that we, as humans, are earthbound. There it is above us — heaven, sky, however you want to think of it — and we are so very rooted here, so that even (after a certain age) even if you fall down from a trivial height, you'll be injured. Sad. Yet, above us are these creatures, imaginary as well as fleshed, escaping (or seeming to) gravity's pull. And I find it telling that until the age of mechanics there were no metal spaceships recorded — at least that I'm aware of. Winged humans, horses, dragons, yes and they were very corporal. Angels? — well, I don't know what substance they're supposed to made from, but in no case were they mistaken in the reports of witnesses as illusory. And then, in the Nineteen Forties there appeared these metal things buzzing around at the very time when we earthbound humans were conceiving and inventing our own. Well, that's my response as a poet. As a skeptic… that's another story.
Reply With Quote
  #17  
Unread 12-24-2017, 06:54 AM
Jim Moonan Jim Moonan is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2016
Location: Boston, MA
Posts: 4,197
Default

It is an attractive possibility.


Alien

“Passing through, passing through
Sometimes happy sometimes blue.
Glad that I ran into you.”
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx-L. Cohen


I am the center of the universe.
The only intelligent being
I’ve encountered that I can verify.
I am alone, though it is populated
With shiny things that whiz in and out of view.
I’ve not much time here; I’m only passing through.
xxx
Reply With Quote
  #18  
Unread 12-24-2017, 07:26 AM
John Isbell John Isbell is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2017
Location: TX
Posts: 6,630
Default

Good morning Jim,

I feel like Cisco Houston wrote that great song.

Cisco Houston Passing Through - YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEtol8f-qKg

Merry Christmas,
John
Reply With Quote
  #19  
Unread 12-24-2017, 08:36 AM
Allen Tice's Avatar
Allen Tice Allen Tice is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Brooklyn, NY USA
Posts: 6,119
Default

Hi Rob, Jim, and John,
I'm really delighted with that analysis about how the development of the physical imagery for extra-natural visitations has paralleled the history of human technological progress. Quite delighted. It implies that people have been "seeing" things for a long time, "real" or not, and that (1) their descriptive metaphors grow from what they see every day, and (2) that these subjective experiences don't need a consistent physical basis. That's psychology for you. Whatever the deep nature of our experiential reality is, humans can only see or think in the ways we have evolved to see and think, and we will impose a narrative upon our chaotic samples of sense input at all costs. (Even if each day we woke up in a different world entirely, our brains, built for survival, would put together some kind of story.)

Occam's razor is still a good first response tool.
Reply With Quote
  #20  
Unread 12-24-2017, 12:08 PM
Jim Moonan Jim Moonan is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2016
Location: Boston, MA
Posts: 4,197
Default

John I.: I feel like Cisco Houston wrote that great song.

Well waddya know... I never knew... Just passin' thru...

Likewise, Merry Christmas to you,

Jim
Reply With Quote
Reply

Bookmarks

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump



Forum Right Top
Forum Left Bottom Forum Right Bottom
 
Right Left
Member Login
Forgot password?
Forum LeftForum Right


Forum Statistics:
Forum Members: 8,399
Total Threads: 21,841
Total Posts: 270,805
There are 2951 users
currently browsing forums.
Forum LeftForum Right


Forum Sponsor:
Donate & Support Able Muse / Eratosphere
Forum LeftForum Right
Right Right
Right Bottom Left Right Bottom Right

Hosted by ApplauZ Online