Have we already been visited by aliens? • Hacker News Board

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#81

Post by wait_a_minute » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:41 PM UTC

clort wrote: post #67

wait_a_minute wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of the biggest problems I have with Star Trek. If we were literally gods by comparison to some fledgling species, the only ethical approach would be to elevate them and cure their diseases and advance their knowledge as quickly as humanly possible.

see also David Brin's Uplift novels, which deal with this by having more advanced species engage with undeveloped species and be responsible for their upbringing, as it were.

Huge thank you for the recommendation, I love the concept and will check out those novels for sure.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#82

Post by wait_a_minute » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:42 PM UTC

Xelbair wrote: post #50

wait_a_minute wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of the biggest problems I have with Star Trek. If we were literally gods by comparison to some fledgling species, the only ethical approach would be to elevate them and cure their diseases and advance their knowledge as quickly as humanly possible.

but were we, humanity, gods? There is always a chance that the Higher Civilization missed something - culturally, scientifically or artistically speaking. Letting such civilization emerge, and help them ascend when they reach certain level seems to be saner and safer approach. The Higher Civilization might've been stuck in local maxima, adding such random element might let the Higher Civilisation absorb the best part…

You raise good points, but what you're missing in my opinion is that life is precious and finite. And if we can elevate ourselves and other species to a higher state of life and consciousness and even longer life spans, I believe we have a moral obligation to do it. It'd certainly be wise to do it, even if only to have allies against the vast darkness and whatever lurks in it that might hate us or our friends.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#83

Post by wait_a_minute » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:44 PM UTC

readmodifywrite wrote: post #48

wait_a_minute wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of the biggest problems I have with Star Trek. If we were literally gods by comparison to some fledgling species, the only ethical approach would be to elevate them and cure their diseases and advance their knowledge as quickly as humanly possible.

There are TNG episodes that specifically deal with that, and the problems it causes. I think ENT had a few as well, instances which led them to the creation of the Prime Directive.

I will have to check those out since I've not seen them. I'm open-minded to it, but also pretty confident that the weight of the logic will eventually fall on the side of being good and helpful to others if we ever make it to the stars.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#84

Post by wait_a_minute » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:44 PM UTC

notahacker wrote: post #65

ErikVandeWater wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans can't manage that on earth.

Not even for other humans, and not just because we can't or won't foot the bill for more education and medication, but also because encouraging relatively primitive tribes to abandon their traditions and join the modern world is widely seen as unethical.

I see no issues with telling tribes or ancient cultures or fledgling species if their beliefs about reality are incorrect. Otherwise those faulty beliefs could lead the species to extinction.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#85

Post by rmah » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:45 PM UTC

cbozeman wrote: post #52

wait_a_minute wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of the biggest problems I have with Star Trek. If we were literally gods by comparison to some fledgling species, the only ethical approach would be to elevate them and cure their diseases and advance their knowledge as quickly as humanly possible.

Imagine a race of ultra-advanced aliens were to give us technology that keeps us not only alive indefinitely, but robust and healthy, without disease. Just that one piece of technology. Not even weird weapons like antimatter bombs, etc. Do you think humanity would suddenly come together in understanding and peace to explore the stars and advance ourselves... or do you think people who already have enormous wealth and…

Well no, but people would be robust and healthy, without disease. And IMO, that's a positive even if all our other failings are still there.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#86

Post by eloff » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:45 PM UTC

bostonsre wrote: post #54

eloff wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think very many people are saying it is impossible that Oumuamua was an alien construct and actively discouraging science based on the idea it could be. Actually yes. You'll be laughed out of the virtual room, not get funding, and potentially damage your career. As he points out in his interview with Lex (linked elsewhere in the comments here) is fine to propose a multi billion dollar experiment to detect o…

Ridiculing scientists for plausible hypothesis seems very unscientific.

This is very common in science. New theories are usually rejected and ridiculed until/if they develop enough evidence behind them to sway people.

Some careers are destroyed. Some scientists are only vindicated posthumously. The process can take many decades.

Scientists, like most humans, are not that open-minded and are subject to the same group-think blind spots. I think if we could get better at being open-minded as a species, we'd make faster progress and better ideas would win out more often. This is as much true in society at large, or business, as it is in science.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#87

Post by matmatmatmat » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:46 PM UTC

cronix wrote: post #75

scythmic_waves wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My (relatively uninformed) understanding was that you couldn't transfer information via quantum entanglement. Is that not correct?

This is not my field, but it seem if you can spin 1 particle in a known direction and the entangled "partner" particle spins the exact opposite direction, then why not? Basically everything would just be reversed with a 1 being a 0 and a 0 being a 1 on the receiving end. I know both the Chinese and American governments are working on quantum entanglement as a communication mechanism and the Chinese have had some succ…

As others have said, the fundamental problem is that all you can deduce is that whatever the spin of your particle is, the other particle has the opposite spin. You cannot determine the spin of your particle in order to affect the spin of the other particle.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#88

Post by throwanem » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:46 PM UTC

StavrosK wrote: post #62

throwanem wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, do! I also saw a few early episodes as a kid, but didn't really have a chance to get what they were trying to do; it wasn't until years later, when I had a chance to watch the full series straight through thanks to a friend's carefully made VHS tapes, that any of what I was seeing really made sense to me. Nothing since then has even come close to replacing B5 at the head of my SF TV affections. Reflecting on that…

I'll definitely watch then, thank you. As a sidenote, I think that the TNG I watched has remastered CGI. I remember remarking how good the CGI looked for the 90s, and realized/heard later than they redid all the CGI. The new CGI was definitely not out of place, if not fairly good, but I'm not entirely sure that what I'm saying is true. Just mentioning it in case you wanted to look into it.

I saw the originals when they were first broadcast, and have since seen the remasters. The latter definitely improve on the look of the series, but incrementally, and they also suffer from some of the same problem that led the makers of Generations to underlight scenes on, and finally blow up, the Enterprise-D: while TNG's space effects were on par with movies of their time, its sets and props were decidedly not, having been designed with the understanding that SD TV quality would hide a lot of imperfections that would be visible otherwise. Beside that, the pillarboxing necessary to render 4:3 content on a 16:9 display feels really obtrusive these days, or so at least I've come to find it since 16:9 became the standard.

The thing about B5 is that few of its space scenes involve much compositing, since they were all CGI from the start and compositing was hard back then. For that reason, I think a space-effects redo would be unusually feasible for that show, albeit still too expensive for anyone to actually do one.

A harder, if smaller, remastering issue would be that they shot practical effects on video and special effects on film, largely due to that being the cheapest option for both. In standard definition you can't really see the difference, but watching the show today you definitely do.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#89

Post by eloff » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:47 PM UTC

mcbits wrote: post #71

eloff wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, if we had the technology to do that it would be amazing. We can't generate even within a couple orders of magnitude of the acceleration needed to do that.

We probably do have the technology (money is the hard part) to build a telescope array that spans the solar system, and to keep some rockets in standby orbits beyond Neptune. That would provide for earlier detection of an approaching object and a better chance of having a rocket close enough to intercept it.

The volume of space beyond Neptune is absolutely insane, and the speeds of interstellar objects (theoretical speeds that is, we don't have a large enough sample size to draw conclusions about how well that matches actual velocities) are also insane. We're very far from being able do this.

Re: Have we already been visited by aliens?

#90

Post by gfxgirl » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 5:53 PM UTC

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #64

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #35

> Loeb, though, explicitly rejects the Sagan standard—“It is not obvious to me why extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence,” he observes—and flips its logic on its head: “Extraordinary conservatism keeps us extraordinarily ignorant.” So long as there’s a chance that 1I/2017 U1 is an alien probe, we’d be fools not to pursue the idea. “If we acknowledge that ‘Oumuamua is plausibly of extraterrestrial-techno…

There seems to be a giant mismatch about what side is open minded. People who think its most likely aliens think it’s closed minded to assign that low probability, presumably because we’re this tiny corner of the universe. People who think it’s most likely not aliens Think it’s closed minded to assign everything else low probability, presumably because aliens are a tiny corner of everything else. Is it a misapplicati…

I thought the idea that there are gazillions of advanced aliens has been pretty much disproven by the fermi paradox.

If there are gazillion, at least one out of all the diversity out there should have already colonized the entire galaxy and evidence should be plentiful.