The world is full of fascinating things that have nothing to do with politics
posted by Infidel753 at 7:15 AM
Individualist, pro-technology, pro-democracy, anti-religion. I speak only for myself and not for any ideology, movement, or party. It has been my great good fortune to live my whole life free of "spirituality" of any kind. I believe that evidence and reason are the keys to understanding reality; that technology rather than ideology or politics has been the great liberator of humanity; and that in the long run, human intelligence is the most powerful force in the universe.
God doesn't exist
Evolution happened
Global warming is real
Homosexuality is normal
Aging is a curable disease
The election was not stolen
Everything "spiritual" is a lie
US out of UN, UN out of US
Free speech is for everybody
Humans do not have "souls"
Men can't become women
Fetuses are not persons
Words are not violence
Taiwan is a nation
Pluto is a planet
10 Comments:
And here we are: Possibly the only "intelligent" life form in the universe, hell-bent on destroying ourselves.
Oh, come on. No we aren't.
Well... interesting philosophical question. It comes down to the questions of time and the right conditions. How long does it take a planet to evolve to where an organism can also thrive and evolve into a sentient being capable of logical thought? I've watched some videos asking, "What if the dinosaurs were not hit with an extinction-level event?" Would they have eventually evolved into a higher form of intelligence much like how early mammals evolved into primates and then into humans? Our evolution took... eons. Millions of years encompassing thousands of epochs where some variable changed to allow our form of life and level of intelligence to root.
We look at our next neighbor over, Mars. Our rovers have discovered fossilized remains of coral from seas that dissipated when the Martian atmosphere weakened. Life. Could that have evolved further? We won't know. Satellites exploring our solar system are discovering building blocks of life on the moons of other planetary bodies of Saturn and Jupiter. We won't know definitively until we can further explore.
So what are the odds that somewhere in the universe, a similar stellar evolution occurred? I have to think that, yes, it has or is. Life evolved, grew and more or less went extinct because of some form of ignorance. Or the life evolved beyond the need to dominate one sub-species over another and let intellect thrive.
Did you actually watch the video? Your comment suggests you aren't aware of the issues it actually addresses, which mostly have to do with the low probability of the initial emergence of life in the first place, not with the subsequent development of life.
It is absolutely not true that "our rovers have discovered fossilized remains of coral from seas that dissipated when the Martian atmosphere weakened". They've discovered traces of chemicals which might be the product of organic chemical processes in the distant past, though they could also have been produced in other ways. I've seen a news item about the discovery of a piece of rock which looks like coral, but nobody is seriously arguing that it is fossilized coral (well, I suppose some crank website somewhere might be saying that, but not NASA or any real science agency). After decades of searching there is still zero evidence supporting the idea that life ever existed on Mars.
Again, nothing you said addresses the actual points made in the video at all.
I did listen to the video. The point I was trying to make is; I believe that life did or does exist elsewhere. Given the estimated age of the universe, and the random variables necessary for life to flourish and evolve, other civilizations had to have been established, risen and more than likely fallen. Today, last year, billions of years ago. But we will never know in our lifetimes. And my comment on Mars was based on a video from Reuters. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yxZcbxYQYk Microbes, Infidel. And they have not even begun to explore the polar caps where there is the hint of water.
I wish I were more enthralled with the notion of life elsewhere. I did at one time; no more. I am accepting the notion that the human species has peaked intellectually. That there is just too few people wanting to push our society to be greater than we were 30, 40 years ago (unless there is capitalization from the effort). I blame religion. "If you don't understand it, you need to fear it, shun it and shut off your cognitive and critical thinking to comprehend it!"
But you didn't address any of the points made in the video, which make everything you said irrelevant. "Given the estimated age of the universe, and the random variables necessary for life to flourish and evolve, other civilizations had to have been established, risen and more than likely fallen" is just an assertion of belief. You don't give any evidence to support it. There isn't any. It's just one of the old clichés that this video debunks.
You said that fossilized remains of coral have been discovered on Mars. This is 100% categorically false. Nor has any evidence of microbes ever been discovered there. At most, we have discovered what could be residue of ancient organic processes but could also have been produced inorganically (the video you linked says the same thing). If any actual evidence of life on Mars (past or present) is ever discovered, it will rank among the most important scientific discoveries of all time. It hasn't happened yet and there's no reason to think it ever will.
I am accepting the notion that the human species has peaked intellectually
Utterly ridiculous. You're taking a very minor fluctuation (in one country) in the upward trend of human progress to be some huge globally significant inflection point. Compared to the challenges human progress has met and overcome over the last few centuries, the Trump administration and the current religious fulminations barely qualify as a piddling inconvenience. At worst, the US contribution will decrease for a generation or two because too many of our best scientists have relocated to places like Europe or Canada, but they'll go on to make their contributions in those countries instead. In the long run, nations come and go but progress endures.
Deleted Anon: There is nothing more worthless than an "AI"-generated response. Don't bring that garbage to my blog. Also, again, you're not addressing any of the specific points made in the video, just making an unsupported assertion of belief.
Starting here, I'm deleting any comment that doesn't address the specific points made in the video. No comment yet has said a single thing that was actually relevant.
The odds are overwhelming that there is intelligent life out there. I believe that. There are so many planets, so many solar systems. To think that we are the only example of a successful life on a planet is just too much to think of. Sure the odds according to this video are small but scientists don't know for sure what's going on way out there in space where we can't see the planets. I want to believe that there is other life out there. Even if that life isn't like ours.
OK, I give up. Comments closed.
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