Love the thread & will try video tomorrow. On the numbers game, I assume we can apply it to the number of big bangs and universes that might occur too? If a Divine presence started this universes in a big bang, and if the Eternal Word at some point became an earth creature to help reveal the Divine purpose by showing what evolution on this planet can achieve, beyond this life and this humanity, united to the Creator, I wonder how many diverse ways the Eternal Divine Word might appear to other highly evolved life forms on how many other planets, or even other universes? Now lets take a look at that video.
Fly 2.4 billion light years in 2 minutes
by seattleniceguy 33 Replies latest jw friends
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sonnyboy
If the Pompeii worm can adapt to survive in hydrothermal vents with temperatures up to 194 degrees fahrenheit, I'm sure life can find a way in much more inhospitable environments. Less-complex organisms can exist in temperatures up to 700 degrees.
I'm sure there are thousands of planets out there with the capacity to sustain life as we know it, but I don't think that a planet would necessarily need the ingredients we consider essential to produce life. The environment on other worlds may be ideal for some form of noncarbon-based life.
There very well may be life on every planet of our solar system. I always theorized that if these "gray aliens" are real, they most likely live beneath the ground (due to their pale skin and large, light-gathering eyes) or on a gaseous planet in which the sun's rays don't fully penetrate the atmosphere.
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DannyHaszard
I luv physics especially astrophysics and particle physics.
Reg;UFOs and space aliens.Science fiction flicks have us conditioned to ET's who are more advanced than us by a couple of hundred years or so. Think about this....What if they were advanced,not by a few centuries but by a million years?Well,if Heaven exist their 'civilization' would be BILLIONS of years more advanced,and superhuman to begin with.They could have a multi-dimensional database,and could have unlimited (omnipotent) abilities.Raising the dead would be a walk in the park for them. The only database that we have on them is 2,000 years old delivered to a simple pastoral people.The Bible wasn't written for the Harvard alumni. Blind me with science baby, Danny Haszard retired carpenter with a 7th grade (JW/1975) education
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tetrapod.sapien
Think about this....What if they were advanced,not by a few centuries but by a million years?Well,if Heaven exist their 'civilization' would be BILLIONS of years more advanced,and superhuman to begin with.They could have a multi-dimensional database,and could have unlimited (omnipotent) abilities.Raising the dead would be a walk in the park for them.
the numbers game is interesting. i think SNG has done a bang up job on explaining it. the probability of life that is actually intelligent like us? much different. evolution still applies, but getting to this point in our evolution has been a long and winding road with many false starts and dead ends. but it is possible that intelligent life has evolved. evolution shows us this.
it could be that they are highly evolved, like you say danny. it could also be that "they" have had an even harder time becoming "intelligent". perhaps they are more primitive compared to us? perhaps the linear classification fall apart? perhaps they are so different from us, that we don't even recognize each other as "life". perhaps they are close to where we are in development, but have completely different value systems. perhaps they are having similar problems as we are, trying to overcome magical thinking and exhausting natural resources.
there was a soviet nuclear physicist, i forget his name now, that came up with a scale of "civilizations" that may exist in the universe. here is a good explanation i found online:
In the excellent book entitled, "Hyperspace", theorical physicist Michio Kaku mentioned about three kinds of civilizations:
Type 1, 2, & 3 Civilizations
Type I – this civilization harnesses the energy output of an entire planet.
Type II – this civilization harnesses the energy output of a star, and generates about 10 billion times the energy output of a Type I civilization.
Type III – this civilization harnesses the energy output of a galaxy, or about 10 billion time the energy output of a Type II civilization.
A Type I civilization would be able to manipulate truly planetary energies. They might, for example, control or modify their weather. They would have the power to manipulate planetary phenomena, such as hurricanes, which can release the energy of hundreds of hydrogen bombs. Perhaps volcanoes or even earthquakes may be altered by such a civilization.
A Type II civilization may resemble the Federation of Planets seen on the TV program Star Trek (which is capable of igniting stars and has colonized a tiny fraction of the near-by stars in the galaxy). A Type II civilization might be able to manipulate the power of solar flares.
A Type III civilization may resemble the Borg, or perhaps the Empire found in the Star Wars saga. They have colonized the galaxy itself, extracting energy from hundreds of billions of stars.
By contrast, we are a Type 0 civilization, which extracts its energy from dead plants (oil and coal). Growing at the average rate of about 3% per year, however, one may calculate that our own civilization may attain Type I status in about 100-200 years, Type II status in a few thousand years, and Type III status in about 100,000 to a million years. These time scales are insignificant when compared with the universe itself.
On this scale, one may now rank the different propulsion systems available to different types of civilizations:
Type 0
Chemical rockets
Ionic engines
Fission power
EM propulsion (rail guns)
Type I
Ram-jet fusion engines
Photonic drive
Type II
Antimatter drive
Von Neumann nano probes
Type III
Planck energy propulsionit's all speculation of course, and who can say? but interesting. interesting that we consider ourselves so advanced and "special", and yet according to this scale, we don't even register yet! type 0!
michio kaku said something about where we are in our history in relation to this scale that i found optimistic. he said that (paraphrasing): 'every time i turn on the news, or open my paper in the morning, i see all of our problems as systemic to us going from a type 0 to a type 1 civilization. growing pains.'
perhaps there are highly evolved aliens in the universe, but they are battling with themselves over how to go from a type 0 civilization to a type 1. OR, perhaps they were on the verge of becoming type 1, but made themselves extinct in the process by using all their natural resources and killing each other.
whatever the case, i find it less probable in my mind, that there are ultra evolved super intelligent aliens out there. after all, don't you think they would have come to proselytize their belief system to us by now? it's a scary thought. but whatever the case, if we ever do come across "intelligent" life elsewhere, it will be science and math that will be the language of communication. probably the one thing that two different civilizations that can get to that point will have in common, is their understanding of evolutionary theory. afterall, it's universal, isn't it?
the movie posted inspires such awe.
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Terry
A coin comes up heads one out of two times on average. Therefore, if we flip the coin a hundred times, it is extremely likely that we will get heads many times. And it is highly unlikely that heads will never come up.
I use to have a friend nicknamed Scooter. He was a contrarian. His most oft spoken utterance was, "Not necessarily".
I somehow suddenly feel like I'm Scooter. But, I just wanted to take out a bit of semantic sandpaper and smooth a few rough edges, if I might. (Without sounding like a dopey contrarian.)
If you flip a binary coin (only heads OR tails) a hundred times the result is not PREORDAINED by either "likely" "extremely likely" or "unlikley" results. What you get are THE ACTUAL RESULTS which may or may not conform to an expected pattern.
Please re-read that paragraph.
If you expect a pattern it could only justifiably be as a result of what has happened in PREVIOUS tosses over a range of time.
With LIFE you have no binary coin that gets repeatedly flipped. No repetition is possible. Why? Because life emerged here. How do you flip "here" over and over and over?
It is quite COUNTER-INTUITIVE to think this way. We talk about a 50/50 chance with certainty and optimism that (over an infinitely long period of time) might seem convincing. (Because of our coin-toss model)
However......................
Somewhere (and anywhere at any time) in this endless series of coin tosses you can end up with all Tails or all Heads. Note: during this "streak" of all Tails or all Heads you paradoxically face the same amount of "extreme liklihood" that it will continue as that it will end 50/50.
Why?
Because the dumb coin doesn't keep track of itself.
Further....
Nobody with superpowers is in charge of ___making sure___the coin conforms to a pattern.
With that in mind I have to say all the money lost on a sure thing by gambler's over the centuries is understandable (To me, anyway) if not to the loser with the empty pockets.
Now, why do I mention this seeming anomaly?
We can easily be sucked into thinking there is some math law operating at all times in all places that comfort and assure us that no cataclysmic flux will erase our smile and pin a huge grimace of befuddled consternation in its place. That's why.
My conjecture (that is really all it is) is that life on our planet was neither likely nor unlikey. It just happened. It didn't happen elsewhere for the same reason. It wasn't likely. It wasn't unlikely. It just didn't happen.
All the numbers and coin tosses with a simple BINARY outcome fool us. It isn't just a matter of LIFE/NO LIFE being EQUAL POSSIBILITIES. Far from it!!
LIFE is one of the fluxes you can't factor in because there are no repeated instances (like the coin toss) to lend a pattern to our analogy (coin toss).
In fact, the coin toss is completely non-analogous.
The opposite of non-life isn't life.
Non-life has no opposite.
The opposite of Life is non-existence.
There is a difference. A huge one.
T.
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seattleniceguy
Terry,
On the likelihood of a coin coming up heads on any given toss, yes, I realize that there is no force ordaining it to be a certain way, and that any so-called "pattern" up until the current toss has no bearing whatsoever on what the current toss will be.
The point is that in something like a coin toss, you get on average an even distribution of states, unless the environment is biased toward one of the states. It doesn't work this way with dice only. We could switch to a 20-sided die. You will get on average any particular number 1 out of 20 times, over a large enough sample of trials.
The place that you are misunderstanding me is that I am not relating this to life (at least not yet) - I am instead relating it to any given planet's likelihood of being conducive to life along multiple dimensions. For example, say we through a thousand plants into the universe like a gigantic Yahtzee roll. Some land too close to stars, some land too far. But since they will end up at distances that are evenly distributed through the possible states, then given a large enough number of trials (in relation to the number of states), some of the planets will end up at distances that are within the thresholds we consider conducive to life. We're looking at one dimension only here: distance from star.
It's as if you walked into a gymnasium and marked out a few small boxes on the floor that represented "good" states, and then you walked to the sidelines and started blasting sand all over the gym. Assuming that you distrubute sand fairly evenly, then with a high enough number of trials (grains of sand), at some point it becomes likely that some sand lands in the boxes. For example, when the gym floor is covered in an inch-thick layer of sand, there are many grains in each box.
Imagine you back a dump truck full of planets up and dump them all around a bunch of star systems. The planets are distributed at various distances. Given enough trials, some of them will be at "good" distances, unless you posit a force that biases them toward particular states.
Let's stop here for now, lest we get lost in details. Are you in agreement up to this point, that given a large enough number of planets orbiting stars at various distances, that some of them will be at the correct distance to be conducive to life (at least, as we know it)?
SNG
P.S. Incidentally, I can't wait to use the probability discussion with the next Witness/Mormon that comes to my door. If they are silly enough to suggest that the probability of getting a heads does not go up as the number of trials does, I'll propose a simple experiment: We flip ten quarters. If none of them are heads, I'll study JWism/Mormonism. If at least one is heads, they will listen to what I have to say. (I bet the Mormons will go for this, since they are strong believers in God's guidance and testimony.)
The probability that at least one quarter out of 10 will be heads is [1 - (.5 ^ 10)] = 99.9%
One more thing, Terry: You keep talking about the coin being binary. I'm only using a coin because it is easier to understand. We could easily switch to a 20-sided die, or a billion sided die, and the principles work the same way.
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seattleniceguy
If you flip a binary coin (only heads OR tails) a hundred times the result is not PREORDAINED by either "likely" "extremely likely" or "unlikley" results. What you get are THE ACTUAL RESULTS which may or may not conform to an expected pattern.
I re-read this paragraph several times, as you suggested.
I beg to differ with you. If you were to take a box full of 1000 coins and throw them all over the floor, it is indeed absurdly likely that at least one will be heads. You could safely bet your life on the outcome. Yes, it is possible to get 1000 tails. It will happen, on average, 1 time out of 10 ^ 300 times. To put that in perspective, you could try this once per second for the entire age of the universe and probably never have it happen.
Probability is a force you can count on. Casinos ain't making money by bucking the natural laws of the universe. They count on them to the tenth of a percent. Consider roulette, where the gambler has a 47% chance of winning on any spin. Over the long haul, the casino doesn't have to worry. They will make money. A stroll down the Strip in Las Vegas should convince you of the reliability of probability.
The problem with the "sure bet" you mention that leaves a gambler's pockets empty is that probability is reliable only when the number of trials is large enough with relation to the number of states, and when the gambler does his math right. :-)
As a general rule, when the number of trials is at least as large as the number of states squared (for number of states > about 5), your odds become blindingly good. So, for example, with a six-sided die, throw it 36 times, and I promise you, you will get the number you are looking for. Try it. Seriously.
SNG
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seattleniceguy
Sorry to deluge you, but there's one more thing that I think we may be getting hung up on. The trials do not need to be distributed through time in order for probability to work as I have described. Let's consider the 36 6-side die throws that I described above. You could throw them sequentially, or you could put them in a shoe box and throw them all at once. It doesn't matter.
It is true that the universe shot debris out from a source only one time (at least in our iteration). Think of this as a gigantic Yahtzee throw, scattering billions of planets around. Each planet is a trial.
SNG
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Terry
. Are you in agreement up to this point, that given a large enough number of planets orbiting stars at various distances, that some of them will be at the correct distance to be conducive to life (at least, as we know it)?
I'm always wary of premises.
They are tricky things.
You have to parse them and shake out hidden things lurking underneath unseen.
In this instance, the "correct" distance would presumably be the distance that produces life. However, paradoxically, since there has been no life at those instances, each example that produced NO life would turn the argument on its head.
So, I'd have to say "no".
T.
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seattleniceguy
Gosh, Terry, you're really making this difficult!
Let me rephrase the question. We have identified one requirement for life as we know it as a planet with a stable source of heat. One way of obtaining this is by having a planet that, by virtue of its distance from its star, has a stable surface temperature within a range of, say 0 - 100 degrees Celcius. For any star, this is a range of distances that will satisfy this requirment.
Given enough trials, then, are you in agreement that there will be planets that satisfy this requirement?
SNG