[EROEI]

Okay, as we here at Peak Oil all know about

1) EROEI
2) Globalization = Ponzi Pyramid Scheme
3) Dr. Albert's Presentation on the EXPONENTIAL FUNCTION
4) Easter Island, Bacteria in Petri Dish, Reindeer dieoff, Olduvai Gorge
5) etc etc etc you gets the point...


Then that would mean there is no such a thing as 'advanced civilization/ ultra advanced aliens/ etc' simply because they hit the impassable 'mathematical certainty' 'wall' and dieoff just like we are about to. I'm not saying that warp technology isn't possible (the technology itself, the physics itself, etc) , I'm saying its not possible for any species to obtain. Because in order to obtain that technology they must not only survive peak oil but growth forever (the classical economical dream) which of course is not possible.

The way I see it, one million times out of a million Oludvia Gorge always hits before Omega Point, so it doesn't really matter if the physics is possible or not anyway, we/they are not/ did not reach it.

So having said that, why is the DOD pretending to be all hush-hush on UFO conspiracies? Are they secretly trying to get the public suspicious and make them think that aliens are real, to get them from realizing the truth... I mean if Bush was to say to everyone that advanced aliens could not POSSIBLY have visited earth AND give the real reason, I mean they US gov would be shooting itself in the foot if it told us the real reason why there aren't advanced aliens right? So is that why they pretend to be secretive about 'UFO' Area 54,etc, not because they have something to hide, but because they have to keep up the image, the expectation of future star trek??????

[wisconsin_cur]

Since we know nothing about the biological history of other planets (and thus thus the amount of petreolum products they might have) then no you cannot say that there are no advanced lifeforms.

I have doubts that humanity would be, under any circumstances capable of advancing to that point but perhaps if we had the better luck to have 50, 100 or 1000X more reserves then perhaps we would overcome some boundary and be able to go out and exploit the resources of other planets and expand forever.

[EROEI]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('wisconsin_cur', 'S')ince we know nothing about the biological history of other planets (and thus thus the amount of petreolum products they might have) then no you cannot say that there are no advanced lifeforms.

I have doubts that humanity would be, under any circumstances capable of advancing to that point but perhaps if we had the better luck to have 50, 100 or 1000X more reserves then perhaps we would overcome some boundary and be able to go out and exploit the resources of other planets and expand forever.

[Emma]

an advanced civilization wouldnt multiply like rabbits and destroy the environment.
We chose the way of greed and profit and we're now paying the price, we are hitting the wall. We will go back and find better ways to evolve.

[EROEI]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ferrelgiraffe', 'Y')ou do not want to know the answer to that or you would never sleep at night again.

[EROEI]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Emma', 'a')n advanced civilization wouldnt multiply like rabbits and destroy the environment.
We chose the way of greed and profit and we're now paying the price, we are hitting the wall. We will go back and find better ways to evolve.

[KaiserCesar06]

I think with any race that has a tendency towards aggressive exploration/expansion/resource depletion, will be less likely to advance far enough to obtain such technology before some sort of dieoff or loss of knowledge. Also, your whole thing with the DOD doesn't make much sense. If they don't visit, how does anyone know the real reason why they don't? They don't need to create a fake conspiracy to get people to be optimistic about our future technologically, anyway. You have science fiction for that. A few weeks ago I was having lunch with a few friends and one of them said something along the lines of "I think in the future there will be food made for each specific person that tastes perfect to everyone."

[EROEI]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserCesar06', 'I') think with any race that has a tendency towards aggressive exploration/expansion/resource depletion, will be less likely to advance far enough to obtain such technology before some sort of dieoff or loss of knowledge. Also, your whole thing with the DOD doesn't make much sense. If they don't visit, how does anyone know the real reason why they don't? They don't need to create a fake conspiracy to get people to be optimistic about our future technologically, anyway. You have science fiction for that. A few weeks ago I was having lunch with a few friends and one of them said something along the lines of "I think in the future there will be food made for each specific person that tastes perfect to everyone."

[Roccland]

Well - our galactic hippy friends recently showed up again (last week) in England and gave us this...

enjoy

[mmasters]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ferrelgiraffe', 'Y')ou do not want to know the answer to that or you would never sleep at night again.

[Plantagenet]

ADVANCED ALIENS will only make contact in with ADVANCED HUMANS.

The AVERAGE HUMANS will have to wait until the AVERAGE ALIENS get here for contact to occur.

[mmasters]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', 'A')DVANCED ALIENS will only make contact in with ADVANCED HUMANS.

The AVERAGE HUMANS will have to wait until the AVERAGE ALIENS get here for contact to occur.

[Resurrection]

I pretty much go with this guys thinking about Alien life and the chance we would ever get to see any:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')So, to wrap things up: ET is very likely out there. But it's very unlikely ET has a light sword, a space ship or an index finger that lights up in the dark. ET is more likely a bacteria -- or at its best, a multicellular organism with no particular intelligence at all.

Hey, and besides. Just suppose there is, in spite of all the problems, intelligent life out there somewhere? Would we be at risk of being killed by them?

Surely, they'd have to be able to travel around. That's not an easy one, although science-fiction freaks carelessly say that such a civilization undoubtedly will use `worm-holes' for inter-dimensional travels. Or warp-drive, or teleportation. The cold fact, however, is that such things may well appear to be just impossible by physical law. It is so very easy to say: `Well, they're ahead of us, so they must have come up with something.'

Even then, the aliens have to find us. That too is a tough one. The Universe is so big. And our planet is only a tiny speck of dust in the endless nothingness. Okay, we send out signals into space, from our satellites, radio's and TV-sets. But our transmissions have a tiny reach in the vastness of the cosmos.

And even within reach of Earth transmissions, an alien would have to listen extremely closely to pick up our faded-away signal. Let alone the problem of which frequency to choose. Or the problem that an alien might prefer a very different technique than `radio signals'.

Okay, okay. Against all odds, our hypothetical alien has overcome all these difficulties, and has finally found us. What's up next?

Nothing much, probably. The aliens may want to study us -- a civilization that builds spaceships and has found out how worm holes work definitely is in it for science. They would study us in much the same way we study the microbes we'll undoubtedly find on Mars or Europa.

Yeah, some Independence Day-fans might grumble. But they might also be here to colonize our planet, to steal our mineral goodies!

O yeah, sure. What nonsense. Do you really think a civilization that builds intergalactic spaceships and opens worm holes doesn't know how to solve problems like shortage of minerals in some technical way? They'd have to be a race of real dumb-ass aliens, if you ask me.

[perdition79]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mmasters', 'T')he bottom line being that the human race could be nothing more than a slave race. A slave race being guided to deplete the planet's resources to help serve an alien agenda. And the aliens themselves couldn't care less about us (beyond our ability to be manipulated). And they surely don't care about the health of our planet.

[dorlomin]

The next hundred years will not be the extinction of mankind or the end of all plausable civilisation any more than the black death extinguished European civilisation. It will be a speed bump on the road of our progress and when the pieces are being picked up, a warning to future Icharuses about being more conservative with resources. Prometheus has not been chained, just chastened.


There is peak oil doomer pessimism and then there is just plain "My Chemical Romance" type emo whining. (Do you call emo's emo's in the states? *unsure*) I think extrapolating our current short term condition to a universe of billions of galaxies is a wee bit the latter.

[Ayame]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EROEI', ' ')With all due respect, study 'evolutionary darwinism' and you will know that in this universe, with this set of laws of physics, that aliens in terms of 'greed' would have been no different than us. We didn't just turn out to be capitalistic pigs for no good reason out of the blue, its a fact of biological life. .... They would most definetly NOT behave in a more 'sustainable' way of life, maybe quantitatively a little different but definitely not qualitatively.

[Emma]

So if I give to the poor or use a green car I am going against Darwin's laws?
I am not saying that greed and capitalism cannot exist, just saying that we have to set our priorities right if we want to survive and evolve.

There are various levels of greed, my dog is greedy when it comes to food but he won't kill me if I don't give him my cheeseburgers.
We kill each other and the environment for profit.

[TheDude]

Ah, I love SF. But I subscribe to the Rare Earth hypothesis myself. There are likely plenty of aliens out there, it's just that they're microbial. The solar system has many unique characteristics which may have assisted in the development of complex life.

Re: Hostile aliens, I'm reading the second book in David Brin's Uplift series. Interesting take on the interaction of civilizations.

[pillowhead]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dorlomin', 'I')t will be a speed bump on the road of our progress and when the pieces are being picked up