Thoughts on Extraterrestrial Life

[Nic2004]

I have placed this is IMHO because that is mostly what I would like to see. I am not an astro-physist or archeologist, just an amateur of both. I also am a huge fan of the space program in all of it's forms. I say this up-front to avoid any misunderstandings derived from the nature of this post.
I have taken some time to try to organize some of the various information that has been shaping my opinion for some time now. I have not prepared a paper like this in decades so please be kind on format.
Having said this, I am curious what the minds of the Dope think about the likihood of discovering life outside of our planet? Please find my humble attempt to present my thoughts here.

All throughout human history there has been speculation on the possibility of life on other planets. This has never been more so than it is today with the search for life ranging from Mars to the moons orbiting the great gas giants. Recent advances have led to the identification of planets orbiting stars other than our Sun. It is this possibility of extraterrestrial life I would like to consider.
First, I would like to make some arbitrary limits on the scope and definitions of our considerations. There are many levels of life to consider. For the purpose of this discussion I would like to broadly group them as Primitive Life Forms (single cell up to say jellyfish), Complex Life Forms (up to say mammals including dolphin and whales) and Intelligent Life Forms (this is to be tool-users and city builders).
Secondly, I would like to limit the sphere of consideration to 15 parsecs or 48.9 light years. Excluding such things as warp drive or worm holes, I think this is a distance at the margin of human travel with the foreseeable future as this would take nearly a century of in-flight time allowing for a build up of speed to even a fraction of light and then the necessary braking.

The most recent advances in dating put the age of the Earth at 4.55 billion years. Link

It is also generally accepted that the Earth’s Moon is the result of a collision with a mars-size object called Theia Link
and sometimes referred to as “The Big Whack” and it went something like this:
“According to the hypothesis, 4.533 billion years (4.533 Ga) ago, 34 million years after the Earth formed, a Mars-sized planetesimal hit the Earth at an oblique angle, destroying the impactor and ejecting most of the impactor and a significant portion of the Earth's felsic-rich mantle into space.”
link
This accident of planetary trajectories left us with one of the largest moons in the solar system (when compared with the host planets mass) and a brand new surface of molten rock. It has been argued that the presence of this large moon and it’s proximity to the Earth have had an important, if not crucial, role in the development and subsequent evolution of life on this planet.
“The fact that there are tidal zones on the beaches of the world had an enormous effect on the way that life got started and evolved on earth. There are also tidal effects, less visible, but equally important, on the earth's atmosphere, which influence the weather and climate. To have a large tidal effect on a planet, a moon must be not only large, but also reasonably close.”
Link
In addition to the tidal effects that it provides, there is a stabilizing effect on the rotation of the Earth that has created stable seasons .
“The Moon has had dramatic effects on our planet and the life that inhabits it, researchers believe. The Moon stabilizes Earth's rotation, for example, preventing otherwise dramatic movements of the poles that would fuel climate swings that some scientists figure might have doomed any chance for life to form, let alone evolve”
Link
Additionally, the Earths magnetic field protects life from solar winds that otherwise would strip the atmosphere away and expose life to lethal doses of solar radiation. It is entirely likely that a significant proportion of the iron at the Earth’s core may have been contributed by Theia.
“It is likely that some of the early Martian atmosphere has been lost to space because Mars, like Venus has no substantial intrinsic magnetic field to protect the atmosphere from solar wind scavenging.”

It is my purpose here to suggest that for a planet to be of the right size and composition may not be enough to see the beginnings of life. It must also inhabit the “Goldilocks” zone of a solar orbit that is cool enough to keep water from boiling away into space but warm enough to allow liquid water for life. It must have an iron core sufficient to create a magnetic field that can protect life from cosmic rays. It must have enough mass to hold an atmosphere or an ocean rich enough to provide oxygen to life. Additionally, the presence of a moon-sized object in close orbit my be essential as well.

Having considered the planetary requirements for the origin of life, we must consider the type of life. Even after four billion years, life was still of the Primitive Life Form (PLF) type I referred to earlier. This very long and broadly defined era was known as the Precambian.
“Nearly 4 thousand million years passed after the Earth's inception before the first animals left their traces. This stretch of time is called the Precambrian. To speak of ‘the Precambrian’ as a single unified time period is misleading, for it makes up roughly seven-eighths of the Earth's history. During the Precambrian, the most important events in biological history took place. Consider that the Earth formed, life arose, the first tectonic plates arose and began to move, eukaryotic cells evolved, the atmosphere became enriched in oxygen -- and just before the end of the Precambrian, complex multicellular organisms, including the first animals, evolved.
Link
“Four thousand million years” of a lifeless planet. But once it begins, it spreads throughout the seas and continues to evolve in complexity. And then life really begins to evolve in earnest and a wide range of creatures come into being including land-dwellers very much like the dinosaurs we know and love. Even with this complexity and extremely long period of evolution, what we recognize as intelligence never shows up as a survival mechanism. Then at the end of the Permian era we find “The Great Dying” of the Permian-Triassic extinction. Very nearly all life on earth is destroyed.
“…not to be confused with the better-known Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction that signaled the end
of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Whatever happened during the Permian-Triassic period
was much worse: No class of life was spared from the devastation. Trees, plants, lizards,
proto-mammals, insects, fish, mollusks, and microbes -- all were nearly wiped out. Roughly 9
in 10 marine species and 7 in 10 land species vanished. Life on our planet almost came to an
End.”
Link
The slate is very nearly wiped clean. But, remarkably, life goes on and makes a spectacular come back. Life continues to evolve and flourish for millions of years with one of the most successful branches of life we call the Dinosaurs. They are masters of this world and exist in many, many forms and develop many survival strategies. None of which is higher intelligence. In all that time and all those forms, no self-awareness or tool-making develops as far as extensive study can determine. If not for the fresh start arranged by yet another fortuitous major impact 65 million years ago, it seems unlikely that the small, frail proto-mammals could have developed the size to support a larger brain and the higher thinking it affords.

Lately, astronomers have been able to identify planets orbiting around distant stars. There are about 40 such planets identified so far. However, most of these planets have a greater mass than Jupiter with only three with a mass somewhat less than Saturn. The size of these planets has come as a surprise to many but equally interesting is the fact of that planet’s distance from it’s sun and revolution period are much less than earth. Often times these giants are completing a revolution in two to five days as opposed to 365 for Earth.
Site
Conjecture on these finds led some to think that near-sun giants that have formed by sweeping the inner system area of most or all of the leftover materials following the birth of a star. As likely as this seems, if this is typical what implications does this have for earth-sized planets developing inside the “Goldilocks” region in nearby systems and subsequently, what are the implications for life on other worlds in other star systems? Granted, there have been many discussions on life’s ability to thrive in the most hostile of environs like polar caps and deep sea thermal vents. However, I wonder if life could have begun there or has it stared in more accommodating surroundings and these creatures have adapted to occupy a niche? Is life beginning in such places as likely as migration and adaptation?

The Earth has been broadcasting radio signals to the stars for around 70 years now. Since these signals travel through space at the speed of light, in essence we have created a radio signal sphere 140 light years in diameter and radiating out every day. A planet within the 50 L.Y. we discussed at the beginning would have been able to hear these signals for twenty years now. I stands to reason that a planet populated with an ILF may well have discovered radio signals and even if they were only slightly ahead of us in technology we should be inundated with many channels of various communications. It is equally likely that their broadcast lifespan would be far greater than ours and therefore their “radio wave sphere” should be many times larger than our own and even to the point of overlapping other spheres. Yet, in the years since 1960, S.E.T.I. has been searching vast areas of the sky only to find silence.
Link


In summary, my question is this. Given the following criteria:

A collision with an impactor of approximately half the mass of the proto-earth on a sufficient angle to cause a large moon in low orbit to form without destroying both worlds. In the event of mutual destruction, it is likely that a single planet would have formed much latter and would not have had a large moon.

Not one, but two major impacts creating so much damage to the environment that it almost sterilizes the planet the first time and wipes out the dominant species the second time. In both cases, artificially altering the natural progress of natural selection to allow the rise of creatures that may well not have been able to come into existence.

In both of the extremely long periods of life developing on Earth preceding the current epoch, the survival method of intelligence never arose or a rudimentary form was unable to survive long enough to flourish.


What are the possibilities of life that we might recognize as an Intelligent Life Form (ILF) might develop on a planet that is within a distance to be practical to humans. I would love to hear of life being discovered to have come into being on a world independently of the life we know. I suspect that there is a possibility of PLF within our own system. Perhaps a moon of Jupiter or Saturn will yield such a monumental discovery, perhaps even some form of Complex Life Form, but my hopes for communication with an intelligent race is tempered by my feeling that our existence here is the result of events that have proven beneficial to the development of a frail, slow, hairless, clawless creature that has survived by out smarting the other creatures with which it shares a world. Based on the two extremely long epochs that preceded our own, it would appear that the development of intelligence is a fluke, not a norm.
I fear that if the future holds a galaxy of planets populated with Intelligent Life Forms, it will be because we have made it so.

"In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves." -- Carl Sagan

Thoughts? Are we alone? Is it up to humanity to populate this part of the galaxy if we wish to see the type of interplanetary future we have dreamt about?

[DMark]

I think you give humans too much credit.

All we have really done is populate like rabbits, ruined a perfectly nice planet and kill each other off in wars. Gee, wonder why an intelligent life form wouldn't make a mad dash to come and meet us.

I think the chances of us finding mirrored images of ourselves (hairy humans who still use Microsoft) on another planet is slim.

Until we figure out a way to communicate with other species on this planet, we will never be in a position to understand what is out there. My guess is that there are intelligent life forms all over the place, probably communicating amongst each other on a regular basis - we are just too stupid to see it and understand.

[Ranchoth]

I think, given the sheer, gargantuan size of the universe, that it seems unlikely that we're the only planet to develop life, ever. And life—from what we know of it, on our world—tends to be notoriously hard to wipe out, completely.

However, beyond that—not enough data for a meaningful answer.

That being the case, I see no reason to just hang around the homeworld, waiting for information to come to us.

And, worst-case scenario, even if all we find is rock, or primeval goop—well, if it's an empty, godforsaken universe anyway...that just means there's room for some new managment, doesn't it?

C'mon...who wouldn't want to be one of the "first ones"?

[Nava]

Several answers:


First, Rita's Theory of Wasteful Nature. (Rita is a friend of Mom's, one of those people whose formal education stopped at 3rd grade but who are enormously curious and who've been so busy taking care of people and things that they just don't have time for silliness).

Nature is very wasteful. A woman has millions of cells that could become eggs, but only a number in the 6 figures actually starts the process; only a few thousands ever start the trip to the uterus; and even if you're Mother Rabbit, you're not going to go beyond the low two-figures. So, who's to say that planets aren't like a woman's pre-eggs? Zillions of them, but very few could have life and while it's possible that other planets did, it's also possible that only this one has.


Second, I don't remember who this is from:

Any intelligent lifeform who found us, if they really are intelligent, will turn tail.



I'm all for going out to look. We may find someone, we may not, but the trip in itself would be interesting, perhaps in a "hope we don't run over the edge of the world" way.

[Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor]

Invertibrates are more common than vertibrates.

Logically, the first "people" we meet are likely to look more like Insects or Lobsters than Humans.

And, equally likely, are probably not going to recognise us as sapient. And may very well attempt to eat us.

Ergo, Heinlein was right, & we must prepare for the Bug War.

[Grossbottom]

I think either there's nothing out there, and if there ever was we won't be meeting it, but I'll respond.

Without more data, it's impossible to make a useful comment on our moon's impact on the evolution of life here. I can't imagine such a big moon orbiting a small rock planet as being common, but then there's alot of star systems in the galaxy.

As for magnetic spheres...well, you know, that's a PITA, but only if you assume that life started on the Earth's surface. Underground now, that's comfy. Nice and warm, no crazy weather or offplanet radiation, just live off the minerals and reproduce. Ocean isn't too bad either.

We started in the oceans or underground, and our magnetic sphere allowed us to eventually live on the solid surface of Earth, but that doesn't need to be the rule. Intelligent life elsewhere could follow a subterranean or aquatic evolutionary path, and not give two figs for whether they've got a strong magnetic field.

To which I say, hey. You shoot a nuke down a bughole, you've got alot of dead bugs.

[gonzomax]

Too much emphasis on man. Extremophiles live in
antarctic cold
Volcanic vents in land and ocean
very dry and hot areas
deep underground rock formations severe chemical environments
highly radioactive environments
Many are blissfully ignorant of moon tides. Who knows what a million years of evolution will turn them into.

[Giles]

One problem is that stars are really far apart (at least in this part of the Galaxy), and it requires a lot of energy to go from star to star. So there might be thousands of plants with life on them in our galaxy, but they are all too far away for us ever to make contact. Even trying to contact using radio waves assumes that: (1) they use radio waves for communication, and (2) we would recognise a radio signal created by an alien civilisation if it hit us in the radio telescope.

[chappachula]

the universe is a fairly large place. (Bigger than my volkswagen, that's for sure.)
So physically there are enough rocks floating around for lots of intelligent beings to live on.

But the big size isn't measured just in miles of rock. It's also measured in time. There could have been intelligent beings beaming radio waves at us back when we were still ameobas floating in the primordial soup. Or when we were living in caves. Or when we were busy building the Roman Empire. Then they stopped using radio waves, and upgraded their software to Vista- universe edition, with a really effective firewall..

So now we'll never find them, and vice versa. We should have started looking about 3 million years ago.

[Lemur866]

While complex animals only appeared 650 million years ago during the Cambrian explosion, bacteria have been on Earth almost since the formation of the Earth. Which leads to the hypothesis that bacterial life will very quickly appear on any planet with liquid water. However, for three billion years there is no evidence of multicellular animal or plant life. Which leads to the hypothesis that although bacterial grade life is very common, multicellular life probably isn't. And of course, for 650 million years we've had various sorts of animals, there is no teleology causing them to develop into human-like creatures.

If you visited Earth 500,000 years ago you'd find Homo erectus running around...but he wouldn't strike you as the kind of creature likely to invent digital watches, even if he thought they were a good idea. Only around 50,000 years ago did Homo sapiens sapiens pass some sort of cognitive threshold, then we see an incredible flowering of art and new tool types, whereas before technology had remained static. Neandertals famously used exactly the same technique for making stone points for a hundred thousand years.

Which means that even though Neandertals had larger brains than modern Homo sapiens and probably lived a very similar lifestyle compared to modern hunter-gatherers, they had a very different mental life than we do. Although no one is sure exactly why that was...lack of a complex language maybe? But in any case, despite making complex tools a Neandertal was in many ways just another speices of really smart primate.

So while we have some reason to suspect that bacterial grade life is pretty common in the universe, we have no reason to suspect that multicellular animal life is common. And we have good reason to suspect that tool-using spaceship building animals are very unlikely to evolve, for 649 million years there was nothing on Earth even in the ballpark of toolusing animals, and only for the last 50,000 years has there been fully human human intelligence.

[chappachula]

also, if you want to get some hands-on experience at how hard it is to communicate with the aliens, try this:
do some volunteer work with autistic people.

If we can't communicate with them, how will we deal with giant insect creatures from Alpha Centauri?

[Voyager]

The short answer is that we don't have enough information. We're just beginning to find planets around other stars, and the size of the planets we find is large due to our not very good observation techniques.

Second, with a sample size of one, we don't know if a large moon really is necessary. Life might evolve to take advantage of whatever conditions there are, and life in a high cosmic ray environment might wonder how we get along without them.

Third, maybe the asteroid impacts slowed down the development of intelligent life. Could intelligent dinosaurs have evolved ten million years after the KT event?

Fourth, even if some civilization did get our radio signals, maybe they're waiting until we mature a bit before they respond. A civilization beaming out "Amos and Andy" doesn't inspire confidence, and they might want to see if we made it past the nuclear danger zone first. Or they may be waiting until we visit them. Or they might have moved their brains into machines 100 million years ago, and no longer care. The biggest flaw in most sf stories with lots of races is not ftl travel, but the assumption that over the 14 billion life of the universe there are a reasonable number of civilizations close enough to our level to make for an interesting story. If we run into another race, they will be either gods of savages - and considering our age, most likely gods.

It's like we are natives of an isolated Pacific Island, wondering why our carved sticks thrown into the water will ever get a response or if outriggers from another island will ever visit.

[Nic2004]

There have been some very interesting thoughts here and some that seem like the OP remains unread. I am not considering the likelihood of human-looking life somewhere in all of the galaxies. If they do, or did, 150 million LYs away, who cares? It would be an interesting discovery but of limited practical use. To far to talk or travel to to exchange info. That is why I limited this consideration to ~50 light years. To my thinking a stilted conversation requiring 100 years for question and answer seem like a top end to me.
My central theme is the seemingly unlikely events that came into place for humans to develop here and the possibility that the emergence of intelligence is not necessarily an end result of complex life existing on a planet.
It is possible dinosaurs might have gotten there in time but, after tens of millions of years they had not. The cosmic-radiation-loving life is possible but seems improbable given it's effects on any form of carbon-based tissue we can imagine. The argument for existing in inhospitable environs I think is difficult to use as a measure in that it is highly likely that most or all have evolved to tolerate this condition in more acceptable areas instead of coming into being in an environment so harsh.
I made the moon connection here to demonstrate that a moon of such size, around a planet of the right size and composition, revolving around an acceptable star, in the "Goldilocks" region is likely to be extremely rare and that it's role is possibly crucial and the evolution of intelligent life on top of that seems unlikely.
If the Earths rotation were as erratic as Mars' then the range and predictability of seasons would not have existed to promote life. Also, without the infusion of iron from the impactor would we have the radiation protection necessary?
Lemur866- It appears that you are on the same line of thinking as I am and see my point. I suspect that primitive life forms exist in many places relatively speaking. If we are to find life, this is mostly what we can expect.
Also the age of different systems may play a major role. If they had our current state of technology before our sun ignited, it seems a good possibility that they may not be available to come to the phone right now.
I also include the information about the planets so far discovered outside of our own system. I realize that we are only seeing the very, very large for obvious reasons. My point is that in the stars we have found to have a planet orbiting, it is HUGE and more importantly, it is close to the Goldilocks region. It appears fairly common that a large body has formed and swept up all the other matter around it. It is likely that these giants would have a gravity and heat to make beginnings of life unlikely and it is further possible that this is the norm. Small rocky inner planets with large gas giants in the farther regions of a system appear to be uncommon, at least at this stage anyway.
So, if rocky planets, in the Goldilocks region, orbiting a medium sized star, with water, and an iron core, with a stabilizing moon is rare, were does this leave us?

[Frank]

Moved from IMHO to GD.

[Nic2004]

Originally Posted by Frank

Moved from IMHO to GD.

Sorry to object but I had prefered to remain in IMHO due to the more stringent requirements for posting in GD. I often do not enter a discussion because I am not prepared to do a documented research paper before adding my thoughts. I would prefer insights and opinions on this subject and a freedom to offer cunjecture. If it must be GD I understand but prefer it otherwise.
Thanks

[Lemur866]

There's no need for a research paper.

And there's no reason to think that these large close superjovian planets have swept everything from the inner system. It could be that they have as many or more satelites than our solar gas giants. A superjovian at the correct distance from the star with 10 large moons could have multiple "planets" that support life. And there's no reason to suspect that the life zone is very narrow...it turns out that Mars and Venus don't seem capable of supporting life, but that didn't have to be the case, a solar system with two or more planets in the liquid water range isn't physically impossible.

And we just don't know how important our moon is for life. Maybe only planets with large moons can develop life, or mulicellular life...but we just don't know. It seems a rather brash assumption to believe that Earth is an extreme statistical outlier in terms of supporting life. Sure, it's the best in our solar system. But we imagine the Earth is a paradise because we evolved on Earth. It's easy to imagine some xenobiologist on 61 Cygni IV speculating that a large moon would make life impossible.

[Steve MB]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

I also include the information about the planets so far discovered outside of our own system. I realize that we are only seeing the very, very large for obvious reasons. My point is that in the stars we have found to have a planet orbiting, it is HUGE and more importantly, it is close to the Goldilocks region. It appears fairly common that a large body has formed and swept up all the other matter around it. It is likely that these giants would have a gravity and heat to make beginnings of life unlikely and it is further possible that this is the norm. Small rocky inner planets with large gas giants in the farther regions of a system appear to be uncommon, at least at this stage anyway.

We are only seeing the ones that are large and in relatively close orbits around their stars. The latter is important because it allows multiple orbits' worth of data to be obtained (required for all known detection methods) and because it creates a greater velocity perturbation in the star's motion (required for Doppler-shift detection).

Thus, both the large size and the close-in orbits of known extrasolar planets are skewed by detection effects -- there could be many stars with gas giants in orbits more similar to those of Jupiter and Saturn in our system, but we have no way of knowing as of yet.

[Der Trihs]

Originally Posted by Lemur866

And there's no reason to think that these large close superjovian planets have swept everything from the inner system. It could be that they have as many or more satelites than our solar gas giants. A superjovian at the correct distance from the star with 10 large moons could have multiple "planets" that support life. And there's no reason to suspect that the life zone is very narrow...it turns out that Mars and Venus don't seem capable of supporting life, but that didn't have to be the case, a solar system with two or more planets in the liquid water range isn't physically impossible.

Here's a thought I had, when those large, close in planets were discovered. Most stars are red dwarves, and it's long been thought that they couldn't support life because a world close in enough to be livable would be tide locked, and one side would fry while the air froze out on the dark side. It has occurred to me that that wouldn't necessarily apply to a large satellite of a gas giant; it would be tide locked to the giant, if anything. That would drastically increse the numbers of potential life bearing wolrds.

OTOH, I've seen it pointed out that Earth may be unusual in having just enough water. Much less, and it would be dead or near to it; a desert planet. Much more, and it would be an ocean world; not hostile to life, but very hostile to the development of technology. If the majority of life bearing worlds are ocean worlds, there could be a million in the galaxy and we wouldn't know since none have ever developed technology.

[Voyager]

Now we're in GD we can do some math. A sphere of space with radius 50 l.y. has a volume of 125,000 ly**3. I don't know the average distance between stars, let's say 6 l.y, which means there is a sphere of 9 ly**3 around each star. This gives us just under 14,000 star systems in this region of space. I know a few years ago people thought multiple star systems could not support planet formation, but I seem to remember reading something saying this was no longer believed. Let's say a tenth can, that gives us 1,400 planetary systems. Let's say a fifth of these havereasonably sized planets in a habital zone - this gives us 280.
Now the next thing people usually do is to try to figure out what percentage of these would produce intelligent life, but I don't think that's necessary. Let's say each civilization of interest lasts five million years, and that every planet produces one. That still is only 1.4 billion years worth of civilization, out of 10 billion years of existence (assuming it takes 4 billion years to produce reasonable stars.) I could compute the probability of overlap, but you see the odds aren't very good, if you restrict yourself to such a small space.

The kicker though is that 50 l.y. should be nothing to a million year old civilization that could build self-reproducing intelligent probes. But maybe an ethical civilization would never send these out. First, there would be very likely nothing to find close by, and second, they might consider it immoral to seed a potentially habitable world and make the emergence of a native intelligent race impossible.

My point is that there is so little knowledge that speculation will never be more than that.

[Nic2004]

This is the kind of input I was looking to see. This is one of those thought problems that seems to suggest a solution that the typical person does not want to come to for an answer. I want to believe in UFO's, but reason and available evidence does not support it. Same with the questions of religion.
Awhile back I read a discussion (yet another) about the existence of GOD and in this an option that was put forward was a super intelligence that exists on a cosmic scale and immeasurable age and is preoccupied with cosmic things and has little to no interest in the brief existence of a few primitives on an obscure and nondescript planet. The reply to this was of course "then what does it matter?"
It is this same kind of feeling I have about the possibility of intelligent life 50 million LY away. So? To far to travel or to even communicate with. Quite possibly extinct before any sign could reach us. This is the reason for my arbitrary limit on distance. If we receive a signal of random communication from somewhere else and it originated even 200 LY away buy the time we said "Hey, we're here!" or the equivalent in mathematical formula, 200 years back and 200 hundred to get a "Uh, who's calling?" back, would this be a practical means of communication. Earthshaking, yes. Of practical use, not so much. However, a 50 year one way or less may be do-able given human lifespans and attention spans.
Like Voyager has said, the cosmos is so old and our system is made of previous systems that have gone super nova so the possibility that such a city-builder has come and gone.
As to the ocean-planet type of scenario, I see the highest intelligence in the seas to be former land dwellers. If there was no land at all, no tidal pools for warmth and protection, could/would the proto-life goo have come together for life to begin? There were sea creatures that closely resemble dolphin in body shape in prehistoric times but this is understandable as this is a terrific shape to have for speed and maneuverability in the water. But, would problem solving, self-awareness levels of intelligence have developed if restricted to a ocean-going species?

The concept put forward about inhabitable moons circling a gas giant in near-star orbit is interesting. It does answer some of my apprehension about the "giant sweeper" effect that may prevent earth type planets in the Goldilocks region. Some mention earlier of a "red-dwarf" I think is a bit off. Seems like there are red giants and white dwarf stars and I discount both as likely hosts. The red giant's lifespan is about 30 million years IIRC and this seem far to short a period for complex life, much less intelligence. The white dwarf is a end product of a sun of greater mass than our own having gone nova and blown off most of it's components in a massive explosion. I would think this would likely toast any life-bearing planets it may once have had.

[Frank]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

Sorry to object but I had prefered to remain in IMHO due to the more stringent requirements for posting in GD. I often do not enter a discussion because I am not prepared to do a documented research paper before adding my thoughts. I would prefer insights and opinions on this subject and a freedom to offer cunjecture. If it must be GD I understand but prefer it otherwise.
Thanks

Your OP was pretty intense, and in my opinion, both it and the subject are GD-worthy. Perhaps Tom will disagree and move it back.

By the way, I'm almost certain that both opinion and conjecture are allowed in this forum.

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

This is the kind of input I was looking to see. This is one of those thought problems that seems to suggest a solution that the typical person does not want to come to for an answer. I want to believe in UFO's, but reason and available evidence does not support it. Same with the questions of religion.
Awhile back I read a discussion (yet another) about the existence of GOD and in this an option that was put forward was a super intelligence that exists on a cosmic scale and immeasurable age and is preoccupied with cosmic things and has little to no interest in the brief existence of a few primitives on an obscure and nondescript planet. The reply to this was of course "then what does it matter?"
It is this same kind of feeling I have about the possibility of intelligent life 50 million LY away. So? To far to travel or to even communicate with. Quite possibly extinct before any sign could reach us. This is the reason for my arbitrary limit on distance. If we receive a signal of random communication from somewhere else and it originated even 200 LY away buy the time we said "Hey, we're here!" or the equivalent in mathematical formula, 200 years back and 200 hundred to get a "Uh, who's calling?" back, would this be a practical means of communication. Earthshaking, yes. Of practical use, not so much. However, a 50 year one way or less may be do-able given human lifespans and attention spans.

First of all, if UFOs are real, we'd know it. No one is going to travel those distances and play games with jets and go popping out of the woods going boo. You don't need any of these calculations to refute them - you just have to assume that space traveling alien races have IQs higher than a turnip. (Despite what we see in the standard '50s scifi movie.)

You're assuming, though, that the alien race stays at home and sends out probes. That is almost certainly not the way I'd do it. How much exploring of the West would there have been if the British started from London each time? No, a race would transform likely planets, or establish large space habitats in systems with the needed resources, and slowly expand. The life time you are assuming seems laughably short - we've had real medicine for about 150 years, and already we are beginning to understand aging. Increasing lifespans is one scientific project that just about everyone would get behind.

I don't think you can explain the absence of aliens through technical limitations like these.

[Nic2004]

Frank- I understand and yield to your superior judgement.

Voyager- I'm not certain but I hope you understood I was NOT supporting the case for UFO's or using this discussion as a basis for my disbelief. My point was that I would love to think of a universe with a city building race on every other star system. I would love to believe we are on the brink of a FTL means of travel. I was saying that sometimes your reasoning's yield an outcome that conflicts with the world you'd like to see.
Such is the status of my reasoning's on extraterrestrial life at this time. I just have had these pieces of information in somewhat of a fragmented arrangement and sought to bring some order to the process and at the same time, put them before the smartest think-tank I have access to in order to see perspectives or flaws I cannot see myself.
The input about the gas giants is a good one for example. I can see this as a possible place for life to begin but considering the gravitational forces and the possible time-in-shadow combined with extreme ranges in temperatures from such an orbit moving closer to the star and then much further on a regular basis it seems complex life would be less likely.
The life time I was referring to was that of current day humans.

[Der Trihs]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

But, would problem solving, self-awareness levels of intelligence have developed if restricted to a ocean-going species?

Squid can solve problems, such as opening screw top bottles. I don't know what tests have been done on self awareness.

Originally Posted by Nic2004

Some mention earlier of a "red-dwarf" I think is a bit off. Seems like there are red giants and white dwarf stars and I discount both as likely hosts. The red giant's lifespan is about 30 million years IIRC and this seem far to short a period for complex life, much less intelligence. The white dwarf is a end product of a sun of greater mass than our own having gone nova and blown off most of it's components in a massive explosion.

Red dwarves are neither; they are main sequence stars like our own yellow dwarf, and are the majority of such stars. They also live much longer than a star like ours.

[elucidator]

Originally Posted by Frank

...By the way, I'm almost certain that both opinion and conjecture are allowed in this forum.

Cite?

[gonzomax]

The technology we possess may be pretty neanderthal compared to our neighbors.In a hundred years we have changed our understanding of scientific knowledge to a tremendous degree. Do we really know anything. Speed of light as fast as we can go. If so, we have no neighbors. They all live too far away. Then we are alone. If the future finds a way around that all bets are offf.

[elucidator]

Two changes over the last years of import. One is the realization that life is a more formidable force than we had realized. We had operated under the assumption that life was very delicate, requiring very exacting conditions, very Goldilocks - not too hot, not too cold, not too much methane, etc.

Of late we find differently. Life will squeeze out an existence in the most unpromising situations, like the volcanic vents in the ocean. This coincides with pushing back the earliest forms of life farther and farther back.

So did it start here? I think not, I don't think the time frame allows for such complex development from "scratch". I lean very heavily towards notions of panspermia, the theory of extraterrestial origin and "contamination". Which would imply that DNA is the basis of life in Known Space.

The good news is when we meet them, we can eat them. Bad news, the opposite also applies.

[Lemur866]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

Seems like there are red giants and white dwarf stars and I discount both as likely hosts. The red giant's lifespan is about 30 million years IIRC and this seem far to short a period for complex life, much less intelligence. The white dwarf is a end product of a sun of greater mass than our own having gone nova and blown off most of it's components in a massive explosion. I would think this would likely toast any life-bearing planets it may once have had.

White dwarfs aren't nova remains, but rather remains of a main sequence star.

And red dwarfs are very very common, about 10 times as common as "main sequence" stars. And they last orders of magnitude longer. The more massive a star is, the hotter it burns, and the hotter it burns the faster it burns. Blue-white stars burn very fast and have life spans in the range of millions of years. Red dwarfs are the exact opposite, they burn very cool and will last for hundreds of billions of years. Our sun is in the middle, it will last for another couple of billion years before it swells up to become a red giant. The red giant stage only lasts for a short while before most of it's material is ejected.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_dwarf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_dwarf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_giant

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

Voyager- I'm not certain but I hope you understood I was NOT supporting the case for UFO's or using this discussion as a basis for my disbelief. My point was that I would love to think of a universe with a city building race on every other star system. I would love to believe we are on the brink of a FTL means of travel. I was saying that sometimes your reasoning's yield an outcome that conflicts with the world you'd like to see.

No worries - just giving a reason I agreed with you.

We're nowhere near FTL travel - but if we are as close as the Greeks were to space travel, we'll be in good shape. I've constructed an ftl travel method for a book. The secret is that it can't violate anything we do know - we just can't go faster than light in this or any other universe. I think I can show that causality won't be violated - no wormholes. But as far as we can tell now, we're alone, and if anyone is out there, they're not talking to us.

[Merijeek]

Originally Posted by chappachula

also, if you want to get some hands-on experience at how hard it is to communicate with the aliens, try this:
do some volunteer work with autistic people.

If we can't communicate with them, how will we deal with giant insect creatures from Alpha Centauri?

We'll give them some of our women. Preferably in go-go outfits.

Have you considered doing that with the autistic people?

-Joe

[Steve MB]

Originally Posted by Voyager

I don't know the average distance between stars, let's say 6 l.y, which means there is a sphere of 9 ly**3 around each star.

Where do you get that figure?

If we simplify a bit and imagine that each star is in the center of its own cube 6 ly on a side, that assigns a volume of 216 ly**3 to each. That reduces your subsequent figures by a factor of 24.[/quote]

[Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor]

Originally Posted by Merijeek

We'll give them some of our women. Preferably in go-go outfits.

Have you considered doing that with the autistic people?

-Joe

What size dresses do these autistic people wear?

[ralph124c]

It may well be that advanced life is very rare. perhaps the conditions that gave rise to human life are pretty unique, so if the universe is mostly populated by blue-green algae, no surpize. I am surprised that we haven't picked up any kind of radio signals by now..or maybe we are in the wrong neighborhood.

[Nic2004]

I recall an episode of Cosmos in which Carl Sagan was speaking of Mars and the fact that, to all appearances at this time, it is a lifeless world. And paraphrasing, he said that if so, we should use it as best fits the needs of mankind. However, what if there is life. If we find that life exists, even in it's most simple form, should we take steps to change this place for our needs? He said he did not think we should.
What are your feelings on this? If there is a basic life form, like the blue algae mentioned above, do you think we should proceed with colonizing and terraforming if it meant the extinction of this native life form? Do we ignore the one world most like our own and perhaps the only one we will have access to for centuries to come for the sake of a bit of slime at the edge of one of the poles?
If yes, then is there a point were we would not intrude?

When I consider the effects western civilization has had on the native species in Australia of the Hawaiian Islands it gives me pause. Even with the precautions used by NASA, one of the Apollo missions brought back a piece of an early unmanned mission on which was found bacteria that continued to thrive once returned to a warmer atmosphere environment.

[Kinthalis]

I think that if Mars becomes crucial to our survival and future expansion colonization of other systems, then yes, we should change it if we can.

It is the natural order of things. When the price of not doing so is extinction, it will be done.

[Lemur866]

Look, the process of terraforming Mars would take centuries, if it is possible at all. Surely we have no need to make split-second decisions about whether exterminate any native Martian life. Terraforming of Mars will never be critical to human survival, because surviving on Mars is going to be 100 times harder and 1000 times more expensive than surviving on Antarctica. If we can't build human habitats in Antarctica, the Sahara, Baffin Island, and the middle of the Pacific Ocean, then there's no way we can build self-sufficient habitats on Mars. If we can't survive on a nuclear-winterized or post-asteroid strike Earth then how can we do so on Mars?

[msmith537]

Originally Posted by Voyager

Fourth, even if some civilization did get our radio signals, maybe they're waiting until we mature a bit before they respond. A civilization beaming out "Amos and Andy" doesn't inspire confidence, and they might want to see if we made it past the nuclear danger zone first.

First, what makes you think aliens could even interpret our signals as anything other than interesting noise patterns?

Second, I don't know why people think aliens are somehow more noble or altruistic or moral than we humans.


And finally, people always seem to give anthropomorphic properties to aliens. Aliens could be so unlike us that we might not even recognize them. They might not even operate on human scales or timelines.


Think of it like this. A forest is a complex ecosystem. It consists of many components - trees, soil, animals, etc that all interact and depend on each other. A forest grows and recedes based on a myriad of conditions. It doesn't decide to, it just does.

Urban sprawl is also a complex ecosystem of sorts. Viewed from space over a long period of time, it appears like a metal, glass and concrete fungus growing all over the planet tended by various smaller suborganisms.

Now imagine an alien coming into contact with Earth. They might see various competing organisms that appear like alternating green and gray illuminated fungus slowly competing for space. In their quest for getting at whatever it is they are interested in, they might demolish some of our cities with about as much regard as we might demolish an ant colony while digging the foundation to a new skyscraper.

[Nic2004]

Lemur866

Look, the process of terraforming Mars would take centuries, if it is possible at all. Surely we have no need to make split-second decisions about whether exterminate any native Martian life.

Oh, I think we can afford to give the Dopers here a little more time than that to consider the question ::Jeopardy music::
The Earth areas mentioned are far easier to resupply on a regular basis making a self-sustaining habitat not cost-efficient. Not so with Mars.

msmith537- I realize your reply was not directed to me specifically but, if I may:

First, what makes you think aliens could even interpret our signals as anything other than interesting noise patterns?

If we are discussing a city building and possible space faring race there must be some form of technology involved and as such an ability to intercept radio signals. There must also be some degree of mathematical knowledge and therefore the ability to distinguish between naturally occurring noise in common frequencies and a sustained signal of a type seemingly artificial. And if so, they could recognize mathematical progressions like 1,1,2,3,5,8 or 1,2,3,5,7,11 type of stuff.

Second, I don't know why people think aliens are somehow more noble or altruistic or moral than we humans.

Judging by what I see on the news each day, I can hardly imagine that they would not be.

And finally, people always seem to give anthropomorphic properties to aliens. Aliens could be so unlike us that we might not even recognize them. They might not even operate on human scales or timelines.

I agree whole-heartily with this. The mostly-human bipeds of sci-fi is entirely unlikely. However, I do think there are survival strategies that work here and may be very common in other world species. To wit: Eyes that work in the visible spectrum at the least. A method to detect vibrations in the surrounding air, like ears. A method to sample free-floating molecules in the air, like a nose or a snakes tongue. I think these items would be grouped closely together and close to the brain to minimize signal travel time and signal degradation. They should be on a head that allows increased elevation when needed to survey an area of possible danger and must swivel ( as on a neck) to afford the greatest panning of an area. I recall reading of a prehistoric sea creature that looked almost exactly like a dolphin but obviously was not a mammal. Why? Because that form works very well in that environment so the unconnected recurrence seems like a logical outcome.
I think this is likely the most we can expect as to recognizably.

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by Steve MB

Where do you get that figure?

If we simplify a bit and imagine that each star is in the center of its own cube 6 ly on a side, that assigns a volume of 216 ly**3 to each. That reduces your subsequent figures by a factor of 24.

[/quote]
27 ly**3 of course. I had done the first calculation with a 4 ly average distance (which comes out to an 8 ly**3 sphere, and got stuck there.

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by msmith537

First, what makes you think aliens could even interpret our signals as anything other than interesting noise patterns?

Radio waves are somewhat simple to intercept. The regularity of them in terms of speech and music, would stand right out. I was joking about Amos and Andy, of course, and the aliens might never be able to translate our language (though receiving TV signals should make it easier) but they'd know it was intelligently generated.

Second, I don't know why people think aliens are somehow more noble or altruistic or moral than we humans.

I don't. But an advanced alien species would have managed to make it through a number of crisis points, including the development of nuclear weapons. If the are too nasty they won't survive in the long run, though we might get unlucky.

And finally, people always seem to give anthropomorphic properties to aliens. Aliens could be so unlike us that we might not even recognize them. They might not even operate on human scales or timelines.

I'm quite familiar with this argument, and I don't buy it. First of all, our thought rate is determined chemically, and even if aliens move into computers, where the thought rate will be faster, you'd expect them to be able to interface with the natural world which moves more or less at our rate.

I agree that aliens would plan over much wider horizons than we do (or even more than the cathedral builders did 1,000 years ago) but they'd still be able to recognize short term events. Actually, that is why I think spreading through the galaxy is more probable than the OP does.

Think of it like this. A forest is a complex ecosystem. It consists of many components - trees, soil, animals, etc that all interact and depend on each other. A forest grows and recedes based on a myriad of conditions. It doesn't decide to, it just does.

Urban sprawl is also a complex ecosystem of sorts. Viewed from space over a long period of time, it appears like a metal, glass and concrete fungus growing all over the planet tended by various smaller suborganisms.

Now imagine an alien coming into contact with Earth. They might see various competing organisms that appear like alternating green and gray illuminated fungus slowly competing for space. In their quest for getting at whatever it is they are interested in, they might demolish some of our cities with about as much regard as we might demolish an ant colony while digging the foundation to a new skyscraper.

The first problem with this is that intelligence is very evident. I don't buy that intelligent aliens wouldn't recognize it - at least after a bit of study.

Second, anyone coming that far won't need anything we have. We're far more likely to be the bad guys than they are - not that we'd get very far.

The far greater danger when confronted with an advanced alien race is to give up when we find that that they know everything worth discovering for the next thousand years, and we move from discoverers to not very advanced school children.

[gazpacho]

Originally Posted by Voyager

Radio waves are somewhat simple to intercept. The regularity of them in terms of speech and music, would stand right out. I was joking about Amos and Andy, of course, and the aliens might never be able to translate our language (though receiving TV signals should make it easier) but they'd know it was intelligently generated.

I disagree. We are rapidly moving away from simply modulated waveforms for radio signals. More and more we are compressing audio and visual signals when we wend them so the signals look more and more like noise. Then the are complex multiple access schemes which create an even more complex signal. I believe that there will only be say a 200 year window with any simple periodic signals broadcast with a lot of power.

[Der Trihs]

Originally Posted by Voyager

I don't. But an advanced alien species would have managed to make it through a number of crisis points, including the development of nuclear weapons. If the are too nasty they won't survive in the long run, though we might get unlucky.

They are only required to practice self restraint on their own species in order to survive, not other intelligent life. That leads right to the sci-fi scenario of the rabidly xenophobic species that considers only it's own kind to be of value. They won't blow themselves up, but they might cheerfully drop an asteroid on us, or round us all up onto ranches as meat animals.

[msmith537]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

Lemur866
msmith537- I realize your reply was not directed to me specifically but, if I may:

If we are discussing a city building and possible space faring race there must be some form of technology involved and as such an ability to intercept radio signals. There must also be some degree of mathematical knowledge and therefore the ability to distinguish between naturally occurring noise in common frequencies and a sustained signal of a type seemingly artificial. And if so, they could recognize mathematical progressions like 1,1,2,3,5,8 or 1,2,3,5,7,11 type of stuff.

No, you're right. They will be able to see that the signal was generated by an intelligence, But they would not be able to decrypt, decode or interpret it. They don't know what NTSC standard is and even if they did, they might not even have eyes or ears like we understand them in which to hear and see!

Originally Posted by Voyager

The first problem with this is that intelligence is very evident. I don't buy that intelligent aliens wouldn't recognize it - at least after a bit of study.

You're still thinking they think like we do. What if the alien is say...a giant AI the size of a planet. It doesn't have a lifespan like we do. It just cruises around the galaxy at it's own pace. It comes across Earth and sees a planet covered with some low-level organisms that are of no more consequence to it than a termite mound is to us. Maybe it finds us interesting so it scoops up a sample (say...California) for study and then grinds the rest of the Earth down into raw materials to continue it's voyage.

Think about how the old European empires viewed undeveloped human cultures. Imagine how a civilization or entity that could travel between stars might view us.

[Nic2004]

Something I forgot to include in my expectations for alien physiology is the ability to be tool makers. In old sci-fi you see something like a giant eyeball arriving in a silver spaceship. But on consideration, I wonder who mined the metals and forged the steel and hammered it into shape and set the rivets in place? An Eye? Or a creature that looks like a praying mantis. What is it using for hands? I think in addition to the basic design features mentioned in my last post, there must be a way to finely manipulate objects. Four arms with three fingers each? Fine. Ten tentacle-like appendages with fine motor control? Okay. Something with hands like a lion or and elephant? No.
There may be an intelligence that is more whale-like in that it considers it's surroundings and communicates with it's fellow creatures but these are not city builders and unlikely to alter their surroundings to in significant ways to be see as the tool-users we are seeking here.
A free-roaming, self-aware Death Star is not the intelligent civilization we were attempting to target here.

Voyager- You said

that is why I think spreading through the galaxy is more probable than the OP does.

. I am not opposed to humanity spreading out through space. It wasn't my intention to suggest that. I was trying to consider if Earth-like planets are as common as sometimes portrayed and, even if they are fairly typical in similar star systems, what is the likelihood of
a) life
b) complex life
c) intelligent life in the tool-user, city builder sense.

I certainly hope humanity will get off this rock if only to keep from having "all of our eggs in one basket". However, I doubt the Star Trek fantasy of many star systems with intelligent life that look like us (even breeds with us) and other quick fix outlooks.
I think that we may well be it for all practical purposes (excluding vastly distant life forms too far flung for us to interact with either by travel or communication) and if there is a time in the future with multiple civilizations in multiple systems it will be through slow and methodical work on the part of humans and that our wish for instant gratification will not bring us to were we want to be in this situation.

[antechinus]

It has been estimated that there are 10^22 stars in the universe. More suns than grains of sand on earth.

Even though the set of conditions required for life to form on earth is exceeedingly improbable, there are many opportinities for it to do so. So I think out there somewhere there is at least some form of life. However since it will be an incredible distance/time from us, it may as well not exist.

Another condition necessary for development of life: gas gaints to protect earth life by decreasing liklihood of extiniction collisions.

As for sentient life, I think that is nothing special (other than from our point of view). I think higher intelligence with language and memes is just a weird quirk of evolution like the peacocks tail or bombardier beetles spray. On might as well ask what are the chances of peacock tails existing anywhere else in the universe.

IMHO, sentient life is unique to earth.

Great OP by the way Nic2004.

[levdrakon]

Originally Posted by antechinus

As for sentient life, I think that is nothing special (other than from our point of view). I think higher intelligence with language and memes is just a weird quirk of evolution like the peacocks tail or bombardier beetles spray. On might as well ask what are the chances of peacock tails existing anywhere else in the universe.

It seems to me if there is a niche for peacock tails or for instance, giraffes, then we can expect to find things on other planets that are very much like peacock tails & giraffes. If there's a niche for it, it'll get filled. We filled the language using opposable thumbs having radio transmitting spaceship building niche. Why wouldn't someone else?

It seems to come down to whether you follow the Rare Earth Hypothesis or the Mediocraty Principle.

I tend towards the Mediocraty Principle. Problem is, intelligent tool using humans have only been doing cool stuff for a hundred years or so. It could turn out intelligent tool using species are wildly common. But they only do cool stuff for a hundred years or so.

[levdrakon]

And if I can't even spell mediocrity right, who the heck cares what I think?

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by Nic2004

I certainly hope humanity will get off this rock if only to keep from having "all of our eggs in one basket". However, I doubt the Star Trek fantasy of many star systems with intelligent life that look like us (even breeds with us) and other quick fix outlooks.
I think that we may well be it for all practical purposes (excluding vastly distant life forms too far flung for us to interact with either by travel or communication) and if there is a time in the future with multiple civilizations in multiple systems it will be through slow and methodical work on the part of humans and that our wish for instant gratification will not bring us to were we want to be in this situation.

You may be right about this. An Asimov Galaxy, with only one or a few cultures spreading everywhere, might be more likely. Using sf as a model for what the future will actually look like is a bit dangerous, because most sf universes are more driven by story than plausibility.

[gonzomax]

http://www.netro.ca/disclosure/npccmenu.htm I almost hate to refer to this. It is a video and long. I was browsing a couple months ago and read a story about the government losing a long lawsuit to supress some information. I had to follow it up and was surprised that it was this. I am not a believer . I wish there were visitors so we could understand we share this planet and should treat it properly.

[Nic2004]

antechinus- Thanks for the compliment. I agree with your conclusion in the sense that I don't see us fining any peacocks but if complex life exists on a world, I would expect to find a creature that uses wildly colorful displays to increase the chance of continuing it's gene line.

levdrakon- What a LINK! I am floored and almost feel like a plagiarist in that the reasoning and examples follow so well, only better. The addition of a planet being somewhat smaller or larger affecting the shape of the surface and thus life's origin is interesting. To much mass, makes a smooth sphere and no mountains or valleys. Too little, and the extremes tend to be the norm. Also, the position in the galaxy (too near the galactic center or out in the arm) is an approach I also had not considered. The "habitable zone" not just in relation to the parent star but it's location and eccentricity of it's galactic orbit is dumbfounding. They also mention the need for a Jupiter size planet in the outer system to limit the number of near-fatal strikes to the planet. I was aware of this but failed to include it as it seems to be getting much longer than I had intended as it was.
Thanks very much.

Although I hesitate to refer to a sci-fi view, in general I feel like the one presented in Dune is the most likely in that it is set something like 10,000 years in the future were humanity has spread out through space and as a result, the beings there have changed over time due to physical, political, philosophical differences much like the finch in Darwin's studies. I don't know about that off-shoot worm-thingy but who knows.

Voyager- I have always held a view of a galaxy filled with strange and wonderful civilizations since I was a boy. Now I tend to see it as devoid of intelligent life and lonely. I kinda makes me sad. However, the thought that we are it brings a certain challenge and sense of pride. The onus may well be on Humanity to make a vast civilization spread throughout he stars and when we have existed as long as the dinosaurs did, there will be many forms of human and hopefully they will be aware of their origins and we will be the ancients.