Some are not interested in truth. It scares them.
In connection with crop circles, there appears to be a deliberate effort to muddy the waters…
Have you ever taken the time to look into Dr. Levengood’s work?
No. That’s above top secret! If I told you, then I would have to kill you.
Besides, they would deny it anyway. You know that…
You know, that funky “circle” with the alien portrait and the cd-looking thing I saw deconstructed on Slashdot a while back. There was a just for kicks sort of story showing some of the more elaborate recent crop art. Anyways, the /. crowd, geeks that they are, went to work on the pattern on the cd, decoding it as if it were, if memory serves, ascii, and it actually contained a real message, though I can’t for the life of me remember what it might have been. I shall have to go dig through their archives. The whole thing was really quite entertaining.
Joe Nickell of CSICOP has and demostrates his methodology and conclusions are biased and specious.
We have, so far, an example of exactly one planet with life on it. With all due respect to Drake and Q.E.D., any extrapolation done from one point is just an exercise in wishful thinking. That makes it common ground for New Agers and evolutionists.
P.S. Supposedly the “aliens” have a way of bending space/time so they can travel between the stars much faster than light. It’s an interesting sci-fi idea…
Ah, memory does not serve. How embarassing. The Slashdot story contained a link to an article which decoded the “cd”, revealing the message “Beware the bearers of FALSE gifts & their BROKEN PROMISES. Much PAIN but still time. BELIEvE. There is GOOD out there. We OPpose DECEPTION. Conduit CLOSING. Acknowledge.” (Ignoring a couple encoding errors. Oops!) The slashdotters then proceded to make fun of the “aliens” for their use of ascii. Ah well. Still entertaining, even if I remembered it slightly differently.
To expand on someone else’s throwaway point, lekatt, do you believe that traditional forms of graffiti are caused by aliens as well? Why or why not?
Ah yes!
The always unbiased Mr. Nickell…
I’ll have to take a look at your link when I have a bit more time, or need a good laugh.
Later.
Gee, there’s a valid counterargument… :rolleyes:
woot! wtg Doc! Its been a looongg time since I have seen a Bloomcounty reference! kudos.
For the record, and off the topic, I would take Bill the Cat and Opus over George and Dick anyday!
Q.E.D.
You really need to read your own cites – this is GD and precision counts.
You said that “even the most liberal estimate” estimate is that there are “no more than” 1000. What your cite actually said was:
Bolding mine.
So what you should have said is that “one researcher guesses there are at least 1000 civilizations.” This is a far cry from “the most liberal estimate” being "no more than"1000.
**
You are utterly and completely full of shit. Drake is currently Senior Scientist for the SETI Institute, the leading SETI research organization in the world.
Hey!! I read that book :D, back in highschool…
…
oh wait, you weren’t actually talking about it…
Didn’t think you would provide a cite. Funny how it is so top secret yet YOU know about it. :rolleyes:
I always thought that the aliens were just bypassing the humans altogether, and came here just to communicate with the wheat.
Look, I admire SETI and its work. I run SET@home. But face it, they are not the most unbiased folks when it comes to estimating things like Galactic civilization distribution. Naturally, SETI is going to estimate towards the high end.
In any case, I don’t know why you are arguing with me. I’m certainly not saying we are the only advanced civilization in our galaxy. I’m only saying I don’t think they’re terribly common, and certainly are not visiting us.
And why not - the cereal crops have evidently astutely co-opted those pesky mammals in their successful attempt to colonise large swathes of the planet.
They are made by aliens. here’s my cite:
Traditional Graffiti: Them pictures on the subway is made by aliens!
by A. Guy, A. Nother Guy (Paperback - January 2003)
Avg. Customer Rating: 5 chocolate starfish
If that isn’t proof, I dunno what is…
I hereby volunteer to reed any one of these “citations” from cover to cover, and report back with a summary of the author’s most incontrovertible points, if any. I’d just like to know which of these books lekatt considers to be the most authoritative and substantial, so I can choose that one. This assumes that lekatt has actually read any of them himself.
Being such an inexperienced poster you may be unaware of this, but people in GD will often argue with you when you spout untruths – especially when you try and defend them.
My figures are no more or less truthful than yours. The fact is there are too many numbers to be plugged into Drake’s equation which we simply do not know to even several orders of magnitude. To say that a figure of 1,000 extant civilizations is any less correct than one of 1,000,000 is foolish as both are based on sheer guesswork. I raised the issue as a means to demostrate the unlikeliness of alien life having visited us. Are you suggesting it has?
Your vehemence is misplaced. Sounding like you’re frothing at the mouth doesn’t go far towards convincing one of your rationality. I am more than happy to debate this topic with yuy, but I refuse to do so if you cannot maintain a decent level of civility.