Me, in a thread asking Will we survive earth?
Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees in a Guardian article:
This seems an extraordinarily specific point to make. Do I mistakenly flatter myself overmuch, and this profound point simply occurred to the august Sir Martin completely independently?
Probably. This seems a pretty common theme, both in science and science fiction. Take, for example, H.G. Welles’ “The Time Machine”. It’s just not what most ordinary people are thinking of. And it’s perhaps a bit contrary to standard judeo-christian theology.
It would be nice to think that a scientist of Martin Rees calibre did lurk here or is perhaps even a member.
Heh heh. 
I wonder if one of our Administrators could tell us if SirMartinRees’ IP address is consistent with Cambridge University or, at least, the UK? Alternatively, if SirMartin could tell me a brief description of The Granta, which only someone familiar with Cambridge would know about?
Whats the color of the boathouse at Hereford? :dubious:
I’ve never been there and even I know the answer to that one:
There is no boathouse at Hereford!
SM, can you prove you’re not Rees?
The Queen is an alcoholic corgiphile. You can quote me.
I think it’s a point that anyone who has read any popular science (Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, Richard Dawkins) is pretty well aware of.
I couldn’t give you a cite to anything one of them has written right now, but that notion is basically completely ingrained in me.
Hmm - I’d say that *a posteriori, after someone makes it, anyone would say “Yes, of course that’s correct”. But beforehand? Framing the point in that exact manner seemed to me so specific when I read the Guardian article (and I was damned sure I hadn’t absorbed it from anywhere else) that my brow furrowed in curiosity. I’m not sure that one could say that everyone is “aware of” that precise way of putting it any more than I am “aware of” a song someone else has written, despite my extensive understanding of music and songwriting in general.
I’m not saying you didn’t develop the point independently of all other people.
It’s silly for you to think that Martin Rees said it because he read it here, because it’s a point that is well known to many people – especially a professor of astrophysics at Cambridge.
You may feel flattered that you came up with this point about evolution on your own. As a matter of fact, Rees pointed out in that article that his major scientific concern is that not enough intelligent people really dig that. But, don’t think that a professor at Cambridge spends his time here, much less repeats things he heard here in his articles.
Rees is a guy, who presumably spends a lot of time thinking about the earth in geologic time scales. Believe me, he knew that humans wouldn’t be here to see the earth destroyed long before you posted it on February of this year.
You say this as if it were a bad thing.
Do you mean that the Queen is a drunken dog “lover”? In what sense do you mean that? This could be a scandal of the first order.
SirMartinRees has boobies? May I suggest a Mansierre?
Nice pub, average beer, lots of rugby, plenty of punts, kingfisher in the gardens, overlooks Darwin’s island.
Reminds me of Alpha Lyrae when the light hits it right… 
He mentions that humans will in all probability not be the creatures that see the end of our sun and planet. Being the only intelligent creatures (at least thousands of times more so than the runner-ups) we don’t know if we are the cumulation of what life can evolve to. For all we know intellegent life is a fluke and cockroaches will be the last animals to die on this rock.
He didn’t specifically say that intelligent life was going to be there at the end but he did mention that we believe we are and always will be the most intelligent animal ever. Without evidence that there are any species with any basic advances on us that could surpass us I tend to doubt it. in 4 billion years this is impossible to predict, though but I’d tend to believe that humans, or whatever evolves from us will be the top of the list intelligence wise on this planet until its end (“it” being the human race and its decendants, which could, and in all probability will, cause its own demise).
OK, OK, I should have known better than to even go here (although I do think that the charge of me being “silly for even thinking that” was a little uncalled for, Trunk.)
I’m Martin Rees. And so’s my wife. 
I’m Spartacus.
Has anyone else noticed that the MartinRees post has vanished?
That’s what happens to sock posts. I guess we can conclude that SirMartinRees and SirMartinReesToo were one-time-only Guest socks of another member here.