Aliens in Australia

[Paulbot]

So been catching up on UFO news. NT's been a bit of a hotspot lately, with alien abductions on the rise.

http://www.ntnews.com.au/news/northern-territory/close-encounters-of-the-territory-kind/story-fnk0b1zt-1227522715201

http://www.ntnews.com.au/lifestyle/nts-top-ufo-spotter-photographs-first-ufo-of-the-season-over-his-acacia-hills-property/story-fnk0b1ks-1227350424453

When I was younger I was fascinated by all this stuff, read all the books and watched all the shows, but I kind of grew out of it. I think aliens had their spotlight in popular culture in the 90s, but these days it's all zombies.

I believe there must be alien life out there in the universe, but not convinced by all the UFO conspiracies - although I enjoy the tales and there are plenty of unexplained things that raise questions. (The Westall incident (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westall_UFO) in the 60s for instance as a local one. )

As Agent Mulder once asked, Do you believe in the existence of extra-terrestrials?

[1AZRAEL1]

In the vast universe that we have only viewed a small portion of from afar, sure as hell there has gotta be more life out there in some form. Tbh i wouldn't be surprised if they have visited here but hidden under the radar so to speak

On anothet note though, i greatly enjoyed the non alien stuff on Xfiles more :p

[Bladestorm]

It would be arrogant for us to assume we are the only sentient beings in the universe so I'd like to hope there is someone else out there... and hopefully they think before they shoot. ;)

One of my best friends father used to swear black and blue he had been abducted by aliens but that kind of thing I'm not as convinced by...

[Trent]

Statistically, it's impossible for us to be the only intelligent life in the universe. I do however believe that aliens have much better things to do with their time then buzz rednecks and abduct idiots to stick probes up their bums...

[Sharky]

who is to say that we are in fact intelligent life....

we may be behind the curve that other life does not even consider us intelligent, perhaps how we view snails...

[1AZRAEL1]

Well after the latest political kerfuffle, I'm sure the aliens must be laughing at our intelligence :p

[llamatron]

Stop the (space)boats!

[Lint]

Stop the (space)boats!

And eat a space onion: Skin on!

[GoktimusPrime]

We've already found extra-terrestrial life in the form of extinct fossilised Martian bacteria. So I think it's certainly possible that extant complex and possibly even sentient and sapient extra terrestrial life could exist.

But this leads to another question, are alien visitations (e.g. extra terrestrial UFOs, covert abductions etc.) real? Because to travel from just the next galaxy to ours would consume an incredible amount of resources, regardless of how advanced a civilisation may be. Which means that they wouldn't come all the way here and not make themselves announced. It'd be like if a person flew to another country, secretly took photos of the locals, maybe abducted a few for experimentations, then flew back. That's a lot of effort to do something so covert. Also, they would most likely only justify the voyage here if they felt that they had something to gain from Earth (e.g. resources). So there's a fair chance that if a more advanced civilisation came here, they may want to conquer, exploit or eradicate us in order to get at whatever resources we have that they need. Even if they just came here to colonise and make a new home, we'd most likely be screwed, because look at the entire history of whenever one civilisation colonises somewhere else and what happens to the indigenous population. It's never a good outcome for the locals.

If the aliens are so advanced that expending such resources to travel across the galaxy is negligible, then there's a chance that we would be so 'primitive' that it wouldn't even be worth their time/effort to visit us. We'd be like a sentient species of insects to them. They'd either just leave us alone or destroy us (latter might happen if we had a resource that they needed). If humans found a colony of insects sitting atop a gold mine, do you think that we would kindly relocate those insects before mining that gold? There are already many species of Australian mammals and reptiles that are currently endangered due to mining.

Or maybe the problem with these hypotheses is that they're applying human standards onto extra-terrestrials. Perhaps they are better than us and would simply wish to make first contact and invite us to be their friends. :o

[BigTransformerTrev]

I went to a PD many years ago that my school paid for and one of the key note speakers was a scientist who was an incredibly intelligent and articulate woman whom sadly I have forgottent he name of.

Anyway, using math, science and common sense she described over an hour with better clarity than I have ever heard before or since what can be condensed down to the two following points:

1: Yes, of course there are aliens. Don't ber stupid! Its esentially a statistical imposibility that we are the only self aware intelligent life in the universe.

2: No, of course aliens have not visited Earth. Don't be stupid! The amount of time and energy to get to where Earth is located in regards galactically to where the next habitable planet could be located - going by physics as we understand it - is so great that they would have had to set out thousands of years ago and be headed directly for Earth, and this is before Earth had ever sent out a single radio signal in to space. Nope, they haven't been here.

I wish I could remember her lecture properly, she put it a bit better than I have :o

[kup]

We've already found extra-terrestrial life in the form of extinct fossilised Martian bacteria.


Where did you read something so conclusive?

[GoktimusPrime]

Where did you read something so conclusive?
Allow me to restate that, Martian bacterial life may have been found from the ALH84001 meteorite (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Hills_84001).

Other articles:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/6660045/Bacteria-from-Mars-found-inside-ancient-meteorite.html
http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/snc/nasa1.html
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-03-07/nasa-scientist-finds-alien-fossils-on-meteorite/1969084
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/lpi/meteorites/life.html
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/bacteriafr.html
"These are not evidence for life, but evidence that life (as we know it) could be possible, and that the life could be Martian."

[Paulbot]

If I recall correctly, in 2003, the Beagle 2 Mars Rover detected alien life on Mars, but the final transmission was classified top secret (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoVkYuCiHsA). It was the only warning we would ever get.

[Dead End]

Yes, definitely! I also find the alien enthusiast subculture pretty fascinating. Been wanting to do a road trip to Wycliffe for a while, supposedly Australia's "alien hotspot" and if nothing else I hear there's an ace pub there.

Somebody's been creating a list of UFO sightings in Trove's newspapers that's worth a gander: http://trove.nla.gov.au/list?id=3265

[Paulbot]

Interesting link.

I was curious if anyone here has had a close encounter.

[Demonac]

I always find it interesting that astronomers (who spend most of their time looking at the sky), both professional & amateur, never seem to sight UFO's. It is always farmer Joe out in the bush.

[Handsprime]

I remember as a kid this one time a UFO flew by my house a few times. I swear it was real because of the amount of times I heard it.
To this day I never knew what it was. All I remember is that something from the distance came close to my window. Went up a few meters, then flew over my roof.

[kup]

If I recall correctly, in 2003, the Beagle 2 Mars Rover detected alien life on Mars, but the final transmission was classified top secret (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoVkYuCiHsA). It was the only warning we would ever get.

There is a conspiracy theory in which they actually did find an ancient civilization on Mars. The world Governments in the know feel that humanity (as in the religious types) would not be able to process conclusive evidence that there is/was another civilization just as advanced as ours (or more) so they covered it up for the sake of world order.

[5FDP]

I think where a lot of people go wrong is assuming that alien life must look almost humanoid and rely on things like oxygen and water to survive. If all we're looking for are planets that we (humans) could potentially survive, we're overlooking the possibility that life could exist under different conditions that defy our laws of physics.

"It's life Jim but not as we know it".

[AJ_Prime]

The Fermi Paradox sums up quite nicely the reasons why we haven't discovered intelligent life yet.

[Paulbot]

The Fermi Paradox sums up quite nicely the reasons why we haven't discovered intelligent life yet.

For those that know what that is, the Wait But Why summary of the Fermi Paradox (http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html) is a good place to start.

[BigTransformerTrev]

For those that know what that is, the Wait But Why summary of the Fermi Paradox (http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html) is a good place to start.

That was a really interesting read :)

[Paulbot]

It's where I learnt about the Fermi Paradox. Jaydisc introduced me to that site and there's quite a few interesting articles. The Your Family: Past, Present and Future (http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/01/your-family-past-present-and-future.html) one is pretty mindblowing.

[AJ_Prime]

For those that know what that is, the Wait But Why summary of the Fermi Paradox (http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html) is a good place to start.

That's a really good summary, and pretty much lays out what the theory is all about. I think I recall reading this page a while ago too. On a galactic scale, it totally makes sense, of course we find it difficult to imagine time, distance and evolution on such huge scales. The notion that other intelligent life exists is both probable and romantic. The likelihood that we will ever encounter it is not incredibly likely.

Of course, if it was non-organic like Transformers then, well that would be sweet.

I always found the fact that Transformers, a race whose lifespans extend over many centuries and sometimes millennia, can be so primitive in the way they behave. To not have the capacity to transcend war seems a bit strange given how much they have supposedly "evolved". However, given that the stories are written by humans, naturally we can relate better to the stories. We also find it difficult to imagine a Utopian race, because we will always find reasons why it can't last. Also, without conflict, the stories would be bland. So I'm personally quite happy to overlook the lack of evolution in order to enjoy a good story.

[GoktimusPrime]

I always found the fact that Transformers, a race whose lifespans extend over many centuries and sometimes millennia, can be so primitive in the way they behave. To not have the capacity to transcend war seems a bit strange given how much they have supposedly "evolved".
This is why IDW Thundercracker walked out on the Decepticons and focused himself on raising a dog and becoming a screenplay writer. ;)