God hasn't made them yet.

since you're talking odds then i can only assume (which i don't like doing) that you're not a creationist. if we really did randomly pop-up on this planet or if we really did evolve from the tinyist of microbes already living here, then odds would say that it's possible that the same thing happened on at least one of the other billions of planets out there (earth-like or not...noone says aliens have to be carbon-based lifeforms).

but i believe that God made us and, since there's no mention of anyone besides us and the angles in the bible, then i can only assume (which i don't like doing) that there is no one else. that doesn't mean that He hasn't created other peoples...it just means that i don't believe that He has, since He's made no mention of them.

and if He has created other people (and i'm open-minded enough to believe that's it's possible that he has) and they're out there somewhere right now, then it must not be important for us to know about them. or maybe He would've told us about them, but once we sinned He decided that we weren't worth telling. or maybe He always planned on us finding each other on our own - so one day, if we ever get our act together space-wise, we will.

i could keep going, but i'll stop there.

Really? Genesis 4:17 certainly looks like there was someone else out there. But, if it wasn't YHWH who made this other people in the east, who was it? Sorry kid, looks like YHWH (the jealous god) had some rivals...

by "in the east", do you mean an earthly direction? because what i meant by "...there's no mention of anyone besides us and the angles..." i meant no mention of anyone besides humans and the angles. and i can agree that after a time there were plenty of humans filling the earth, including the eastern half...

and when you say "Genesis 4:17", i'm not sure how that applies...mine says...

"Cain had intercourse with his wife, and she concived and gave birth to Enoch. He became the founder of a city and gave the city the name of his son Enoch."

or maybe they're like us and haven't killed themselves yet, but are so busy trying that they have no time to explore space.

Well, there is that, or what actually worries me more, is what Dale said about destroying ourselves (or other species all destroying themselves as well)

Of course, it makes my fantasies of boldly going whre no man has gone before, and meeting the green skinned hottie that much more unlikely. Oh well.

Dave

I wish you would have, it's painful enough reading one entire post where the only time you correctly use capitalization you're referring to God.

Grammar nazism aside, there are many reasons why we may not have any sign of intelligent life yet - or may not have recognized it as such. Still, I speak for myself when I say I'm glad Shadowrun doesn't have to deal with extraterrestrials just yet. I could do without the inevitable slash on fanfiction sites.

Actually, I just remembered an equation I'd heard about, that give the number of intelligent alien lifeforms in our galaxy. A bit of googling revealed that it's called Drake's Equation. It basically encompasses these things we're talking about - the tiny chance of a life supporting planet, and then intelligent life actually coming through. Anyway, the *current* result of the equation is 0.0000008.

So yeah, like I thought, not very likely.

Really? Because, from where I am sitting, it looks like we are on Dumpshock. That means DS's rules, not yours or your nation's. As for freedom of religion in the US, I can name some parts of Texas that would disagree with you there. Even hint at being a heathen and you will end up staring down the business end of Sheriff Root's 12-gauge...

As to the topic at hand, I think quoting creationism in a scientific discussion is akin to quoting "Mein Kampf" at the synagogue. It smells like trolling to me...

You know, Cyber, I'm a US Marine, and I would fight and die for your right to go out in public and scream at the top of your lungs whatever your belief is. However, as Firewall said, the Dumpshock forums are not the US, and thus, have different rules. So, again, if you would like to discuss religion, please start a thread about it. However, just as I would not interject my comments about how spinach is so good into your thread about why the Mustang is the fastest car made these days, I would appreciate if you (or anyone else) did not inject something totally irrelevant into a discussion about life on other planets.

Dave

It is by no means inevitable. It requires that enough members of that species want to spread out to justify the construction of interstellar arks and it would require that those members are wealthy and powerful enough to fund such a project.

Asside from the ability to survive the death of their star, there is no logical reason for any species to spread out beyond their imediate system. Creating a meaning ful interstealer empire is impossible due to time delays and interstellar trade is pointless for the same reason. Since wealth-building is the number one motivation for colonization this presents a problem.

Likewise, it is possible for cultures to devolp advnaced technology but refuse to use it, either out of preferance or short-sightedness. Look at Japan and China and their sailing technology. Both countries possessed sailing technology during the middle ages but neither of them put that technology to wide use because of their insular natures. There was no cultural incentive to do so. The steam engine was first invented in ancient Greece. If someone had the common sense to put it on a warship we'd all be speaking Greek right now. But no one did. Leonardo created the first tank and the first autonomous robot but there weren't many tanks or robots in Renaissance Italy.

It is far more liekly that a species will stay confined to its near star system in the absence of FTL technology. The costs of interstelar travel, both economic and personal, usually outweigh the benefits.

You just don't get it, do you? Religion (whatever your beliefs are) has about as much place in a scientific discussion as spinach does in a discussion about the speed of cars.


Hyz, well, I agree that some races that develop space travel will not have that desire to explore, I also think the resources in a single solar system are limited, and in 100,000 years of use, they are bound to get depleted. A species survival instinct (which, if you subscribe to evoloution, as I do, is bound to exist in any successful species) will dictate that eventually they will begin to spread amongst the stars, even if only to avoid some sort of natural disaster (comets, interstellar dust storms, etc...)

So, I'm thinking that they should be spreading out at some point.

That's it, use logic against the creationist! That'll win him over for sure!

It's not that religious points of view are unacceptable, it's just that they require belief, and can not be proven/disproven by evidence, whereas scientific theories, by their very nature, can be disproven by evidence. It's the whole scientific method thing... Religious beliefs, coversely, are just that, beliefs, and require faith, and can not be disproven. So, while they are certainly valid world-view beliefs, they don't belong in a scientific discussion.

Plus, if you keep religion out of a discussion, you usually have less flaming and heated arguements, since politics and religion are the two things that really seem to set people off.

Like I said, I didn't see anyone proclaim this was only a scientific discussion. Someone asked a question, one of the (valid) answers happens to be based on non-scientific speculation.

As for the latter, the only people I've seen fly off the handle so far are the anti-religious. It occurs to me that they're the ones who should be chastised, not the person who honestly thinks he's contributing to the conversation.

why is that a good sign? i’m into intelligent design but I love science, physics, science fiction, shadowrun (with all it’s cyber, science, magic and noted lack of theology) and other RPGs, the science and history channels (the history channel often having programs along the scientific vein), et cetera.

i just want you to know that someone like me can be open to many things – i’m not just a creationist.

thanks to nezumi here. derek, if your title or first post had mentioned that creationism wasn’t wanted or that it was ‘scientific answers only’, i would’ve happily kept my spiritual views out. but if you’re going to ask a question about the creation of [not necessarily human] life in a public forum, then you need to be prepared to receive an answer that includes God, unless you specify first that those answers are not wanted. and please note that from now on i’ll know that you don’t want to hear it and that i'll refrain from posting it.

thanks also to witness - his is the post that brought be back in. i refuse to engage in arguments, as they get you nowhere; but a debate/discussion is something that can help you learn.

a) i don’t believe that scientists are out to ‘fool’ everyone. i believe that scientists do us (humanity) a great service by exploring our world and discovering new things about it. i simply don’t believe that science can hold many answers to anything ‘big’ at this point since we (all humans) only have a human understanding of the world/universe and can’t possibly know more than a fraction of what’s really going on.

b) “incontrovertible: not open to question or dispute; indisputable”. i do not dispute that there is evidence to support evolution – but i do dispute said evidence’s validity. again, i simply believe that our knowledge of the world around us, vast as it is, just isn’t vast enough. we only know a fraction of what there is to know, so how can we claim that the ‘evidence’ we’re looking at isn’t something completely different than what we’ve ‘concluded’ it to be?

i absorb information from all available sources (christian, scientific, et cetera) – and i take all of my learned knowledge with a grain of salt until one of two things happens:

1) someone comes up with a way to 100% prove that the information is correct
2) i gather enough supporting information to make up my own mind, without the influence of others

and at this point, the things science has shown me are just not enough to make me believe that it holds the answers to questions such as ‘where did we come from?’ that doesn’t mean i’m dismissing what scientists have to say (like militant christians do) – it just means that i take what they say and file it away for future use. maybe one day #1 above will happen proving me wrong about evolution; or perhaps one day all of the science knowledge i’ve gathered will be enough for me to accept evolution as being valid…i’m open to that. but for now, i choose to continue to believe that we were created by God because it’s what makes more sense to me.

to close, please note that i never meant to hijack derek’s thread – and i apologize to those who have been trying to keep this thread on track. i only wanted those who read this thread to think about all of the possibilities of why there may not be other life out there or why they may not have contacted us yet if there is. if anyone wants to continue a religious vs. science debate, please start up a new thread and link to it here.

I am not anti-religious, I just know how to keep my religion separate from scientific discussion. I recognise that science requires understanding, faith needs only belief. Of course, I also understand that most of what my religion tells me is not literal. If you can understand that some things are metaphor, you can often find that science is the best place to look for scientific answers.

What I object to is people who put forth Christian dogma as fact without even thinking that some of us are not Christian...

what i object to is people who put forth scientific dogma as fact without even thinking that some of us are Christian...

UM,

#1 That will never happen. I have never seen a real researcher say thats 100% the reason why things work, because well, they know they dont know it all. And any scientist/researcher says other wise is selling something.

#2 Do you do all your own experiments? And what supporting information are you gethering? Because if its supporting something then you already have made up your mind and are just looking for proof that it fits in the puzzle you have already made. If you arent doing all your own experiements then you are goign to get information that will influence you one way or another. If you are anti-something, all you have to do is look around, for the right price youll find a doctor that says what you want him to say and support your side, lawyers do it all the time for trials.

Not picking on you specifically or religion in general. But holding those kinds of rules in place to define what you believe is rather absurd. I mean I know airplanes fly and I know what I was told about how they do it and it seems logical. But I have never done aerodynamic testing on airplanes, so for all I know everything I was told is a lie and magic pixies carry the airplanes around. Science works on probablities and works to make those probablities as close to 100% as possible. The chances of life being on another planet is pretty damn probable, but till we find it, its just a possibility. So far the bible is winning by saying we are the one and only, but time will tell.

when someone tells me something, i can choose to believe it or not. if not, then all that means is that i don't believe it yet.

at that point, i have no pre-conceived notion as to how that puzzle will be solved, so any new information could potentially shed light on that subject - for better or worse. and maybe i can't figure out how that new info fits into the puzzle, but i'm open to the fact that other people could be able to explain it to me.

now, you have to understand that when we're talking about 99% of scientific stuff, my defenses are not that hard. i can accept things that the scientific community says very easily. i trust them to know what they know because they work hard to gain that knowledge.

it's that 1% of science that tries to explain the big questions like 'where did we come from' that i have to be very defensive against, because there's a BIG difference between there being a God and not. that's a belief that i take very seriously and i don't let christians or scientists or christian scientists or anyone mess with it without a fight.

Call me cynical, but am I being blamed for something? I was just agreeing with you.