Nan has had some interesting posts lately on extraterrestrial life and the possibility of our meeting them. Or their visiting us. And this has got me thinking, good money is being spent on space exploration and there is a race going on at the moment on who will take man to Mars first? There are a myriad of world crises that that money would help solve. Before you become Jesus & tell me the poor you will always have with you, hear me out.
I am aware that some of the research for space travel & living has yielded useful solutions for the here and now. But I think this has been by accident. So these kind of results would still be arrived at had money been poured towards their solving.
But back to extraterrestrials, is it out of cosmic loneliness that we seek them while at the same time working towards our annihilation? Or is it borne out of the desire to show, once and for all, the creationists that we are not alone?
What are your thoughts?
And a little digression, occasionally when I am reading a book or watching a movie, I find my eyes pissing when either a character or the narrator moves Me. And most times this happens when the writer manages, with pen and paper, to express humanity at its finest. You know, like a great show of love, joy, comradeship or something of that kind.
Random thoughts 
I say let the aliens be good neighbors. I’m tired of taking freshly baked cookies to my earthly neighbors. They’re all snobs and never show me “love, joy, comradeship or something of that kind.”
I think I would enjoy meeting somebody/something new. ๐
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Maybe aliens are snobs and don’t want to meet us with all our religiosity and wars
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Medical science needs priority right now.
Yes, I tear up with emotional books/movies.
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I think we need to learn simple math first. how do we distribute finite resources more equitably in an ever expanding human population?
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I wish I had a simple answer.
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I think the search for extraterrestrials is motivated by curiosity, excitement, fame, greed or to win – the same as most quests for knowledge.
Whether or not the cost is justified will only be known in hindsight, which is the case in most endeavours.
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I agree.
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Space exploration, particularly crewed exploration, can’t really be defended on any kind of practical grounds. The arguments for it comes down to curiosity and long term (very long term) survival.
I’m actually much more in favor of robotic exploration than crewed missions. I’m not sure deep space crewed missions should happen until we have much better propulsion systems.
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and fame…..we were there first ๐
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Since humanity, with far too many shortsighted people, who are apathetic and lazy about learning things, I feel my desire and feeling that itโs important to know if “they” are out there, is based on two thoughts.
If we are curious here that means others, if they are out there, are curious too. And while we will likely never know here, in part, due to our self destructive nature, some one out there will. I want someone and it doesnโt matter that it wonโt be us and that I personally wonโt ever know, to finally know that we are not alone.
And second if it turned out to be, “itโs only us”, that could lend toward the possibility of a god, which I find disturbing, as it would take away the very awesomeness, complexity and beauty of nature and the laws of physics and the long long game of evolution and change, of time and space.
Iโm not explaining myself well, I know, but itโs just a sense of feeling that itโs extremely important for some being to know this, far beyond curiosity or greed, but the very foundation of all that there is or ever will be. Itโs rudimentary….fundamental.
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Hello Mary. I don’t think we have seen you around here this new year. Hope you are keeping well.
in a galaxy that spans millions of light years across, i think we can’t be alone. this would only be the case if all our physics is wrong- that is on the vastness of the universe and on the presence of other earth-like planets among other assumptions we have made.
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Thanks and it has been awhile. I got burnt out on politics, but these discussions, I enjoy. And I agree with you totally there must be many others out there, but I just wish we had a way to know. It would settle religion once and for all and put it in itโs proper place of fantasy, wishful thinking and a means to judge and discriminate against others.
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We can’t be the only intelligent tool users in the universe. If it happened on this lonely rock, and given the incredible expanse of just our visible universe, with its mind boggling number of galaxies, with a limitless supply of stars, each with a high probability of planets, of which a few could harbor life, it is almost a sure thing.
Damn shame we will probably never see it though…
I personally am all in for space exploration. I say lets go back to the moon. Let’s go to Mars. Just so we can say we did.
Do I think some of that $$ might be better spent here? Yes. But in all honesty I’m not sure all the money in the world is enough to help all of us. But, we should do what we can. I do not see this as a either/ or situation, let us do both, within our limitations.
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It might not, but it would go along way in improving many livelihoods.
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Aliens are already with us!!! The Democratic party is made up of lizard-skinned, baby-eating aliens in human-looking masks! Fact, bro! FACT!! ๐
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I believe you.
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Jesus was right. But at the moment, I’m more concerned about the confirmed extra terrestrials flooding in from across the southern border than some as yet undiscovered aliens that might exist somewhere out there in space.
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I thought a wall was built along the southern border so those hombres should not bother you
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It’s a long border. And as it is with all things political, after all was said and done, more was said than done.
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The story of Trump’s time in office.
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In politics, one gets away with saying more than they can and will do.
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Given the utter waste of money any wall would have been, I count this failure as one of Trump’s “successes”. Plus, it made a few politically connected and corrupt contractors a few bucks! What’s wrong with that? ๐
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I still wonder how he had expected Mexico to pay for the wall
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So did millions of Americans — while others were totally convinced he’d pull it off. SURPRISE!
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People can dream.
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Net migration from Mexico is effectively zero now, Ron. As for Central Americans, maybe they are “flooding” across, but given that American foreign policy and our voracious appetite for cocaine and narcotics has helped (note I said helped…rapacious local elites are also to blame) have turned places like El Salvador and Honduras into disaster zones…can you blame them?
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I don’t think so.
Plus the war on drugs, just like the war on terror has made drugs a lucrative venture for all involved
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Space exploration does provide answers to some of our current crises. That is, it gives some of us an option to continue the species elsewhere should the rest of the species decide to make the planet too hot or nuke each other or die to a pandemic.
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I wouldn’t count on that during the short time we may have left. Despite my diet of sci fi since a nerdy little lad, even I realize the distances and difficulties are simply too great. Plus, why is survival of one particular primate species so important anyway? Given how carcinogenic we have been w/r/t the overall ecosystem…maybe it will be best for us to fade away into the sunset of time? ๐
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We would have to take a whole host of other species with us if we wanted to terraform anything. So, many other species would benefit. Furthermore, going to a place like Mars, our penchant for warming things up would be useful in making the planet more habitable.
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it would, but our egos are too big
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this is only for the uber rich to get away
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