Reply to: Monday Links from the Bench vol. CCXXXV

[BrilloPad]

The very advanced civilisations (billions of years ahead of us) probably all round us, like spirits of the wind and rain.

Like the holy spirit you mean?

Amazing how reports of Aliens went up dramatically after HollyWood started films of aliens.....

[Platypus]

then all that remains in the way of novelty and exploration is nature's variety ... a civilisation that stayed put would inevitably end up in terminal decline sooner or later.

If you've not read it, you might enjoy this:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dancers-at-E.../dp/057510855X

Great book!

[Platypus]

Argh seems my link was abducted by an alien

This link:
Ancient Aliens - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[GreyWolf]

The very advanced civilisations (billions of years ahead of us) probably all round us, like spirits of the wind

What, even when I'm having a crap? They could at least pass me a new arse fodder roll when I run out.

[OwlHoot]

So where are they all?

The very advanced civilisations (billions of years ahead of us) probably all round us, like spirits of the wind and rain. We'd have absolutely no chance of detecting them in the foreseeable future and equally no chance whatever they would make their presence known to us, accidently or otherwise.

The intermediate ones (still in corporeal form of some kind), fast asleep I reckon, tucked up in their cryogenic chambers for millions of years as they travel round the galaxy in pre-planned synchronised waves first outwards and then reconverging to compare notes. That would explain why they don't bother with radio signals or any detectable activity - What would be the point when their plans are already decided and they are in transit anyway?

If you think about it, once all physical laws are established and experimentally confirmed to theoretical limits (and those do exist), then all that remains in the way of novelty and exploration is nature's variety, and that means having to up sticks and turn nomadic. An alien civilisation that stayed put would inevitably end up in terminal decline sooner or later.

Assuming (as most physicists do) that dark matter exists, if there wasn't such a heck of a lot of it (more so than Baryonic matter), one might be tempted to speculate that it is simply exhaust from innumerable interstellar space ships, circling the Galaxy for aeons

[mudskipper]

Check out what?

I've already debunked the "alien in a flying car" theory. So what is the next tin foil UFO theory that needs demolishing?

So where are they all?

[OwlHoot]

And lots of other evidence too, if only people would listen!

Check this out. Even if you think it's bollux it makes you wonder "well what is the explanation?"

Check out what?

I've already debunked the "alien in a flying car" theory. So what is the next tin foil UFO theory that needs demolishing?

[Platypus]

Lots of UFOs in Renaissance art

And lots of other evidence too, if only people would listen!

Check this out. Even if you think it's bollux it makes you wonder "well what is the explanation?"

[Mich the Tester]

Or God exists.

We're ****ed then. That settles it.

[BrilloPad]

The Fermi Paradox - A good introduction to the various possible explanations of why we appear to be alone in the Universe: ”Where is everybody?… We’re left with three possible realities: We’re rare, we’re first, or we’re ****ed.”

Or God exists.

[Mich the Tester]

"... a group of ancient hunter-gatherer tribes may have experienced some crazy alien tulip, but they had no good way to tell anyone in the future about it."

Drug laws were more liberal back then.

[mudskipper]

...and he took hold of his own clothes, and rent them in two pieces.

Is that how Moss Bros was born?

[speling bee]

"... a group of ancient hunter-gatherer tribes may have experienced some crazy alien tulip, but they had no good way to tell anyone in the future about it."

Lots of UFOs in Renaissance art

UFO's In Ancient Art

...

2 Kings
2:11 And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. 12 And Elisha saw it, and he cried, My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof. And he saw him no more: and he took hold of his own clothes, and rent them in two pieces.

[OwlHoot]

"... a group of ancient hunter-gatherer tribes may have experienced some crazy alien tulip, but they had no good way to tell anyone in the future about it."

Lots of UFOs in Renaissance art ...

It's hardly surprising that many old paintings show little individual figures scooting around inside what is obviously meant to represent a star, as early and medievil Christians believed that every star was or at least held the soul of someone in paradise.

Nobody knew stars were distant suns before Giordano Bruno first suggested it in the late 1500s, and was burned at the stake for his heresy! (Suggesting that every star was orbited by its own inhabited planets probably didn't help his case.)

I bought "The City of God" by Augustine of Hippo in a charity shop a couple of weeks ago, and was skimming through it the other day, which was where I read the star-soul explanation. Written in c 400 AD it is quite interesting and vivid in places, although way too long (as the author pretty much admitted!) Among other things, it details many fascinating pagan superstitions and beliefs no longer documented in any other surviving works, even if only to rubbish them!

[mudskipper]

Some lunchtime reading; used judiciously, it should last you until home time

• The Fermi Paradox - A good introduction to the various possible explanations of why we appear to be alone in the Universe: ”Where is everybody?… We’re left with three possible realities: We’re rare, we’re first, or we’re ****ed.”
  

"... a group of ancient hunter-gatherer tribes may have experienced some crazy alien tulip, but they had no good way to tell anyone in the future about it."

Lots of UFOs in Renaissance art

UFO's In Ancient Art