Can we all take a moment to appreciate how Arvin puts this content to us in a way we can understand it so eloquently? Thanks Arvin. This are the type of videos that I crave to watch on RUclips despite giving me an existential crisis.
It gives me the opposite of existential crisis, it makes me see how our daily expriences arent anything to the universe, making me not care about little shit
Why doesn't anyone ever talk about the odds of Life are so great elsewhere but they're so distant they're probably having a hard time getting here as we're having a hard time getting there
I suspect any intelligent species would not "announce" themselves to us without sufficient surveillance. It seems logical to believe they will do their best to remain "unknown" until they know enough about us to ensure we won't be harmful to them. If this is the case, I would not blame them if they continue to remain anonymous for the foreseeable future.
Do you suppose the first message we get back from an alien species would be to ask us to turn down our radio? Like "We're trying to listen for an intelligent civilization but you're all we can hear."
For the first time on my sadly uninspiring RUclips journey I just subscribed to a channel not just for the content and delivery, but for all the positive vibing and thought exchange in the comment threads. Very refreshing to find intelligent life out here in the ether for real!
It's great seeing a fresh take on this topic. Our view of aliens has been so skewed by modern media. I wonder what will happen when we actually make first contact?
@@russhamilton3800 that depends on the ultimate fate of the human race more than anything. Maybe we destroy ourselves, or maybe we strand ourselves on this planet and never get off. If neither of those things happen, however, we'll likely become a space faring civilization growing our empire for millions of years, and if that happens it's very unlikely that we don't eventually stumble across *something*
@@CalebTerryRED Or more simply, maybe there is no magical work around to the galactic speed limit and that makes us and "everyone" else, effectively alone...
I never thought that potential hostilities coming from alien intelligences would be because of resources that could be found almost anywhere in the universe, but more likely the control or influence we might assume in the rest of the universe and the way that may affect them. They may take issue with the way our presence and activities changes their lives, society or politics.
Mineral resources are widely distributed through the cosmos, however planets with temperate and long-term stable environments are rare indeed.. The Earth is a gem with inestimable value friend.. Who knows if there are envious eyes watching us at this moment..?
@@WideCuriosity If one has already got to the stage of developing interstellar craft, then robots that can build factories and ships in space will have been invented long before they get to us, so why bother with squishy, uncooperative human slaves? The only reason I can think of is if they're like the Affront in Iain M Banks "Culture" series, and are just plain sadistic (which is possible).
If they are a pro social and curious species they would probably be more interested in sharing culture. If they are like us Id imagine them being curious about our music, food and history. And their and our people would become fans of obscure musical groups and styles from other planets. And something alike to "dutch learning "(Rangaku) in Isolationist japan would spring up in either side. But we would only be indirectly in contact through technological means. Because travel is impractical. Like interstellar penpals. That would be the absolutely ideal outcome.
We normally don't give much regard to roaches or other pests unless they're get into our areas, and usually that interaction doesn't have a favorable outcome for the pest. Well, as we develop technology for faster space travel, we have to also consider that first contact could be us in the role of a pest.
I DONT KNOW ANYMORE. I just admittedly-desperately want more people to know about No-Knock-Raids and other heavy Issues with OBVIOUS SOLUTIONS. I just dont want people to keep dying and Homelessness to increase all while RUclipsrs like Some More News literally came-up with simple, obvious Solutions. That Guy has 2 Videos on the topic of ‚Things Politicans should really know but just not enough do so they also dont know’. And all i can do is write YT-Comments and hope people dont think of this as sp-am. Damn, i feel helpless.
@@zadkiel242 Yeah, sorry for being random. I mean, i can also phrase it the funny way, but i thought today, i try Serious Seriouesness. I just think supporting said channel (especially said videos) helps this chaotic world.
Or what we consider as pests here might be closest to kin to them and they might enforce regulations on us to not abuse them or include them in our welfare system.
As an evolutionary biologist (now retired), I love this video: it's clear, engaging, and scientifically accurate. I particularly appreciate the point about raw "belief" as opposed to epistemically justified data-grounded "belief" (which is science).
Absolutely brilliant! This is the most refreshing and positive take on things since before CGI was invented. Life is out there, what it looks like 'lord' only knows. Whether first contact will ever happen or not depends on whether two or more sentient species can avoid the pitfall of destroying themselves before first date .. and even 'We' are way behind the curve in that respect.
Imagine an alien currently watching their AlienTube, explaining about other life exist throughout universe. Curiosity is what driven any species to find the answer.
Thank you Arvin. Your delivery of otherwise high-brow, science based speculations, theories and hard facts is so approachable and uncomplicated. Liberating and very likeable too! Please keep up your good work. We are many who appreciate it immensely. 👍😊👏
[02:29] "We are made of Star dust in star dust proportions!" Even though I've already heard Carl Sagen's sentence, that was the nicest thing anyone said to me today. Thank you.
I believe you nailed it with one exception. First physical contact will be with probes or autonomous devices as they require fewer resources to displace. With todays technology we could send micro satellites to our closest neighbour in under ten years. That is a more likely scenario. Great video.
First physical contact? If you consider that Luytens star is 12.5 light years distant, and that our fastest probe so far has attained a speed of 700,000km/h, it would take such a probe well over 18 thousand YEARS to get there! The distances between stars are just too great to ever contemplate physical contact or any kind of physical interaction.
@@theslay66 Spacecraft aren't concerned with air resistance. See what I did there? I mentioned a related phenomenon without demonstrating why or how it was in any way relevant to the conversation. Maybe you're just trying to sound smart. I don't know, but it didn't work.
I think there's one more important thing we have: a habitable terrestrial planet in the goldilocks zone. The anthropic Copernican principle says we should be in the most common environment that can support life to observe it. So our temp, atmosphere gravitational pull, chemical elements, magnetic field, sun type, etc are probable close to within tolerance of an alien species. And resources such as water and metals are close by. Sure other planets may have more of certain resources, but as your said what are they gonna do, carry it all back home? Likely a biological or AI contact would value finding an optimum place to inhabit with nearby resources. If intelligent life is relatively rare within a contactable distance, then the planet supporting it is also rare, making it valuable.
Not only a habital zone in relation to its star, but a habital zone within the galaxy, where elements heavier than iron have been synthesized within red giant stars that have gone super nova.
I’m glad to see you mention the proportions and distributions of the basic elements/building blocks for “life”. Many science communicators, and even more “speculators”, tend to gloss over, or completely ignore such facts.
Arvin gets it. I always laughed when people talked about alien invasions. Any culture that has the ability to travel between star systems has absolutely no reason to want anything from us.
I mean, you don't actually know that. You are essentially saying they are beyond our understanding and presuming to know what importance they would put on a less advanced race. Kind of a contradiction.
in my mind the most likely reason they would come is to settle on a habitable world after fleeing the end of their home planet. we already know that there aren't many of us out there. if they could settle in places that humans find inhospitable it could work out great. like the Sahara desert or Antarctica, the North Pole, Detroit etc.. worst case scenario would be if they brought a virus with them that cleaned us all out in short order. which is unfortunately a very likely scenario...
I’m an artist but I love to read about scientific concepts and understandings. For that reason last year I decided to challenge one of the biggest misunderstandings about life-forms, which is still barely researched by scientists. Namely: what’s the reason to have all complex life forms on our planet evolving in symmetrical bodies (either radial or bilateral symmetry). And I say “misunderstandings”, because after I’ve read couple of scientific papers on that matter (actually very few existing), I saw that the reason of having symmetrical complex life forms on our planet is far of being explained. That’s why I sat and drew 10 big scale drawings displaying how it’s absolutely possible to have asymmetrical life forms which can move and perform the same activities (movements) which symmetrical body can perform. After I finished the project, a very good friend of mine who’s indeed a biologist saw the drawings and said “according to your drawings asymmetrical life body is indeed very possible and works, which is stunning…”. All I want to say is that the human mind can’t perceive life forms which aren’t symmetrical. Maybe for that reason we still haven’t met one, who knows :) P.S: Thank you for the very interesting video!
It's not a "misunderstanding," except on your biologist friend. Scientists don't actively pooh-pooh asymmetry. They actually study it. A simple search will provide you a list of asymmetric lifeforms here on Earth. And other artists have previously explored this. As have many sci-fi books. Generally, symmetric forms are more energy and informationally efficient. Evolution's billions of years of experience isn't devoid of imagination. It works under hard-coded laws. Obviously, the extremes of these laws can be explored. But the tendency (and probabilities) will inure to symmetry.
@@jaybingham3711 Thank you for your response, which response told me indeed nothing I don’t know. Additionally, only poorly educated people use arguments such as “many”. “Many” is an illegitimate argument especially when it comes to science (and an artist tells you that, so you can imagine how poorly based on facts is your unnecessary answer). When you say that “many” Sci-Fi books explore the possibility of asymmetrical complex life forms to exist and evolve, please, name a few of those books, because I’d like to read what other people have to say about that, and so far I haven’t discovered a single Sci-Fi novel to elaborate on that particular topic. Thank you.
In some sense, most bodys are asymmetrical, if you consider, that some organs (like the spleen, liver or gallbladder) are on one side, but not on the other side.
@@yourguard4 That is the most fascinating thing about the biology of the complex life forms on planet Earth - the anatomy of the bodies is not necessarily based on symmetry (except for skeletons on which the muscles and joints are attached in case there are hard skeletons building up the body). Yet, the shapes of the bodies are in 99% of the cases (just very few spices don’t have that feature) based on symmetry (either radial or bilateral). The case to define why is the feature “symmetry” so prominent on complex life forms on Earth is indeed very difficult, and the main reason for that is that not a single gene (on any living body on this planet) is responsible for building a symmetrical body. That feature is not recorded in the DNA, yet it’s prominent. The oldest fossils (so far) discovered on our planet are the stromatolites and trilobites - both are already based on bilateral symmetry, and there’s no way to explain as to how the non-symmetrical one-cells organisms evolved into symmetrical ones (as complex life forms). It’s fascinating, that’s all I’m trying to say…
I think our first alien contact will probably be a scientist seeing something interesting in a microscope. Any alien life we encounter will most likely be microbial.
In order to achieve interstellar travel, you would have to be scientifically minded and have a sense of wonder for discovery. Thus, I don't understand why they would only bring and spread death.
In our culture, we greet & communicate that we are peaceful by pressing our body parts together & shaking them up & down, up & down. This could go badly wrong in a 1st contact situation.
@@incognito6313 Well, those unfortunate events were always rooted in power or revenge. But as far as I'm aware, scientists has never chosen destruction over knowledge, unless commanded to do so. And when we are talking about such advanced goals as interstellar travel, I don't think it's reasonable to question our future methods with scepticism due to our history before mass communication. The internet is the beginning of what has, will and would set any civilization on the right path to longevity. Otherwise, one could also say that because of the human history, we will never save this planet from pollution. But mass communication has made it more likely than ever before that we can and will do just that. PS: Sorry for the optimism.
@@incognito6313 It should be noted that Hiroshima wasn't simply some act of cruel barbarism. The Japanese regime was fanatical about telling it's citizens to NEVER surrender, no matter what the cost. The estimated death toll of defeating Japan via invasion was 2 million lives, way higher than the 2 bombs. They didn't just nuke them out of the blue: they told the Japanese government they have the bomb and to surrender, lest they drop it. They refused. After the 1st bomb they offered surrender again, and they still refused. After the 2nd bomb they offered again and they STILL refused - then it took an insurrection within the Japanese forces to finally force a surrender. Japan was as bad as the Nazis (death camps and all), they had to be defeated and the 2 bombs achieved that with the lowest possible death toll.
@@incognito6313 Who's to say that the alien scientists wouldn't govern in their world? Because they probably do if they can travel such extreme distances. And even though our scientists don't govern here, we still care a great deal about protecting potential life on Mars and the moon Europa. So if we do that, despite who is in power and despite our dark history, I'd say that's a rather good sign.
I think of Peter Cawdron as Mr. First Contact. Everyone of his books comes up with a different well thought out scenario. I really liked Cold Eyes, it shows US as the aliens going to make first contact.
So a couple of things to note: 1) Love the video's the detail, the thought provocation, the graphics to go along with your video's are great. 2) If an alien species is traveling the stars already it's a good chance they are using modes of communication that are beyond radio waves. Perhaps a way more advanced version of Quantum entanglement. It's also a good bet, they are using some type of stealth technology that would render our current methods of detection technology useless. 3) I agree, physical contact is likely the last thing to happen right away especially since humans still can't get over the fact that humans come in multiple colors as well. They may not even be capable of communicating in any way we do. Maybe their all telepathic, maybe they communicate similar to bee's, maybe they use flashes of light. IT's so exciting to think about. 4) If I was an alien species and I detected life on a celestial body I would start to observe. How to they treat one another, How they express themselves, how does their society function. What technological level are they at. (Honestly, based on our current conditions on earth I would stay away) I think it's incredibly arrogant of humans to assume that an alien species would want to make contact with us. We are still a very young and primitive race. We still allow fear, anger, greed to make a lot of decisions. Thanks again, Sulanis
@@katiefincher2433 Would you care to elaborate? I cannot understand your comment. What "new takes" are you talking about? In the video he says that "First contact" will likely be scientists finding life on another planet. This "discovery of life" will likely only consist of bacteria and maybe plants as the most "advanced life" we can find. If humanity right now where to meet "space traveling" aliens, then of course those aliens would be more technologically advanced then us, who haven't even visited our nearest planet. In the universe, life is probably abundant but it's like a pyramid: most life will be just bacteria and microbes, a very tiny amount of all life will be animal-like creatures and a tiny amount of those creatures will be intelligent enough to build civilizations and so on. It might take humanity millions of years before we discover "intellegent life" after we've discovered "life".
@@katiefincher2433 The problem with your comment is your grammar is somewhat confusing. "...is assuming STILL that IF ALIEN THEN ADVANCED CULTURE." Let's presume that's a typo, and if so, what exactly is it you're trying to say?
I've read "The War of the Worlds" as a kid. It's insane that 125 years old book described an attack and defeat of aliens with very accurate science. Two most amazing details that always forgotten in modern works: 1) non-humanoid aliens with explanation of their anatomy. 2) microbes kill them. At that time microbiology was very weak science but Wells understood it well. P.S. I know that he based his work on the conquest of the Native Americans.
Truthfully, the science wasn’t very accurate. If they were that advanced, they like us now, would understand the concept of disease, and therefor bacteria and viruses. There would be no way they would die off from that. They would fully protect themselves. Wells, like other authors, didn’t truly understand scientific advances. He couldn’t have imagined how far we would have advanced today, and how much further than that any civilization from Mars could have advanced if they became capable of invading us, something we’re possibly a hundred years away from doing ourselves.
20-30 years ago there was a sci-fi show on TV, I forget the name. Away the aliens had taken over the world. One of the things the rebels did with a captured alien is subject him to various bacteria and viruses. No dice the aliens had inoculated themselves.
Nice to see a well thought out science-based First Contact alternative to sci-fi and whacko theorists. Far from depressing, I found this scenario both logically satisfying and spiritually reassuring. It's nice to spend a few minutes considering whether we might have a big brother out there somewhere instead of the usual worrying about daily life with "Big Brother" here.
An excellent analysis! However, something not considered is the possibility of inadvertent arrivals due to on board emergencies on one of their spacecraft. The OMG we gotta get on solid ground quick before we accidentally do something devastating to our sector of the galaxy scenario seems much more likely to me. My own experience in aviation leads me to be in constant awareness of essential consumables, whatever that might mean to the intrepid spacefaring types we encounter from out yonder.
If you roam the stars at 1% light speed, then the galaxy is yours in the short span of 10 million years. But a 5ly trip takes 500 years, meaning your machines are reliable well beyond the wildest dreams of Earth engineers, meaning your exp in aviation is irrelevant. Like talking exp in wood archery when talking nukes.
Joe Scott theorised in a video (with references to Contact) that radio signals from Earth will weaken to under background noise level after just a few light years of travel, thus likely not detectable when reaching other planets. What's your take on that?
TV and radio broadcasts would be difficult to detect at more than a few light years away. However, earth is sending out high power radar waves into space used to track space hardware. These would be detectible throughout the Milky Way galaxy...provided the aliens aimed their antenna towards earth.
Thank you for the time and effort Mr Ash. I’d think that the 3rd potential contact wouldn’t be them physically but their technology. Their Voyagers and AI. The problems of sending organic life vs robots is, like with us, much more difficult and complicated.
I was thinking the same thing. And only if they programmed the AI to make contact. A small probe sent only to collect information would most likely go undetected but if they intended it to contact us it would be interesting to find out what information they were willing to share and what to keep to themselves. They might be completely paranoid and not even let us know where the probe originated or be remarkably open and give us an encyclopedia of science and technology completely new to us. I don't believe that merely the confirmation of the existence of ET would have much effect on us, we are already primed for this by our entertainment, and such worldviews such as religions have been historically very good at either assimilating new knowledge or willing to completely deny it, either way continuing on as before. New tech though would have serious effects but tech has changed unimaginably fast in the last couple of centuries and for the most part, people just go on living their lives.
Maybe not. If an alien race had the intelligence and technical sophistication to find a way to cross interstellar space, then perhaps it would be easy enough for them to do it in person. We send robotic probes to places like Mars and Jupiter because, even if we COULD send people right now, it would still be cheaper and safer. But if we could get to Mars as easy and as safely as hopping in the car and going to Walmart, maybe we'd send fewer probes and more people.
@@klat2baraada579 Okay, let's take your #HopOverToWalmartInTheCar analogy one step further and imagine that they are an extremely-long-lived alien species who are able to drop a quantum-entangled copy or variant of their core consciousness into their version of a sublight-speed interstellar probe and tell it to "hop over to Sol and see what they are up to and report back to me in a couple of millennia about their wierdly-short-lived doings.." That would work right?
I think Hawking has one factor in his favor: that is in fact biology. Here on earth we know first-hand how a species transported to a new environment can wind up taking over and throwing the eco-system it is introduced into a tailspin. The example of Columbus is a cautionary tale. His greed and avarice aside, his precesence alone introduced diseases that the native populations had no answer for. It was more disease, with Columbus and his compatriots unwittingly acting as weapons of mass destruction, that did in the natives, and allowed colonization to proceed, moreso than their advanced, relatively speaking, weapons. Physical alien contact may be equally as dicey, assuming they have only good intent otherwise as Arvin likely correctly posits, our viruses and bacteria may do them real harm (which is how aliens were defeated in Welles War of the Worlds novel) and vice versa, their own viruses and bacteria my wipe us out in short order. I guess we can suppose that aliens, being far more advanced, considering they can travel between worlds or galaxies, will be fully prepared to deal with this problem but who knows for sure.
That was happening long before Columbus. The plague of Justinian, the Black Death, and many more over the centuries were caused by travelers bringing in diseases from foreign lands.
I am in the Hawking camp. "The Killing Star" by Charles R. Pellegrino and George Zebrowski changed my mind about first contact. It's a very good book that explores the darker side of first contact.
The reality is that we will not be capable of human interstellar travel for centuries and maybe even millennia. Any life in our own solar system is bound to be less advanced than humans, or we would have noticed by now, which means intelligent aliens would have to come our way. That implies they are exponentially more technologically and philosophically developed than we are, and as such far removed from the primitive idea of conquest by annihilation of indigenous populations. An advanced species, maybe a type 2 civilization, will be self sufficient with only curiosity as a driver.
Love the non-hyperbolic approach to the question of first contact, but I can’t help but think life could easily be seen as an exploitable resource itself.
Great thoughts and video as always, Arvind! Sadly though, I think it’s ultimately a moot point. Although life is probably reasonably common in the universe of suitable planets “out there,” intelligent, technological life is so rare that civilizations will never meet, and are very unlikely to ever even establish two-way communication. The real bottleneck is time more than distance: From the only example we have to work from, intelligent life takes billions of years to evolve. Then after it finally does evolve, there is (sadly!) a lot of evidence that intelligent, technological life has a tendency to extinguish itself, or at least to enter continuous cycles of Technology (e.g., Rome) -> Dark Ages -> Technology (today) -> Dark Ages -> Technology (a millenium from now) -> Dark Ages … So, in short, there may be 5 or so currently-technological civilizations, including us, somewhere in the Milky Way, but they have essentially zero chance of ever finding each other before either we or they go back into a Dark-Ages cycle, or destroy ourselves utterly. Plus of course, there is an “even-zeroer” chance of any such civilization ever traveling to physically meet another. Warp drives require vastly, vastly, waaaay too much energy to make such a trip worth the cost. And if a civilization ever can harness that much energy, they’re far more likely to use it to destroy themselves, all-too-sadly. There’s also almost no chance communication can be established either, again sadly: Even without regard to the round-trip times, the inverse-square-distance attenuation, and the diminishing signal-to-noise ratio, rapidly makes any such signal undetectable, no matter how powerful a radio dish you throw at the problem.
There is also a rarity to our condition even among our own (Earthlings). There are many species older than us on Earth with the potential to have developed or exceeded our intellect by now but with no facility to build complex habitats or tame their food supply to facilitate further advancement. We alone shifted posture permanently and relatively quickly leaving us with not only 2 spare limbs but remarkable dexterity due to our nature as former tree climbers, as well as being large enough to allow for substantial encephalization. This is rare series of unlikely events that evolution did not require. Life may be common but our modern lives are largely unconnected to any evolutionary need and this may be extremely unusual.
@@janegerrard1073, yes indeed! That then raises the question, “what precisely is intelligence?” We tend to think of typical IQ-test-type intelligence, but I take a more-evolution-inspired definition: I define intelligence as “the sum effect of all mental abilities that give an organism an advantage in their environment.” So, yes, intelligence could be your ability to “put two and two together,” so to speak, but it could be many other things too, for example: - A really voluminous memory. - Great capabilities of observation and hyper-awareness of the world around you. - An ability to think very quickly, even if overall mental capability is not particularly amazing. - Ability to *manipulate* the environment. By some accounts, we’re not much more “clever” than dolphins, but we have greater mental and physical means to act upon our mental constructs. - Great carisma: Even if we’re not extraordinary thought, if we can convince others to do our bidding, then we will do better in our environment.
@@janegerrard1073, direct quote from 微笑, our cat: “My humans are so pathetic! They can’t see at night, can’t smell much of anything any time of day, they can hardly jump at all, and their teeth and claws couldn’t kill a thing! Still, the free food they give me - occasionally anyway - is tolerable, so I’ll keep them for now.”
It's refreshing to have such a heartening view of this subject, most recently I've been thinking about the Dark Forest theory, which makes a lot of sense, coming from a perspective of distrust, we humans have so much trust issues between each other, I imagine coming into contact with alien intelligent forms would be as distrustful
I'm not too optimistic about first physical contact as you are, if we observe life in general one thing is sure, it's hostile and parasitic, it always relies on feeding from other life for it to survive, it could also happen at an intellectual/technological level as we see it on Earth between nations. Intelligent life might see us as a future threat and may decide to attack us to prevent our species from ever reaching the stars and become serious competition, this actually might be the reason why we can't find intelligent life out there, not even signals of it yet. I'm a firm believer in the Zoo hypothesis, they might be watching us and deciding what to do with us. The James Webb will find signatures of "life" fairly quickly though and as usual with in our present social state where news feeds get lost in the constant bombardment of meaningless information it will be forgotten as quickly as it appeared on our screen. I love your videos Mr. Ash. Thank you for sharing your ideas with us.
Hi Arvin, great video as always :) What do you think, does this same logic apply to the artificial intelligence? Would it also be more interested in sharing/consuming ideas, enjoying arts and music and even such things as friendship? Focusing its calculating resources for reaching to the stars and solving the world's mysteries, instead of having conflicts with humans, like it's usually shown by the movies/books?
I am not as optimistic about AI - the main reason is that it would presumably share resources with us, and if sentient it may sense a threat. In addition, AI could be programmed to be evil. Aliens would not have been sharing any resources, particularly if they survived in space over hundreds or thousands of years to ge here.
I think the odds are, first contact would be be alien AI, since biological units cannot handle long term interstellar travel. So, AI being interested in humans? I don't see it. Then again, why would AI make contact in the first place?
@@geoff8742 >since biological units cannot handle long term interstellar travel >> with technologies of 2022? True. > why would AI make contact >> Why not? Out of curiosity or boredom or the reasons we can't even understand by now
There are several problems with the idea of sentient AI. The first one is that you either have it sentient or artificial, not both. But the mix of sentience and AI already exists: there are sentient humans with the knowledge to create AI. The other problems are that it usually neglects to take into account what exactly makes life sentient in the first place, and it usually neglects to consider what the A stands for: Artificial intelligence isn't intelligence at all. It's only a whole bunch of procedures that create certain behaviors, and in some cases behaviors that mimic those of intelligent beings. The idea often presupposes that AI can get to a point where it has it's own initiative to do things and to self-replicate. Even if you could remove the A, that might not make it sentient, and it wouldn't give it any initiative. The reason why we have initiative to do anything at all, isn't because we are intelligent. It's because we have biological necessities. Intelligence isn't what leads to self-sustainability and needs, it's the opposite way around. Bacteria have initiative and they aren't intelligent at all. They are simply compelled, just like we are, by the two main functions of all life: 1- reproduction, and 2- resource gathering to support continuous reproduction. But then even the simplest life forms are absurdly complex. Robots would require much, much more than just any level of non-artificial intelligence in order to have needs and initiative. But then i'll posit that the extravagant amount of complexity required for that makes it prohibitively difficult to achieve, on top of the already prohibitively difficult challenge of reaching intelligence levels that wouldn't be artificial anymore. It's much more feasible to just augment life with robotics than the opposite. If you're worried about dangerous AI, that has already existed for decades. For someone with enough knowledge it's not very hard to write some kind of dangerous malware. Sentience isn't a requirement for it to be the most dangerous. You can rest assured that an AI that is solely designed for one or a few specific purposes is much more effective than any AI that is designed for a lot of different purposes.
Who says it isn't the superior form? It'd be cool if your car would heal after an accident all on it's own! If you haven't seen it, check out the abduction from Fire in the Sky, or Colonel Corso's claim that UFO craft are sometimes living, metallic beings.
They might be able to store there consciousness in virtual world. And maybe able to upload their consciousness in artificial biological body or Robotic body
No, images are fuzzy to avoid disclosing detection capabilities. Warships pack a lot of detection kit. When they can exclude ball lightning with reasonable confidence, alien probes are no less probable than any other conjecture. However, the idea of something living is not implied by stuff that appears to require unknown physics, just as most probes we send are robots.
Why wouldn’t an exponentially more advanced civilization look at humans similar to how humanity perceives ants, flies, or bacteria? I don’t think it’s reasonable to assume alien civilizations would necessarily value human life the same as we value ourselves. Fantastic video by the way.
Except for a small percentage of people who express psychopathic tendencies, humans only attack ants, flies, or bacteria when they're a nuance or when they're threatening. So it shouldn't really matter how little they may value us so long as we don't piss them off.
@@chubbymoth5810 Would be a cool feature of the universe if those civilizations destroyed themselves first. I mean, maybe not cool for us, depending on how things go for the next 10-20 years.
Arvin: “…we have something extremely valuable. In fact, it’s the most valuable resource in the universe.” Me: “ah yes, labor. They’ll come to enslave us.” Arvin: “life.” Me: “meh, same thing.”
Good thing is that the kind of work you use slaves for, is exactly the kind of work that is most easily automated. So there's no true reason to enslave us.
Labor only provides a decent level production at a fairly low level of technological development. This is why I disagree strongly with Elon Musk for instance on government subsidized income. It won't be necessary as production is the root of all wealth. A species that can traverse the cosmos has no need of meatbags of chemicals to do any sort of labor, manual or otherwise. When you can exploit the nature of the atom within the quantum field, what use would we be?
Thanks to your comment, I think about it. If they can come and greet us here they'll have sustain their life for at least hundreds of years on space, everything will probably be automatic, they won't need us. But what if there's something that we all need to sustaining life but can't be automated? It's idea, creativity, it's the first thing that make us human, higher than any other life form on earth. If they really come and enslave us, they won't come for our muscles, they'll come for our brain. Perhaps things like ask us any solution for their dying planet, they'll share their problem with us.
That WE know of. We have found thousands of exoplanets but our tech isn’t good at finding planets as small as earth which is important due to too little or too much gravity.
I was going to post the same thing. An alien civilization could go to other planets for the same reason we might ultimately go for - we trashed our own beyond repair. Not only does it have the necessary elements, it has breathable oxygen, liquid water, and a steady heat source that won't fry you.
Great video! Especially interesting thinking about Intellectual Contact. I wonder if we’d ever be able to create and broadcast a type of “Rosetta stone” for an intelligent species to pick up and attempt to learn how to communicate with us. Or would it need to be a physical artifact? Star Trek TNG had a great episode (“The Inner Light”) where the ship flew into an area, a beam hit the ship (specifically the captain) and Picard (being hit by the probe’s transmission) lived an entire person’s life in an instant. From that, he was able to describe the long dead civilization. Doubt we’d be capable of anything like that- but curious what we could do and how an intelligent civilization would know how to comprehend it?
@@VadulTharys A very good point, but suppose that there would have been 20 up until now, but 3 wiped themselves out, another 5 got knocked out by huge asteroid impacts, gamma ray bursts or other stellar disasters, 3 just weren't very successful, maybe they lost interest in everything, and a sort of malaise set in? Then another 3 _would have been_ technologically advanced, but despite being intelligent and innovative, 2 of them evolved on planets that were mainly, or all, water, and the third was on such a high G planet that even launching satellites into orbit would just have been ridiculously costly and dangerous? That leaves 5 and ourselves. One is 600 light years away, but only now entering the technological equivalent of the 2nd century, and another is 1000 light years away, but is in the equivalent of the 19th century (it's very unlikely that they would be so close in space and time frames, but you never know). Out of the remaining 3, one is 20,000 years ahead of us, but is very quiet and cautious, they're also 18,000 LY away. They have detected signatures of life in our atmosphere, but don't want anything to do with us, just in case. The other 2 are 50,000 years ahead of us, but are also 50,000 LY away, so have known about each other for millennia, but didn't manage interstellar travel for a few centuries. Their early radio signals were too far away, too weak and impossible to detect through all the interstellar dust, let alone pick out from the natural radio waves saturating the galaxy. Later, they moved to other forms of communication (focused laser beam messages, neutrino messages, or whatever), far too long ago for us to have detected. They now know about us, having set up huge telescopes of various sizes and various points around their side of the galaxy, but robot spacecraft sent to investigate us won't arrive for another few centuries...
@@pineapplepenumbra Sounds like a mix of Dark Forest theory, and too early. Did you hear the news about the warp bubble that was just created. It was an accident but it has been duplicated twice. Combine that with an Alcubierre drive and we have faster than light travel. With the rate of our current technological advancements we should have a working warp drive in about 50 years. Interestingly about 10 years after Star Trek predicted we would achieve it.
@@VadulTharys "Did you hear the news about the warp bubble that was just created." Yes I did, and I just knew, before clicking on the video, that it would be an incredibly tiny effect. However, who knows what the future holds? I don't think it will be within a couple of centuries, at least, if it's possible on larger scales at all. The paperwork suggested a theoretical velocity (if that's even the right word, when the spacecraft isn't really moving) of about 0.0004C which is slower than the latest Solar probe (with a max velocity of 160km per second, as opposed to 120km per second, but that had the benefit of the Sun's gravity. So one could get to Mars in less than a week, if it's timed to be closer to us, and Jupiter in about 3 months. In a way I think it would be better if we don't get warp drives until at least a couple of centuries or more, as that would give us time to grow up a bit and become more civilised, much as I would simply _love_ to see such a development within my lifetime. Another reason would be that if we came across another civilisation similar to ours, but maybe early 20th century levels of technological development, our being ahead of them by a few centuries means that we're less likely to have an interstellar war. A few months after I first read about the Alcubierre Sphere (and its numerous problems, such as needing a ludicrous amount of negative energy, the temperature inside the warp bubble being hotter than the surface of the Sun, anything in front of the bubble being massively charged*, and then blowing up when one reaches one's destination), I had a creepy dream that I realised had been inspired by it. A mate and I were transporting papers and equipment for the Russians, after a failed attempt at a warp speed capable craft. We were in a convoy and stopped somewhere, while my mate decided to have a rumage through the back of the truck, to see what was in the papers. There was a box in the back, and when we looked inside, there was a woman's head, screaming. Her body was shrunken and tiny, but she was still alive (which wouldn't have been possible in real life). We discovered that they were going to try again, and my mate had a go at the Russians in charge, saying that they could kill more people (the woman being the only survivor). The Russians tried to reassure us that the technology had been much improved, and it would be safer this time. *Which could still be a huge problem.
@@pineapplepenumbra ROFLMAO your dream sounds like the start of a good movie. In a way I hope we break it soon, as it would move us to a post scarcity society. The fear I have is that it will draw attention to us from those who we should never be noticed by. I am a pessimist when it comes to potential alien life. Everything about it will be alien except one critical thing. If they have expanded past their home world they are aggressive. They are also most likely from a predatory species. Those two combinations do not bode well for humans.
So thought provoking. At last a video that gives realistic answers, rather than blinding with science or leaving the viewer with more questions. Thank You Arvin!!!
I dont know why I would need a place to store my password. Its easy to remember 12345. 😁 Thanks for the video. My ex-wife looks rather alien so they are probably already here 🏁
I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the Earth is unusually rich and diverse in all kinds of lifeforms, compared with other planets were life might spring up. From the Artic to the Antarctic, from the shallows to the darkest depths of the ocean, you can usually find some kind of life clinging to existence. I wouldn't be at all surprised if life on other planets is far more narrow in its scope than what we're used to on Earth - and yet, we're killing the environment 😢
Yeah, well, for billions of years earth had nothing but single celled organisms. We're like an anomaly historically speaking. Also, nothing but a rounding error in the big picture.
At some point in time in Earth's history, multiple celled organisms began evolving. As soon as this happened life went crazy with all kinds of different types of creatures. If multicellular life exists on another planet, every single possible type of life would most likely exist there too. It would be statistically unlikely not to haveany variations. One incredible thing that happened was the first ancient mitochondria relationship in cells. Two cells joined together and rather than the large cell devouring the small cell, they started working together and this allowed for more complex life to happen. This was one of the most important events for life on earth. If that never happened we wouldn't see life as we know it.
@@AfricanLionBat That's right. If an alien species ever detected life on earth, odds are it would detect single celled organisms. Just because of the odds of the detection being part of the vast portion of earth's history where single celled organisms were all there was. Multicelled organisms, and sexual reproduction, seems to be a game changer in many ways though. Both for the ones doing the detection, and for the ones being detected.
@@sk4lman I put another comment on this video. What do you think about this? "The only thing I can think of that would make aliens want to take over the planet would be to have a habitable planet. Earth is likely very rare (calm star, the type of moon causing stable tilt allowing for tolerable weather, large gas giant planets in a further orbit to protect against comets/meteors). If I'm not mistaken gas giants are usually closer to their stars. Let's say the aliens left their planets thousands of years ago and are living on a ship and mining resources as they go. They come across our solar system and see Earth and realize they can actually live 5here. All they have to do is murder the inferior life and they can finally live like their ancestors did before they had to bail out."
Fantastic. I love when someone comes up with original, yet obvious, conclusions on a difficult subject based on pure logic. As much as I appreciated Hawking’s ideas in this field I never could escape the feeling that they were motivated more by sociopolitical trends than science.
I've long thought antropomorphic aliens were a very ridiculous part of sci-fi (big sci-fi lover though). But, I'm questioning that, now that I see every element repeats so evenly across the universe, so, Why wouldn't life evolve in much the same way it's already done with the same "puzzle pieces"?
No please don't. Anthropomorphic aliens have always been and will always be an extremely ridiculous part of sci-fi. There is an uncountably infinite more strange ways for life to evolve other than the generic 2-legged 2-eyed erect sapien.
welll life could be prevalent as in made from "carbon" and water, and breathe oxygen, but to evolve into hairless apes that look like us probably happens depending on how close to infinite the universe is, but i reckon its not really common.. considering how many different environments and certain lucky events that have to happen for a species to develop intelligence.. For example if the dinosaurs hadnt been wiped out by the asteroid we wouldnt be here right now
The only explanation for anything antropomorphic out there would be that if life was to develop technology it would need to evolve in such a way that allows it to manipulate with objects in it's surrounding. That means that it would need to have some sort of organ that enables it to examine it's surrounding, either by sight or smell, while also having extremities that enable it to grab and hold stuff, while possessing enough strength and intelligence to transform it into something useful. Sight arose here as a light sensitive cell which then evolved into the eyes many creatures possess today. It's the logical path for evolution of sight, more so than some sort of telepathic or even echolocation like sense, as single celled and first multi celled organisms in which sight first appeared were to small and unable to produce anything like echolocation or telepathy. Telekinetic aliens might be out there, but again, it's much more likely that a small speck in some alien ocean evolved some sort of extremities for swimming in it's surrounding which then evolved into more complex extremities that are capable of interacting with objects, rather than any sort of contactless object manipulation. Again, I'm sure there's all sorts of stuff out there, can't really rule anything out as the universe seems to be infinite and very ancient, but I don't find antropomorphic, or rather 'earth analog like' life impossible. I'd bet on it being more likely to be analog to life on earth actually.
I think it is a bit naive to think about the good intentions of some hypothetical visitors to our planet. We have one resource that they may want and that is the distance from the sun, the Goldilocks zone, which makes our planet habitable. A species that needs to spread to other planets can be a danger to us. And if they can travel through the stars, the technological difference would be so overwhelming that we would have no chance to defend ourselves.
Agreed and beyond the planet, there is us. While it is nice to think they would value our intellectual development, most likely we would be view as a sub species no different than how humans view the animals. We would just be a resource to an alien that can transverse the vast emptiness of space. The question is would it be subversion or annihilation. History proves, If we ever gain the ability to travel in mass to a habitat planet, if the local life forms cannot defend themselves, we will populate the planet. There is no reason to believe other life forms would be different. in fact, I would bet they are transversing space for just that reason.
I also wonder, given the huge random factors involved in what alien life may be like compared to Earth-spawned life... would some kind of microbial infection threat be likely? Would an alien microbe which evolved in a totally foreign environment even have the ability or tendency to infect or cause any kind of interaction with Earth life? (I guess it is possible is some elements are common one one planet and toxic to the other) but it seems that biological microbes would likely have to be from the same origin to be able to know how to "infect" or utilize an alien form of life.
I see a similar hole in Arvin's argument. He pointed out that exotic amino acids made the designer pathogens intended to mimic alien microbes very hard for T cells to attack, but the other side of the coin is that any of those exotic amino acids that they cannot synthesize would be practically unavailable in our bodies and biosphere. The worst might be that alien microbes just form spores and become dormant because they can't find the amino acids they need.
It’s likely that any civilization able to harness the energy required to travel between stars will have gotten past the kinds of petty disagreements and the horrors of war that still plague mankind. In addition, Carl Sagan once said that when one intelligent civilization meets another, one will always completely dominate the other technologically because of the vast differences in time that they have been evolving their technology and civilization.
I DONT KNOW ANYMORE. I just admittedly-desperately want more people to know about No-Knock-Raids and other heavy Issues with OBVIOUS SOLUTIONS. I just dont want people to keep dying and Homelessness to increase all while RUclipsrs like Some More News literally came-up with simple, obvious Solutions. That Guy has 2 Videos on the topic of ‚Things Politicans should really know but just not enough do so they also dont know’. And all i can do is write YT-Comments and hope people dont think of this as sp-am. Damn, i feel helpless.
First physical contact? If you consider that Luytens star is 12.5 light years distant, and that our fastest probe so far has attained a speed of 700,000km/h, it would take such a probe well over 18 thousand YEARS to get there! The distances between stars are just too great to ever contemplate physical contact or any kind of physical interaction. Even with light speed communication we would have to wait 25 years just to say hello and receive a reply!
You're making an assumption that technology won't advance and also ignoring time dilation effects. Even at sublight speeds, maybe you'll have to wait a while on Earth, but the journey for the interstellar pioneers could potentially be as fast as a 19th century transoceanic cruise with technology we could develop within the next couple of decades if we had the funding for it. It's not that we can't make something go faster, we just haven't had a sufficient need to do it.
@@sanders555 problem is with kinda our universe. There are two barriers to break before even considering to colonize exo-planets and potentially expanding in that order, travel time and communication time. Both of which are pretty much at worst speeds in relation to time Completion. Making it incredibly hard for anything to keep up with ourselves on exo planets. Even if we found some particle that travels like infinity of speed, problems with travel still presist. And if it's so challenging for universe to incarnate example of wormholes something, then it would be merely the most collosal mission for any civilization so it's highly more likely that nobody has stepped foot outta their solar system. (Perhaps they did but not in some way to colonize planets tbh.)
that is why the first contact, if there will be any and I doubt it, would probably be made by techno-organic beings engineered to withstand interstellar journeys, and not the actual alien race who made them.
@@sanders555 And why would there ever be 'sufficient need' to make things go much faster? Even if they were made to go ten times faster it would still take thousands of years to reach the NEAREST possible planet, where it's highly unlikely there would be any good reason to spend billions to go there.
Over the years, my imagining alien life in the Galaxy changed drastically. I used to think there must be intelligent aliens everywhere out there. Now I believe intelligence is rare and the likely impossible distances from us to any intelligent aliens will prevent any kind of contact. We could be a "fluke of the Universe" as the song goes.
Possible but incredibly depressing if so. I’d like to believe that even if intelligence is super rare, the sheer number of solar systems will still have to produce a handful or so civilizations out there.
There is no way we are the only ones in the universe. I don't even think that scientists believe that. It's as crazy as thinking we are living on a flat earth.
Intelligence is not the only condition in play here, which makes it even more rare. Society is another one, but since I'm very interested in sociology, I know that society could've developed in very different ways. The unreal technological advancements we have have very much to do with capitalism, but even if a species like us developes biologically on some planet that's just the first step, the next step is that a system like capitalism emerges(before that of course sedentariness, which makes it even more unlikely). One has to know that society how we know it is not identical to our species - only the potential of it. It can develope probably in a million different ways, just like life on earth itself can(and that the outcome is a technology like ours is not guerenteed for a species like us). Because emergence is the keyword here. Society is not exactly the aquivalent to the plural of brains or psyches. It has emergent qualities and is a new emergent layer of the universe(ant colonys are not the same btw. there are fundamental differences). You can see it like this: Sociology compared to psychology is a bit like biology compared to chemics - as an example. In the end, that we humans have the technology we have today and will have in the future has to do with very special conditions. Things have to work out in the developements on the life/biology part and things have to work out in the societal part to give the right picture. THIS is the great filter(because two probabilities are multiplied), because it's very unlikely, but I still think that there is life with comparable technology like ours in the universe, but it might be not around the corner of our solar system and it probably rare. In short, I basically just wanted to say: Even if there is a species like us, it doesn't mean they develop as society like us, because that's just as unlikely because it has emerge too, just like life itself.
Imagine lying awake at night, disturbed by an incessant noise. Upon investigation, you discover its source: a group of rats engaged in a horrific scene of cannibalism and violence. It's a disturbing image, reflective of how our first encounter with extraterrestrial life might unfold. In this analogy, we, humanity, are likened to the rats, engaging in behavior that would likely appall any advanced beings we encounter from beyond our world.
If there is such an award as a Tubi, I would nominate this video for Best Video Targeting The Adults In The Room. A reasonable, rational treatment of a subject that too often leads video makers to pander to an audience's less cerebral instincts. Yes, we are desperate to answer the "are we alone" question, but we don't want exaggeration, innuendo, or false hope. So, kudos to Mr Ash for his down-to-earth presentation (pun intended). Look forward the next one.
I’ve often wondered whether our first contact will be with an insect, particularly the cockroach, one of the greatest of all survivors. What an anticlimax that will be! But we have to get real and expect that these are the kinds of species that are more likely to inhabit hostile planets than any other
@@shadowoffire4307 No the OP nailed it. It's the Cockroaches that can and will survive a nuclear war where almost all other species will sucomb to radiation poisoning Although I'd say rats would stand a better chance than other species of surviving since they also love to go underground in basements, sewers etc.
Humans? Well think about all the other life forms on the planet other than Humans. How many of THEM are hostile? Black Mamba Snakes. Saltwater Crocodile. Wolverines. Sun Bears. Bull Sharks. Northern Goshawks. Wild Boars. Hippos. Fire Ants. Piranhas. Killer Bees. ...... even a Cat is Hostile to a Canary. Going back in time? We could name more like a Velociraptor. THAT is the reason we think Aliens could possibly be hostile. These are some Very ill-tempered creatures. You aint holding hands with no Piranhas or Killer Bees. PERIOD! Its not a portrayal of OUR nature. It's a portrayal of Nature ITSELF. WE ... NEED.... TO STOP.........BEING .... SO ARROGANT........ THINKING ITS ALL ABOUT............ US. Optimism, arrogance, and/or Bias is going to get us in Trouuuuuuuble messing around with what we have never encountered befooooooore.
@@kennethober9070 Calm Down?? Maybe YOU should stop reading my comments with a rowdy voice in your head. :-/ How do you know I wasn't singing all that?
Thanks for another great video Arvin. I often wonder about life elsewhere. I don't doubt that it can exist, but I still believe life as we know it was created. It's curious that we understand our complete biological makeup, yet we are still unable to create the simplest form of life despite having all the ingredients. Something unique has to provide the spark to bring those ingredients to life.
Great video! A very optimistic view of alien contact. All tallied, I think the human race just isn’t ready to cope with such a thing. Some folks, sure. But just think about how many stupid people you encounter every day, feebly coping with the most mundane tasks. What value would we hold to a species advanced enough to travel the cosmos?
Your thoughts were best summed up in the movie "Men in Black" Will Smith: "Why don't you tell people about the aliens? People are smart" Tommy-Lee Jones: "A person is smart; people are dumber than cattle"
The Big Front Yard by Clifford D. Simak is one of my favorite first contact stories. The other first contact book I really love is Dragon's Egg by Robert L. Forward. I think that the best chance for first contact is the one outlined in the Galactic Center series by Gregory Benford. Left over AI that has achieved sentience that can span the stars at sub-light speeds may be the first contact. In the Galactic Center series it didn't turn out well however. The thing about aliens though is that they are alien. We are so technology centric that we think that is the only way an advanced civilisation could exist. That may not even be true. Alien means alien, something completely outside our range of experience. In fact there may be alien life out there, and we may never recognise it as such. We can't even decide if animals on earth are "intelligent". I think this may be even more difficult for alien life. Gregory Benford has a creature in the Galactic Center series that comes from the beginning of time and is a collection of gases that span the Galactic Center. Could we even recognise such a thing? The real problem though with the idea of technological civilizations is Fermi's Paradox. So far there hasn't been any good explanations of why Fermi's Paradox doesn't rule out any advanced civilizations. Most of the reasons given are not convincing at all. If technological aliens were common in the observable universe than we should see non-random electromagnetic signals around us. Why? Because science is a process. You don't jump from the bronze age to building space ships. There are a number of steps you have to have in place between the two and one of them is the radio phase. We are currently in the radio phase and we have been broadcasting radio and TV waves into space since the advent of radio and television. Any civilization that would be similar or more advanced than us would also have to go through the radio phase. If technological life were common we should see these radio hotspots all over the sky. Howerver, there is nothing out there. This also applies to artificial life as well. There probably is life out there but I doubt any of it has any sort of technology we can detect, assuming we can even recognize it as life.
Actually I think I read somewhere that we have already left the radio-phase. We send signals to sattelites, they send them to each other and then back to earth. Since they are aimed at obects in orbit, they dont need to be as strong as before, or something of the sort. Also from what I understand, the signals disperse with distance, 100 ly from Earth our radio signals can not be picked out from background noise.
@@mjolnir_swe If our radio cannot be detected over 100 ly holds true, very little chance we have an audience. Only a matter of hundreds of viable stars within reach, and we have not seem much activity. I'd guess that stars bigger than class G burn out too quick, and smaller than class K won't have any habitable planets that are not tidally locked. My two cents.
Aliens:"let's travel millions of light year to scoup up some salty water on some god forsaken place with crazy savages and pass over sextillion tons of water alone the way."
The stuffed Platipus example, that they thought it was made of different animal parts, that's exactly what happened with the Mexican Mummies. We're just too predictable😂
I was surprised that you characterized much science fiction as "patronizing" in their critiques of human societies. I have found them overall to be important and valid --and God knows there's a lot to criticize! One of my favorites is the original Star Trek episode about the planet where two races hated each other intensely because they were so different. You see, one race was black on the right side of their face and white on the left side. The other race was black on the left side and white on the right. They ended up destroying each other....A brilliant commentary on how idiotic and damaging prejudice based on skin color is, and so pertinent to conflicts that still occupy us today.
Besides providing a lot of social commentary, Star Trek also addressed the anthropomorphized depiction of other alien beings in our sector of the galaxy. All of the humanoid species were seeded on their planets by a much older humanoid civilization.
I agree with Arvin. Most sci-fi is patronising. The Star Trek episode you described sounds pretty cool, savvy and clever - and also the perfect example of how it is mainly patronising. Humans pollute the earth and aliens come to kill us. Yawn. We find ourselves surviving a plague. Also yawn. What about post apocalyptic nuclear war? Double yawn. Friendly aliens land on earth and us dumb humans try to kill them. OMG if I yawned anymore my jaw will fall off. Aliens land and pretend to be friendly and secretly plot to overthrow humans… please stop! Quirky, funny, serious or epic, they are all entertainment and all patronising. Hard sci-fi is less so: think the new Dune or The Expanse. The rest, forget it.
Thank you for the content! If the extreme distances (assuming FTL ends up fundamentally impossible) still leave a possibility of physical contact, I would imagine there never being a need or desire for in-person visits. With the scale of deep time, the odds of an intelligent race only being a few hundred or thousand years ahead of us seems pretty low (I'd think they would be millions or even billions of years ahead of us, if a society can exist that long). With technology that advanced, I would think every aspect of in-person visits could be accomplished through some kind of information-dense communication; like us sending them genetic codes of different earth species for remote cloning, them showing us how to create scanners so detailed that we can record and send a recreation of the earth experience down to the molecule or beyond, or them transferring copies of their consciousnesses to vessels they've taught us how to manufacture on earth.
I agree. However what if the civilisation were nomadic? We are fixed on the idea that everything is based on a "home" planet. What if, as their civilisation advanced, they consumed all of the vital resources on their "home"planet. I sometimes think of a planet as an egg, providing the energy and raw material necessary for the hatchling to consume, up to a point where it is necessary for it to extricate itself in order to find other sources of energy. Still I agree that the vast expanse of the universe means a biological contact is highly unlikely. I would imagine that this nomadic space civilisation would have a fleet of robotic probes(scouts) that would gather information regarding any dangers, nearby resources and any intelligent life that they may encounter along their path. So I believe a robotic vehicle would most likely be the first form of contact, if they wanted to do so.
If they are millions of years ahead of us then we should see their space engineering feats all over the place (think obscuring million of stars / entire galaxies?), therefore we're alone (as a tech civilization) in this "corner" of space, counted in millions of ly radius. I believe life is rather common, but tech is a fluke. Lucky us.
It's annoying that you give any credit to Mick West. To believe his debunking you have to believe that this guy, who has never flown a fighter jet and has zero experience with the sensors on board, understands what was seen better than guys with thousands of hours of real world experience and in depth training using those same sensors. That is a giant leap of faith.
One factor that sets us apart from most exoplanets (as far as we know) is our oversized moon that gave us tide pools. Some are concerned that without tide pools wetting and drying the chemicals on a periodic basis, it would be harder for the molecules to develop into life.
I saw a movie where aliens made 1st contact & gave us an object that made whatever was in our minds become manifest in reality. Thus in good species it was a gift = a wishfulfiller. But the minds of humans were dark & twisted; our nightmares arose bringing with them the threat of humanity's extinction. Perhaps, in this way, warlike species are removed like weeds & all wars in the galaxy are avoided.
@@TheElectra5000 perhaps 'The Sphere'? It followed a similar premise. Admittedly the device seemed to be willfully mischievous though. Even though it supposedly summoned 'subconscious fears and desires', i don't recall it blinking into existence a plate of pancakes or comfortable wool socks. Instead it really seemed to get off on just torturing the poor crew. But it was a sci-fi thriller, so for thematic purposes it had proper reason to do so.
Those UFO images of black batshapes have been shown to be created by the software used on the military aircraft whenever the system locates a distant plane exhaust moving directly away😂 It's our inept media jumping to conclusions as usual And those guys that could be heard on the original footage shouting stuff like... "wow, look at that thing go"😲 That was military trainees😂
Alien bugs are not the only physiological threat from contact of the fourth kind. Massive allergic reactions to alien proteins, for the visitor and the visited, could be hard to overcome.
Arvin your videos are consistently fantastic! Thank you for all your work presenting such fascinating information with humor and scientific background. Btw...where can I tune in to hear alien Elvis singing Viva Las Vegas?😅
FYI, the JWST did find not only bio markers, but pollution ( Lead ) in an exoplanet atmos. What i find fascinating is that we think they would understand our models ( of the universe ). Its more likely they would put them up on their refrigerators, and tell us we are "doing a great job!" :-) In addition, there is a zero chance that interstellar capable entities would be vulnerable to our microbes.
What's the song with the chorus: "we are stardust, we are golden, we are thousand year old carbon, and we've got to get ourselves back to the garden"? Something to do with Woodstock?
Can we all take a moment to appreciate how Arvin puts this content to us in a way we can understand it so eloquently? Thanks Arvin. This are the type of videos that I crave to watch on RUclips despite giving me an existential crisis.
This is one of the Best channels on RUclips so far...
best youtube chanel ever
It gives me the opposite of existential crisis, it makes me see how our daily expriences arent anything to the universe, making me not care about little shit
Why doesn't anyone ever talk about the odds of Life are so great elsewhere but they're so distant they're probably having a hard time getting here as we're having a hard time getting there
@@juliuscaesar5270 Definitely. The channel's content always sparks interest and grabs attention
I suspect any intelligent species would not "announce" themselves to us without sufficient surveillance. It seems logical to believe they will do their best to remain "unknown" until they know enough about us to ensure we won't be harmful to them. If this is the case, I would not blame them if they continue to remain anonymous for the foreseeable future.
Why would they come here? There are millions of choices
@@doozerchuck8625 to take a view of most precious resource
LIFE
@@doozerchuck8625 I imagine for the same reason many people here want to visit other worlds inhabited with intelligent life.
@@doozerchuck8625 You never know. They might come because our blue marble looks so beautiful 😍 💙
@@doozerchuck8625 How do you know that?
Do you suppose the first message we get back from an alien species would be to ask us to turn down our radio? Like "We're trying to listen for an intelligent civilization but you're all we can hear."
This gave me a good laugh 😂👍
Second alien species: OOOOOOOOHHHHHHH! [Falls over into arms/tentacles of a buddy]
Send our best memes in response, let the meme space war begin!
@@sascher7461imagine being insulted online by aliens
We've been beaming "I Love Lucy" to star systems 70 light years away since 1951.
For the first time on my sadly uninspiring RUclips journey I just subscribed to a channel not just for the content and delivery, but for all the positive vibing and thought exchange in the comment threads. Very refreshing to find intelligent life out here in the ether for real!
I think the movie “Arrival” did a pretty good job of telling the story about what first contact would really be like.
It's great seeing a fresh take on this topic. Our view of aliens has been so skewed by modern media. I wonder what will happen when we actually make first contact?
Not likely to ever happen. There are likely billions of civilizations out there and each is effectively alone, and always will be.
@@russhamilton3800 that depends on the ultimate fate of the human race more than anything. Maybe we destroy ourselves, or maybe we strand ourselves on this planet and never get off. If neither of those things happen, however, we'll likely become a space faring civilization growing our empire for millions of years, and if that happens it's very unlikely that we don't eventually stumble across *something*
@@CalebTerryRED Or more simply, maybe there is no magical work around to the galactic speed limit and that makes us and "everyone" else, effectively alone...
@@russhamilton3800 Ouch man at least just let humans have hope that they can do something that's kinda meaningful in this universe
@@aeaeeaoiauea it's the likely reason there has been no contact...
I never thought that potential hostilities coming from alien intelligences would be because of resources that could be found almost anywhere in the universe, but more likely the control or influence we might assume in the rest of the universe and the way that may affect them. They may take issue with the way our presence and activities changes their lives, society or politics.
Mineral resources are widely distributed through the cosmos, however planets with temperate and long-term stable environments are rare indeed.. The Earth is a gem with inestimable value friend.. Who knows if there are envious eyes watching us at this moment..?
Ah but we have one resource not that common elsewhere. Potential slaves 😲
HFY?
@@WideCuriosity If one has already got to the stage of developing interstellar craft, then robots that can build factories and ships in space will have been invented long before they get to us, so why bother with squishy, uncooperative human slaves?
The only reason I can think of is if they're like the Affront in Iain M Banks "Culture" series, and are just plain sadistic (which is possible).
If they are a pro social and curious species they would probably be more interested in sharing culture. If they are like us Id imagine them being curious about our music, food and history. And their and our people would become fans of obscure musical groups and styles from other planets. And something alike to "dutch learning "(Rangaku) in Isolationist japan would spring up in either side. But we would only be indirectly in contact through technological means. Because travel is impractical. Like interstellar penpals. That would be the absolutely ideal outcome.
We normally don't give much regard to roaches or other pests unless they're get into our areas, and usually that interaction doesn't have a favorable outcome for the pest.
Well, as we develop technology for faster space travel, we have to also consider that first contact could be us in the role of a pest.
I DONT KNOW ANYMORE.
I just admittedly-desperately want more people to know
about No-Knock-Raids and other heavy Issues with OBVIOUS SOLUTIONS.
I just dont want people to keep dying and Homelessness to increase all while RUclipsrs like Some More News literally came-up with simple, obvious Solutions. That Guy has 2 Videos on the topic of ‚Things Politicans should really know but just not enough do so they also dont know’. And all i can do is write YT-Comments and hope people dont think of this as sp-am. Damn, i feel helpless.
@@loturzelrestaurant OMG FOR REAL?
@@zadkiel242 Yeah, sorry for being random.
I mean, i can also phrase it the funny way, but i thought today, i try Serious Seriouesness.
I just think supporting said channel (especially said videos) helps this chaotic world.
Or what we consider as pests here might be closest to kin to them and they might enforce regulations on us to not abuse them or include them in our welfare system.
If life is rare they would be super interested in us. If we found even basic life on mars we would be talking about it everyday.
As an evolutionary biologist (now retired), I love this video: it's clear, engaging, and scientifically accurate. I particularly appreciate the point about raw "belief" as opposed to epistemically justified data-grounded "belief" (which is science).
I always thought the Sagan quote was "star stuff" not "star dust". However, the presentation was great and very informative.
Absolutely brilliant! This is the most refreshing and positive take on things since before CGI was invented. Life is out there, what it looks like 'lord' only knows. Whether first contact will ever happen or not depends on whether two or more sentient species can avoid the pitfall of destroying themselves before first date .. and even 'We' are way behind the curve in that respect.
Take me to your leader
They'll be curious.😮
Imagine an alien currently watching their AlienTube, explaining about other life exist throughout universe.
Curiosity is what driven any species to find the answer.
This is probably the most criminally underrated channel in the RUclips. Thank you Guru, for the contents you upload.❤️
Love how they're so-called experts on "first contact" BEFORE we ever have first contact.
Thank you Arvin. Your delivery of otherwise high-brow, science based speculations, theories and hard facts is so approachable and uncomplicated. Liberating and very likeable too! Please keep up your good work. We are many who appreciate it immensely.
👍😊👏
and it IS just speculation
[02:29] "We are made of Star dust in star dust proportions!" Even though I've already heard Carl Sagen's sentence, that was the nicest thing anyone said to me today. Thank you.
The Universe is laughing at behind your back. You are a fluke.
I believe you nailed it with one exception. First physical contact will be with probes or autonomous devices as they require fewer resources to displace. With todays technology we could send micro satellites to our closest neighbour in under ten years. That is a more likely scenario. Great video.
First physical contact? If you consider that Luytens star is 12.5 light years distant, and that our fastest probe so far has attained a speed of 700,000km/h, it would take such a probe well over 18 thousand YEARS to get there! The distances between stars are just too great to ever contemplate physical contact or any kind of physical interaction.
@@Beevreeter And our fastest plane 100 years ago was 150mph. I don't see your point.
@@sanders555 Planes are not concerned by relativistic effects.
@@theslay66 Uh... yeah. Which makes them worse, not better. So I don't see your point, either.
@@theslay66 Spacecraft aren't concerned with air resistance.
See what I did there? I mentioned a related phenomenon without demonstrating why or how it was in any way relevant to the conversation. Maybe you're just trying to sound smart. I don't know, but it didn't work.
I think there's one more important thing we have: a habitable terrestrial planet in the goldilocks zone. The anthropic Copernican principle says we should be in the most common environment that can support life to observe it. So our temp, atmosphere gravitational pull, chemical elements, magnetic field, sun type, etc are probable close to within tolerance of an alien species. And resources such as water and metals are close by. Sure other planets may have more of certain resources, but as your said what are they gonna do, carry it all back home? Likely a biological or AI contact would value finding an optimum place to inhabit with nearby resources. If intelligent life is relatively rare within a contactable distance, then the planet supporting it is also rare, making it valuable.
Not only a habital zone in relation to its star, but a habital zone within the galaxy, where elements heavier than iron have been synthesized within red giant stars that have gone super nova.
👍
Not to mention some 8 billion free labour force units at hand!
I’m glad to see you mention the proportions and distributions of the basic elements/building blocks for “life”.
Many science communicators, and even more “speculators”, tend to gloss over, or completely ignore such facts.
Arvin gets it. I always laughed when people talked about alien invasions. Any culture that has the ability to travel between star systems has absolutely no reason to want anything from us.
I mean, you don't actually know that. You are essentially saying they are beyond our understanding and presuming to know what importance they would put on a less advanced race. Kind of a contradiction.
in my mind the most likely reason they would come is to settle on a habitable world after fleeing the end of their home planet. we already know that there aren't many of us out there. if they could settle in places that humans find inhospitable it could work out great. like the Sahara desert or Antarctica, the North Pole, Detroit etc.. worst case scenario would be if they brought a virus with them that cleaned us all out in short order. which is unfortunately a very likely scenario...
@@SirSayakaMikiThe3rd they can mine the oort cloud or the asteroids & avoid us plebian apes.
I’m an artist but I love to read about scientific concepts and understandings. For that reason last year I decided to challenge one of the biggest misunderstandings about life-forms, which is still barely researched by scientists. Namely: what’s the reason to have all complex life forms on our planet evolving in symmetrical bodies (either radial or bilateral symmetry). And I say “misunderstandings”, because after I’ve read couple of scientific papers on that matter (actually very few existing), I saw that the reason of having symmetrical complex life forms on our planet is far of being explained. That’s why I sat and drew 10 big scale drawings displaying how it’s absolutely possible to have asymmetrical life forms which can move and perform the same activities (movements) which symmetrical body can perform. After I finished the project, a very good friend of mine who’s indeed a biologist saw the drawings and said “according to your drawings asymmetrical life body is indeed very possible and works, which is stunning…”. All I want to say is that the human mind can’t perceive life forms which aren’t symmetrical. Maybe for that reason we still haven’t met one, who knows :)
P.S: Thank you for the very interesting video!
It's not a "misunderstanding," except on your biologist friend. Scientists don't actively pooh-pooh asymmetry. They actually study it. A simple search will provide you a list of asymmetric lifeforms here on Earth. And other artists have previously explored this. As have many sci-fi books. Generally, symmetric forms are more energy and informationally efficient. Evolution's billions of years of experience isn't devoid of imagination. It works under hard-coded laws. Obviously, the extremes of these laws can be explored. But the tendency (and probabilities) will inure to symmetry.
@@jaybingham3711 Thank you for your response, which response told me indeed nothing I don’t know. Additionally, only poorly educated people use arguments such as “many”. “Many” is an illegitimate argument especially when it comes to science (and an artist tells you that, so you can imagine how poorly based on facts is your unnecessary answer). When you say that “many” Sci-Fi books explore the possibility of asymmetrical complex life forms to exist and evolve, please, name a few of those books, because I’d like to read what other people have to say about that, and so far I haven’t discovered a single Sci-Fi novel to elaborate on that particular topic. Thank you.
In some sense, most bodys are asymmetrical, if you consider, that some organs (like the spleen, liver or gallbladder) are on one side, but not on the other side.
@@yourguard4 That is the most fascinating thing about the biology of the complex life forms on planet Earth - the anatomy of the bodies is not necessarily based on symmetry (except for skeletons on which the muscles and joints are attached in case there are hard skeletons building up the body). Yet, the shapes of the bodies are in 99% of the cases (just very few spices don’t have that feature) based on symmetry (either radial or bilateral). The case to define why is the feature “symmetry” so prominent on complex life forms on Earth is indeed very difficult, and the main reason for that is that not a single gene (on any living body on this planet) is responsible for building a symmetrical body. That feature is not recorded in the DNA, yet it’s prominent. The oldest fossils (so far) discovered on our planet are the stromatolites and trilobites - both are already based on bilateral symmetry, and there’s no way to explain as to how the non-symmetrical one-cells organisms evolved into symmetrical ones (as complex life forms). It’s fascinating, that’s all I’m trying to say…
I think our first alien contact will probably be a scientist seeing something interesting in a microscope. Any alien life we encounter will most likely be microbial.
till allah al hamd comes jesus and angels to destroy the earth eventually... no human nor suns will destroy earth
@@tentimesful nah, 5 billion years from now the Sun will hit the red giant phase and incinerate the Earth.
@@tentimesful 🤦♂️ What are you even doing on this channel 🤦♂️
@@tentimesful say it with me everyone:
not everyone is religious
@@tentimesful why do you people even come on these science channels 🤦♂️
In order to achieve interstellar travel, you would have to be scientifically minded and have a sense of wonder for discovery.
Thus, I don't understand why they would only bring and spread death.
Yep. They wouldn't. Our panic is based on projecting our primal fears to the unknown.
In our culture, we greet & communicate that we are peaceful by pressing our body parts together & shaking them up & down, up & down. This could go badly wrong in a 1st contact situation.
@@incognito6313
Well, those unfortunate events were always rooted in power or revenge.
But as far as I'm aware, scientists has never chosen destruction over knowledge, unless commanded to do so.
And when we are talking about such advanced goals as interstellar travel, I don't think it's reasonable to question our future methods with scepticism due to our history before mass communication.
The internet is the beginning of what has, will and would set any civilization on the right path to longevity.
Otherwise, one could also say that because of the human history, we will never save this planet from pollution.
But mass communication has made it more likely than ever before that we can and will do just that.
PS: Sorry for the optimism.
@@incognito6313 It should be noted that Hiroshima wasn't simply some act of cruel barbarism. The Japanese regime was fanatical about telling it's citizens to NEVER surrender, no matter what the cost. The estimated death toll of defeating Japan via invasion was 2 million lives, way higher than the 2 bombs.
They didn't just nuke them out of the blue: they told the Japanese government they have the bomb and to surrender, lest they drop it. They refused. After the 1st bomb they offered surrender again, and they still refused. After the 2nd bomb they offered again and they STILL refused - then it took an insurrection within the Japanese forces to finally force a surrender.
Japan was as bad as the Nazis (death camps and all), they had to be defeated and the 2 bombs achieved that with the lowest possible death toll.
@@incognito6313
Who's to say that the alien scientists wouldn't govern in their world?
Because they probably do if they can travel such extreme distances.
And even though our scientists don't govern here, we still care a great deal about protecting potential life on Mars and the moon Europa.
So if we do that, despite who is in power and despite our dark history, I'd say that's a rather good sign.
Remember 'The Abyss'? Those were some awesome aliens.
I think of Peter Cawdron as Mr. First Contact. Everyone of his books comes up with a different well thought out scenario. I really liked Cold Eyes, it shows US as the aliens going to make first contact.
So a couple of things to note:
1) Love the video's the detail, the thought provocation, the graphics to go along with your video's are great.
2) If an alien species is traveling the stars already it's a good chance they are using modes of communication that are beyond radio waves. Perhaps a way more advanced version of Quantum entanglement. It's also a good bet, they are using some type of stealth technology that would render our current methods of detection technology useless.
3) I agree, physical contact is likely the last thing to happen right away especially since humans still can't get over the fact that humans come in multiple colors as well.
They may not even be capable of communicating in any way we do. Maybe their all telepathic, maybe they communicate similar to bee's, maybe they use flashes of light. IT's so exciting to think about.
4) If I was an alien species and I detected life on a celestial body I would start to observe. How to they treat one another, How they express themselves, how does their society function. What technological level are they at. (Honestly, based on our current conditions on earth I would stay away)
I think it's incredibly arrogant of humans to assume that an alien species would want to make contact with us. We are still a very young and primitive race. We still allow fear, anger, greed to make a lot of decisions.
Thanks again,
Sulanis
If they are using Neutrinos to communicate? We would never even know they are contacting us by the min.
@@katiefincher2433 Would you care to elaborate? I cannot understand your comment. What "new takes" are you talking about?
In the video he says that "First contact" will likely be scientists finding life on another planet. This "discovery of life" will likely only consist of bacteria and maybe plants as the most "advanced life" we can find. If humanity right now where to meet "space traveling" aliens, then of course those aliens would be more technologically advanced then us, who haven't even visited our nearest planet. In the universe, life is probably abundant but it's like a pyramid: most life will be just bacteria and microbes, a very tiny amount of all life will be animal-like creatures and a tiny amount of those creatures will be intelligent enough to build civilizations and so on. It might take humanity millions of years before we discover "intellegent life" after we've discovered "life".
@@katiefincher2433 The problem with your comment is your grammar is somewhat confusing. "...is assuming STILL that IF ALIEN THEN ADVANCED CULTURE." Let's presume that's a typo, and if so, what exactly is it you're trying to say?
@@syriouskash537 by the min?
@@sulanis8444
By the Min.
I've read "The War of the Worlds" as a kid. It's insane that 125 years old book described an attack and defeat of aliens with very accurate science.
Two most amazing details that always forgotten in modern works:
1) non-humanoid aliens with explanation of their anatomy.
2) microbes kill them. At that time microbiology was very weak science but Wells understood it well.
P.S. I know that he based his work on the conquest of the Native Americans.
H.G. Wells brother, he was way ahead of his time. The Island of Dr. Moreau, The World Set Free, The Time Machine, so many stories.
Truthfully, the science wasn’t very accurate. If they were that advanced, they like us now, would understand the concept of disease, and therefor bacteria and viruses. There would be no way they would die off from that. They would fully protect themselves. Wells, like other authors, didn’t truly understand scientific advances. He couldn’t have imagined how far we would have advanced today, and how much further than that any civilization from Mars could have advanced if they became capable of invading us, something we’re possibly a hundred years away from doing ourselves.
@@melgross yes sure, he just showed what _could_ happen
@@melgross Probably, but as humans, aliens could also be irrational and being good in one field and really bad in another. Who knows.
20-30 years ago there was a sci-fi show on TV, I forget the name. Away the aliens had taken over the world. One of the things the rebels did with a captured alien is subject him to various bacteria and viruses. No dice the aliens had inoculated themselves.
Nice to see a well thought out science-based First Contact alternative to sci-fi and whacko theorists.
Far from depressing, I found this scenario both logically satisfying and spiritually reassuring.
It's nice to spend a few minutes considering whether we might have a big brother out there somewhere instead of the usual worrying about daily life with "Big Brother" here.
Good one. Peter Cawdron is one of the great modern sci-fi authors, a modern Charles Sheffield, so it's nice to see this collaboration.
An excellent analysis! However, something not considered is the possibility of inadvertent arrivals due to on board emergencies on one of their spacecraft. The OMG we gotta get on solid ground quick before we accidentally do something devastating to our sector of the galaxy scenario seems much more likely to me. My own experience in aviation leads me to be in constant awareness of essential consumables, whatever that might mean to the intrepid spacefaring types we encounter from out yonder.
If you roam the stars at 1% light speed, then the galaxy is yours in the short span of 10 million years. But a 5ly trip takes 500 years, meaning your machines are reliable well beyond the wildest dreams of Earth engineers, meaning your exp in aviation is irrelevant. Like talking exp in wood archery when talking nukes.
Joe Scott theorised in a video (with references to Contact) that radio signals from Earth will weaken to under background noise level after just a few light years of travel, thus likely not detectable when reaching other planets. What's your take on that?
TV and radio broadcasts would be difficult to detect at more than a few light years away. However, earth is sending out high power radar waves into space used to track space hardware. These would be detectible throughout the Milky Way galaxy...provided the aliens aimed their antenna towards earth.
Thank you for the time and effort Mr Ash.
I’d think that the 3rd potential contact wouldn’t be them physically but their technology. Their Voyagers and AI. The problems of sending organic life vs robots is, like with us, much more difficult and complicated.
I was thinking the same thing. And only if they programmed the AI to make contact. A small probe sent only to collect information would most likely go undetected but if they intended it to contact us it would be interesting to find out what information they were willing to share and what to keep to themselves. They might be completely paranoid and not even let us know where the probe originated or be remarkably open and give us an encyclopedia of science and technology completely new to us. I don't believe that merely the confirmation of the existence of ET would have much effect on us, we are already primed for this by our entertainment, and such worldviews such as religions have been historically very good at either assimilating new knowledge or willing to completely deny it, either way continuing on as before. New tech though would have serious effects but tech has changed unimaginably fast in the last couple of centuries and for the most part, people just go on living their lives.
Maybe not. If an alien race had the intelligence and technical sophistication to find a way to cross interstellar space, then perhaps it would be easy enough for them to do it in person. We send robotic probes to places like Mars and Jupiter because, even if we COULD send people right now, it would still be cheaper and safer. But if we could get to Mars as easy and as safely as hopping in the car and going to Walmart, maybe we'd send fewer probes and more people.
@@klat2baraada579
Okay, let's take your #HopOverToWalmartInTheCar analogy one step further and imagine that they are an extremely-long-lived alien species who are able to drop a quantum-entangled copy or variant of their core consciousness into their version of a sublight-speed interstellar probe and tell it to "hop over to Sol and see what they are up to and report back to me in a couple of millennia about their wierdly-short-lived doings.."
That would work right?
@@klat2baraada579I know quite a few people I'd like to send to Mars.
I think Hawking has one factor in his favor: that is in fact biology. Here on earth we know first-hand how a species transported to a new environment can wind up taking over and throwing the eco-system it is introduced into a tailspin. The example of Columbus is a cautionary tale. His greed and avarice aside, his precesence alone introduced diseases that the native populations had no answer for. It was more disease, with Columbus and his compatriots unwittingly acting as weapons of mass destruction, that did in the natives, and allowed colonization to proceed, moreso than their advanced, relatively speaking, weapons. Physical alien contact may be equally as dicey, assuming they have only good intent otherwise as Arvin likely correctly posits, our viruses and bacteria may do them real harm (which is how aliens were defeated in Welles War of the Worlds novel) and vice versa, their own viruses and bacteria my wipe us out in short order. I guess we can suppose that aliens, being far more advanced, considering they can travel between worlds or galaxies, will be fully prepared to deal with this problem but who knows for sure.
That was happening long before Columbus. The plague of Justinian, the Black Death, and many more over the centuries were caused by travelers bringing in diseases from foreign lands.
I am in the Hawking camp. "The Killing Star" by Charles R. Pellegrino and George Zebrowski changed my mind about first contact. It's a very good book that explores the darker side of first contact.
Same here. "Danger Will Robinson!"
The reality is that we will not be capable of human interstellar travel for centuries and maybe even millennia. Any life in our own solar system is bound to be less advanced than humans, or we would have noticed by now, which means intelligent aliens would have to come our way. That implies they are exponentially more technologically and philosophically developed than we are, and as such far removed from the primitive idea of conquest by annihilation of indigenous populations. An advanced species, maybe a type 2 civilization, will be self sufficient with only curiosity as a driver.
The dark forest?
Stephen Hawking a pedo
A message from the future: Steven Hawking turned out to be a heinous and despicable individual posthumously.
Love the non-hyperbolic approach to the question of first contact, but I can’t help but think life could easily be seen as an exploitable resource itself.
The one element that aliens can find on Earth and nowhere else in the universe... HUMAN BLOOD. "It's a cookbook!"
"To Serve Man" ?
The Human who are eaten are the lucky ones. The rest of humanity will be enslaved by the Aliens.
What's the next stop? The twilight zone.
Yummy 😋
I have to wonder if we could even recognize alien life as life if we come across it.
Great thoughts and video as always, Arvind! Sadly though, I think it’s ultimately a moot point. Although life is probably reasonably common in the universe of suitable planets “out there,” intelligent, technological life is so rare that civilizations will never meet, and are very unlikely to ever even establish two-way communication.
The real bottleneck is time more than distance: From the only example we have to work from, intelligent life takes billions of years to evolve. Then after it finally does evolve, there is (sadly!) a lot of evidence that intelligent, technological life has a tendency to extinguish itself, or at least to enter continuous cycles of Technology (e.g., Rome) -> Dark Ages -> Technology (today) -> Dark Ages -> Technology (a millenium from now) -> Dark Ages …
So, in short, there may be 5 or so currently-technological civilizations, including us, somewhere in the Milky Way, but they have essentially zero chance of ever finding each other before either we or they go back into a Dark-Ages cycle, or destroy ourselves utterly.
Plus of course, there is an “even-zeroer” chance of any such civilization ever traveling to physically meet another. Warp drives require vastly, vastly, waaaay too much energy to make such a trip worth the cost. And if a civilization ever can harness that much energy, they’re far more likely to use it to destroy themselves, all-too-sadly.
There’s also almost no chance communication can be established either, again sadly: Even without regard to the round-trip times, the inverse-square-distance attenuation, and the diminishing signal-to-noise ratio, rapidly makes any such signal undetectable, no matter how powerful a radio dish you throw at the problem.
There is also a rarity to our condition even among our own (Earthlings). There are many species older than us on Earth with the potential to have developed or exceeded our intellect by now but with no facility to build complex habitats or tame their food supply to facilitate further advancement. We alone shifted posture permanently and relatively quickly leaving us with not only 2 spare limbs but remarkable dexterity due to our nature as former tree climbers, as well as being large enough to allow for substantial encephalization. This is rare series of unlikely events that evolution did not require. Life may be common but our modern lives are largely unconnected to any evolutionary need and this may be extremely unusual.
@@janegerrard1073, yes indeed! That then raises the question, “what precisely is intelligence?” We tend to think of typical IQ-test-type intelligence, but I take a more-evolution-inspired definition: I define intelligence as “the sum effect of all mental abilities that give an organism an advantage in their environment.”
So, yes, intelligence could be your ability to “put two and two together,” so to speak, but it could be many other things too, for example:
- A really voluminous memory.
- Great capabilities of observation and hyper-awareness of the world around you.
- An ability to think very quickly, even if overall mental capability is not particularly amazing.
- Ability to *manipulate* the environment. By some accounts, we’re not much more “clever” than dolphins, but we have greater mental and physical means to act upon our mental constructs.
- Great carisma: Even if we’re not extraordinary thought, if we can convince others to do our bidding, then we will do better in our environment.
@@mr88cet I agree, and it's quite possible that other animals look upon us as being a bit backward in some regards.
@@janegerrard1073, direct quote from 微笑, our cat: “My humans are so pathetic! They can’t see at night, can’t smell much of anything any time of day, they can hardly jump at all, and their teeth and claws couldn’t kill a thing! Still, the free food they give me - occasionally anyway - is tolerable, so I’ll keep them for now.”
Yeah. But i mean we can still colonise planets with non intelligent Life on it
It's refreshing to have such a heartening view of this subject, most recently I've been thinking about the Dark Forest theory, which makes a lot of sense, coming from a perspective of distrust, we humans have so much trust issues between each other, I imagine coming into contact with alien intelligent forms would be as distrustful
You are awesome, Arvin ❤
I'm not too optimistic about first physical contact as you are, if we observe life in general one thing is sure, it's hostile and parasitic, it always relies on feeding from other life for it to survive, it could also happen at an intellectual/technological level as we see it on Earth between nations.
Intelligent life might see us as a future threat and may decide to attack us to prevent our species from ever reaching the stars and become serious competition, this actually might be the reason why we can't find intelligent life out there, not even signals of it yet. I'm a firm believer in the Zoo hypothesis, they might be watching us and deciding what to do with us.
The James Webb will find signatures of "life" fairly quickly though and as usual with in our present social state where news feeds get lost in the constant bombardment of meaningless information it will be forgotten as quickly as it appeared on our screen.
I love your videos Mr. Ash. Thank you for sharing your ideas with us.
Hi Arvin, great video as always :) What do you think, does this same logic apply to the artificial intelligence? Would it also be more interested in sharing/consuming ideas, enjoying arts and music and even such things as friendship? Focusing its calculating resources for reaching to the stars and solving the world's mysteries, instead of having conflicts with humans, like it's usually shown by the movies/books?
I am not as optimistic about AI - the main reason is that it would presumably share resources with us, and if sentient it may sense a threat. In addition, AI could be programmed to be evil. Aliens would not have been sharing any resources, particularly if they survived in space over hundreds or thousands of years to ge here.
I think the odds are, first contact would be be alien AI, since biological units cannot handle long term interstellar travel. So, AI being interested in humans? I don't see it. Then again, why would AI make contact in the first place?
@@geoff8742 what if they figured out a way to warp through space?
@@geoff8742 >since biological units cannot handle long term interstellar travel >> with technologies of 2022? True. > why would AI make contact >> Why not? Out of curiosity or boredom or the reasons we can't even understand by now
There are several problems with the idea of sentient AI. The first one is that you either have it sentient or artificial, not both. But the mix of sentience and AI already exists: there are sentient humans with the knowledge to create AI.
The other problems are that it usually neglects to take into account what exactly makes life sentient in the first place, and it usually neglects to consider what the A stands for: Artificial intelligence isn't intelligence at all. It's only a whole bunch of procedures that create certain behaviors, and in some cases behaviors that mimic those of intelligent beings.
The idea often presupposes that AI can get to a point where it has it's own initiative to do things and to self-replicate. Even if you could remove the A, that might not make it sentient, and it wouldn't give it any initiative. The reason why we have initiative to do anything at all, isn't because we are intelligent. It's because we have biological necessities. Intelligence isn't what leads to self-sustainability and needs, it's the opposite way around. Bacteria have initiative and they aren't intelligent at all. They are simply compelled, just like we are, by the two main functions of all life: 1- reproduction, and 2- resource gathering to support continuous reproduction.
But then even the simplest life forms are absurdly complex. Robots would require much, much more than just any level of non-artificial intelligence in order to have needs and initiative. But then i'll posit that the extravagant amount of complexity required for that makes it prohibitively difficult to achieve, on top of the already prohibitively difficult challenge of reaching intelligence levels that wouldn't be artificial anymore.
It's much more feasible to just augment life with robotics than the opposite.
If you're worried about dangerous AI, that has already existed for decades. For someone with enough knowledge it's not very hard to write some kind of dangerous malware. Sentience isn't a requirement for it to be the most dangerous. You can rest assured that an AI that is solely designed for one or a few specific purposes is much more effective than any AI that is designed for a lot of different purposes.
Do you really think Aliens who have the technology to travel vast distance of space , still be in their primitive biological form !!!!
Who says it isn't the superior form? It'd be cool if your car would heal after an accident all on it's own! If you haven't seen it, check out the abduction from Fire in the Sky, or Colonel Corso's claim that UFO craft are sometimes living, metallic beings.
Yes
They might be able to store there consciousness in virtual world. And maybe able to upload their consciousness in artificial biological body or Robotic body
Why do you think biological forms are primitive?
No, images are fuzzy to avoid disclosing detection capabilities. Warships pack a lot of detection kit. When they can exclude ball lightning with reasonable confidence, alien probes are no less probable than any other conjecture. However, the idea of something living is not implied by stuff that appears to require unknown physics, just as most probes we send are robots.
At about 13:50, you dropped a deep one! The commentary and that billboard... wow.
Back to the comments to see who else caught that!
Why wouldn’t an exponentially more advanced civilization look at humans similar to how humanity perceives ants, flies, or bacteria? I don’t think it’s reasonable to assume alien civilizations would necessarily value human life the same as we value ourselves.
Fantastic video by the way.
Except for a small percentage of people who express psychopathic tendencies, humans only attack ants, flies, or bacteria when they're a nuance or when they're threatening. So it shouldn't really matter how little they may value us so long as we don't piss them off.
@Seek Vapes Agreed. I think Hawking might have been just getting curmudgeonly in his old age.
If alien life that visits us is as dumb as us, we're toast.
@@chubbymoth5810 Would be a cool feature of the universe if those civilizations destroyed themselves first. I mean, maybe not cool for us, depending on how things go for the next 10-20 years.
Arvin: “…we have something extremely valuable. In fact, it’s the most valuable resource in the universe.”
Me: “ah yes, labor. They’ll come to enslave us.”
Arvin: “life.”
Me: “meh, same thing.”
Good thing is that the kind of work you use slaves for, is exactly the kind of work that is most easily automated. So there's no true reason to enslave us.
Labor only provides a decent level production at a fairly low level of technological development. This is why I disagree strongly with Elon Musk for instance on government subsidized income. It won't be necessary as production is the root of all wealth. A species that can traverse the cosmos has no need of meatbags of chemicals to do any sort of labor, manual or otherwise. When you can exploit the nature of the atom within the quantum field, what use would we be?
Thanks to your comment, I think about it. If they can come and greet us here they'll have sustain their life for at least hundreds of years on space, everything will probably be automatic, they won't need us.
But what if there's something that we all need to sustaining life but can't be automated? It's idea, creativity, it's the first thing that make us human, higher than any other life form on earth.
If they really come and enslave us, they won't come for our muscles, they'll come for our brain. Perhaps things like ask us any solution for their dying planet, they'll share their problem with us.
You missed the biggest resource we have available: A habitable planet in the goldilocks zone of a main-sequence star.
Well, what you’ve described could be very common, indeed.
That WE know of. We have found thousands of exoplanets but our tech isn’t good at finding planets as small as earth which is important due to too little or too much gravity.
Also one that has had life for a long time that has created an oxygen atmosphere. Terraforming a lifeless planet is far more work.
I was going to post the same thing. An alien civilization could go to other planets for the same reason we might ultimately go for - we trashed our own beyond repair. Not only does it have the necessary elements, it has breathable oxygen, liquid water, and a steady heat source that won't fry you.
Nope he didn't miss it, you just ignored it, planets in habitable zones are very common in the universe.
I loved the par on how to actually detect aliens on exoplanets, so cool.
BTW, your series are PHENOMENAL!!!!
Great video! Especially interesting thinking about Intellectual Contact. I wonder if we’d ever be able to create and broadcast a type of “Rosetta stone” for an intelligent species to pick up and attempt to learn how to communicate with us. Or would it need to be a physical artifact?
Star Trek TNG had a great episode (“The Inner Light”) where the ship flew into an area, a beam hit the ship (specifically the captain) and Picard (being hit by the probe’s transmission) lived an entire person’s life in an instant. From that, he was able to describe the long dead civilization. Doubt we’d be capable of anything like that- but curious what we could do and how an intelligent civilization would know how to comprehend it?
You have to ask yourself if there are large numbers of technological civilizations why have we not already found them to make contact?
@@VadulTharys A very good point, but suppose that there would have been 20 up until now, but 3 wiped themselves out, another 5 got knocked out by huge asteroid impacts, gamma ray bursts or other stellar disasters, 3 just weren't very successful, maybe they lost interest in everything, and a sort of malaise set in?
Then another 3 _would have been_ technologically advanced, but despite being intelligent and innovative, 2 of them evolved on planets that were mainly, or all, water, and the third was on such a high G planet that even launching satellites into orbit would just have been ridiculously costly and dangerous?
That leaves 5 and ourselves. One is 600 light years away, but only now entering the technological equivalent of the 2nd century, and another is 1000 light years away, but is in the equivalent of the 19th century (it's very unlikely that they would be so close in space and time frames, but you never know).
Out of the remaining 3, one is 20,000 years ahead of us, but is very quiet and cautious, they're also 18,000 LY away. They have detected signatures of life in our atmosphere, but don't want anything to do with us, just in case.
The other 2 are 50,000 years ahead of us, but are also 50,000 LY away, so have known about each other for millennia, but didn't manage interstellar travel for a few centuries. Their early radio signals were too far away, too weak and impossible to detect through all the interstellar dust, let alone pick out from the natural radio waves saturating the galaxy.
Later, they moved to other forms of communication (focused laser beam messages, neutrino messages, or whatever), far too long ago for us to have detected. They now know about us, having set up huge telescopes of various sizes and various points around their side of the galaxy, but robot spacecraft sent to investigate us won't arrive for another few centuries...
@@pineapplepenumbra Sounds like a mix of Dark Forest theory, and too early.
Did you hear the news about the warp bubble that was just created. It was an accident but it has been duplicated twice. Combine that with an Alcubierre drive and we have faster than light travel. With the rate of our current technological advancements we should have a working warp drive in about 50 years. Interestingly about 10 years after Star Trek predicted we would achieve it.
@@VadulTharys "Did you hear the news about the warp bubble that was just created."
Yes I did, and I just knew, before clicking on the video, that it would be an incredibly tiny effect. However, who knows what the future holds?
I don't think it will be within a couple of centuries, at least, if it's possible on larger scales at all.
The paperwork suggested a theoretical velocity (if that's even the right word, when the spacecraft isn't really moving) of about 0.0004C which is slower than the latest Solar probe (with a max velocity of 160km per second, as opposed to 120km per second, but that had the benefit of the Sun's gravity.
So one could get to Mars in less than a week, if it's timed to be closer to us, and Jupiter in about 3 months.
In a way I think it would be better if we don't get warp drives until at least a couple of centuries or more, as that would give us time to grow up a bit and become more civilised, much as I would simply _love_ to see such a development within my lifetime.
Another reason would be that if we came across another civilisation similar to ours, but maybe early 20th century levels of technological development, our being ahead of them by a few centuries means that we're less likely to have an interstellar war.
A few months after I first read about the Alcubierre Sphere (and its numerous problems, such as needing a ludicrous amount of negative energy, the temperature inside the warp bubble being hotter than the surface of the Sun, anything in front of the bubble being massively charged*, and then blowing up when one reaches one's destination), I had a creepy dream that I realised had been inspired by it.
A mate and I were transporting papers and equipment for the Russians, after a failed attempt at a warp speed capable craft. We were in a convoy and stopped somewhere, while my mate decided to have a rumage through the back of the truck, to see what was in the papers.
There was a box in the back, and when we looked inside, there was a woman's head, screaming. Her body was shrunken and tiny, but she was still alive (which wouldn't have been possible in real life). We discovered that they were going to try again, and my mate had a go at the Russians in charge, saying that they could kill more people (the woman being the only survivor).
The Russians tried to reassure us that the technology had been much improved, and it would be safer this time.
*Which could still be a huge problem.
@@pineapplepenumbra ROFLMAO your dream sounds like the start of a good movie.
In a way I hope we break it soon, as it would move us to a post scarcity society. The fear I have is that it will draw attention to us from those who we should never be noticed by.
I am a pessimist when it comes to potential alien life. Everything about it will be alien except one critical thing. If they have expanded past their home world they are aggressive. They are also most likely from a predatory species. Those two combinations do not bode well for humans.
So thought provoking. At last a video that gives realistic answers, rather than blinding with science or leaving the viewer with more questions. Thank You Arvin!!!
I dont know why I would need a place to store my password. Its easy to remember 12345. 😁
Thanks for the video.
My ex-wife looks rather alien so they are probably already here 🏁
Haha. You're in trouble now!
Sorry. What was your email address again?
@@sighterinfo 🙃
"The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff" Carl Sagan
Proof that intelligent life exists on RUclips.
Subscribed !
I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the Earth is unusually rich and diverse in all kinds of lifeforms, compared with other planets were life might spring up. From the Artic to the Antarctic, from the shallows to the darkest depths of the ocean, you can usually find some kind of life clinging to existence. I wouldn't be at all surprised if life on other planets is far more narrow in its scope than what we're used to on Earth - and yet, we're killing the environment 😢
Yeah, well, for billions of years earth had nothing but single celled organisms. We're like an anomaly historically speaking. Also, nothing but a rounding error in the big picture.
diversity is killing the social trust , thats much worse.
At some point in time in Earth's history, multiple celled organisms began evolving. As soon as this happened life went crazy with all kinds of different types of creatures. If multicellular life exists on another planet, every single possible type of life would most likely exist there too. It would be statistically unlikely not to haveany variations. One incredible thing that happened was the first ancient mitochondria relationship in cells. Two cells joined together and rather than the large cell devouring the small cell, they started working together and this allowed for more complex life to happen. This was one of the most important events for life on earth. If that never happened we wouldn't see life as we know it.
@@AfricanLionBat That's right. If an alien species ever detected life on earth, odds are it would detect single celled organisms. Just because of the odds of the detection being part of the vast portion of earth's history where single celled organisms were all there was.
Multicelled organisms, and sexual reproduction, seems to be a game changer in many ways though. Both for the ones doing the detection, and for the ones being detected.
@@sk4lman I put another comment on this video. What do you think about this? "The only thing I can think of that would make aliens want to take over the planet would be to have a habitable planet. Earth is likely very rare (calm star, the type of moon causing stable tilt allowing for tolerable weather, large gas giant planets in a further orbit to protect against comets/meteors). If I'm not mistaken gas giants are usually closer to their stars. Let's say the aliens left their planets thousands of years ago and are living on a ship and mining resources as they go. They come across our solar system and see Earth and realize they can actually live 5here. All they have to do is murder the inferior life and they can finally live like their ancestors did before they had to bail out."
Fantastic. I love when someone comes up with original, yet obvious, conclusions on a difficult subject based on pure logic. As much as I appreciated Hawking’s ideas in this field I never could escape the feeling that they were motivated more by sociopolitical trends than science.
Well said!
I've long thought antropomorphic aliens were a very ridiculous part of sci-fi (big sci-fi lover though). But, I'm questioning that, now that I see every element repeats so evenly across the universe, so, Why wouldn't life evolve in much the same way it's already done with the same "puzzle pieces"?
No please don't. Anthropomorphic aliens have always been and will always be an extremely ridiculous part of sci-fi. There is an uncountably infinite more strange ways for life to evolve other than the generic 2-legged 2-eyed erect sapien.
welll life could be prevalent as in made from "carbon" and water, and breathe oxygen, but to evolve into hairless apes that look like us probably happens depending on how close to infinite the universe is, but i reckon its not really common.. considering how many different environments and certain lucky events that have to happen for a species to develop intelligence.. For example if the dinosaurs hadnt been wiped out by the asteroid we wouldnt be here right now
The only explanation for anything antropomorphic out there would be that if life was to develop technology it would need to evolve in such a way that allows it to manipulate with objects in it's surrounding.
That means that it would need to have some sort of organ that enables it to examine it's surrounding, either by sight or smell, while also having extremities that enable it to grab and hold stuff, while possessing enough strength and intelligence to transform it into something useful.
Sight arose here as a light sensitive cell which then evolved into the eyes many creatures possess today.
It's the logical path for evolution of sight, more so than some sort of telepathic or even echolocation like sense, as single celled and first multi celled organisms in which sight first appeared were to small and unable to produce anything like echolocation or telepathy.
Telekinetic aliens might be out there, but again, it's much more likely that a small speck in some alien ocean evolved some sort of extremities for swimming in it's surrounding which then evolved into more complex extremities that are capable of interacting with objects, rather than any sort of contactless object manipulation.
Again, I'm sure there's all sorts of stuff out there, can't really rule anything out as the universe seems to be infinite and very ancient, but I don't find antropomorphic, or rather 'earth analog like' life impossible.
I'd bet on it being more likely to be analog to life on earth actually.
@@somedumbozzie1539 sorry, was on mobile, just woke up, etc 😅 I've edited the comment. Again, I'm very sorry for the eye sore I've caused.
@@somedumbozzie1539 Exactly! Thanks for understanding
Ok, that was good..."one thing they won't share with us is their passwords". Took me a minute. Well played Arvin. I like that
You are a very good science communicator. I enjoy your videos immensely.
I think South Park has guest it right. Earth is a giant reality T.V. show for the universe.
I think it is a bit naive to think about the good intentions of some hypothetical visitors to our planet. We have one resource that they may want and that is the distance from the sun, the Goldilocks zone, which makes our planet habitable. A species that needs to spread to other planets can be a danger to us. And if they can travel through the stars, the technological difference would be so overwhelming that we would have no chance to defend ourselves.
So why worry?
Agreed and beyond the planet, there is us. While it is nice to think they would value our intellectual development, most likely we would be view as a sub species no different than how humans view the animals. We would just be a resource to an alien that can transverse the vast emptiness of space. The question is would it be subversion or annihilation. History proves, If we ever gain the ability to travel in mass to a habitat planet, if the local life forms cannot defend themselves, we will populate the planet. There is no reason to believe other life forms would be different. in fact, I would bet they are transversing space for just that reason.
I also wonder, given the huge random factors involved in what alien life may be like compared to Earth-spawned life... would some kind of microbial infection threat be likely? Would an alien microbe which evolved in a totally foreign environment even have the ability or tendency to infect or cause any kind of interaction with Earth life? (I guess it is possible is some elements are common one one planet and toxic to the other) but it seems that biological microbes would likely have to be from the same origin to be able to know how to "infect" or utilize an alien form of life.
I see a similar hole in Arvin's argument. He pointed out that exotic amino acids made the designer pathogens intended to mimic alien microbes very hard for T cells to attack, but the other side of the coin is that any of those exotic amino acids that they cannot synthesize would be practically unavailable in our bodies and biosphere. The worst might be that alien microbes just form spores and become dormant because they can't find the amino acids they need.
Lem had some great Outlook on first contact with alien species - "solaris", "the invincible" and especially "Fiasco".
It’s likely that any civilization able to harness the energy required to travel between stars will have gotten past the kinds of petty disagreements and the horrors of war that still plague mankind. In addition, Carl Sagan once said that when one intelligent civilization meets another, one will always completely dominate the other technologically because of the vast differences in time that they have been evolving their technology and civilization.
*Aliens visiting earth:* “We’ve been trying to reach you about your cars extended warranty!”
I DONT KNOW ANYMORE.
I just admittedly-desperately want more people to know
about No-Knock-Raids and other heavy Issues with OBVIOUS SOLUTIONS.
I just dont want people to keep dying and Homelessness to increase all while RUclipsrs like Some More News literally came-up with simple, obvious Solutions. That Guy has 2 Videos on the topic of ‚Things Politicans should really know but just not enough do so they also dont know’.
And all i can do is write YT-Comments and hope people dont think of this as sp-am.
Damn, i feel helpless.
Sign up now to extend your planets warranty.
First physical contact? If you consider that Luytens star is 12.5 light years distant, and that our fastest probe so far has attained a speed of 700,000km/h, it would take such a probe well over 18 thousand YEARS to get there! The distances between stars are just too great to ever contemplate physical contact or any kind of physical interaction. Even with light speed communication we would have to wait 25 years just to say hello and receive a reply!
You're making an assumption that technology won't advance and also ignoring time dilation effects. Even at sublight speeds, maybe you'll have to wait a while on Earth, but the journey for the interstellar pioneers could potentially be as fast as a 19th century transoceanic cruise with technology we could develop within the next couple of decades if we had the funding for it. It's not that we can't make something go faster, we just haven't had a sufficient need to do it.
And a lot of possible hazards in between if your solution is just _go fast._
@@sanders555 problem is with kinda our universe. There are two barriers to break before even considering to colonize exo-planets and potentially expanding in that order, travel time and communication time.
Both of which are pretty much at worst speeds in relation to time Completion. Making it incredibly hard for anything to keep up with ourselves on exo planets. Even if we found some particle that travels like infinity of speed, problems with travel still presist. And if it's so challenging for universe to incarnate example of wormholes something, then it would be merely the most collosal mission for any civilization so it's highly more likely that nobody has stepped foot outta their solar system. (Perhaps they did but not in some way to colonize planets tbh.)
that is why the first contact, if there will be any and I doubt it, would probably be made by techno-organic beings engineered to withstand interstellar journeys, and not the actual alien race who made them.
@@sanders555 And why would there ever be 'sufficient need' to make things go much faster? Even if they were made to go ten times faster it would still take thousands of years to reach the NEAREST possible planet, where it's highly unlikely there would be any good reason to spend billions to go there.
Over the years, my imagining alien life in the Galaxy changed drastically. I used to think there must be intelligent aliens everywhere out there. Now I believe intelligence is rare and the likely impossible distances from us to any intelligent aliens will prevent any kind of contact. We could be a "fluke of the Universe" as the song goes.
Possible but incredibly depressing if so. I’d like to believe that even if intelligence is super rare, the sheer number of solar systems will still have to produce a handful or so civilizations out there.
There is no way we are the only ones in the universe. I don't even think that scientists believe that. It's as crazy as thinking we are living on a flat earth.
Intelligence is not the only condition in play here, which makes it even more rare. Society is another one, but since I'm very interested in sociology, I know that society could've developed in very different ways. The unreal technological advancements we have have very much to do with capitalism, but even if a species like us developes biologically on some planet that's just the first step, the next step is that a system like capitalism emerges(before that of course sedentariness, which makes it even more unlikely). One has to know that society how we know it is not identical to our species - only the potential of it. It can develope probably in a million different ways, just like life on earth itself can(and that the outcome is a technology like ours is not guerenteed for a species like us). Because emergence is the keyword here. Society is not exactly the aquivalent to the plural of brains or psyches. It has emergent qualities and is a new emergent layer of the universe(ant colonys are not the same btw. there are fundamental differences). You can see it like this: Sociology compared to psychology is a bit like biology compared to chemics - as an example. In the end, that we humans have the technology we have today and will have in the future has to do with very special conditions. Things have to work out in the developements on the life/biology part and things have to work out in the societal part to give the right picture. THIS is the great filter(because two probabilities are multiplied), because it's very unlikely, but I still think that there is life with comparable technology like ours in the universe, but it might be not around the corner of our solar system and it probably rare.
In short, I basically just wanted to say: Even if there is a species like us, it doesn't mean they develop as society like us, because that's just as unlikely because it has emerge too, just like life itself.
Imagine lying awake at night, disturbed by an incessant noise. Upon investigation, you discover its source: a group of rats engaged in a horrific scene of cannibalism and violence. It's a disturbing image, reflective of how our first encounter with extraterrestrial life might unfold. In this analogy, we, humanity, are likened to the rats, engaging in behavior that would likely appall any advanced beings we encounter from beyond our world.
If there is such an award as a Tubi, I would nominate this video for Best Video Targeting The Adults In The Room. A reasonable, rational treatment of a subject that too often leads video makers to pander to an audience's less cerebral instincts. Yes, we are desperate to answer the "are we alone" question, but we don't want exaggeration, innuendo, or false hope. So, kudos to Mr Ash for his down-to-earth presentation (pun intended). Look forward the next one.
I’ve often wondered whether our first contact will be with an insect, particularly the cockroach, one of the greatest of all survivors. What an anticlimax that will be! But we have to get real and expect that these are the kinds of species that are more likely to inhabit hostile planets than any other
Rats are greatest of all surviver also.
@@shadowoffire4307 No the OP nailed it. It's the Cockroaches that can and will survive a nuclear war where almost all other species will sucomb to radiation poisoning
Although I'd say rats would stand a better chance than other species of surviving since they also love to go underground in basements, sewers etc.
@@AnthonyGoodley
Right
#1 Rosches
#2 rats
#3 mosquitoes but they can't escape nuke blast and fallout.
@@AnthonyGoodley how’s u get verified
Do you think maybe a spaceship will land and a bug will walk out? Maybe you think we will learn to travel faster than light?
"We like to think Aliens would be hostile, because that's how we have been. It's a portrayal of our own nature." - Dang correct it is.
Humans? Well think about all the other life forms on the planet other than Humans. How many of THEM are hostile?
Black Mamba Snakes. Saltwater Crocodile. Wolverines. Sun Bears. Bull Sharks. Northern Goshawks. Wild Boars. Hippos.
Fire Ants. Piranhas. Killer Bees. ...... even a Cat is Hostile to a Canary. Going back in time? We could name more like a Velociraptor.
THAT is the reason we think Aliens could possibly be hostile. These are some Very ill-tempered creatures. You aint holding hands with no Piranhas or Killer Bees. PERIOD! Its not a portrayal of OUR nature. It's a portrayal of Nature ITSELF.
WE ... NEED.... TO STOP.........BEING .... SO ARROGANT........ THINKING ITS ALL ABOUT............ US.
Optimism, arrogance, and/or Bias is going to get us in Trouuuuuuuble messing around with what we have never encountered befooooooore.
@@syriouskash537 Calm down
@@kennethober9070
Calm Down??
Maybe YOU should stop reading my comments with a rowdy voice in your head. :-/
How do you know I wasn't singing all that?
Thanks for another great video Arvin. I often wonder about life elsewhere. I don't doubt that it can exist, but I still believe life as we know it was created. It's curious that we understand our complete biological makeup, yet we are still unable to create the simplest form of life despite having all the ingredients. Something unique has to provide the spark to bring those ingredients to life.
This is the best RUclips channel of them all.
One of the best most informative things I have ever seen. And wonderfully positive.
Great video! A very optimistic view of alien contact. All tallied, I think the human race just isn’t ready to cope with such a thing. Some folks, sure. But just think about how many stupid people you encounter every day, feebly coping with the most mundane tasks. What value would we hold to a species advanced enough to travel the cosmos?
Your thoughts were best summed up in the movie "Men in Black"
Will Smith: "Why don't you tell people about the aliens? People are smart"
Tommy-Lee Jones: "A person is smart; people are dumber than cattle"
The Big Front Yard by Clifford D. Simak is one of my favorite first contact stories. The other first contact book I really love is Dragon's Egg by Robert L. Forward. I think that the best chance for first contact is the one outlined in the Galactic Center series by Gregory Benford. Left over AI that has achieved sentience that can span the stars at sub-light speeds may be the first contact. In the Galactic Center series it didn't turn out well however.
The thing about aliens though is that they are alien. We are so technology centric that we think that is the only way an advanced civilisation could exist. That may not even be true. Alien means alien, something completely outside our range of experience. In fact there may be alien life out there, and we may never recognise it as such. We can't even decide if animals on earth are "intelligent". I think this may be even more difficult for alien life. Gregory Benford has a creature in the Galactic Center series that comes from the beginning of time and is a collection of gases that span the Galactic Center. Could we even recognise such a thing?
The real problem though with the idea of technological civilizations is Fermi's Paradox. So far there hasn't been any good explanations of why Fermi's Paradox doesn't rule out any advanced civilizations. Most of the reasons given are not convincing at all. If technological aliens were common in the observable universe than we should see non-random electromagnetic signals around us. Why? Because science is a process. You don't jump from the bronze age to building space ships. There are a number of steps you have to have in place between the two and one of them is the radio phase. We are currently in the radio phase and we have been broadcasting radio and TV waves into space since the advent of radio and television. Any civilization that would be similar or more advanced than us would also have to go through the radio phase. If technological life were common we should see these radio hotspots all over the sky. Howerver, there is nothing out there. This also applies to artificial life as well. There probably is life out there but I doubt any of it has any sort of technology we can detect, assuming we can even recognize it as life.
Actually I think I read somewhere that we have already left the radio-phase. We send signals to sattelites, they send them to each other and then back to earth. Since they are aimed at obects in orbit, they dont need to be as strong as before, or something of the sort.
Also from what I understand, the signals disperse with distance, 100 ly from Earth our radio signals can not be picked out from background noise.
Em radiation is undetectable after 2 light-years
2 light years
@@mjolnir_swe If our radio cannot be detected over 100 ly holds true, very little chance we have an audience. Only a matter of hundreds of viable stars within reach, and we have not seem much activity. I'd guess that stars bigger than class G burn out too quick, and smaller than class K won't have any habitable planets that are not tidally locked. My two cents.
Aliens:"let's travel millions of light year to scoup up some salty water on some god forsaken place with crazy savages and pass over sextillion tons of water alone the way."
There was just a congressional hearing regarding this. They said we have totally made contact with non-human tech.
being un-biased needs to be part of this.. if you want it to be true. it wont matter if its good evidence or not, it will be considered true.
The stuffed Platipus example, that they thought it was made of different animal parts, that's exactly what happened with the Mexican Mummies. We're just too predictable😂
I was surprised that you characterized much science fiction as "patronizing" in their critiques of human societies. I have found them overall to be important and valid --and God knows there's a lot to criticize! One of my favorites is the original Star Trek episode about the planet where two races hated each other intensely because they were so different. You see, one race was black on the right side of their face and white on the left side. The other race was black on the left side and white on the right. They ended up destroying each other....A brilliant commentary on how idiotic and damaging prejudice based on skin color is, and so pertinent to conflicts that still occupy us today.
You may be right. I may have been too harsh in my judgement.
@@ArvinAsh Thanks for replying.
Besides providing a lot of social commentary, Star Trek also addressed the anthropomorphized depiction of other alien beings in our sector of the galaxy. All of the humanoid species were seeded on their planets by a much older humanoid civilization.
@@robbybeauchamp Yes, ST producers and writers have tried hard to give scientific explanations for their fictional universe over the decades.
I agree with Arvin. Most sci-fi is patronising. The Star Trek episode you described sounds pretty cool, savvy and clever - and also the perfect example of how it is mainly patronising. Humans pollute the earth and aliens come to kill us. Yawn. We find ourselves surviving a plague. Also yawn. What about post apocalyptic nuclear war? Double yawn. Friendly aliens land on earth and us dumb humans try to kill them. OMG if I yawned anymore my jaw will fall off. Aliens land and pretend to be friendly and secretly plot to overthrow humans… please stop! Quirky, funny, serious or epic, they are all entertainment and all patronising. Hard sci-fi is less so: think the new Dune or The Expanse. The rest, forget it.
Thank you for the content! If the extreme distances (assuming FTL ends up fundamentally impossible) still leave a possibility of physical contact, I would imagine there never being a need or desire for in-person visits. With the scale of deep time, the odds of an intelligent race only being a few hundred or thousand years ahead of us seems pretty low (I'd think they would be millions or even billions of years ahead of us, if a society can exist that long). With technology that advanced, I would think every aspect of in-person visits could be accomplished through some kind of information-dense communication; like us sending them genetic codes of different earth species for remote cloning, them showing us how to create scanners so detailed that we can record and send a recreation of the earth experience down to the molecule or beyond, or them transferring copies of their consciousnesses to vessels they've taught us how to manufacture on earth.
I agree. However what if the civilisation were nomadic? We are fixed on the idea that everything is based on a "home" planet. What if, as their civilisation advanced, they consumed all of the vital resources on their "home"planet. I sometimes think of a planet as an egg, providing the energy and raw material necessary for the hatchling to consume, up to a point where it is necessary for it to extricate itself in order to find other sources of energy. Still I agree that the vast expanse of the universe means a biological contact is highly unlikely. I would imagine that this nomadic space civilisation would have a fleet of robotic probes(scouts) that would gather information regarding any dangers, nearby resources and any intelligent life that they may encounter along their path. So I believe a robotic vehicle would most likely be the first form of contact, if they wanted to do so.
If they are millions of years ahead of us then we should see their space engineering feats all over the place (think obscuring million of stars / entire galaxies?), therefore we're alone (as a tech civilization) in this "corner" of space, counted in millions of ly radius. I believe life is rather common, but tech is a fluke. Lucky us.
It's annoying that you give any credit to Mick West. To believe his debunking you have to believe that this guy, who has never flown a fighter jet and has zero experience with the sensors on board, understands what was seen better than guys with thousands of hours of real world experience and in depth training using those same sensors. That is a giant leap of faith.
Thank you! Beautifully explained video on extraterrestrial life and contact!
Excellent video so different from the usual.
Those closing statements were key to how we deal with the possibility of first contact. I fear the human race might carry on texting!
The more i think about it..the more i think WE are the aliens.
If this kind of stuff interests you, check out Issac Arthur’s channel, he’s a sci-fi genius. Someone other sci-fi writers look to for ideas.
I watch video after video of Arvin just in order to listen to this fantastic intro music!
One factor that sets us apart from most exoplanets (as far as we know) is our oversized moon that gave us tide pools. Some are concerned that without tide pools wetting and drying the chemicals on a periodic basis, it would be harder for the molecules to develop into life.
I saw a movie where aliens made 1st contact & gave us an object that made whatever was in our minds become manifest in reality. Thus in good species it was a gift = a wishfulfiller. But the minds of humans were dark & twisted; our nightmares arose bringing with them the threat of humanity's extinction. Perhaps, in this way, warlike species are removed like weeds & all wars in the galaxy are avoided.
What is it called?
@@TheElectra5000 perhaps 'The Sphere'? It followed a similar premise. Admittedly the device seemed to be willfully mischievous though. Even though it supposedly summoned 'subconscious fears and desires', i don't recall it blinking into existence a plate of pancakes or comfortable wool socks. Instead it really seemed to get off on just torturing the poor crew. But it was a sci-fi thriller, so for thematic purposes it had proper reason to do so.
michael crichton story?
Those UFO images of black batshapes have been shown to be created by the software used on the military aircraft whenever the system locates a distant plane exhaust moving directly away😂
It's our inept media jumping to conclusions as usual
And those guys that could be heard on the original footage shouting stuff like...
"wow, look at that thing go"😲
That was military trainees😂
Yup, UFO freaks are dumber than flat Earth morons
Alien bugs are not the only physiological threat from contact of the fourth kind. Massive allergic reactions to alien proteins, for the visitor and the visited, could be hard to overcome.
Arvin your videos are consistently fantastic! Thank you for all your work presenting such fascinating information with humor and scientific background. Btw...where can I tune in to hear alien Elvis singing Viva Las Vegas?😅
Alien Elvis! Sounds like a great idea for a new channel!
@Arvin In you amino chart you used the hydrophobic tag twice, should not one of those groups be hydrophilic?
FYI, the JWST did find not only bio markers, but pollution ( Lead ) in an exoplanet atmos.
What i find fascinating is that we think they would understand our models ( of the universe ). Its more likely they would put them up on their refrigerators, and tell us we are "doing a great job!" :-)
In addition, there is a zero chance that interstellar capable entities would be vulnerable to our microbes.
What's the song with the chorus: "we are stardust, we are golden, we are thousand year old carbon, and we've got to get ourselves back to the garden"? Something to do with Woodstock?
He just taught me algebra better then the school I went to when I was child.
If we met aliens, we would be either all dead in under 1second or we live.
You're probably right
"The surest sign that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe is that none of it has tried to contact us."
-Calvin and Hobbes.