Has NASA found (potentially) extraterrestrial life?

GalaxiomAtHome said:

No, the planet appears heavy and flattened in the direction you are travelling.

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So to calculate the planet's details for the speed I need to slow to for orbit I need to wait until we are close and at "normal" speed. For the sake of the exercise I am leaving out any forumalas you might have that would allow me to factor in 50% light speed etc.

As noted above it takes less time to get there than expected as measured by the clock on board the ship. Consulting the speedometer and comparing with the time we can only conclude that the distance is less than we researched on GoogleSpace before we set out. Likewise the planet looks flattened due to "Relativistic Foreshortening".

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I searched around on "relavistic" and my understanding is that is a speed where all this stuff comes into play and Newton has to stand in the corned of the room and it is not a specific velocity. Is this correct?

The mass is harder to explain but I will try to keep it simple. Firstly remember there is no absolute inertial frame. Every perspective is as valid as every other. That is the basis of Relativity.

Although in some ways we can consider the planet as moving towards us, the crucial difference is the space in between is stationary for them but moving for us.

To us it appears they are only travelling the foreshortened distance towards us. Consequently we see their speed towards us as slower than our speedometer reading.

However when we send the probe to collide with it (in order to determine its mass by the rebound) we find that it has considerably more momentum than we expected from that speed. We can only conclude that its mass was higher than the link on GoogleSpace had told us.

From their perspective they see our probe moving the whole distance because the space separating us is stationary relative to them. However their clock is ticking faster than ours so the probe doesn't appear to be travelling as fast for them as our speedometer reading. Likewise, after the collision they conclude the mass of our probe is higher than expected.

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OK. If I fire a bullet from my rifle through a chronograph and the velocity is 3500 f/s and behind the chronograph I have old style ballistic pendulum, I could calculate how far the pendulum will swing.

Lets say I can get the rifle to do 50% light speed. What velocity will the chronograph show, bearing in mind it is a timing device. I assume the ballistic pendulum will higher than my calculated momentun because the bullets mass is greater. Or is it a case that for the pendulum the bullet's mass is the same on impact.

Yes. As our frame of reference changes back to that of the planets, the relativistic kinetic energy must be extracted. (Better start work on Isaac early as he was known for being rather arrogant.)

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So there is a reversal factor. So does this mean the slowing down from 50% light speed brings everything back to the same for the 3 observers, that is, earth, us and the new planet.

No. The time that you "saved" is never lost. It is important to realise that this isn't an illusion caused by speed. Your time is absolutely as valid as any other measurement of time in the Universe. What is lost is the whole meaning of "simultaneous" for things moving relative to each other at high speed.

Time only passes at the same rate for objects that are not moving relative to each other (and have the same gravitational influences, but that is another story that took another decade for Einstein to fully grasp).



It depends on where you measure from. It is as a function of the percentage of light speed relative to the observer's frame of reference. You will observe a very, very small increase in mass of the probe while observers on Earth will see a larger one. This is because of the Pythagorean relationship that makes the effect more pronounced as we approach the speed of light.

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I think that answered my previous question.

No need for a God. What science knows of reality is far weirder than anything the religious could possibly dream up. Truth is really stranger than fiction especially when it gets to Quantum Mechanics. Cause and Effect no longer apply. Instead probabiliies take over, allowing counter intuitive possibilites like someting being literally in two places at once. (I kid you not.)

If you want a real conundrum that will set your mind spinning about the potential for faster than light communication, check out "Quantum Entanglement".

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Is Quantum Mechanics where Einstein said something like "God does not roll dice" and my understanding of that was he could not see science based on something that was random.

Is Quantum Mechanics the "god" that covers all the unexplained.

Mike375 said:

Lets say I can get the rifle to do 50% light speed. What velocity will the chronograph show, bearing in mind it is a timing device. I assume the ballistic pendulum will higher than my calculated momentun because the bullets mass is greater. Or is it a case that for the pendulum the bullet's mass is the same on impact.

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If you get the rifle to c/2 (the bullet's additional speed is trivial) relative to the ballistic equipment the bullet's mass will be increased resulting in a higher momemtum value. The observer on the passing spaceship at any speed you choose will see the bullet's velocity relative to their ship.

However they will observe exactly the same relative momentum in the colliding particles as the stationary equipment. Any extra momentum their relative motion contibutes to the measurement will appear in both the cooiding particles and the view of the spaceship from those particles.

FDor this to happen regardless of the speed and associated foreshortening they must observe a different value for mass.

Momentum has to be frame independent because during a collision two things really are in the same place at the same time. If different frames observed different relative momenta then the rebounds from the collision would be different for different observers which is clearly impossible.

This is not to say they would see the same rebound angles. The observed directions of the particles would depend on the foreshortening that results from their speed relative to the collided particles.

Is Quantum Mechanics where Einstein said something like "God does not roll dice" and my understanding of that was he could not see science based on something that was random.

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Yes. Einstein spent the rest of his life trying to explain the observations described in Quantum Mechanics in terms of Relativiity but failed. To this day the reconciliation of QM and General Relativity (which includes Gravitation) remains the Holy Grail of Physics.

Ironically his first big breakthrough was on a QM phenomenon, the PhotoElectric Effect. In fact his Nobel prize was not for Relativity but for this work where he actually laid the foundations for QM.

Is Quantum Mechanics the "god" that covers all the unexplained.

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QM is already the explanation for virtually everything. Quantum Mechanical devices such as lasers which cannot be described by Classical Physics are the hallmark of our technology. Electricity, light, radio, chemistry, nuclear physics can be all be derived from the equasions of QM.

If there is still a need for "something out there" then I expect it will be something even weirder than QM. Perhaps it will come to light as a possibility when we finally understand the nature of reality.

However I don't believe it will be anything to do with a supreme primordial consciousness. I hope to see it in my life time because God's last retreat will be exposed and He will have to come out with His hands up or we will accept the truth.

"On the seventh day, man made God in his image."

GalaxiomAtHome said:

If there is still a need for "something out there" then I expect it will be something even weirder than QM. Perhaps it will come to light as a possibility when we finally understand the nature of reality.

However I don't believe it will be anything to do with a supreme primordial consciousness. I hope to see it in my life time because God's last retreat will be exposed and He will have to come out with His hands up or we will accept the truth.

"On the seventh day, man made God in his image."

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My own personal feeling, at least for the last few years, is a god or God did not create the universe. I think there are beings so far avdvanced over us that for practical purposes they are god like. However, they are limited in power. To the insects and little lizards in the garden I am god like. I can change their weather etc and there is nothing they will ever be able to do to predict what I might do tomorrow.

I feel the the universe and its creation or whatever you like to call it is supernatural in the sense it does not obey any laws of physics that we have or will ever have.

My feeling is the speed light, Quantum Mechanics and so on is like chemical energy and we have yet to discover the counterpart of nuclear energy and I don't think that discovery is available to us.

But one thing for sure is "exceeding speed of light" gets a lot of stuff up on Google

But there seems to be a lot of emphasis on observation. So I have another question.

Let's say I have a gun with some special powder and I work up a load while facing the opposite direction of the earth's orbit around the sun. My load gets to 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999% of light speed and so the energy and pressure etc to fire my bullet is 99.999999999999999999999999% of bursting the gun.

I turn around and fire the gun in the direction of the earths orbit and the additional velocity would add to a "figure" greater then speed of light for the muzzle velocity. does the gun burst?

Glaxiom,

As a side note I see you spell "equation" as "equasion" Which is correct. Google defaults to "equation"

Is it a new way of spelling the word.

Mike375 said:

Is Quantum Mechanics where Einstein said something like "God does not roll dice" and my understanding of that was he could not see science based on something that was random.

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It was my understanding that it offended his sense of the aesthetic.

GalaxiomAtHome said:

"On the seventh day, man made God in his image."

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And if we ever have the power - it will be the first thing people do.

Galaxiom here is one thing that bugs me in terms of calculating probabilities.

The standard line is that given infinity basically everything is possible. It strikes me that while certain dimensions appear to be infinite up down back and front. The period of time within which the present laws of physics would appear to have existed appear to be finite , although large.

To a certain extent would it be correct to say that our universe is therefore in someway finite?

For instance they always talk about a chimp typing out Shakespeares works word for word. But lets say there are processes that take 18 billion years. That would be an example of something that cannot exist in our universe not because our universe is not large enough but it has come up against one of the finite dimensions of the universe. (from our perspective)

Therefore its slightly incorrect to say everything is possible.

A more accurate position would be - everything is possible that has a time horizon within the limit of the age of the universe (that requires present laws of physics).

The important point is that potentially it turns a 100% probability into a 0% probability - kind of interesting!

I don't think the "chimpanzee" will ever get there because he will not type in a true random manner. He might be left handed.

I also wonder if the formation of planets etc suffers from a similar fate, that is, because of gravity or "whatever" things won't be really random but favour certain patterns. Of course if that is true it could mean just our near neighbour stars could be surrounded by earth like situation planets. Of course it could also mean the reverse and earth is unique.

Kryst51 said:

I have never claimed that Science requires faith, I say that Evolution requires faith based on the fact that many of its major supporters (interviews I have heard on Ben Steins "Expelled") say that it is highly unlikely to be true and the lack of evidence suggest that it is believed only because people want to.... Not based on science..... Thus requiring faith to support the belief....

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Just to give you a perspective from the other side, the terms "major supporters of evolution" and "on Ben Stein's (anything)" don't belong together.

Here's a link to a Scientific American review. They were asked to review the film by the film's creator. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-john-rennie

Kryst51 said:

Uh.... not according to everything I have heard..... And my reasoning is fine, you just don't reason the same way.....

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So, according to everything you have read, Creationsim is equally based in science as evolution is? If so, you really need to read more diverse sources.

And, I'm not attacking your reasoning. You have the right to believe in whatever you want. But "reason", using deductive logic, etc, does not lend its self to Creationism. Once again, that way requires a lot of faith.

Kryst51 said:

Just because it basically comes down to faith doesn't mean that science doesn't point things out, just not everything..... All of creation declares the glory of God, thus science does too.

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You will always find the same answer if that is all you allow yourself to find.

Kryst51 said:

No, not because of doubt..... I don't like pain and do everythhing I can to avoid it.... I would be a masochist to say that I did want to experience pain.....

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That's because its a normal, human reaction to avoid pain. As it is a normal, human reaction to have doubt. Every human since humans have existed has dealt with their own mortality at one point or another. We're wired to fear the unknown, and the unknown is what occurs at death. Even if think you know exactly what happens when you die, you will still have doubt. It's only human.

Mike375 said:

My own personal feeling, at least for the last few years, is a god or God did not create the universe. I think there are beings so far avdvanced over us that for practical purposes they are god like. However, they are limited in power.

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And where did they come from? This proposition just pushes the problem one step further away, adding more questions than it answers and provides no resolution. Moreover it is proposed without evidence or need.

I feel the the universe and its creation or whatever you like to call it is supernatural in the sense it does not obey any laws of physics that we have or will ever have.

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The currently accepted physical laws are not violated for all verifiable observations and are coherent from the moment the Universe reached the diameter of the smallest quanta of distance.
(This is known as The Planck Length and is about 1.6 x 10^-35 metres).

We have no theory of the nature of reality for any finer resolution. Essentially this is the size where pixelation of the Universe sets in.

The real goal is to find a mechanism to explain how the first pixel was injected with a concentration of raw energy. That is very difficult given that we cannot directly observe either this event or anything beyond the edge of the Universe.

However recent measurements of deviations from complete homogenatity and matter flow require explantions. While experimental error and noise have yet to be eliminated, some physicists have suggested that it indicates interaction with objects beyond our Universe. Hopefully this will ultimately provide us with an opportunity to assess proposed models.

Your alternative proposition that gods initiated the highly focussed energy is a very complex proposition to explain one simple question. Clearly it is unnecessary.

My feeling is the speed light, Quantum Mechanics and so on is like chemical energy and we have yet to discover the counterpart of nuclear energy and I don't think that discovery is available to us.

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Perhaps. The "nuclear" equivalent would be the revelation of the structure of the medium that gave birth to the Big Bang and our Universe. There are several proposals but as yet none has been able to offer a prediction that would confirm it as a leader.

Such is the case with String Theory. The maths fits the observations because they have been crafted to do so. However all coherent alternatives remain on the table until the maths of one suggests a new observation that turns out to be uniquely correct for one theory.

Let's say I have a gun with some special powder and I work up a load while facing the opposite direction of the earth's orbit around the sun. My load gets to 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999% of light speed and so the energy and pressure etc to fire my bullet is 99.999999999999999999999999% of bursting the gun.

I turn around and fire the gun in the direction of the earths orbit and the additional velocity would add to a "figure" greater then speed of light for the muzzle velocity. does the gun burst?

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As I explained earlier, the bullet cannot under any circumstances exceed the speed of light. The relativistic time effect of the extra orbital velocity would cause the vapors from the charge to expand slightly more slowly, reducing the muzzle velocity and protecting the barrel.

Mike, I don't think you have grasped this issue at all. As I said before, it is not a speed in the ordinary sense but a fundamental property of SpaceTime. This is what Einstein realised when he studied Maxwell's Equations and until you comprehend this you will never understand the issues that govern speed.

There are any number of curious but naive amateur physicists detailing various theories about reality from as simple as "something out there" to elaborate but obviously incoherent proposals. The Internet has given them a voice but they are still talking rubbish.

Until a person can get their head around General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics any attempt to work at the cutting edge of the field is quite delusional.

Lightwave said:

Galaxiom here is one thing that bugs me in terms of calculating probabilities.

The standard line is that given infinity basically everything is possible. It strikes me that while certain dimensions appear to be infinite up down back and front. The period of time within which the present laws of physics would appear to have existed appear to be finite , although large.

To a certain extent would it be correct to say that our universe is therefore in someway finite?

For instance they always talk about a chimp typing out Shakespeares works word for word. But lets say there are processes that take 18 billion years. That would be an example of something that cannot exist in our universe not because our universe is not large enough but it has come up against one of the finite dimensions of the universe. (from our perspective)

Therefore its slightly incorrect to say everything is possible.

A more accurate position would be - everything is possible that has a time horizon within the limit of the age of the universe (that requires present laws of physics).

The important point is that potentially it turns a 100% probability into a 0% probability - kind of interesting!

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We do know that life as we know it is dependent on what we call the Goldilocks Factor and these conditions are only likely to be met a limited number of times in our Universe.

Indeed the Universe as we know it is even more special in that matter could not even exist if the fundamental constants were even slightly different.

However we have no idea of how big the ultimate media that manifests our Universe may be, though there is little doubt there is something outside it that led to the Big Bang.

Some theories indicate there may be as many as 10^500 different types of Universes and no reason why this many or even more couldn't exist. This literally unimaginable number dwarfs any concepts of numbers in our Universe, including the number of atoms, by hundreds of orders of magnitude.

This easily explains the possibily that at least one universe, our Universe meets the precise conditions necessary and has at least one planet exactly right for us to exist.

Once again the probablilties are not as important as the fact that the observation is inevitably made from the same place that manifested the right conditions.

Goldilocks was born in Baby Bear's bed.

GalaxiomAtHome said:

And where did they come from? This proposition just pushes the problem one step further away, adding more questions than it answers and provides no resolution. Moreover it is proposed without evidence or need.

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Assuming there is intelligent life elsewhere the odds would be very high that some of it is extremely advances compared to us.....god like for practical purposes.

On the other hand if we are the only intelligent life, then that brings us back to "you know where"

Your alternative proposition that gods initiated the highly focussed energy is a very complex proposition to explain one simple question. Clearly it is unnecessary.

Perhaps. The "nuclear" equivalent would be the revelation of the structure of the medium that gave birth to the Big Bang and our Universe. There are several proposals but as yet none has been able to offer a prediction that would confirm it as a leader.

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No, my proposition was that the "physics" would never be available to us because not part of our natural laws. Thus it is supernatural.

What is pre Big Bang. Wasn't it Hawking who said something along the lines of.....we can't observe pre Big Bang, no physics or time etc....

Mike, I don't think you have grasped this issue at all. As I said before, it is not a speed in the ordinary sense but a fundamental property of SpaceTime. This is what Einstein realised when he studied Maxwell's Equations and until you comprehend this you will never understand the issues that govern speed.

There are any number of curious but naive amateur physicists detailing various theories about reality from as simple as "something out there" to elaborate but obviously incoherent proposals. The Internet has given them a voice but they are still talking rubbish.

Until a person can get their head around General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics any attempt to work at the cutting edge of the field is quite delusional.

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I don't have the maths to be into cutting edge Quantum Mechanics or the desire. I would have thought questions like mine and similar were a long way from cutting edge And it seems the mor ecutting edge you get the close you get to "don't know"

The reason I asked about the gun bursting and the bullet was to see if this stuff manifests as more than observations.

Adam Caramon said:

That's because its a normal, human reaction to avoid pain. As it is a normal, human reaction to have doubt. Every human since humans have existed has dealt with their own mortality at one point or another. We're wired to fear the unknown, and the unknown is what occurs at death. Even if think you know exactly what happens when you die, you will still have doubt. It's only human.

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This one lost me a bit. Unless I misunderstood it, your original question wasn't whether or not someone wanted to be in pain, but why they wanted to avoid dying if they were sure they were going to a far, far better place. There are plenty of ways of dying that involve little or no pain (and I'm not talking exclusively about suicide, since I know religions often frown on that). By responding as if you'd asked about pain, the question was neatly sidestepped.

Mike375 said:

Assuming there is intelligent life elsewhere the odds would be very high that some of it is extremely advances compared to us.....god like for practical purposes.

On the other hand if we are the only intelligent life, then that brings us back to "you know where"

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Why would the odds be 'very high' that some of this life is extremely advanced compared to us? Yes, it might be, but equally there might be thousands of lifeforms out there, of which we're the most advanced. The only reason I can see to assume that there are more advanced beings is that it supports your idea of their having created everything in the first place. That's got a dangerously Christian ring to it, mate.

Adam Caramon said:

Just to give you a perspective from the other side, the terms "major supporters of evolution" and "on Ben Stein's (anything)" don't belong together.

Here's a link to a Scientific American review. They were asked to review the film by the film's creator. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-john-rennie

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I'll check it out during my lunch break.

Adam Caramon said:

So, according to everything you have read, Creationsim is equally based in science as evolution is? If so, you really need to read more diverse sources.

And, I'm not attacking your reasoning. You have the right to believe in whatever you want. But "reason", using deductive logic, etc, does not lend its self to Creationism. Once again, that way requires a lot of faith.

You will always find the same answer if that is all you allow yourself to find.

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OK

Adam Caramon said:

That's because its a normal, human reaction to avoid pain. As it is a normal, human reaction to have doubt. Every human since humans have existed has dealt with their own mortality at one point or another. We're wired to fear the unknown, and the unknown is what occurs at death. Even if think you know exactly what happens when you die, you will still have doubt. It's only human.

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OK

Alc said:

Why would the odds be 'very high' that some of this life is extremely advanced compared to us?

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For the same reason if you pulled out a bank account from the big bank the odds are very high that it would be very small compared to the biggest accounts.

The only reason I can see to assume that there are more advanced beings is that it supports your idea of their having created everything in the first place. That's got a dangerously Christian ring to it, mate.

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I did not suggest that these very advanced beings started the universe. But they may well be repsonsible for doing or having "god like" things. But if turns out we are all alone, then Christianity is on the home straight as the favourite

The start of the universe will be supernatural because our physics is not present pre Big Bang and so pre Big Bang is supernatural. Being supernatural does not mean a man with a white beard.

Originally Posted by Alc
Why would the odds be 'very high' that some of this life is extremely advanced compared to us?

Mike375 said:

For the same reason if you pulled out a bank account from the big bank the odds are very high that it would be very small compared to the biggest accounts.

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You, presumably, know that every major bank in the developed world has at least some very rich clients. If they didn't, they'd go out of business.

I know the person closest to me at the moment is around 5' 10" tall. Based on that I could say that the odds on me not being the shortest guy in my office are very high.

Neither of us is dealing with odds, since we both know the statements to be undeniably true.

You don't know anything about any of these other lifeforms (assuming, for argument's sake, that they exist), so you're basing these odds on what?

Alc said:

Originally Posted by Alc

You don't know anything about any of these other lifeforms (assuming, for argument's sake, that they exist), so you're basing these odds on what?

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Evolution and the odds being extremely high that life is throughout the universe.

But of course we might be alone.

Mike375 said:

Evolution and the odds being extremely high that life is throughout the universe.

But of course we might be alone.

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Ok, so assume other lifeforms exist. This proves nothing. The fact that they exist doesn't mean that the odds are high that they're more (or less) evolved or advanced than we are. We have no information at all on which to base assumptions on their intelligence.

Alc said:

Ok, so assume other lifeforms exist. This proves nothing. The fact that they exist doesn't mean that the odds are high that they're more (or less) evolved or advanced than we are. We have no information at all on which to base assumptions on their intelligence.

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If there are millions of them wouldn't you expect some to be extremely advanced?

And if there are not millions of them I would think we are alone.