tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post7857076879743133928..comments2024-03-28T20:50:49.311-07:00Comments on CONTRARY BRIN: Here comes the debate over the other kind of aliens...David Brinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comBlogger72125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-5343347544971259062010-05-04T11:34:30.928-07:002010-05-04T11:34:30.928-07:00SteveO said:
"Although the Fertile Crescent ...SteveO said:<br /><br /><i>"Although the Fertile Crescent may have *allowed* farming earlier (I haven't seen climate data for it during the last Ice Age - link if you know of some), you need more than that to get a farming society leading to civilization, as Jared Diamond explores in Guns, Germs, and Steel. You also need a reason to allocate energy to farming (working now for a more predictable payoff later) rather than hunting and gathering (payoff now, but subject to greater variation)."</i><br /><br />Okay, I think I understand your position better, and I think we are pretty much on the same page. Climate change throughout the late Pleistocene / early Holocene, undeniably did affect human cultural development. Exactly what led to humans changing from H/G to AG is in some dispute still.<br /><br />I don't have much time for a search at the moment but here is one link you might find interesting. It is sort of an overview on the current hypotheses regarding this subject and the methods behind the data that lead to the hypotheses.<a href="http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=biogeography" rel="nofollow">Biogeography</a><br /><br />Some interesting excerpts:<br /><br /><i>"Hence the term agriculture refers to the rise of a “new<br />kind of relationship” that came about when the hunting-and-gathering no longer provided<br />sufficient resources for a population. Studies have shown that gathering can actually be more<br />energy efficient than cultivation under the right conditions (Harlan 1975). Our human ancestors<br />had been hunter-gatherer societies for millions of years before, which leaves us to assume<br />agriculture emerged out of some kind of new necessity that emerged during this period when only gathering food was no longer a reliable source. This change could have occurred due to<br />either population growth or shortages of food for one reason or another. Thus, humans instated<br />measures to control food sources through domestication."</i><br /><br /><i>"For example, wild<br />grains, grinding equipment, and a stone oven were excavated in 2004 from Israel’s Sea of<br />Galilee. Archaeologists found 143 varieties of seeds, including wheat and barley, dating back<br />over 23,000 years. Researchers suggest they did not actually plant crops but rather a cooling<br />period and disappearance of wild game forced these Ohalo people to gather seeds in the fall,<br />grind them into flour and bake the food source to survive winter months (Zorich 2005)."</i>Darrell Ehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14054311762477388637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-15943176350642255022010-05-04T00:40:58.403-07:002010-05-04T00:40:58.403-07:00on to next.,....on to next.,....David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-48767659238736081982010-05-03T21:18:10.869-07:002010-05-03T21:18:10.869-07:00On Mass Effect, a clip from ME2 demonstrating why ...On Mass Effect, a clip from ME2 demonstrating why ME is just pure awesome: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCoHT_cHPzY" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCoHT_cHPzY</a>Ilithi Dragonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10300247936272572280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-48552414977641149912010-05-03T20:22:14.441-07:002010-05-03T20:22:14.441-07:00We'll almost definitely have the ability to de...We'll almost definitely have the ability to detect habitable planets and even techological civilizations in other solar systems well before we have the ability to travel between solar systems.<br /><br />The same probably goes for any hypothetical aliens.<br /><br />So staying quiet is probably futile anyway.<br /><br />If aliens exist, their equivalent of the Kepler telsecope is probably clicking away right this second.<br /><br />If the hypothetical aliens are aggressive and expansive as Hawkings suggests, they're likely to be proactively looking for new targets, not waiting for us to send up a flare.<br /><br />On a related note, there's one proposed form of METI which I read about 30-odd years ago which I'm surprised doesn;t get moe discussion.<br /><br />Manufacture several tons of a relatively long-lasting artificial isotope like Technetium and fire it into the sun so it shows up the soalr spectrum.<br /><br />Not exactly useful for exchanging data but it certainly says "Hey, look over here."<br /><br />Has anyone ever checked the spectra of other stars for evidence of his sort of manipulation? <br /><br />Although coem to think of it it'd make a lot more sense to spray clouds of Technetium near the sun to maximise the visibility.Ian Gouldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04352147295160200128noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-1667495583578415192010-05-03T20:12:10.653-07:002010-05-03T20:12:10.653-07:00In 'The Weathermakers' Tim Flannery points...In 'The Weathermakers' Tim Flannery points out that it was the gradual deterioration of the 'fertile crescent' due to climate change (the Milankovich cycles tidying up the last ice age on that occasion) which led to desparate remedies on the part of the inhabitants.<br /><br />They invented the city.<br /><br />asesima: an affluent suburb of UrTony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-27067864027248866222010-05-03T20:05:50.017-07:002010-05-03T20:05:50.017-07:00There was an excellent piece of dialogue in Mass E...There was an excellent piece of dialogue in Mass Effect 2 concerning intelligent life which hit home, and may help explain the relative lack of identifiable sentient life via radio waves and the like: All scientific advancement is a result of intelligence overcoming and compensating for limitations. If there are no limitations, then there are no advancement. No advancement results in cultural stagnation. This works the other way too. Advancement before a culture is ready is disastrous.<br /><br />If humanity was more able physically, stronger, with effective claws and the like, then there would have been little reason to develop and use tools. Humanity would have remained a smart predator. But it would not have gone beyond this.<br /><br />It is the weak that have to overcome their limitations. The meek inherit the Earth because they struggle to overcome. Because their life <i>is</i> struggle. If there is a too-effective predator that wipes out a new intelligence, then that world will never evolve effective intelligence (or it will take forever for the intelligence to arise at least). If a world is somehow too benevolent environmentally (say the entire world is one huge series of islands rather than continents, and has a warm and stable climate) then life has no need to fight and grow.<br /><br />Life may actually be commonplace. But it may be limited to its environment... too harsh and it never evolves beyond single-cell organisms. Too benign, and there is no struggle to force life to thrive... and thus intelligence is not encouraged. And if there's a super-predator that is overly effective... then these new intelligences may be hunted into extinction before it can grow enough to overcome this threat.<br /><br />Rob H.Acacia H.https://www.blogger.com/profile/07678539067303911329noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-72109075086466066032010-05-03T18:30:09.509-07:002010-05-03T18:30:09.509-07:00Rewinn & Matt, I had in mind something to dete...Rewinn & Matt, I had in mind something to detect long waves and very weak signals. Concerning a lot of small, guided radio telescopes, it seems more difficult and the mission might not be interchangeable. Might want both, if we could.Tim H.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-47621453802704874742010-05-03T17:25:04.349-07:002010-05-03T17:25:04.349-07:00Ilithi, from what I have heard about the "bom...Ilithi, from what I have heard about the "bomb" it doesn't sound like a particularly workable explosive device. More like one built by someone who watched too much MacGuyver, or action movies where cars apparently can't wait to explode. If it was actually sponsored by a Taliban or al-Qaeda, I think it would have been a simpler, more robust, design with which they have experience.<br /><br />For now, my money is on a home-grown idiot.SteveOhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04028435196419643147noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-23160598807438060202010-05-03T17:18:35.450-07:002010-05-03T17:18:35.450-07:00@Darrell E
To be clear, I don't buy the "...@Darrell E<br /><br />To be clear, I don't buy the "Rare Earth" hypothesis either, with respect to life origination or think that the factors would prevent intelligent life from arising. I do think that some of these factors might reduce the probability (a.k.a. increase the length of time before) a *tech* civilization could get up and running. And given the really short (geologically speaking) span of time it took to form life on Earth once conditions allowed it, I tend to think that we will find life pretty much anywhere it is possible, and intelligent life in a good number (though I am much less sure about that - I mean, really, where is the evolutionary pressure to evolve such mutant brains as ours?). Though of course, this too extrapolates from a data point of one!!<br /><br />Although the Fertile Crescent may have *allowed* farming earlier (I haven't seen climate data for it during the last Ice Age - link if you know of some), you need more than that to get a farming society leading to civilization, as Jared Diamond explores in <i>Guns, Germs, and Steel</i>. You also need a reason to allocate energy to farming (working now for a more predictable payoff later) rather than hunting and gathering (payoff now, but subject to greater variation).<br /><br />There is probably no one reason for this transition in those areas that independently invented agriculture, but I suspect at least part of it is some minimum human density. In order to get that density to allow farming, then they must be very efficient hunters and gatherers in a fecund location. So why switch to farming at all? My guess is that they were so efficient that they grew to such numbers that they started to deplete the easily available resources, AND were lucky enough to be in a place that not only had a stable enough climate for farming, but had potentially farm-able plants. We don't need to know the exact probabilities to know that that is a chain of dependent events, so the joint probability of happening is smaller than the probability of intelligent hunter-gatherers' way of life. This is borne out by different societies across our planet - some never did leave the hunter-gatherer stage, and for a variety of reasons.<br /><br />Similarly with the Moon, there is a large number of things it did for the Earth to allow more global stability (and local predictable instability) that may have allowed life to develop sooner. And there just are not a lot of ways to get a big Moon orbiting a terrestrial planet deep in a sun's gravity well based on the physics we know now. Not to say that is a complete knowledge, but we can only hypothesize from what we know. Still and all, I'd bet that a big moon is not necessary for life - it just might speed up the appearance of complex life earlier.<br /><br />So I guess I don't disagree with you that there is a huge paucity of data so we really can't answer these questions, but I do tend to think that we can come up with some reasonable hypotheses based on what we do know. And this seems a reasonable hypothesis about why we haven't heard from anyone yet.SteveOhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04028435196419643147noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-50140586585472255902010-05-03T16:31:26.069-07:002010-05-03T16:31:26.069-07:00@Robert said...
"...a Federal law forbidding ...@Robert said...<br /><i>"...a Federal law forbidding that practice (the confiscation and harassment of civilian filming of arrests) might be called for. After all, the best method of preventing police abuse is through citizen surveillance efforts."</i><br /><br />PLUS it would be protective of "good cops" by creating a record that they were not abusive (which incidentally removing any advantage that "bad cops" might have from their behavior.) Also in the rare unfortunate incident where something very bad happens to the cop, a citizen record can help catch the badguy.<br /><br />Unfortunately, some police treat even <a href="http://www.seattlepi.com/local/419183_golflawsuit28.html?source=rss" rel="nofollow">their own recordings as things to hide when they misbehave.</a>rewinnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14008105385364113371noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-84134659892960150202010-05-03T16:23:12.584-07:002010-05-03T16:23:12.584-07:00Matt & Tim H. said..."Another reason to v...Matt & Tim H. said...<i>"Another reason to visit asteroids, a large one might be a great place to anchor a Preposterously Large Array, which might have some chance of detecting something interesting.<br /><br />Why anchor such an array to anything? You'd be better off with a small fleet of telescope satellites that would know how to keep themselves in some precise formation"</i><br /><br />Do we need to keep precise formation, so long as we know each probe's relative position and can juggle the data appropriately?<br /><br />How light a radiotelescope would be worth launching toward infinity, perhaps with a solar sail to provide a little extra push, as part of a Preposterously Large Array? Could the cost of mass-producing and lofting them ( perhaps in a bundle ) be brought within range of the vanity of billionaires and of energy-cartel owners ?rewinnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14008105385364113371noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-10906509784971495712010-05-03T12:38:47.034-07:002010-05-03T12:38:47.034-07:00Hi David,
Your link to your "The great silen...Hi David,<br /><br />Your link to your "The great silence" article on http://www.davidbrin.com/science.htm to http://www.brin-l.com/brin/silence.html seems broken. <br /><br />I found a copy of the article at http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1983QJRAS..24..283BDave Xhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07921503998514640850noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-19269796998496333032010-05-03T12:17:32.193-07:002010-05-03T12:17:32.193-07:00Considering that police have been deliberately tar...Considering that police have been deliberately targeting people who film arrests and the like with "obstruction of law enforcement" suits and confiscating cameras and camera phones, I think that a Federal law forbidding that practice (the confiscation and harassment of civilian filming of arrests) might be called for. After all, the best method of preventing police abuse is through citizen surveillance efforts.<br /><br />Rob H.Acacia H.https://www.blogger.com/profile/07678539067303911329noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-19114908652548874962010-05-03T10:50:56.425-07:002010-05-03T10:50:56.425-07:00Citizen surveillance is in the news:
I just heard...Citizen surveillance is in the news:<br /><br />I just heard an NPR report on a <a href="http://www.philly.com/dailynews/hot_topics/Tainted_Justice.html" rel="nofollow">Pulitzer prize-winning series</a> by the Philadelphia Daily News. It was about a narcotics unit that went around robbing convenience stores and abusing the owners under the guise of looking for small cellophane baggies (read: drug paraphernalia.)<br /><br />In each case, the police disabled the store's surveillance system before proceeding. The reporters' break came when they were sent surveillance video from a man whose system not only saved the video locally, but also uploaded it to his home.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17774230311169357530noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-24156817434771332552010-05-03T10:42:30.651-07:002010-05-03T10:42:30.651-07:00Tim H. said...
Another reason to visit astero...Tim H. said...<br /><br /><i> Another reason to visit asteroids, a large one might be a great place to anchor a Preposterously Large Array, which might have some chance of detecting something interesting.</i><br /><br />Why anchor such an array to anything? You'd be better off with a small fleet of telescope satellites that would know how to keep themselves in some precise formation.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00418412726523908875noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-14558657204483599432010-05-03T05:57:20.638-07:002010-05-03T05:57:20.638-07:00Rob H. does have a good point, there (and maybe TH...Rob H. does have a good point, there (and maybe THAT'S why we haven't heard anything! <br />} ; = 8 P ). I'd much rather see the funds allocated to projects that can produce something useful, like going to Mars or mining asteroids, etc.<br /><br /><br />Off-topic, and on a disturbing note, is anyone else suspecting the attempted Times Square bomber was an attempted Oklahoma City bomber repeat? There's a Taliban group claiming credit, but everyone involved in the investigation is skeptical of that because they apparently claim credit for everything. My money's on home-grown terrorism attempting to copy the Oklahoma City Bombing.Ilithi Dragonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10300247936272572280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-54811524044628249052010-05-02T20:08:24.065-07:002010-05-02T20:08:24.065-07:00Considering the scarcity of funds and resources fo...Considering the scarcity of funds and resources for far too many scientific and astronomical projects, should we waste our time and money beaming messages to aliens who may not even exist when that money could be better spent studying stars, upgrading our technology so we can accurately find habitable planets, and generally improving science as a whole?<br /><br />Yes, this is basically the "why should we waste money in space when we have hungry people in our own country" argument, but it is also valid: why waste time and resources for something that has no real reason to it but arrogance to shout out into the night "Here we are! Come and get us!" If we had found a radio signal out there that was definitely from aliens, that would be one thing. We'd have a valid target to send messages back to. But we don't. It doesn't matter if the hypothetical aliens are hostile or not. What matters is that the money, time, and effort should be spent on other scientific endeavors, not wasted on prideful foolishness.<br /><br />Rob H.Acacia H.https://www.blogger.com/profile/07678539067303911329noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-5794339704994248752010-05-02T16:09:42.748-07:002010-05-02T16:09:42.748-07:00My definition of civilization is a bit different. ...My definition of civilization is a bit different. <br /><br />What it is to me is a network of trust, rather a network of networks. And there are of course, different levels of trust, and trust is in a constant state of flux.<br /><br />So yes, you can have Hegemony or dictatorship or anything, as long as there is trust. You don't have to like it, there just needs to be trust between the participants. Someone will be carrying out their "duties" and in return gain something, Money, honor, power, it doesn't matter, but each side "trusts" the other to carry out their end.<br /><br />A good example of a low level of trust is one of the pillars of civilization, the contract. It doesn't require a deep amount of trust, just an agreed method and amount of exchange. (Gold is Good! )<br /><br />Understand, my Mother's youngest sister had an arranged marriage. Neither she nor my uncle wanted to marry each other, but it was arranged by their mothers. But it was there to keep land that was reclaimed from the sea, over 150 years ago, in certain families. And yes, my Mother's family was founded in 367BC. (We have records. -even though there may have been breaks, during the War Centuries.)<br /><br />But......<br /><br />In return, my Mother's youngest sister controls her family farm and money. She works very hard and is rewarded, very well. So even though both parties were unwilling, everyone trusted they would carry out side of the bargain.<br /><br />*Sigh* But you may ask, what happens when there is a violation of that trust. I'm afraid we are going to see what happens, and fairly soon. Because whether or not, merely perceived or fact, I think we are facing an Integrum. A breakdown of trust is coming.<br /><br />Fear Not! ( I like using that phrase.) I don't expect a "Long Night" in fact, it might only last a few months, maybe a couple of years to five years, at the outside, in places like Central and Northern California. Because modern telecommunications, trust will "heal" very, very quickly. The very nature of things like business has lots of safeguards and will evolve new ones, as time goes one.<br /><br />I must admit, I had this discussion with Tom Kratman, and he expects it may take 20 years or longer to re-establish civilization.<br /><br />In either case, due to the geopolitical location of North America, North America will dominate the world for the next century, it's just a matter of who's going to dominate North America. Some of the guys from Stratfor (Strategic Forecast) here in Austin, think it will be Mexico. ( I think that Mexico's infrastructure is in too much of a mess.)<br /><br />So what's my point. I don't think anybody had THE answer to Civilization. And I think David is right, we need to know more before we run into Others, because aliens are well, alien. At least we now have a pretty good idea of which stars have the proper spectrum to hold habitable planets. (within the last couple of months, only.)Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09335558313809700438noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-63901385443029160172010-05-02T10:49:26.509-07:002010-05-02T10:49:26.509-07:00"... but it does look like humanity tends to ...<i>"... but it does look like humanity tends to reach a certain level of stability when the average person becomes content enough. Hopefully this isn't just a blip... "</i><br /><br />In addition, as a general trend, when human females control their reproductive capacity, they produce fewer kids. The contentment angle is certainly very important as a motivator, but the empowerment angle seems to be necessary to connecting motivation to action.<br /><br />We might therefore conjecture that a species in which the costs of reproduction are borne roughly in proportion to the amount of contentment it provides the individual (...or whatever reproductive unit is relevant...) would experience little expansion pressure due to population. We might hope that they would outproduce, in a technological way, more unbalanced civilizations but ... who knows?<br /><br />Many people seem to satisfy their procreative needs (... some would say "sublimate" ;-) with other creative endeavours, such as writing or developing ever more elaborate virtual worlds. Perhaps the aliens will conquer Earth in order to get more players for their equivaent of Star Wars: Galaxies.rewinnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14008105385364113371noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-65272593528902336352010-05-02T10:19:21.302-07:002010-05-02T10:19:21.302-07:00FoundOnWeb: " Surely our normal radio/TV/BMEW...FoundOnWeb: " Surely our normal radio/TV/BMEWS transmissions are more easily detectable than a single 'hello world' fired off into the ether."<br /><br />Maybe not. The more controversial METI messages involve sending a directed signal to nearby systems which look like they might plausibly support life. It takes far less energy to send a signal to a particular place than to blanket the universe with it.rsynnotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12125935382858758107noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-32103286795293855432010-05-02T10:05:46.246-07:002010-05-02T10:05:46.246-07:00CulturalEngineer: "As much as I loved the Niv...CulturalEngineer: "As much as I loved the Niven "Kzinti" stories, it seems unlikely that a highly technical society could develop without substantial co-operation drives."<br /><br />(Minor spoiler, but mentioned towards the beginning of almost all Kzinti stories) They <i>didn't</i> develop a technological society; they stole it.rsynnotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12125935382858758107noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-73302065360124593792010-05-02T10:01:53.681-07:002010-05-02T10:01:53.681-07:00Johnathan: The puppeteers are the paranoid herd an...Johnathan: The puppeteers are the paranoid herd animals, of course. And, in the later books, turn out to be much, <i>much</i> nastier than anyone else.rsynnotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12125935382858758107noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-68266087631162566762010-05-02T10:00:10.695-07:002010-05-02T10:00:10.695-07:00"All living creatures inherently use resource..."All living creatures inherently use resources to the limits of their ability, inventing new aims, desires and ambitions to suit their next level of power."<br /><br />This one is interesting, actually. Do they really? To what level?<br /><br />We're now seeing a situation where in the most socially advanced (I use this to mean countries with a high level of social/economic equality) development, populations are stabilising, or in some cases actually falling. If a hundred times the resources it currently enjoys were to become available tomorrow, is it really credible that, say, Germany, would consume the lot and go actively looking for more?<br /><br />Of course, you can't necessarily say that any given aliens would behave the same way, but it does look like humanity tends to reach a certain level of stability when the average person becomes content enough. Hopefully this isn't just a blip...rsynnotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12125935382858758107noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-25741249188659730012010-05-01T23:53:31.104-07:002010-05-01T23:53:31.104-07:00no sweat! The show itself went pretty lame. I ju...no sweat! The show itself went pretty lame. I just don't recall quaking with fear over invasion. My WHOLE point was that we don't know and need to talk more among ourselves before shouting yoohooDavid Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-49419914166564079652010-05-01T22:22:43.149-07:002010-05-01T22:22:43.149-07:00Dude,
Sorry to be so critical. I have no problem...Dude, <br /><br />Sorry to be so critical. I have no problem with discussion. But I barely consider Larry King intelligent life from the quality of his show. And I doubt Dan Ayckroyd will ever constructively contribute to any public discussion on any subject. <br /><br />Any danger from phoning ET is far less than from the nuclear power plants we need to be building and even less than from the LHC. <br /><br />Really I'm sorry to be so negative. I like your books. I love many of your essays on the net. Discussing aliens is interesting in itself. I just cannot take the danger from ET seriously.<br /><br />And I really really hate the Larry King show. Sorry.ppnlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01720719028496317693noreply@blogger.com