A few billion years and a few million square miles. Probably a few (or more than a few) other things as well, it's an interesting and very young field. I was lucky to take an 8 student seminar course from Prof Cyril Ponnamperuna, one of the real guiding lights. Awesome and inspiring fellow, and each week, he brought in five star guest lecturers (Rasool, Sagan, Clarke...).
Speaking of Sagan...
Did you read his "Contact" novel that he wrote before his death?
And can you understand this picture, where he smiles near the symbol? He bent his head, so the symbol is well visible...
Did you read his "Contact" novel that he wrote before his death?
And can you understand this picture, where he smiles near the symbol? He bent his head, so the symbol is well visible...
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
A couple of weeks ago a hawk took a rat just before it ran under a car, about 10 metres from me outside my house. First I new was when it put its brakes on just after it shot over my shoulder. How it stopped so quick and managed to fly away without touching car or ground was astounding. There was a program on the radio about research into how rats (or mice...can't remember) sense overhead danger. The problem for this rat was relative velocity.
The chance of this happening just then was, like every isolated event in nature, infinitessimally small. I'm not the only one who has problems with probability.
Increasingly it seems we are the victorious hybrid amongst several hominids. Perhaps a set of different hybrids. Whoever we are, the chance of us having become exactly so is infinitessimally small. So we broaden our definition of "exactly" until chance appears to make sense, so we can make a histogram, for example, where we couldn't draw a continuous curve. To what extent does our conception of probability then depend on how we categorise; on how we divide reality up so we can generalise? Having put ourselves into the top category of our scheme, it's no wonder that we are the only ones there.
If you measure by success in domination then, once again, the contribution of chance is questionable: we ate our competitors. By definition, that was a certainty, because that's what domination means.
Why us? Why are you a human and not an insect? How do I know you aren't an alien life form intent on perplexity? Civilised people make sophisticated assumptions that shape their idea of "strange". Less civilised people make simpler assumptions. Isolated individuals are lost, as ever, and know very little. Social progress has made such a huge contribution, and shouldn't be underestimated. Without it, we couldn't be asking these questions, never mind answering them.
We weren't selected, we select ourselves constantly. That's why we have a concept of "free will", even though it's enormously inconvenient and problematic.
The chance of this happening just then was, like every isolated event in nature, infinitessimally small. I'm not the only one who has problems with probability.
Increasingly it seems we are the victorious hybrid amongst several hominids. Perhaps a set of different hybrids. Whoever we are, the chance of us having become exactly so is infinitessimally small. So we broaden our definition of "exactly" until chance appears to make sense, so we can make a histogram, for example, where we couldn't draw a continuous curve. To what extent does our conception of probability then depend on how we categorise; on how we divide reality up so we can generalise? Having put ourselves into the top category of our scheme, it's no wonder that we are the only ones there.
If you measure by success in domination then, once again, the contribution of chance is questionable: we ate our competitors. By definition, that was a certainty, because that's what domination means.
Why us? Why are you a human and not an insect? How do I know you aren't an alien life form intent on perplexity? Civilised people make sophisticated assumptions that shape their idea of "strange". Less civilised people make simpler assumptions. Isolated individuals are lost, as ever, and know very little. Social progress has made such a huge contribution, and shouldn't be underestimated. Without it, we couldn't be asking these questions, never mind answering them.
We weren't selected, we select ourselves constantly. That's why we have a concept of "free will", even though it's enormously inconvenient and problematic.
If humans had formed in the jar, would that have been less baffling? Maybe it's in the back of an old cupboard now, full of intelligent and very angry insects, with guns.
Don't forget the contribution of the Soviet Union's Oparin, and other European communists.
...You know a few years ago I was talking to someone and the topic just drifted as it does, and for some reason it got to man and life on earth.I mentioned yes evolution etc...This was the answer I was given...You don't believe all that about man and the apes do you>
I was speechless..I could not believe what Had been said..I walked away in shock.
However I can say that if we think we have all the answers we are at fault..
I'm not saying any ideas are right or wrong..however we have been wrong many times in the past and to think we know it all now is flawed..
Evolution is correct but how correct I don't know do you?
Remember how correct people in the past thought they were the world is flat and everything else is wrong..we know now its turtles all the way down..
I still think we have a lot to learn..I know that what I learned at school etc has been added to way more than I realised..
Regards
M. Gregg
Last edited:
Who was Oparin? I never heard such name. I emigrated from Soviet Union.
No turtles, but the Universe is flat. Despite the Earth is ball-shaped.
It is the latest scientific belief.
Its a bit generalised Einstein could be said to be isolated in his thinking..
There are many others..
I'm not comparing the above to the thread topic..
Regards
M. Gregg
But he was a hero. Maybe fell out of favour following the Lysenko fiasco?
Alexander Oparin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The area of research fascinated dialectical materialists, of course. They weren't nutters, either:
John Desmond Bernal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alexander Oparin,
Quote:
There is no fundamental difference between a living organism and lifeless matter. The complex combination of manifestations and properties so characteristic of life must have arisen in the process of the evolution of matter.
That says it all realy..do you believe this comment?
The answer is realy the bottom line..if its yes then is everything alive or dead?
Or do we differentiate some is alive and some is dead or there is no difference the term is not relevant..or everything has the potential to be alive.
Or nothing is alive its just a chemical reaction..
Regards
M. Gregg
Quote:
There is no fundamental difference between a living organism and lifeless matter. The complex combination of manifestations and properties so characteristic of life must have arisen in the process of the evolution of matter.
That says it all realy..do you believe this comment?
The answer is realy the bottom line..if its yes then is everything alive or dead?
Or do we differentiate some is alive and some is dead or there is no difference the term is not relevant..or everything has the potential to be alive.
Or nothing is alive its just a chemical reaction..
Regards
M. Gregg
Plastic is good said some good points . I am very unhappy with Snowball Earth concept . However it is a distinct possibility that it happened . One recent idea is that eddy pools of relatively warm water allowed a few marine creatures to survive . Perhaps ?
The thing that killed sparrows most was more efficient storage of grain it is said .
About man being the last arrival . I agree with what was said . I still think we are remarkably late arrivals . That's all . I strongly doubt any other creature arrived anywhere near our time . Apes 30 Million years ?
As a piece of Star Trek . What is life took 13 billion years to evolve to where we are and a little beyond ? What if the beyond has a zoo called Earth ? That would explain everyone's stories . The missing links are not on Earth as they didn't happen here . However the DNA rightly says it did happen . It might just be not possible in the time frame of 500 million years . In my story the dinosaurs were animal bulldozers to clear the forests for mammals to succeed . Flowers came late after the forest were cleared . Grass " evolved " to keep back the forests ( it does and is also recent ) . Bees evolved from wasps which is interesting ( flowers came later ) . As I say only a story . How many in religion or it's near cousin evolution science would be so honest ? I bet if I live 50 more years much of what we hold to be fact today will make us laugh out loud ? Perhaps 10 billion people by then ? I look forward to the melting of the polar ice . Not the disasters it brings . More to how exciting the world will be . It will be a challenge . With luck war will not result ( some hopes ) . The animals have already lost the battle . For no advantage I can think of we will claim all the land . Birth control is far simpler than lessons of CERN . It needs no coercion , just education and rewards ( pensions and health care ) .
The thing that killed sparrows most was more efficient storage of grain it is said .
About man being the last arrival . I agree with what was said . I still think we are remarkably late arrivals . That's all . I strongly doubt any other creature arrived anywhere near our time . Apes 30 Million years ?
As a piece of Star Trek . What is life took 13 billion years to evolve to where we are and a little beyond ? What if the beyond has a zoo called Earth ? That would explain everyone's stories . The missing links are not on Earth as they didn't happen here . However the DNA rightly says it did happen . It might just be not possible in the time frame of 500 million years . In my story the dinosaurs were animal bulldozers to clear the forests for mammals to succeed . Flowers came late after the forest were cleared . Grass " evolved " to keep back the forests ( it does and is also recent ) . Bees evolved from wasps which is interesting ( flowers came later ) . As I say only a story . How many in religion or it's near cousin evolution science would be so honest ? I bet if I live 50 more years much of what we hold to be fact today will make us laugh out loud ? Perhaps 10 billion people by then ? I look forward to the melting of the polar ice . Not the disasters it brings . More to how exciting the world will be . It will be a challenge . With luck war will not result ( some hopes ) . The animals have already lost the battle . For no advantage I can think of we will claim all the land . Birth control is far simpler than lessons of CERN . It needs no coercion , just education and rewards ( pensions and health care ) .
Fred Hoyle is laughed at ( referring to the link ) . We laugh too easily . Some of this science is very young and enthusiasm a little too accepting .
Hoyle seems wrong . However Quasars do not fit the expanding Universe model I think I am right in saying ? Doubtless because we do not understand Quasars ?
Black-holes seem to be real . That is something I accept . Recently thought to promote our safety ( hubs of spiral galaxies ) . Oh how we chop and change . All the enthusiast have amnesia when the previous notion is proven wrong .
Some say this is a space ship in the link below ( not me ) . Some even had it refueling at the Sun ( again not me ) . I think the wobble it might cause would be noticed if having mass ? Some even say a captured Red Dwarf . We must devellope a space program . We need to study the outer solar system . I would love to see Pluto in HD as I often say . We can not photograph the Moon landing sights from Earth ( or Hubble ? ) . Nearly as blind as Galileo for all of our technology .
NASA: Large New Planet Outside Our Solar System Called Tyche 2011 - YouTube
Hoyle seems wrong . However Quasars do not fit the expanding Universe model I think I am right in saying ? Doubtless because we do not understand Quasars ?
Black-holes seem to be real . That is something I accept . Recently thought to promote our safety ( hubs of spiral galaxies ) . Oh how we chop and change . All the enthusiast have amnesia when the previous notion is proven wrong .
Some say this is a space ship in the link below ( not me ) . Some even had it refueling at the Sun ( again not me ) . I think the wobble it might cause would be noticed if having mass ? Some even say a captured Red Dwarf . We must devellope a space program . We need to study the outer solar system . I would love to see Pluto in HD as I often say . We can not photograph the Moon landing sights from Earth ( or Hubble ? ) . Nearly as blind as Galileo for all of our technology .
NASA: Large New Planet Outside Our Solar System Called Tyche 2011 - YouTube
- Status
- Not open for further replies.