2 hours ago, martin-w said:

Prior to the hot big bang there may have been just an infinite inflaton field, or maybe a cosmic singularity of some kind.

Why not a singularity big bang creating an expanding universe and after it has expanded to it's limit it contracts again to another singularity and another big bang and starts all over again?

Noel

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

Why not a singularity big bang creating an expanding universe and after it has expanded to it's limit it contracts again to another singularity and another big bang and starts all over again?

Noel

 

Yep, the "big bounce" theory. Actually Conformal Cyclic Cosmology is a bit like that but more complex.

And actually, there is a way inflation theory could do that. When the universe has expanded to the point where not even particles are intact we end up with a scalar field identical to the inflaton field. So what happens when that field stops expanding... a new big bang. Interestingly the Higgs field could actually be the Inflaton Field.

Like I said, there are quote a few theories. 

2 hours ago, goates said:

Inhospitable to what we know of as life, yes. Does that mean there couldn't be other forms of life that have evolved to live there?

 

Yep, I'm only referring to life as we know it because that's the only life we can identify.

 I doubt any life could exist to close to the galactic centre though as the conditions there are beyond comprehension, but who knows... maybe. We don't know.

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

I should have left off center and stopped at denser.  I would think the stats that exist in closer proximity would look around home first.  And who's to say the life that evolves closer in wouldn't adapt to their environments.

Which brings up the question why do we think space aliens would be anything like us form or intelligence.  Why do we assume they would think like we do?

Noel

 

Looking around home first is logical. At least at non relativistic speeds. But if you can travel close to light speed all manner of weird things happen and Lorentz Contraction means that traversing, let's say 1,000 lightyears, doest take 1,000 years as distance shortens. So you would have a galaxy wide exploration area.

Since our radio transmissions have been travelling through space for about 50 years, then some advanced alien civilisation within a 50 light year radius could have detected them and come to investigate. If they have some exotic form of propulsion, like warp speed, travelling here would be like us flying across the Atlantic.

I like to think of us as being in the fashionable suburbs of our galaxy.

Edited May 7, 20215 yr by dmwalker

3 hours ago, dmwalker said:

I like to think of us as being in the fashionable suburbs of our galaxy.

I don't read the news much anymore, but when I do I would think of us as being in the slums of our galaxy.  We are a species that doesn't value our neighborhood in space except in how it can be exploited; much like the slums of any big city.

Noel

11 hours ago, martin-w said:

and thus multiple universes, or "pocket universes" as Alan Guth calls them. 

I have a cashmere wool overcoat that must have a "pocket universe" on the left side 'cause every time I put my hand in it, its full of lint! 

6 hours ago, dmwalker said:

Since our radio transmissions have been travelling through space for about 50 years, then some advanced alien civilisation within a 50 light year radius could have detected them and come to investigate.

I imagine that if some aliens ever did visit our planet, after a close look they said "OMG! These primitive beings are INSANE! Let's get the WNA out of here!

3 hours ago, n4gix said:

I imagine that if some aliens ever did visit our planet, after a close look they said "OMG! These primitive beings are INSANE! Let's get the WNA out of here!

 

I don't think they would. I think they would recognise what goes on here as a phase, a phase they perhaps once went through too, or other species they've encountered.

I doubt there's any advanced species out there that had a perfect society through their existance. 

If there are any other advanced species in our galaxy.

I have mixed feelings about the Rendlesham incident. It is a very well known UFO story, but I am personally more interested in the other incident that occurred at almost exactly the same time. That would be the one in Huffman, Texas where three people in a car reported seeing a diamond shaped object hovering above a country road. This object then ascended (whether under its own power or something else is not entirely clear), and was seen to be accompanied by at least twenty unmarked helicopters. Whether this was a UFO (in the strictest sense of the word) or some kind of military/government exercise/experiment will probably never be known.

3 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

That would be the one in Huffman, Texas where three people in a car reported seeing a diamond shaped object hovering above a country road.

I think I remember that incident.

I live in UFO Central.  Every 4th of July weekend the population of Roswell doubles as people from all over the world gather for our UFO festival.  We have a UFO museum and a UFO research library.  I've been to the museum a dozen or so times over the past twenty plus years as visitors who come to the house  want to go to the museum.  

In our other museum is a reconstruction of Doctor Goddard's lab and workshop.  Dr Goddard was the father of rocketry and you can see films of his launches in the 1930s.  His launch tower stands at a corner outside the museum.  I think the Roswell Art Museum with Goddard's exhibit os more interestng tha the UFO Museum.

https://roswell-nm.gov/348/Robert-H-Goddard-Dreamer-Tinkerer-Pionee

Noel

15 hours ago, birdguy said:

I don't read the news much anymore, but when I do I would think of us as being in the slums of our galaxy.  We are a species that doesn't value our neighborhood in space except in how it can be exploited; much like the slums of any big city.

Noel

 

But do you think that other species might have travelled the same or similar evolutionary path? Do you think it might be a phase we are going through and ultimately become more responsible? If we are to survive long term we must. 

7 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

I have mixed feelings about the Rendlesham incident.

 

Me too. Colonel Holt's account was pretty genuine I would say, in fact its identical to the official report he submitted at the time, and as a military officer he would have been in severe trouble if the report had been fictitious. The other stuff added on by others though, like touching  a  craft and having binary code downloaded to ones brain is utter nonsense. 

One of my favourites was from back in the 80's, and in many ways similar to the Nimitz incident, in that two aircraft on an exercise were vectored to a target spotted on ground radar that was unidentified. It was two Bolivian F16's. One of the F16's got within visual range and he said it was a black triangle. He tracked it on his radar streak away at 3000 knots and make a sudden 90 degree turn. So that's three radar's, two in the jets and one on the ground. 

Now the pilots could have been lying of course but it is an official report. And pretty mush identical to so many that have been reported by air forces around the world. 

Edited May 8, 20215 yr by martin-w

13 minutes ago, martin-w said:

But do you think that other species might have travelled the same or similar evolutionary path? Do you think it might be a phase we are going through and ultimately become more responsible? If we are to survive long term we must. 

I remember our society in the late 40s and early 50s.  Nowhere near as violent as it is now days.  And policemen were regarded as friends.  We had less disposable income but then we didn't have all whiz bang gizmos to buy.  As we became more affluent and marketing targets we seemed to change somehow and became less responsible, not as individuals, but as a society.  We weren't as political and we didn't have demonstrations for this and that.  When we had family get togethers the adults talked about their children and the price of things and the favorite stores to go to.  But very seldom politics.  And we played board games or cards...whist or canasta.

Today when invited to an Anglo get together it nothing but politics, politics, politics.  But when invited to an Hispanic get together (and I have as many Hispanic friends as Anglo friends) its like a throwback to the old days.  Women talking about children and where to shop and the men going into the back yard or the park on the corner to play softball or toss a football around.

Sorry, kinda got off the track there, but I maintain that as a society we become meaner and more selfish.  Maybe another culture from another star system might have evolved differently, but that's pure speculation.

Noel

I'm not sure  

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

I remember our society in the late 40s and early 50s.  Nowhere near as violent as it is now days. 

 

That's just your society though. Research suggests the opposite. I mean if you go back in time it was dreadful, you would be hung drawn and quartered for crimes and have the most awful punishments for minor crimes. You could barely walk the streets without women getting raped and men robbed and beaten and killed. 

 

Quote

In his 2011 book The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined, Harvard University psychologist and famed intellect Steven Pinker argues humans are now living in the most peaceful era in the history of our species.

 

In terms of war deaths that too has diminished.

 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/06/200616113913.htm#:~:text=Study settles the score on whether the modern world is less violent,-Date%3A June 16&text=The study%2C by mathematicians at,of the Second World War.

Trouble is the media, they fill our screens with the worst news possible from all over the world that makes us believe we are more hostile than ever.

Walk the streets in the 14th, 15th, 16th 17, 18th century and you would have stood a far greater chance of experiencing violence. Even the state would have subjected you to the most awful violence for the most minor crime. 

 

Edited May 8, 20215 yr by martin-w