Minds that think alike...(re: Aliens)

[Fiona]

As a bit of information, it seems Hawking must have made his remarks regarding avoiding aliens in a press conference following his lecture at George Washington University, as the transcript does not show he said anything of the sort.

http://ims.ivv.nasa.gov/pdf/223968main_HAWKING.pdf

Alien content begins at the bottom of page 19.

Hawking totally discounts UFO observation reports, but then states

"DR. HAWKING: If there is a government conspiracy
to suppress the reports and keep for itself the scientific
knowledge the aliens bring, it seems to have been a
singularly ineffective policy so far."

So my question is- if there isn't any significance to any UFO observation reports, then why even bother mentioning the possible existence of suppression of UFO reports?

Seems a bit of a waste of time. So why say it? Hawking is apparently a very smart guy.

Just seems odd to me.

I have not read most of this thread but I have to say that I do not understand what you are getting at here? Hawkings was asked about whether there is alien life or whether we are alone. A fairly standard question. He laid out in simple terms what the main possibilities are. He is as aware as you and I that UFO's and stuff are much discussed and that they are interesting to the public. He dismissed them and the conspiracy theories which surround them. Why would he not do that? Do you expect him to be unaware of the public interest? He is talking about engaging people with science: popularising it. Do you not think that addresssing the issues which are most talked about is a good way of doing that? And debunking some of the wilder fantasies is part of it? He introduces this with humour (it is noted that the audience laughed so that worked out quite well) and goes on to make some quite serious points. What is odd about that?

 

[SnidelyW]

So you're claiming that because Hawking has mentioned black holes, he's an astrophysicist? Now I understand why you post such tosh. Any pillock who's mentioned anything is automatically an expert. Have you considered visiting the 9/11 forum? You'll find some experts (by your criteria) who will prove to you that no aeroplanes hit the towers.

Now, will you respond to what I posted previously, or are you just going to bark out laughably stupid questions?

For all of the learned readers following this thread, the above post is the most seriously misinformed piece of pulp typed. It MUST be refuted instantly, lest anyone out there want to believe any drivel Sledge states, as exhibited by the above post. Sledge is now stating Dr. Hawking is not an authority on black holes, not an astrophysicist, and I am posting 'tosh', which I am assuming is some sort of colloquialism.

I will let these links do the refutation.

http://www.helium.com/items/77601-the-impacts-of-stephen-hawking8217s-contributions-to-science

"One area to which he made major contributions was the theory of black holes."

http://www.redorbit.com/news/space/1293008/simulated_black_hole_yields_hawking_radiation/

" In the 1970s, Hawking predicted that if such a pair was created near a black hole’s event horizon, one of its members might fall into the black hole before it could be annihilated."

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn6151-hawking-cracks-black-hole-paradox.html

"It was Hawking's own work that created the paradox. In 1976, he calculated that once a black hole forms, it starts losing mass by radiating energy. This "Hawking radiation" contains no information about the matter inside the black hole and once the black hole evaporates, all information is lost."


http://www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/pub/hawkings-brane-new-world

"The scope of the book is as vast as its subject, covering subjects such as p-branes, warped spacetime, black holes, closed time-like loops, curved spacetime, dualities, event horizons..."

I could go ON and ON, with the same result.

So, it seems Sledge, that your irresponsibly ignorant posts have left your opinions without relevance.

Back to my original question - what motivation would Hawking have had for working a 'UFO reporting conspiracy' into his address regarding why we should go into space?

Anyone? Bueller?

 

[Fiona]

For the lulz

 

[SnidelyW]

I have not read most of this thread but I have to say that I do not understand what you are getting at here? Hawkings was asked about whether there is alien life or whether we are alone. A fairly standard question. He laid out in simple terms what the main possibilities are. He is as aware as you and I that UFO's and stuff are much discussed and that they are interesting to the public. He dismissed them and the conspiracy theories which surround them. Why would he not do that? Do you expect him to be unaware of the public interest? He is talking about engaging people with science: popularising it. Do you not think that addresssing the issues which are most talked about is a good way of doing that? And debunking some of the wilder fantasies is part of it? He introduces this with humour (it is noted that the audience laughed so that worked out quite well) and goes on to make some quite serious points. What is odd about that?

I absolutely agree with you regarding Dr. Hawking and his seeming desire to popularize astroscience. His pedigree is beyond question and reproach.

My question was why, with limited time at his disposal, in front of an invited audience of scholars and NASA invited guests, that he would even waste one breath on a '...government conspiracy to suppress the (UFO) reports...'.

If the UFO phenomenon is so marginal, so irrelevant, and so disposable, what would his possible motivation have been for including it in his address? He is one of the most brilliant thinkers on the planet, yet he devotes time in his prepared remarks, and more time in a press conference after the address to the entire alien question. Why?

My thinking is that Dr Hawking senses that the concept of aliens, UFO's and alien visitation is being addressed more and more often in mainstream society and mainstream media. Heck, the Vatican even made a statement about extraterrestrials last November.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/11/vatican-extra-terrestrials-catholic

So, is Dr. Hawking attempting to put the entire subject to rest, or is he just beginning?

 

[Sledge]

Sledge is now stating Dr. Hawking is not an authority on black holes, not an astrophysicist

I double dog dare you to quote the sentence where I said that.

For the lulz

I now have this mental image of Hawking posting on /b/.

 

[Akhenaten]

For the lulz

I now have this mental image of Hawking posting on /b/.

Astrofag.

 

[dafydd]

Why would they want to wipe us out? What possible motivation would an intelligent, highly technological alien species have for wanting to wipe us out? Any species aggressive enough to be interested in genocide for genocide's sake would never have made it into space before wiping themselves out first.

They may have heard our Rap (music?)

 

[Robo Sapien]

I double dog dare you to quote the sentence where I said that.

"So you're claiming that because Hawking has mentioned black holes, he's an astrophysicist?"

Sorry Sledge, but just to be fair, he did call you out on that one. Your statement does imply that Hawking is not an astrophysicist, which is of course not true. If there was another point you were making there, it wasn't clear.

 

[Sledge]

And I stated that he isn't an expert on black holes... where? I'm not implying Hawking isn't an astrophysicist, I'm flat out saying it. The Wiki page on Hawking says:

Stephen William Hawking, CH, CBE, FRS, FRSA (born 8 January 1942) is a British theoretical physicist

It lists his fields as "Applied mathematician" and "Theoretical physicist." He is known for "Black holes, Theoretical cosmology, Quantum gravity, Hawking Radiation." The word "astrophysics" is mentioned precisely once on the page, when it is referencing "Singularities in Collapsing Stars and Expanding Universes with Dennis William Sciama, 1969 Comments on Astrophysics and Space Physics Vol 1 #1." I find it strange that an article on "the foremost astrophysicist in the world" does not mention the word "astrophysics." It's... it's almost as if he isn't actually an astrophysicist.

I'm sure none of this will make any difference to Snidely's ongoing quest to ignore reality and insist that a conspiracy to hide the truth about UFOs exists just ask questions.

 

[SnidelyW]

And I stated that he isn't an expert on black holes... where? I'm not implying Hawking isn't an astrophysicist, I'm flat out saying it. The Wiki page on Hawking says:

It lists his fields as "Applied mathematician" and "Theoretical physicist." He is known for "Black holes, Theoretical cosmology, Quantum gravity, Hawking Radiation." The word "astrophysics" is mentioned precisely once on the page, when it is referencing "Singularities in Collapsing Stars and Expanding Universes with Dennis William Sciama, 1969 Comments on Astrophysics and Space Physics Vol 1 #1." I find it strange that an article on "the foremost astrophysicist in the world" does not mention the word "astrophysics." It's... it's almost as if he isn't actually an astrophysicist.

I'm sure none of this will make any difference to Snidely's ongoing quest to ignore reality and insist that a conspiracy to hide the truth about UFOs exists just ask questions.

When the BBC, ABC News, MSNBC, USA Today, Cosmos magazine, Fox News, The Washington Post, Space.com, CBS News, Yahoo.com, Google.com, American thinker.com, The Daily Mail, physorg.com and hundreds of thousands of other sources all say Dr Hawking is an Astrophysicist, that's good enough for me.

Please stop your feeble attempts to derail this thread with poorly researched, ineffective posts. The only result is to undermine your limited credibility and to waste the valuable time of those who wish to engage in meaningful debate.

Now, I believe we were discussing Dr Hawking, Astrophysicist, and the implications of his address?

 

[Robo Sapien]

Maybe it would help in your debate to be clear on the meaning of astrophysicist?

From Wikipedia:

The name of a university's department ("astrophysics" or "astronomy") often has to do more with the department's history than with the contents of the programs. Astrophysics can be studied at the bachelors, masters, and Ph.D. levels in aerospace engineering, physics, or astronomy departments at many universities.

I'm gathering that "astrophysicist" isn't an official title granted through academics, but more of an applicable label that applies to anyone with a B.S. or higher in the above quoted fields who studies this particular area of astronomy.

 

[TheSkepticCanuck]

I think this site says it best:

http://www.hawking.org.uk/

Welcome to the official website of Professor Stephen W. Hawking, theoretical physicist.

 

[SnidelyW]

Maybe it would help in your debate to be clear on the meaning of astrophysicist?

From Wikipedia:

The name of a university's department ("astrophysics" or "astronomy") often has to do more with the department's history than with the contents of the programs. Astrophysics can be studied at the bachelors, masters, and Ph.D. levels in aerospace engineering, physics, or astronomy departments at many universities.

I'm gathering that "astrophysicist" isn't an official title granted through academics, but more of an applicable label that applies to anyone with a B.S. or higher in the above quoted fields who studies this particular area of astronomy.

Fair enough. Thanks for the additional time to search that out.

I would be happy to debate the definition of astrophysicist in the appropriate thread, but people are here to discuss the substance of Dr Hawkings' address and the subsequent press conference.

This may seem like a novel idea, but why don't we stay on the topic raised in the OP?

 

[carlitos]

delete

 

[phunk]

!!!THEORY WARNING!!!

That is a good assessment, I've felt similarly for a while. From observing evolution, we can see the positive feedback loop of information that formed and caused our species to move forward in huge steps. First we got smart, which led to our first boom in population as a new species. Then subsequent booms occurred with the advent of tools > language > government > industry > technology. Thus it seems plausible to me that the next step (or maybe one or two down the line) is the advent of deliberate self-replication.

Technology mimics nature in that everything we create is based off our ability to replicate natural processes, and our tech advances further as we are able to study things on progressively smaller levels. Starting with the first machines based on processes that are observable by the naked eye, all the way down to those based on observations through an electron microscope. The natural conclusion would then be mimicking the first self-replicating molecule.

So, considering a) the positive feedback loop of information, and b) that DNA is the most tightly-packed form of raw information, I would suspect that the ultima of evolution is the ability to not only construct life, but to assimilate the DNA of other lifeforms and selectively mutate without necessarily facing adversity. In other words, the ability to calculate natural selection. We already have the ability to develop intuition by running through thousands of hypothetical situations unconsciously during REM sleep, so there is an open possibility there to unconsciously test hypothetical DNA configurations.

If life elsewhere in the universe evolves in a similar construct, there is a good chance we'd be assimilated. Beware of the Borg.

You post reminded me of a short story I read recently.

The Things

 

[Nosi]

It is possible that aliens could start out as predatory, dog eat dog, other species wig off; and evolve their big intelligence during that phase of their evolution. Then, later they may evolve past their primary predatory condition.

The Human species is showing signs of this. Weaker specimens of human kind such as the disabled (such as Hawking himself) are able to grow up and thrive in the 21st century with the help and often sacrifice of their stronger unrelated peers. A mere thousand years ago, he would have been discarded.) This compassion spreads to species other than human in wild life parks, rescues, vets, so on. We've a long ways to go, but the bud is on the bush.

 

[SnidelyW]

It is possible that aliens could start out as predatory, dog eat dog, other species wig off; and evolve their big intelligence during that phase of their evolution. Then, later they may evolve past their primary predatory condition.

The Human species is showing signs of this. Weaker specimens of human kind such as the disabled (such as Hawking himself) are able to grow up and thrive in the 21st century with the help and often sacrifice of their stronger unrelated peers. A mere thousand years ago, he would have been discarded.) This compassion spreads to species other than human in wild life parks, rescues, vets, so on. We've a long ways to go, but the bud is on the bush.

So, extrapolating that sort of evolution into a universal standard (even though it may not be, but we've nothing to compare it to) I do not think they would just show up and announce "we're heeere!", perhaps preferring to observe and examine our environment, condition and behaviour before initiating any sort of contact.

 

[Sledge]

Please stop your feeble attempts to derail this thread with poorly researched, ineffective posts. The only result is to undermine your limited credibility and to waste the valuable time of those who wish to engage in meaningful debate.

Well gee, maybe if you'd responded to everything I posted instead of hammering away at what you mistakenly thought was an error my part, the discussion would have stayed on track? Just to show you're not a hypocrite, why don't you go back and respond to everything else I posted?