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Originally Posted by ngcles
Hi Craig, Alex & All
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Why do people feel it would be upsetting, confronting, shocking etc etc if we are alone as intelligent life? Why does this make people feel sad?
Why is this such a bad thing (if it were true)? I just cannot grasp as to why it has become such an emotional issue and further, how that emotion sways our assessments of the probabilities.
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Les, I agree with you.
Why does emotion play a role ?… in one phrase … 'The Anthropic Principle' .. Ie: observations of the physical Universe must be compatible with the conscious life that observes it.
This view seems to be the predominant/politically correct basis to view the world/universe around us, (in present day Society0. If you don't see it this way, you're 'weird'.
(I suspect you know this, and you're looking for someone to challenge you on it … I'm not going to be the challenger, however … I'm in your camp !
)
Quote:
Originally Posted by ngcles
Alex has also re-emphasised what I think is an important point (and I raised it a few times in this thread too). At the moment it comes down to a statistical argument with a substantial number of assumptions and variables.
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Nothing will be proven using statistics or variables in some formula.
Empirical evidence must be found … which justifies the pursuit of it.
(In my opinion).
Quote:
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Originally Posted by ngcles
My opinion is that intelligent life is extremely rare in the Milky Way and even the Universe, but that is only my opinion. The rest of you are of course perfectly entitled to your own wrong opinions. |
Opinions are fine … even wrong ones .. so long as we realise they are opinions, I don't have a problem. Its when we lose sight of our opinions that things go off the rails. When opinions become the 'truth' is when wars break out !
Cheers