| First off, I think that its highly possible that in multiple places in the universe, inteligent life has, or does currently exist. However, we all fantisize about these incredibly advanced civilizations whith the capability of traveling anywhere in the universe on a beam of light. We can't do it, we have theory but no real method for acheiving such a feat. Why should we assume that theres some extraterrestrial civilization that can achieve this kind of thing?
Another point, if anyone has read carl sagan's book contact, or seen the movie, theres a really interesting notion brought up there. It seems like there's a possibility of consciousness traveling at the speed of light, where physical matter cannot because mass dilates and it takes an infinite amount of energy to make that last bit of acceleration.
If theres some truth to the whole traveling conciousness thing, I think that we have been visited, and are in contact with other beings, (read up on native american shamanism, i kidna think we've done the same at points). But as for hollywood, aliens showing up in physical spacecrafts after traveling for light-years, its so doubtful. We're again employing the anthropomorphic fallacy to say that some extraterrestrial culture would be as material-based as ours, and incredibly technologically advanced.
I know this sort of goes back to contrasting science with philosophy, but its an interesting notion. What do you think?
B |