Do you believe in aliens?

Originally posted by Surtur
If it was just crazy people with zero credibility who made these sightings you would have a point, but that just isn't the case. Police officers, people who pilot commercial airplanes, military personnel, etc. There have been numerous sightings at military bases, especially ones that contained any kind of nuclear weapons. Sometimes it was random inexperienced soldiers seeing it. Other times it was experienced generals seeing these things. Also keep in mind reporting that kind of stuff in the military can potentially hurt your career. Or heck in any law enforcement agency as well. Actually, it can even hurt the careers of airline pilots if they actually report these things.

Also the fact people have been able to see the UFO's doesn't mean they aren't advanced. It could just mean the beings in the craft weren't concerned about a couple of people seeing them? Especially if they had any idea the way things were on this planet...they would know the people would be dismissed exactly like what you have just done.

So the problem is we have only been able to debunk about 98% of the sightings.

People make mistakes and see what they want to see. It doesn't mean we should just accept what they say they saw and take it as fact.

If Aliens knew about society then they would know we can record them and take pictures of them. If they didn't care for this they wouldn't try to hide from us as they seem to always do. If they did care about concealing they exist they're doing a bad job at it with their super advanced technology.

Let's assume that 1.) Aliens do exist 2.) They have advanced technology 3.) They conceal their presence from use.

Given this no human could have seen them or know that they exist. If they do show themselves to some humans they must be doing it as a bad joke then, which I respect and would high five them. But this contradicts premise number 3.

Now let's assume they don't care if we know they exist so 3.) They don't conceal their presence.

In such a case why don't they contact humans? Why isn't there a legitimate piece of evidence to prove they exist. Why is all the proof we have of them amount to the proof of big foot?

It's unreasonable to think aliens exist ( but not improbable ) and much more to think they actually visit Earth on regular basis.

I suggest you put more thought into this belief.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
I think any race so advanced would have also master things like happiness and suffering, and would probably be very happy in their continued existence.

Spoken like an species that's not advanced enough 👇

You don't need to "solve" problems with happiness or suffering if everyone is dead, it's the simplest and better solution. The one truly disgusting issue that we have to solve is our fear of Death our stubborness on continued existence.

Originally posted by Bentley
Spoken like an species that's not advanced enough 👇

You don't need to "solve" problems with happiness or suffering if everyone is dead, it's the simplest and better solution. The one truly disgusting issue that we have to solve is our fear of Death our stubborness on continued existence.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
Why do you assume they'd go with the simplest solution?

I assume that they stop self-deceiving themselves after a certain amount of intelligence.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
And why do you assume they'd have this bizarre death cult mentality?

Death Cults are ignorant in their choices and can be seen as blunt hits towards society. As a race that defines good or bad depending on social responsability, this is obviously frowned upon.

Alien that commit mass suicide would do the informed choice and would be erasing any morality factor regarding their culture because it would cease to exist with them.

Entirely different actions in entirely different contexts.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
Being alive and happy is better than being dead.

There are many problems in life beyond personal or even cultural happiness, take our relationship with animals as an example. If the aliens get to be happy, should they also make every organic being in their biosphere happy? If they decide against it, they see themselves as some kind of special event and I'd argue, they aren't at all that intelligent; if they are for it, they essentially launch in a sizeable quest that has no ending and it's stupid in its own right. Life makes you stupid because it's full of poor choices.

Getting technology that makes them essentially gods wouldn't be any less childish than the example above. Learning to live with how things are is also a possibility, but so is Learning to die that way.

Originally posted by Bentley
I assume that they stop self-deceiving themselves after a certain amount of intelligence.

Death Cults are ignorant in their choices and can be seen as blunt hits towards society. As a race that defines good or bad depending on social responsability, this is obviously frowned upon.

Alien that commit mass suicide would do the informed choice and would be erasing any morality factor regarding their culture because it would cease to exist with them.

Entirely different actions in entirely different contexts.

There are many problems in life beyond personal or even cultural happiness, take our relationship with animals as an example. If the aliens get to be happy, should they also make every organic being in their biosphere happy? If they decide against it, they see themselves as some kind of special event and I'd argue, they aren't at all that intelligent; if they are for it, they essentially launch in a sizeable quest that has no ending and it's stupid in its own right. Life makes you stupid because it's full of poor choices.

Getting technology that makes them essentially gods wouldn't be any less childish than the example above. Learning to live with how things are is also a possibility, but so is Learning to die that way.

Yes, you assume.

What about members of the race who did not wish to die? What if they did not wish to join the death cult that their civilization has become? What about morality then?

Well, that would be entirely up to the race in question. If they are able to create godlike technology, then perhaps they are pretty special and highly intelligent, no? What you're saying is that they don't agree with your philosophy that makes them dumb. Please.

Again, we are disagreeing in the nature of self-deception. I think that up to a point you can be a technologically advanced race without displaying an overwhelming intelligence, that poses me no trouble or whatsoever. But advanced intelligences are better off dead, and they'd be smart enough to know so. We, being inferior beings like we are, can only speculate which turns us into blind life cultists.

Originally posted by Bentley
Again, we are disagreeing in the nature of self-deception. I think that up to a point you can be a technologically advanced race without displaying an overwhelming intelligence, that poses me no trouble or whatsoever. But advanced intelligences are better off dead, and they'd be smart enough to know so. We, being inferior beings like we are, can only speculate which turns us into blind life cultists.

Originally posted by Surtur
When I say aliens I do not mean any kind of alien life, but beings with intelligence rivaling/surpassing our own.

If you do believe, why? Is it because you just think it is highly probable intelligent life isn't unique to one planet? Is it because of certain sightings and encounters of UFO's you have heard about? Or even perhaps a personal experience with a sighting?

If you don't believe they exist, why? Is it just a lack of solid evidence? Or there are some people who believe the specific properties you need for intelligent life to come about will not ever occur anywhere else in the universe.

However, I doubt the existence of an alien life-form as capable as shown in some Sci-Fi movies.

Earth is billions of years old and it is yet to experience an invasion by some kind of (hypothetical) super-advanced extraterrestrial force, think about it.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
You're making some seriously bold assumptions about what would "advanced intelligences" think.

Yeah well, I can come up with other assumptions that aren't any less bold. The premise about life and death being irrelevant comes from the idea of existence being essentially meaningless. The advanced intelligence could also know life is important, but it would delve from a kind of knowledge that we can only guess as religious/spiritual right now.

Many people assume that intelligence is some sort of generic value that increases the quality of existence as it goes up, like in a videogame, I see it as a tool to solve problems. It can be a terribly ineffective tool if you apply it incorrectly, for example, if your goal is not to commit mass suicide, you might want to ignore smarts and good sense and lie to yourself forever.

Or find God I guess.

Originally posted by Bentley
Yeah well, I can come up with other assumptions that aren't any less bold. The premise about life and death being irrelevant comes from the idea of existence being essentially meaningless. The advanced intelligence could also know life is important, but it would delve from a kind of knowledge that we can only guess as religious/spiritual right now.

Many people assume that intelligence is some sort of generic value that increases the quality of existence as it goes up, like in a videogame, I see it as a tool to solve problems. It can be a terribly ineffective tool if you apply it incorrectly, for example, if your goal is not to commit mass suicide, you might want to ignore smarts and good sense and lie to yourself forever.

Or find God I guess.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
Humans are intelligent enough to realize that life is intrinsically meaningless, yet we haven't commit mass-suicide yet. I don't understand why you think that a species more advanced than us would take nihilism to such an extreme. Hell, for all we know, they could find a meaning to life we inferior species haven't even considered.

Humans have deduced life is intrinsically meaningless, but we are still basically running on instinct. We reproduce because we produce hormones to mate and we embrace it because it's real and being organic and impulsive aren't bad things. But that isn't reason nor intelligence.

In the other hand couples that are considered to be better at decision making mate less. Human intelligence tends to forego of life. You're right in pointing out that there could be inhuman smarts, but we can only go from what we know, that's the only sensible way to approach the question -otherwise we'd be writting fiction-.

Again, intelligence is just a form of decision making, a simple tool. If a race was to depend on it's use much more than we do, terrible things* might as well happen because that's not a balanced environment.

*- Well, nothing is terrible on and by itself, but that was just dramatic effect.

i've been anal probed by aliens.
don't treat this as a joke. the aliens dressed up like my uncle and raped me

Originally posted by Raisen
i've been anal probed by aliens.
don't treat this as a joke. the aliens dressed up like my uncle and raped me

Tell the police, that way your uncle may sue the alien for impersonating him.

Originally posted by Bentley
Tell the police, that way your uncle may sue the alien for impersonating him.

so i tell the police that an alien raped me while dressed like my uncle? you seem like an expert in this matter so please guide a novice throught

Originally posted by Raisen
so i tell the police that an alien raped me while dressed like my uncle? you seem like an expert in this matter so please guide a novice throught

I'm actually relatively uninformed on US law when it comes to how this kind of thing is filled. If you think it's too tall of a story to tell the police, then you should ask a good friend for advice he might help you spin it in a better way.

maybe i should just go to my uncle's house and discuss this over some wine like he mentioned

Originally posted by Bentley
Humans have deduced life is intrinsically meaningless, but we are still basically running on instinct. We reproduce because we produce hormones to mate and we embrace it because it's real and being organic and impulsive aren't bad things. But that isn't reason nor intelligence.

In the other hand couples that are considered to be better at decision making mate less. Human intelligence tends to forego of life. You're right in pointing out that there could be inhuman smarts, but we can only go from what we know, that's the only sensible way to approach the question -otherwise we'd be writting fiction-.

Again, intelligence is just a form of decision making, a simple tool. If a race was to depend on it's use much more than we do, terrible things* might as well happen because that's not a balanced environment.

*- Well, nothing is terrible on and by itself, but that was just dramatic effect.

Who's to say that an advanced alien species wouldn't have instincts? In fact, an advanced enough civilization could very well actually manipulate and "edit" things like instincts and hormones. They could be organic and impulsive while also being highly intelligent.

While it's true that more educated and intelligent people tend to have fewer children, it doesn't mean that they don't value life.

It seems to me like you think that an advanced intelligence would have to be some kinda of an unfeeling, emotionless machine that would inevitably have to embrace nihilism.

Originally posted by Raisen
i've been anal probed by aliens.
don't treat this as a joke. the aliens dressed up like my uncle and raped me

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
Who's to say that an advanced alien species wouldn't have instincts? In fact, an advanced enough civilization could very well actually manipulate and "edit" things like instincts and hormones. They could be organic and impulsive while also being highly intelligent.

Well, then you could argue that their decision making is poorer because it's impulsive. Then we'd be assuming they are intelligent enough not to be the most intelligent they can be. Which is sort of where we are since we lie to ourselves terribly.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
While it's true that more educated and intelligent people tend to have fewer children, it doesn't mean that they don't value life.

It does tell us that reasonable decision making departs from instict.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
It seems to me like you think that an advanced intelligence would have to be some kinda of an unfeeling, emotionless machine that would inevitably have to embrace nihilism.

Yes, that is because the idea of mass suicide as the end of a race's lifetime came to me from discussing with a poster who was a big promoter of humans becoming essentially AI. By becoming AI they are already commiting mass suicide, so I don't think the AI would have much of a motivation to continue its existence indefinitively. Up to a point, machine intelligence and organic beings are very different things.

However, suicide is something that happen very often with humans compared with less intelligent animals because we are conscious of our actions. It's a part of the life equation despite the many efforts our society makes to hide it as a shameful thing. The more open and intelligent we become, the better option suicide seems to be. At some point we will allow people to kill themselves freely.

Just by looking at us right now I can tell death plays a big part in our desire for eternity, so if we continue to play god with technology it's very likely to be one of our ends. Then again, we could stray from that path given the right conditioning, but as we stand I remain sceptic.

Originally posted by ArtificialGlory
Funny thing... my uncle once raped me in the ass while dressed up as an alien.

i did find that funny. interesting