The meaninglessness of life and believing in aliens
Are you into space travel, sci-fi, aliens? Do you think 'we are not alone'? Out of curiosity, where is your evidence? It is quite interesting how little actual evidence there is considering the amount of belief that there is life out there somewhere, let alone intelligent life.
If we look at the possibility of life developing here on earth and then look at the possibility of it developing the way it has to create us as self-aware tool makers that have the ability to leave the planet, the chances are approaching zero yet, here we are. Before anyone says 'God', I ask the same, where is your evidence?
I don't know what you actually believe in but many do tend to think that out of the billions of stars and galaxies and all of the information we do not know, other life forms are almost a certainty. I think so too but, what if we are wrong?
Boom, boom, bang
Whatever it was that started the chain reaction of movement in the universe began something that has created all that is and all that ever was. Fair enough but, that means that there was a first sun, galaxy, planet, compound, atom, neutron, electron, quark and whatever else makes up all that is.
In those early times, there were many firsts as technically, every movement was a first. Technically, every movement is always a first if you want to breakdown the precise details of something into the positions of the smallest components. Nothing ever repeats absolutely precisely.
Alone at the start
But, what if we are alone in the universe, what if earth is the only place so far where consciousness has ever happened, we are a universal anomaly?
When we look at the size of the universe and our individual place within its realms, it is easy to feel infinitesimally small in the grand scheme of things, much like quarks. What if however rather than just being tiny, we are conscious quarks?
What I mean by this is that quarks seem to be one of the fundamental building blocks of matter and even though they themselves may be made of even smaller components, that is about as small as we can currently acknowledge.
Perhaps humans are part of the chain of fundamental blocks of consciousness and we are alone in this universe as we are the first instance in the vastness of everything that is. Maybe it has taken the 13.8 billion odd years to get to this point and maybe that is why there is not much more unknown to humanity than the enigma that is the nature of consciousness itself due to its infancy.
Conscious quarks
If we imagine ourselves as the only intelligent beings in the universe, the first, the genesis blocks of consciousness, how important are we? From a state of universal meaning, no more or less important than the quark. We may not understand it all, we might not see the bigger picture but we do not know where all of this may lead.
Of course, we are potentially insignificant in the grand scheme of things if we consider that if we do manage to destroy ourselves through greed, violence and a general state of social stupidity, within another 13.8 billion years, the chances are pretty good that some quarks will get together and create consciousness again at some point.
Security of belief
Perhaps this is why so many people are willing to believe in alien life as it offers the security a religion does. A religion says, there is something more after death if you act this way and in so doing, offer a security of our own endlessness so we never have to face true death. Believing in aliens offers a similar security in thought as we can hand over the responsibility of consciousness to them and never have to face true life.
Both ways can mean that we don't have to take responsibility for our own actions as either they are dictated by the universe or, are irrelevant.
Neither pathway makes me feel good about myself and since I am conscious, I would rather have some power over my own perspectives of the world. What people may not consider is that without consciousness, the universe is meaningless and it is only when something is conscious enough to observe their place in it that meaning is born. The universe doesn't give us meaning, we give it meaning.
It is possible that right now, the only reason the universe has any significance at all is because of us.
Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]
'The universe doesn't give us meaning, we give it meaning.'
I kind of agree. Maybe we as conscious beings are alone in the universe but life is much more than that. As an electro-chemical machine it seems to me that elements enjoy clumping together to make certain reactions possible, leading to more and more complex ones till some sort of consciousness forms and this is an illusion created by the underling biochemistry. There may/may not be other aware being in the universe but I believe given time some sort of life is/was inevitable....
But, I could be wrong.
sort of life is/was inevitable..
I agree with some sort of life/organism will be found/ inevitable . Not a walking talking humanoid with a ray gun saying take me to your leader .
ripped off.
don't get the ripped off ?
It means cheated out of something. I was hoping for ray guns....
There I go again spoiling someone expectation. :)
chances are good but, not guaranteed.
We are definitely not alone. The universe is so damn big. Somewhere are some entities with conciousness. Exciting
you sound like a religionist :P
Hahaaha :-)
I got an interesting email this week about measuring the inside of our 66 Ford. I asked why, and it has to do with proving or disproving some UFO photos from many years ago. There's a theory this person set up models and there's photographic investigation happening. I thought that was pretty cool. Usually, when I get an email like this it's so a designer can reproduce it. I get requests for all kinds of vintage stuff they want to reproduce.
that is pretty interesting. Will they send you the results of their investigation?
I think she will. She didn't mind telling me about it and was very nice. Believe me, it was the last thing I expected. She was very serious and is coming to the show the 15th -we keep it out front and she'll have no trouble. I hope to talk to her and get more info on the whole thing,
I was able to Google a few things and confirm what she said and could see it looks like our van from the front seat. They are trying to compare measures to see if it's real or a model.
Interesting views of an earthly spirit. Everything is relative, as is the view of each individual. That's the way it is.
I think it is very conceited of us to believe that we are alone in the vastness of space. There are 10 times more stars in the night sky than grains of sand in the world's deserts and beaches, scientists say. Link to Telegraph article about ratio of stars to sand
I actually wrote a post on this about 2 days ago when the UFO was spoted over Arizona. I would be honored if you gave it a read and maybe gave some pointers on what i could improve on. Link to my post Sorry if it is poor etiquette to drop links. Let me know and i will remove it. I apologize in advance if that is the case.
Nah, it is all good as long as the links are related / not phishing etc. I will have a read soon. As said, I think the chances are likely to but regardless of life or not, until it is confirmed, we should live as if we are alone and keep growing, developing and looking. Just in case.
...taking god out of it (it messes with my logic), and mathematically speaking - it's seems pretty improbable that we are the only 'life' in the entire universe.
Not necessarily sentient or intelligent -( now that might be just an evolutionary error! lol)
IF we are the only life in the universe - and sentient to boot - then you could say everyone on this planet, (before us - or yet to be born) - has pretty much won the biggest universal lottery ticket in existence, every single day that they are alive...
Indeed they have won the lottery. How do we act?
like you have won the lottery....?
No different then the level of belief in God or Gods that many people have. The "proof" is nothing more then some writings from a long time ago. It's a blind faith.
Yep, a different comforting thought but not so different.
God : There is no evidence . Only signs handed down through generations
"Do you think 'we are not alone " Some say the universe is so big that there has to be life out there . But of course they are not talking about intelligent life to talking about a cell or ameba . When you look at a distant Galaxy it's so far away that it takes the light thousands of years to get here . So if you do discover something your looking at it's past , you don't even know it still exist . I do not believe in time travel or that you can travel faster than the speed of light . To me it is not a question of is it a Possibility But one of probability .
Boom, boom, bang : We know that everything is energy what we don't know is where the energy originate it from . Is a question that has no answer .
Maybe it has taken the 13.8 billion : That's a guess an estimation because we cannot see light that is older than that Or traveled further than that .
It is possible that right now, the only reason the universe has any significance at all is because of us.
as they say "aint that a hoot" if it were true
In the meantime let us put our seatbelts on , lock our doors . Put a security system around the house so that we can sleep at night .
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This got me thinking deep and laughing at the same time
On the contrary I think that not knowing where all of this will lead to is what makes us or should make us quarks rather and not from the point of thinking that we are the only intelligent beings in the world.
This post is quite deep and thought provoking, well done.