Does ET exist?

ET, standing, of course, for "extraterrestrial advanced technological civilization" from the movie, is all the talk today.  I add the words "advanced" and so on to be sure we are talking about something important, not just a few microbes or even bunches of whales cavorting on an ocean planet.  Not that these things would not be important, but pale in comparison to a technological society.

Of course I don't suppose whales couldn't evolve technology.  That they did not for quite a long time swimming around here on the earth is evidence, and thinking about it makes the difficulties clear enough, but anything is still possible -- well, maybe not.

I am pretty much persuaded, if not convinced, that ET must be excruciatingly rare, if not completely absent, at least from our galaxy and maybe from the entire universe we have direct knowledge of.

That is at best a heterodox opinion, although not an uncommon one among religious types, but among non-religious people like me.  The religious types have their unique creation to deal with and it is easier to deny, deny, deny  (although to be sure many of them jump through various hoops to get around it).

We now know enough to project that planetary systems, and even solar-system type planetary systems with at least one earth-like planet, are numerous -- by numerous here I mean really mind-graspingly large numbers.

I think, though it's likely that a Jupiter-Saturn sort of pair like the one we have is needed to bring stability to the orbits (early on, it seems they did a dance that kept both of them out of the inner system where in most systems a giant migrates inward and destroys any budding earths).

It also seems that an earth-moon "almost" double planet ("almost" because the center of gravity remains under the surface of the earth) is rare, but needed for the inclination stability over billions of years that would be needed for evolution.  Theories as to the origin of the moon have settled on some sort of early collision with another planet sized body, and not just any collision, but one involving relative masses and orbits in a limited and therefore unlikely range.

Then there is the problem of the system, after this violent beginning, being left alone for several billion years for life to evolve.  There are any number of things that, while individually unlikely, can serve to sterilize or almost sterilize a planet, and over several billion years each of them should happen several times. 

The assumption is often made that given the right conditions the rise of life is almost a certainty, based on the statistical sample of one we have that it happened quickly after the earth settled down.  Not so fast.  We don't know the likelihood of there being the right conditions for the origin of life.  Just the right temperature and mass may well be nowhere near enough.

One would think that with huge oceans in a reducing atmosphere for several million years, with energy sources and no big disasters, molecules that take from the environment to make at least rough copies of themselves would happen, and once started natural selection would step in to make the process better and better until you had living things.  But you need several million or so years, a reducing atmosphere, lots and lots of water and of course a variety of other elements.  While the presence of some of these may be taken as given, the combination may not.  And of course, there is the unresolved problem of protecting these increasingly complex molecules in your soup from all sorts of solar radiation.  An example is that the planet would need a strong magnetic field from day one, something that is by no means a given.

Then there are several major events in the evolution of life that may be one-off affairs with almost no chance of happening, including but not limited to the appearance of multi-cellular ("complex") living organisms.  That this event seems to have been long delayed tells us either that it is unlikely or that necessary precursors are unlikely.  That once it happened, it appears to have happened many times almost at once speaks more to the latter, but it's hard to say, since only one of those many occurrences of the appearance of complex life actually persisted.  It may be that it is not so easy to get it right.

Millions of years, then were spent, first with pre-mammalian-reptilian forms, then with reptiles and mammals, and then with just mammals, all evolving around in circles, punctuated by occasional mass extinctions, until the appearance out of the blue of apes and hominids and mankind.  Again long delays while nothing really takes place except evolution of new flavors of the same things indicates that the appearance of intelligence is not so automatic nor so predictable.

Nor, if we look at the history of our species, does the appearance of technology seem so predictable.  I think slavery and the domestication of animals prevent technology for awhile, and there seems no real reason to rid a society of slaves except accidents of history.  That slavery had disappeared in Europe before elsewhere and that Europe is where technology got started tells a tale.

Finally, there is the "where are they" problem, not easily pushed aside.  It may be that the technologies self-destruct, or maybe (a more optimistic thought) they find ways to exit physical existence into computers or other dimensions or whatever and find things much better there.  Or maybe some equivalent of bird flu eventually appears and spreads so fast and is so deadly that that is that.

There exists another set of issues not often addressed in this topic, the nature of our intelligence and how likely that might be.  AI machines have been promised now for quite a while, but haven't appeared.  The fact is not just our intelligence, but even our sentience (our experience of existence and of senses and emotions and so on) is not understood.  Not only is it not understood, no one has any idea how to approach it.  How can we make predictions as to whether it is likely to appear elsewhere when we don't even know what it is?

Right and wrong exist independently of human opinion

Any truly eternal ethical laws would be independent of God.  What is right is right and what is wrong is wrong, and this applies to any divinities as well as to people.

This of course assumes that right and wrong exist as objective, real "things."  One is tempted to say they are analogous to ideas of beauty and ugliness, entirely in the eye of the beholder.  But beauty is not entirely in the eye of the beholder (while superficially this is so we have to recognize that beauty does have a deeper quality that outlasts cultures and fashions).

A better analogy might be right and wrong are analogous to truth and falsehood.  Even though people have varying ideas of what is true and what is not, we tend in the end to agree that truth and falsehood exist on their own independent of our opinions.

Don't confuse human ideas of right and wrong with real right and wrong.  Human ideas change and indeed seem to progress (slavery is not condemned as wrong), but in the end mankind has always known slavery was wrong, and just buried its head.  At least those who stopped to think objectively about it reached that conclusion.

Persistent religious belief

The number of serious Christians in China is estimated to be between 20 and 90 million.  Sorry for the imprecision in the number but that sort of thing in a country like China is hard to measure.  The actual number is probably on the higher side of this range (remember that China is a seriously big country).

These are mostly people in rural areas that have been Christian for generations and their descendants now moving to cities as part of China's overall planned urbanization, where they become more visible.  How have they persisted in spite of official condemnation and all sorts of discriminations?  The answer is easy: they indoctrinate their children, and no government in the world can defeat that short of breaking up families.

What you were taught as a child by your parents is almost certainly what you will believe, especially if it is done lovingly without brute force and consistently and with the parents setting a non-hypocritical example.  Those who do flirt with other belief systems in the vast majority of cases become lost sheep who experience the joy and peace of returning to the flock a decade or so later, all the time they experienced fear and guilt.

Those who don't return to the flock tend to develop hate for whatever they were indoctrinated into, and serious resentment over what was "done to them" as a child and the suffering this put them through until they were finally able to make a clean break. 

Thus religions and superstitions persist in spite of modern knowledge and rational thought.  It has to do with the way human beings are wired.

Indoctrinated belief vs. learned opinion

I like to make a distinction between "belief" and "opinion."  This kinda reflects ordinary usage but is also a bit technical.  One obtains a belief by being indoctrinated, generally in childhood but for some people this is possible at any age, while one gets an opinion by learning about it and becoming persuaded that the evidence is good enough to say it is probably true.

We aren't really consciously aware of our beliefs; we are about our opinions.  That is to say a belief is taken for granted, like the furniture you sit on in the living room, you rarely if ever actually notice its presence.  Opinions on the other hand tend to get scrutinized more often.  Beliefs are not questions and usually have aspects designed to prevent their being questioned, such as "faith" and guilt for doubting.  Most people however don't really need these crutches -- they believe out of habit and instinct, and in fact react with shock and anger when someone doubts or challenges them.  This is especially the case when they realize they are not able to defend the belief rationally but must resort to rationalization and logical fallacies and slogans.  (Of course the "realization" I mention is not conscious, but is only felt as what is called "cognitive dissonance.")

The ability to "believe" like that seem wired into us, something we evolved as animals, probably as a group coherence mechanism, and that has been supported by the fact that failure to believe has throughout history been a dangerous course.

Beliefs can be good and give us comfort and peace and even joy, but they often are delusions held in place by childhood indoctrination that divide mankind and have created the possibility if not the likelihood of our causing our own extinction.  They need to be identified, scrutinized, and then either converted to opinions or expunged.  That so few people do this is probably because it is so against the interests of religions and ideologies and governing institutions that it tends to be discouraged and suppressed.

Chat anonymity

It's too bad that the internet chat and discussion rooms have to be anonymous (although I understand the need).  So often they cause more depression because of some of the people on them.  Otherwise they would be ideal for lonely and housebound people.

I know I have to watch myself, so I appreciate the problem, and the standard discipline of throwing people off a board actually in my opinion makes things worse as it is probably the person with the most serious problem who ends up getting tossed overboard.  Of course the process is needed to remove spammers and con artists, so I am of split mind and just don't know.

One thing I remind myself: the behavior of a person when they are anonymous tells you more about them than when their personal face is up front.

Skepticism

To take an old joke from Oscar Wilde, skepticism is like society; it is downplayed by those who aren't for one reason or another, usually an inability or unwillingness to think honestly.

Oil replacement hype

Here we see a persistent problem not just on the internet but indeed all of the world's press -- how do you know what to believe and what to disregard.  People have many reasons to lie -- hype to raise money perhaps most common, but wishful thinking and pious fraud (frauds to "save souls" are seen by many as being acceptable behavior) ranks right up there.

I don't know about these stories; I tend to take technology at face value but usually it turns out to be hype.  This is why the conspiracy theories about evil giant oil companies suppressing new technology are around -- people get the wrong impression from the hype that replacing oil is easy.

Enlightenment

Musings About Enlightenment 06/19/05

I think that much that parades itself as "being in touch with oneself," or "being in harmony with the universe," and so on, is air-headed. The concept of enlightenment as the end product of Buddha-hood probably is the same. To have "answers" come to one sitting under the Bod-ha tree, as the myth reports, is not credible to me.

We all have moments of realization – of mental lucidity, and sitting quietly as we mull problems increases the chances we will find answers. However, a conversion on the way to Damascus is to be seriously questioned. We should never fool ourselves into thinking that we, too, do not have the ability to be carried away with ourselves.

Ignorance is one thing. We all are ignorant about most things and unfortunately tend to hide this from ourselves. We are all children trying to figure out the thunder and thinking we know. The desire to know leads to the desire for enlightenment, but one does not achieve enlightenment without removing desire. (I don’t practice Zen. That paradox is enough for me).

I do have faith in reason. “All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore Socrates is mortal.” What is there in reason not to put faith in? Where we get in trouble is not when we are rational, but when we are not. I and almost everyone I know can see the syllogism, and has no difficulty agreeing that the conclusion “follows.” Where does this ability come from?

Oh, sure, the ability does give us a certain advantage over species who cannot reason things out, so if ability to reason is available, we can understand that natural selection would favor individuals who have it. However, that doesn’t explain where it comes from. I figure it comes from our spirit.

Testimonial Evidence is Worthless (almost)

I don't trust my senses, and it follows I don't trust the claims of others based on what they have seen or heard.  Indeed, it is even worse since I see such claims as hearsay, although politeness generally prevents me saying as much.  Still, I know how people can elaborate.

There is just simply no way around this problem that I can see.  The claim, for example, of the presence of witnesses to some outlandish event does not increase credibility but actively reduces it.

Is it possible, then, to say we know something -- anything at all -- since all our knowledge of the outside world comes to us through our senses (highly manipulated and censored, I might add, by our subconscious minds working to keep our conscious minds from having too much to handle).

All I can say is that I don't think there is anything I can say I "know," and I think people who claim otherwise are delusional.  All we can say is that we think with varying degrees of certainty, based mainly on how we perceive probabilities, that some things are probably true and others probably not.

The only exception I would make to that is where what we conclude is based on logic rather than on experience, and even then we are dependent on the principles of logic being true.  For example, I strongly doubt the existence of the Christian God, based on what my senses tell me about suffering in the world and the behavior of the members of that religion, and am persuaded logically this is the case based on the self-referential contradictions claims about this god lead to.

Karma is not supernatural or mysterious

There is nothing mysterious about karma.

Doing harm to others is like gambling; you may "win" short run, but in the long run you always lose.  The world is just simply built that way.

What happened to National Geographic?

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC ON TV

A comment about the "reality" show where venomous snakes were shown (more like exploited) being handled by religious believers.

When I was a kid we subscribed to the National Geographic, and I remember learning a lot about geography and more important about the different people around the world.  It was presented in a slick first person way that a high schooler could enjoy, and emphasized, at least as far as I could tell, the truth in a non-commercial clearly written way with lots of informative pictures and maps.

I gave up on it in college.  Maybe I outgrew it.

Recently (since I don't now live in the states we can get it on satellite), I checked out its TV channel a few times.  They have gone cheap and crass aiming for a low-class audience based on people watching, hoping someone will get killed and they can see it.  I guess that is what draws the TV audience they want -- idiots that can be easily influenced by advertising.

Sad, such an old institution has gone that way. 

America's schools and gross ignorance

AMERICA'S SCHOOLS

I saw a headline in several web pages today that said that a quarter of Americans don't know that the earth circles the sun and that half don't believe in evolution.  The second part of that does not surprise me, considering the religious primitivism (i.e., snake handlers dying of snake bites -- also in today's news) found throughout the States.

That first part though kinda astounded me.

Thinking about it I guess that's probably about right.  I think back on my high school class and about a quarter of them were more than functionally illiterate but flat-out illiterate, after spending most of their waking hours in schoolrooms since they were six.

The thing about primary and secondary education in the states is that it serves to educate the elite and to baby-sit the others, so the parents can have jobs.  Teachers naturally gravitate to the smarter harder working students and try to ignore the others, or at least keep the disturbances they cause to a minimum, and think, rightly, that trying to get them to learn something is so contrary to the anti-intellectual culture of not just their peers but their families and neighborhoods, that there is no point.

So America produces the best doctors and engineers and lawyers and artists and designers and architects and even educators, in the meantime leaving a huge chunk uneducated and perfectly happy with themselves being that way.

The only thing that gets me is that in a democracy those people are encouraged to vote, and where a political machine is in place, in a close election, they do vote.

Impeaching U.S. Presidents

IMPEACHING U.S. PRESIDENTS

Thinking about the past attempts to impeach a U.S. President and I conclude that this clause in the U.S. Constitution is not just outdated and bad and a source of trouble but never was any good.

What are "high crimes and misdemeanors."  I presume way back a couple centuries ago that meant something, but I doubt, since no President has ever actually been convicted (Nixon resigned, admirably I think so that the government could function even though he might not have been convicted and it is hard to see where the charges fit the Constitution anyway).  So the definition has never had a proper court test to my knowledge and is almost meaningless.

Presidents who have the opposition party in control of the House constantly have to deal with impeachment any more, something intolerable, with someone calling for hearings all the time.  American partisan politics is getting worse and worse and already just stinks.

To have effective government you must have a President who can do things "on the edge."

Flappy Bird takedown

FLAPPY BIRD TAKEDOWN

I see the new official line now is that the owner took Flappy Bird down because it is "too addictive."  To be sure it is but that is the first time I've seen that as a reason for taking down a game (something so easy to learn should not, we think, be so hard to win -- hence the addiction as it hurts our egos).

My first reaction was that the Vietnamese authorities advised him to take it down out of their concern for the welfare of the human race.

By the way, I always thought he should have been called "Floppy Bird," since it is obvious he can't fly.

Hillary Clinton and her husband's sexual offenses

HILLARY CLINTON AND HER HUSBAND'S SEXUAL OFFENSES

I see that a prominent Republican has said the party should avoid bringing up Clinton's sex scandal should Hillary be the Democrat's nominee for President.  That would be good advice.

Let me first say that, while I would agree that a man or woman's sexual behavior has little to do with their ability to serve effectively in public office, and while I thought the impeachment effort was just politics, I nevertheless was very much offended by Clinton's behavior.  It was just a gross ego trip by a man in power demeaning an ambitious but silly girl unable to keep her mouth shut (in more ways than one).

Follow that by the public, carefully coached, lie on TV, "I did not have sex with that woman" accompanied by emphatic gestures.  Then when it became clear that this was a lie the hypocritical effort to say that what happened was not really "sex."  Disgusting performance -- so much so that no matter how great a President Clinton may in history be judged, he will never be seen as a great man.

Now we have his wife a likely nominee for President.  Her performance during the episode seems to me to have been acceptable, whether or not she was aware of his womanizing.  Women, especially those married to public figures, need to be seen to be loyal and to support him, and to keep their problems private.

There are other things in her career that are fair targets, but not this one. 

Adam and Eve

Adam and Eve

 
Adam and Eve have always puzzled me a little.

1. They were perfect.

2. It was only through the eating of the forbidden fruit and the subsequent curse that they came under sin – that is, became imperfect.

3. Perfect beings do not do imperfect things.

4. In short, if they really were perfect, they could not have been tempted to eat the forbidden fruit until after they had eaten it.

All the talk about free will does nothing to help this illogical story. Perfect beings don't do imperfect things. They are not even tempted to.

McDonalds Coming to Vietnam

I see McDonald's is opening a "restaurant" in Ho Chi Minh City.  I do hope they leave the clown behind.

One of the things I like about Vietnam is of course the food (this is what everyone says about Vietnamese food because it is true), and one of the features of Vietnamese food is that it uses meat sparingly and more as a condiment and not as an unhealthy plop of meat and fat.

Of course one can get excellent hamburgers in Vietnam.  They aren't cheap, but not outrageous either unless from one of the snob hotels.  They are prepared as one asks, (not mass done with frozen patties) with toasted bun and sliced onion and really good fresh tomatoes and "salad" (the Vietnamese word for lettuce), and you can add ketchup, hot sauce, mustard and mayo and relish to taste (as well as a few more Asian things).  It doesn't come buried in that stuff they call "dressing" that seems designed to hide the absence of reality.

As you can probably can tell from what I have to say about the McDonald's fare I have had in the states (not often, fortunately), I will probably not be a regular customer.