So what will happen when intelligent life is discovered?

Yeah, no problems with aliens in Judaism, either. Actually, some of my geekier friends and I, in rabbinical school, used to have some fun stoned conversations about what to do in the event an alien wanted to convert to Judaism, or how to gauge whether an alien animal might be kosher....

 

I do, its a war of me against them to keep them away from my house when i see them marching closer. I've also had wars with gophers tearing up my yard

It's understandable to believe that, and I think it's a nice sentiment. I would like to hope that our species on this planet can advance far enough to leave such self-defeating and undesirable qualities & tendencies behind. But it's possible that a newly discovered intelligent life would have different societies and cultures that we don't have on our planet, as well as a planetary/species history that differs from our own. I would prefer to believe as you do, that they would have come to be peaceful, but I can't dismiss the possibility that it could also be a hostile warrior race, such as Klingons or the Borg from Star Trek

This is also a possibility. I'm reminded of the newer Battlestar Gallactica series, at the end the remaining survivors settle on a planet to start over

since this thread has also been a little bit about the humanity of earth, ill link this one as well
its a clip taken from part of a larger documentary

 

why does everyone think that we'll instantly start a war with a foreign species? we won't even know what kills these things, not to mention human curiosity will win out before the human need for violence. we'll learn all we can from them first then we go about killing them over silly things like religion or resources or habitable planets or whatever.

 

War is too fun to pass up. Kicking other people's asses is way too engrained in humanity.

 

I find this whole discussion fascinating, largely because I find that the whole idea, the whole conversation about life on other planets is so freaking absurd. People who believe in aliens; I ask - what is your belief based on? There is not one shred of scientifically verifiable proof that aliens have ever existed or do. There is no proof of intelligent life anywhere else in the universe (yes, I'll say it; that we know of). Your faith is based on nothing! And people think Christians are crazy because they believe in a man who physically did exist on this planet, whose existence has been verified by various historical records. A Christians faith is based on something real. Something true. Something of substance. People who believe in aliens, what is your foundation? The substance of things hoped for? The evidence of things not seen?

 

Yes mutie - a post from Tom Cruise to explain please.
I often think what a pity, spending all that money looking for a new habitable planet to annex when we have done such a good job of screwing this one over. Pollution. Isnt that like taking a crap in the living room - you have to live with what you do - or dont. Would this planet be better off without man? To an outside explorer I bet we are not nearly as interesting a nature observation project as Meercat Manor - where at least you feel empathy for Flower and Motzart and the wee gang, going on with their lives. What would a watcher learn about us - other than that we can not be trusted.

 

it´s more of a question of intelligent life discovering us:

on top of that all of it´s equipment will cease functioning by 2025-2030 so when it gets anywhere of any importance it will be space junk. in 40000 years earth will be a vastly different place, with or without humans and i suspect it´s futile to speculate what we´ll do as if we hang around for that long.

as for life discovering us if they have the technology to get here and detect us then we´ll be in no position to dictate the terms of engagement given our current technology so we just better hope that if it happens they´re more curious than territorial

 

Be nice if we found some terrestrial intelligent lifeforms (present company excluded, of course).

 

that some of us are violently xenophobic against our own species and yet protest the orchestrated self-destruction

 

Fascinating topic, indeed. So far away, they won't find anything while I'm alive. Maybe believing very hard in aliens could take me there after death, instead of heaven or hell. What if birth and death are the ways found to ship us between planets?

Nice speech, Martian. Your name implies, you might know more than the rest of us.

We can't know what kind of life forms we might encounter.

I just hope our bodies wouldn't end up as living spare (or extra) parts for them or that we wouldn't get eaten...

 

Or worse, what if we end up in a terrarium on some alien's mantle?

 

I don't believe God ever created alien races that inhabit other planets. It just doesn't fit into His purpose. I believe He created all of the living creatures, organisms and beings that inhabit earth and He created the angels. I do however believe that angels, both fallen(demons) and holy, have been to other planets and other places unseen by humans. Angels and demons are spiritual so they don't have the same physical, material requirements for sustaining life. But they can take physical form and effect the physical universe.

 

I'm wondering... if aliens exist, and ghosts exist... how about the ghost of an alien
or what happens if an alien gets bitten by a vampire, or scratched by a werewolf
assuming, of course, that aliens, ghosts, vampires, and werewolves are all real

 

Eh...they won't find any. We are complete flukes of nature-a collection of molecular happenstance that, unfortunately, is cursed with self-awareness and ego. Rearrange the same molecules and mix in a few more and-tada!-you have a banana tree...

 

Wap-drive? Would that be craft powered by marinara sauce?

JK. I find typos endearing.

 

That is funny, I completely missed that.

 

According to H. G. Wells - it might be our bacteria. Those annoying little buggers might actually be our lifesavers in such a scenario.

When I think about the variety of life on earth, adaptable to all different sorts of environments, I can't believe life is not propagating all over the universe. There's species living on sulfur fumes in the deepest parts of the ocean we haven't even discovered yet.

Of course intelligent life is another matter but we may be wrong in assuming it's a fluke. There's still so much we don't know about genetics and epigenetics especially.

 

...wat