http://www.markshea.blogspot.com/2007_06_01_archive.html#5014093356453365806

Interesting article, with which I entirely sympathize, on
extraterrestrial life

Like anybody with an ounce of romance in his soul, I will be delighted
should the day come that they find life on other worlds. I merely
note, as well, that this article has a whole bunch of hand-waving
standing in for both science and philosophy.

So far, the hard evidence for life elsewhere stands at "0". The
extreme confidence that it must be there is rooted in a particular
philosophy which may or may not be sound. That philosophy is called
the Copernican Principle or Principle of Mediocrity that declares
earths to be a dime a dozen. I'm not at all confident that proposition
is sound. It may be totally off base because, as I say, there is no
hard evidence, just a lot of people who say, "Surely, it would
seem..." or "It only stands to reason that...".

I have no problem with the proposition that we'll find some planet who
spectrum readings suggest it's covered with algae or whatever. As the
Rare Earth guys say, simple life is probably common; complex life
probably, well, rare.

On Aug 23, 3:32 pm, Sound of Trumpet mailcan.com>
wrote:

Sound of Trumpet mailcan.com> wrote in
news:1187901177.075557.207950@q4g2000prc.googlegroups.com:

Well, no. That's an argument that it will someday be found. To argue that
it exists elsewhere, something much stronger is available.

(1) Intelligent life exists.

(2) Hence, the probability of it arising in a star system chosen at
random (with technical details here which needn't concern us) is
presumably some p>0.

(3) If the universe is infinite and homogenous in terms of natural law,
we conclude with probability 1 that intelligent life exists elsewhere.

(4) Even without (3), given the size of what we are looking at, p would
have to be amazingly small for intelligent life not to exist elsewhere.

On Thu, 23 Aug 2007 13:37:51 -0700, jcon yahoo.com> wrote:

Or with each other, using the "waterhole" frequency range. Which we
don't, BTW.

On Aug 23, 4:32 pm, Sound of Trumpet mailcan.com>
wrote:

Zero? Really? By what standard?

I see a world that contains a vastly intricate frame work beyond human
comprehension to even understand, but in your mind is it more probable
that this occurred by chance rather then by design.

(Sound of Trumpet mailcan.com>):

(T Guy):

Cough! Splutter!

Is this an acual comment from SoT rather than just a cut'n'paste job
written by someone else?

Shome mishtake shurely?

(SoT):

(T Guy):

Like anybody with an ounce of decency in his soul, I will be delighted
should the day come that newsgroups cease being plagued by spam.

(Strumpet):

On Aug 23, 3:32 pm, Sound of Trumpet mailcan.com>
wrote:

"T Guy" redbridge.gov.uk> wrote in message
news:1187908607.031706.169580@x35g2000prf.googlegroups.com...

Nope. In the original Mark Shea article, that sentence was a link (to
http://www.guardian.co.uk/space/article/0,,2096473,00.html). SoT was to
stupid to realize that, so he cut-and-pasted it as simple text.

On Aug 23, 3:26 pm, Michae...@gmail.com wrote:

If it is "beyond human comprehension" to even understand, then why do
YOU pretend to understand it? I presume you're human...

I just think you're intellectually lazy. It ain't that difficult to
understand, just pick up some science books and start studying. The
general knowledge is already there, the specific knowledge is
constantly being uncovered. And no supernatural beings are anywhere in
sight. Stop projecting your ignorance and incredulity onto everybody
else.