NationStates Jolt Archive

Then it should be no problem for you to show where the FBI and New Mexico State Police are lying or where they are in error.

I do not have to. Those reports do not confirm the existence of aliens any more than they confirm the existence of vampires or God or werewolves or Atlantis. Just because there isn't a satisfactory explanation for something does not automatically mean that aliens did it. That's the very, very, very simple argument that you have had difficulty comprehending throughout this thread, and that's the reason you've earned the reputation for being extremely dense or deliberately obtuse.

You do have a small point a small one. Unless though some far advanced alien speices can actualy change the laws of phyiscs (and I belive Mr Scott says ye canna do it) then really you have not a leg to stand on.

He doesn't - many pages back, I explicitly eliminated changing the laws of physics without very good reason to show why they're wrong. He hasn't presented any reasons, and definitely hasn't presented any good reasons for why modern physics is fundamentally flawed.

I grant you that using any form of propulsion than man uses, detection would be likely. But you have ingored what is possible if their technology is millions of years beyond what we have achieved. Is dimentional travel 100% impossible? Gravitational slingshotting? Has every possible test been done with matter-antimatter? No! You seem to think they must have thrusters and man already unlocked the secrets of the universe.

Gravitational slingshots are useless for actual interstellar travel, presuming you want to stop at a useful place when you get there.

I have already said that, if you wish to have any sort of productive discussion, science is assumed correct unless you can provide strong evidence to the contrary. Under no scientific theory is travel through more than normal space-time possible*.

Matter-antimatter annihilation produces energy. Specifically, it produces gamma photons plus various unstable mesons, which decay rather rapidly into other particles (and neutrinos, iirc). No matter what you do, this will be very fucking obvious to every sufficiently advanced civilisation within 50 light years, at least, and humanity is a sufficiently advanced civilisation.

You see, what you still haven't realised is that my objections are on the level of physical laws, not particular propulsion systems. I haven't been saying "Well, if they were using space-shuttle style chemical rockets, we would be able to see them". I have been saying "in order to move, they need to use reaction mass, and the faster they want to accelerate, the more reaction mass they need - this follows from Newton's second and third laws. Furthermore, any such system will, from the laws of thermodynamics, inevitably generate entropy and waste large amounts of heat, and hence be very visible to a watching civilisation such as ours. As we haven't seen them, they can't be using any possible propulsion system, not just any propulsion system we've built or devised."

You still can't show me scientifically wrong, because you simply don't know enough about science to even begin having this debate.

*Minus wormholes, which are a) purely theoretical, b) none nearby, and c) impossible to use for travel.

I do not have to. Those reports do not confirm the existence of aliens any more than they confirm the existence of vampires or God or werewolves or Atlantis. Just because there isn't a satisfactory explanation for something does not automatically mean that aliens did it. That's the very, very, very simple argument that you have had difficulty comprehending throughout this thread, and that's the reason you've earned the reputation for being extremely dense or deliberately obtuse.

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction. And in that fiction there has never been a mention of no traces left. (they leave bite marks dont they?) It is a simple process of elimination. By now, these magical maggots and other impossible theories presented here would have resurfaced. But they only seem to come into play for convienence.

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction. And in that fiction there has never been a mention of no traces left. (they leave bite marks dont they?) It is a simple process of elimination. By now, these magical maggots and other impossible theories presented here would have resurfaced. But they only seem to come into play for convienence.

As it currently stands, aliens also come from fiction. There's certainly no factual evidence to prove their existence, especially in the "little green (or Grey) men in flying saucers who mutilate cattle, make crop circles, and anal-probe unsuspecting farmers" flavour you seem to be advocating.

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction.

So do aliens.

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction. And in that fiction there has never been a mention of no traces left. (they leave bite marks dont they?) It is a simple process of elimination. By now, these magical maggots and other impossible theories presented here would have resurfaced. But they only seem to come into play for convienence.

You fail to get the point, yet again. Not that I'm surprised. I claim vampires did it. Can you prove me wrong? Can you, with 100% certainty, say that it wasn't vampires? No, you cannot. Therefore, by the burden of proof you have established in this thread, I can say that vampires exist, possibly.

The answer to a mystery is not necessarily aliens, any more than it is God or vampires or Atlantis or molemen. Just because something is unexplained does not automatically mean it is the result of aliens.

If you respond to this post with anything other than an acquiescence to the validity of my point, then you are a biased hack. Plain and simple. If you continue to refuse to get the fact that nothing here has PROVEN the existence of aliens, only the possibility of aliens, and that there exist plenty of equally fantastical explanations for everything you've claimed here, then you are a fool.

This thread has been sentenced to death for Capital Thought Murder. I demand it be executed immediately. There will be no appeal.

Gravitational slingshots are useless for actual interstellar travel, presuming you want to stop at a useful place when you get there.
Unless you reverse the process at the end of your long journey.


I have already said that, if you wish to have any sort of productive discussion, science is assumed correct unless you can provide strong evidence to the contrary. Under no scientific theory is travel through more than normal space-time possible*.
Using a couple-few hundred years or so of the scientific research that man has delved into

Matter-antimatter annihilation produces energy. Specifically, it produces gamma photons plus various unstable mesons, which decay rather rapidly into other particles (and neutrinos, iirc). No matter what you do, this will be very fucking obvious to every sufficiently advanced civilisation within 50 light years, at least, and humanity is a sufficiently advanced civilisation.
And can you prove that a more controled application would not have much different results than you assume?

Still nothing but unmoderated slander with no tangable debate against me.

It's hardly my fault that you are an illiterate who only wants to imagine things no one has said.

If you respond to this post with anything other than an acquiescence to the validity of my point, then you are a biased hack. Plain and simple. If you continue to refuse to get the fact that nothing here has PROVEN the existence of aliens.

And not one single fact here to prove they do not exist.

And not one single fact here to prove they do not exist.

Prove vampires don't exist. I fucking dare you.

Then it should be no problem for you to show where the FBI and New Mexico State Police are lying or where they are in error.

It's not the FBI or the New Mexico State police who are lying. It's you.

Not one single mention of black leg in this report:
http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:N1TpP6_IweUJ:foia.fbi.gov/cattle/cattle3.pdf&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

There has only been one liar here. Always has been, always will be. You.

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction. And in that fiction there has never been a mention of no traces left. (they leave bite marks dont they?) It is a simple process of elimination. By now, these magical maggots and other impossible theories presented here would have resurfaced. But they only seem to come into play for convienence.

Umm I belive things like vampires and werewolves first came from folx tales(which we know have some grounding in reality) and then the writers of fiction took these folx tales as insperation.

And not one single fact here to prove they do not exist.

*cough* Proving a negative *cough*

I think Dracula did it. Van Helsing actually failed to kill him. Since Dracula has magic AND can fly, it would make perfect sense that he could mutilate cows and leave no evidence behind.

Unless you reverse the process at the end of your long journey.

And it would be a long journey. All you can possibly get from this is a bit of extra fuel efficiency - you still need to burn fuel, and thus use thrusters of some sort. Furthermore, it's an awful lot harder to lose velocity like this than to gain it. Finally, your stopping would involve massive engine burns in the solar system, which would be very very very obvious.


Using a couple-few hundred years or so of the scientific research that man has delved into

Lightspeed limit again. Care to provide any useful suggestions about why it's false?*


And can you prove that a more controled application would not have much different results than you assume?

Yes, because I was talking about what happened when you annihilated one atom with one anti-atom at a time. It is not possible to be more controlled. You do this uncontrolled, and you no longer have a starship, or possibly a planet.

*The author in my sig uses FTL communication in her books. She makes it clear that they are set in a different universe, in which our physical laws do not apply. Indeed, as interesting as the stories she writes are, the universe in which they are set is completely impossible - she keeps relativity, but introduces the principle of simultaneity, which flatly contradicts relativity. Let this be a lesson that, while SF is interesting to read, trying to cite it in a scientific debate will get you rightfully and deservedly hammered.

And not one single fact here to prove they do not exist.

That's not how argument works. It's not up to me to prove that aliens do not exist. It's impossible to prove a negative. It is up to you to prove they DO exist, and thus far, you have failed tragically. Like I said, nothing you've offered here has been PROOF of aliens any more than it has been proof of magical woodland elves with laser cutters.

Tell you what. I'll prove aliens do not exist right after you prove it wasn't fairies, elves, Atlantians, wizards, dragons, werewolves, vampires, Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Hades, Ares, Aphrodite, Artemis, Athena, or Hercules that did it.

Prove vampires don't exist. I fucking dare you.

Not the point is it? IF vampires (as we know them from fiction) were real, they would leave a bite mark.

It's not the FBI or the New Mexico State police who are lying. It's you.


There has only been one liar here. Always has been, always will be. You.
A mistake I admitted to. It was in a section with mispelled words (that YOU said was unreadable) so I skipped over missed that one sentence until you actually did read it and brought it up.

Not the point is it? IF vampires (as we know them from fiction) were real, they would leave a bite mark.

Why? They're magic. They can erase the bite marks.

Not the point is it?
It is, you're just missing it.
IF vampires (as we know them from fiction) were real, they would leave a bite mark.

Vampire's saliva greatly speeds healing. The bite marks heal and don't leave a scar.

And it would be a long journey. All you can possibly get from this is a bit of extra fuel efficiency - you still need to burn fuel, and thus use thrusters of some sort.

Prove it if you are going to speak in absolutes! (that goes for all of you)

It is, you're just missing it.


Vampire's saliva greatly speeds healing. The bite marks heal and don't leave a scar.

As much as I hate to side with DT, that was a flawed answer - after all, if the cow has several organs surgically removed and all its blood drained by a vampire, it isn't in a state in which it can heal.

As much as I hate to side with DT, that was a flawed answer - after all, if the cow has several organs surgically removed and all its blood drained by a vampire, it isn't in a state in which it can heal.

It's magic.

It's magic.

*cough*

*cough* Proving a negative *cough*

I think Dracula did it. Van Helsing actually failed to kill him. Since Dracula has magic AND can fly, it would make perfect sense that he could mutilate cows and leave no evidence behind.

Dragontide, prove me wrong. This theory seems more logical to me.

A mistake I admitted to.

Which you then tried to cover over by bringing up another link and claiming that there was a report that showed a discrepancy. A report that has not been shown to exist.

You're still lying through your teeth.

As much as I hate to side with DT, that was a flawed answer - after all, if the cow has several organs surgically removed and all its blood drained by a vampire, it isn't in a state in which it can heal.

Vampires don't drink the cow's blood, they mutilate cows just to keep us distracted from THE TRUTH!

Prove it if you are going to speak in absolutes! (that goes for all of you)

Mathematically? Given that you cite, without question, sources who can't even handle the definition of an electron-volt, I doubt you could handle the mathematics.

Technically speaking, of course, one gravitational slingshot around the sun could send you to whatever star you choose. Technically speaking, you can go to Alpha Centauri by jumping out of the ISS while wearing a spacesuit (or while not wearing one - won't make a difference to your chances of surviving the trip). Technically speaking, you can send a tungsten block to the center of the galaxy by chucking it out of a space shuttle in exactly the right direction.

Of course, by the time it gets there, the universe will probably have died a heat death*, but still.

There's a maximum velocity you can reach using gravity assist from any given planet or star, beyond which it's not going to grab you enough unless you fly either a) in the atmosphere, or b) through the surface. As a result, you have two real options - the first is to find a nice cluster of black holes to slingshot yourself off, and the second is to use the Oberth Effect. We shall touch on each in turn.

Firstly, the black holes. With enough accuracy in your calculations (which may be impossible - the n body problem runs into fairly solid chaos theory issues), and a ship which can resist the tidal forces experienced when in close proximity to the event horizon (which is only possible up to certain limits), you can use the same tricks to get a series of speed boosts off a nice collection of black holes, eventually (with luck and skill) reaching relativistic speeds.

There are two main problems with this method, however. The first is finding such a collection of black holes. The second is stopping when you get somewhere, in particular, to Earth. We can't prove there's no nice collection of black holes somewhere in the universe, we do know there's none particularly nearby. As a result, if you were to use such a method, you'd need to either a) travel normally from the black holes to here - a matter of many hundreds of light years at least, and then subject to normal comments about visibility or b) decelerate yourself from relativistic speeds to much more reasonable ones before reaching the solar system, which requires expending vast amounts of energy, and would be insanely visible to us. Hence you cannot use this to avoid being seen while approaching**.

"Alright then," you say, "how about that Oberth effect you mentioned. Maybe they could use that to sneak up on us without being seen"***. Unfortunately, this doesn't work either. The Oberth effect is the fact that burning propellant at periapsis gives you a greater kinetic energy burst than it would if burned elsewhere. However, you still need to fire your engines to use it, and therefore all my previous comments about visibility of any interstellar drive system apply. Furthermore, you still need to decelerate once you reach the solar system. The previous paragraph then applies.

Basically, you are, yet again, completely wrong. Gravity assist is a useful phenomenon, but cannot be used as some fantastic tool to enable interstellar travel that we couldn't detect. Interstellar travel without detection remains, therefore, impossible, as it is presumed to do until proven possible.

I note, yet again, that you ignore all but one sentence of my previous post. I assume, therefore, that you have no response to the rest of it, and are thus admitting it by default.

*Which is, incidentally, a result of the laws of thermodynamics. Useful things, they are.

**Without even touching on all the other reasons any starship would be easily visible beyond just its engines. Which, again, you have completely failed to address, because they destroy your position.

***Subject, again, to comments in the preceding footnote.

It's hit or miss with you is it, DT?

Just dozens of links including FBI files that you chose to ignore. That's YOUR problem.
None of which said much of anything. Said nothing on their methods, their thoroughness, nada. It's hard to discuss something that doesn't offer much in the way of details. If you'd like to provide a detailed link that shows the methods, the testing, the ideas that were thrown around and why they were determined plausible or not, I'd be happy to read it. If you'd like to throw out a source that doesn't contradict your own argument when read through, I'd like to read that as well.

Also, based on how many times you brought it up, it seems your argument hinges on the word mysterious. This guy said mysterious, over and over again, two years with the cases and it is mysterious. It must be aliens.

The funny thing is, if the available evidence was so completely unique and unearthly, I think he would have described it as a little more than simply 'mysterious.'

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction. And in that fiction there has never been a mention of no traces left. (they leave bite marks dont they?) It is a simple process of elimination. By now, these magical maggots and other impossible theories presented here would have resurfaced. But they only seem to come into play for convienence.This goes against your own argument. FTL travel comes from fiction too. So by your own logic, it is therefore impossible.

Not the point is it? IF vampires (as we know them from fiction) were real, they would leave a bite mark.So we're only working with definitions as described in the canon so to speak? So the guy who first saw UFO's over Mt. Rainier (where the press got the term flying saucer) would be the original word so to speak? Because he didn't say they were saucer shaped, that was a misquote.

Does that mean we can throw out all witness accounts that say they saw flying saucers because they don't fit the canon? That's what your doing with vampires, so I'd like to make sure I'm keeping your double standards straight.

And not one single fact here to prove they do not exist.That's not how it works and you know it.

I know it's been asked of you countless times over this thread, but I'm not giving up now. Kindly provide some evidence of your claims. Until you do so, I can only assume your idea is as asinine as you presented it.

They say he shot it with an arrow and slit it's throat. See how easy it is for investigators to come to that conclusion? Did it say anything about the dummies trying to hide their tracks? No! Because regular old cattle thieves still do exist. (a point that is irrelevent)
IF posted that link as evidence that humans do weird stuff to animals.
See how I handled that everybody? Did I bitch because it's a Yahoo link? No! If my links are bogus then you all should have absolutly no problem in explaining WHY they are bogus instead of the tired old, "Oh that link sux"
The difference is that IF's link is a news link, whereas yours was to the personal site of someone who, like you, wants to believe that aliens are mutilating our livestock.

Watch the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9JkFsTPEPE&feature=related

Nice video of birds taken with an IR camera. What exactly is that supposed to prove.

Just dozens of links including FBI files that you chose to ignore. That's YOUR problem.

You've presented a lot of blogs, and a few links that don't say what you portray them as.

That's not my problem - it's yours.

Which you then tried to cover over by bringing up another link and claiming that there was a report that showed a discrepancy. A report that has not been shown to exist.

You're still lying through your teeth.

No! You are the one continiously lying about what I said!

Vampires and werewolves come from fiction. And in that fiction there has never been a mention of no traces left. (they leave bite marks dont they?) It is a simple process of elimination. By now, these magical maggots and other impossible theories presented here would have resurfaced. But they only seem to come into play for convienence.

Why are maggots magical or impossible?

How are maggots LESS convincing in your head, than spacemen?

The answer - I suspect - has to do with your preconceptions.

There's a maximum velocity you can reach using gravity assist from any given planet or star.

This is the statement that needed a footnote. How did you come to this conclusion?

This is the statement that needed a footnote. How did you come to this conclusion?

Sure there is. Just less than 299,792,458 meters per second .

This is the statement that needed a footnote. How did you come to this conclusion?

The force exerted on your craft is based on a number of factors, including the distance of closest approach. If your initial velocity is too fast, you'll simply pass straight by, without being appreciably affected by the gravity of the body. If you try to pass closer to the body, in order to increase the force due to gravity, you'll hit the atmosphere, which will do very serious damage to your craft at the sort of velocities we're talking about. If there isn't an atmosphere, you hit the planet instead, which does terminal damage. This is why you can get higher velocities from a black hole - you can approach closer to the center of mass without being killed.

Again, absolutely no contest made by DT on the rest of the post, leading me to conclude that eir contentions were completely disproved. This is doubly backed up by the fact that the one statement ey picked out was not relevant to or required by the main thread of my argument.

Edit: and yes, Galloism is also correct - but my reference was to a limit much below that. In short, the faster you arrive, the less of a boost you can get - the process tends to a limiting velocity, based on the gravity of the body you are using to slingshot from.

If you'd like to provide a detailed link that shows the methods, the testing, the ideas that were thrown around and why they were determined plausible or not
http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:TpgnKXT6SQIJ:www.nmanimalcontrol.com/training/FACT/necropsy.html+necropsy+law&cd=5&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
It is very important to preserve evidence in felony cases involving animal cruelty. If a felony case involves an animal who has died, a necropsy (animal autopsy) should be performed and tissue samples for pathological examination should be taken. Just like cases involving human death, in court cases involving the prosecution of an animal case, an Official Cause of Death must be determined.

In cases where the cause of death is not immediately obvious, very few veterinarians have the advanced training needed to issue an Official Cause of Death that will be acknowledged by the courts. The veterinarians at the New Mexico State Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory in Albuquerque are Board Certified Pathologists and are considered experts in their field. They are qualified to determine an Official Cause of Death. Some veterinarians may believe they are qualified and will fulfill your request for a necropsy, but the courts may not consider them sufficiently qualified and may disregard their opinion.

While, a complete necropsy of the intact carcass by a board certified pathologist will provide the best chance to determine the Cause of Death, in some cases a Cause of Death can also be determined and accepted by the Court if the necropsy is performed by the local practicing veterinarian and appropriate fresh and fixed (preserved) tissues are collected and submitted to the State Diagnostic Lab. Most local veterinarians are equipped to take tissue samples to send to the State Diagnostic Laboratory.




This goes against your own argument. FTL travel comes from fiction too. So by your own logic, it is therefore impossible.
There are fictional crime shows. Does that mean there is no crime?


That's not how it works and you know it.

I know it's been asked of you countless times over this thread, but I'm not giving up now. Kindly provide some evidence of your claims. Until you do so, I can only assume your idea is as asinine as you presented it.

That is an asinine statement. You want me to capture a UFO and park it on your front lawn is all your saying.

Nice video of birds taken with an IR camera. What exactly is that supposed to prove.

Can you (or anybody) enhance it so that we may see wings at work? Dont look like birds to me.

There are fictional crime shows. Does that mean there is no crime?

No it doesn't. It just doesn't mean that there is crime. However, you said:
Vampires and werewolves come from fiction.
Change 'vampires and werewolves' to 'FTL' and you get another true statement.

That is an asinine statement. You want me to capture a UFO and park it on your front lawn is all your saying.

That would be a good way of proving that they exist and are aliens.

Can you (or anybody) enhance it so that we may see wings at work? Dont look like birds to me.

The only possible reasons as to why it doesn't look like birds to you are:

1. You refuse to accept any possibility other than its a flock of alien spacecraft.
or
2. You have never seen birds in flight.

Can you (or anybody) enhance it so that we may see wings at work? Dont look like birds to me.

No, because you can't enhance an image beyond the resolution at which it was obtained.

Now I just know you're taking the piss.

Can you (or anybody) enhance it so that we may see wings at work? Dont look like birds to me.

It's an infrared camera, so the way to notice beating wings would be flashing. Guess what that video included, last time I checked. Also, birds don't all fly with their wings beating rapidly all the time.

There are fictional crime shows. Does that mean there is no crime?


Do you not remember your own argument?

It must be aliens... because vampires and werewiolves are fictional?

The force exerted on your craft is based on a number of factors, including the distance of closest approach. If your initial velocity is too fast, you'll simply pass straight by, without being appreciably affected by the gravity of the body.
Why would that be so?


If you try to pass closer to the body, in order to increase the force due to gravity, you'll hit the atmosphere, which will do very serious damage to your craft at the sort of velocities we're talking about.
Assuming you have manufactured every single possible type of material that could be used in a ship's construction. A lot of these (much stronger and lighter than steel) are still in development so this is not a point you can prove.

If there isn't an atmosphere, you hit the planet instead, which does terminal damage.

Yes a simple crash would do the most damage *cough cough Roswell cough*


Edit: and yes, Galloism is also correct - but my reference was to a limit much below that. In short, the faster you arrive, the less of a boost you can get - the process tends to a limiting velocity, based on the gravity of the body you are using to slingshot from.

But it does increase speed (at high veloicity) Point being, using several planets, moons, black holes, whatever for a long journey.

Do you not remember your own argument?

It must be aliens... because vampires and werewiolves are fictional?

My argument is that aliens are the most likely because nothing else on earth could have mutilated some of those cattle.

My argument is that aliens are the most likely because nothing else on earth could have mutilated some of those cattle.

No, you specifically ruled out vampires and werewolves, because they are fictional.

The fact that you're ignoring plenty of rational and mundane causes to justify your 'aliens' concept is a different problem, but at least be honest.

No, because you can't enhance an image beyond the resolution at which it was obtained.

Now I just know you're taking the piss.

No! That I did not know.

No! That I did not know.

You can interpolate, but you can't enhance beyond - and interpolation can give you a sharper-LOOKING image, but it won't actually add any detail.

No, you specifically ruled out vampires and werewolves, because they are fictional.

The fact that you're ignoring plenty of rational and mundane causes to justify your 'aliens' concept is a different problem, but at least be honest.

Nice try. When vampires, werewolves or a walking dead Richard Nixon get their own S.E.T.I., get back to me.

Nice try. When vampires, werewolves or a walking dead Richard Nixon get their own S.E.T.I., get back to me.

Nice try nothing. That's what you said. That makes your "My argument is..." post a couple of posts back either a BIG error, or deliberately misleading.

You have automatically ruled out predators, bugs, bacteria... all kinds of mundane phenomena that just don't happen to fit with your preconception. I even presented a source that shows WHY these corpses turn up, and youstill go on and on about aliens. Natural decomposition explains what you're talking about, but you still go on and on about aliens.

You're not being honest in your assessment of the evidence.

And if you honestly think there AREN'T organisations focused on unexplained phenomena, then you're deluding yourself.

Why would that be so?

That's how forces act. Go look up the mathematics here - I can't be asked to explain it, given that you're completely ignoring large relevant chunks of my previous posts. Your modus operandi appears to be "read post, discard most of it, snip one sentence out of context, and use this only, ignoring all the rest of the post even when it becomes relevant to the discussion again".


Assuming you have manufactured every single possible type of material that could be used in a ship's construction. A lot of these (much stronger and lighter than steel) are still in development so this is not a point you can prove.

Fine. Presume that the starship is manufactured in such a way that it won't be torn to shreds when hitting atmosphere at high velocity*. Even so, you will suffer massive velocity losses to air resistance, easily outweighing the gains from approaching closer to the center of gravity.


Yes a simple crash would do the most damage *cough cough Roswell cough*

Completely irrelevant. I am talking about beginning an interstellar journey to Earth, which, for quite obvious reasons, has to happen in another star system. Hence claimed alien crashes on Earth are completely irrelevant. Furthermore, an actual crash of the type which might be relevant to this discussion would be a little more noticeable than a few fragments of tinfoil and balsa - think huge screaming ball of fire and death blowing a massive crater in the ground below.

Go look up the idea of a kinetic bombardment, then scale up the mass of the projectile by many tens of times, and the velocity up to something like 5 times escape velocity, to get an idea what would happen.

Finally, any alien species which can calculate trajectories accurately enough to slingshot themselves around several planets, their star, and a local black hole; and then course with absolutely no maneuvering adjustments across hundreds of light years of space; would not then end up crashing into a little backwater planet at low velocity. The two require completely different types of beings.


But it does increase speed (at high veloicity) Point being, using several planets, moons, black holes, whatever for a long journey.

If you had actually read my post, you would have realised I accepted you could use gravitational assist from several bodies to achieve relativistic speeds, and then shown that you still would be detected, and explained why. Care to actually address any of that? Thought not.

If it helps, here's (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=14772356&postcount=776) a link back to the post.

*Which is complete nonsense - the efficient shapes for a starship and a craft to travel through atmosphere are totally different. Just look at the difference in form between the Space Shuttle and the ISS. Or the Lunar lander and the splashdown capsule they used. Effective space forms get torn to pieces very rapidly if you put them into an atmosphere at high speed.

http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:TpgnKXT6SQIJ:www.nmanimalcontrol.com/training/FACT/necropsy.html+necropsy+law&cd=5&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=usLinking what should be done is near useless. Link what was actually done by law enforcement.



There are fictional crime shows. Does that mean there is no crime?That was your argument. You ruled out vampires based off of the canon of vampire fiction. I ruled out FTL the same way.

Care to comment on this bit:
ot the point is it? IF vampires (as we know them from fiction) were real, they would leave a bite mark.So we're only working with definitions as described in the canon so to speak? So the guy who first saw UFO's over Mt. Rainier (where the press got the term flying saucer) would be the original word so to speak? Because he didn't say they were saucer shaped, that was a misquote.

Does that mean we can throw out all witness accounts that say they saw flying saucers because they don't fit the canon? That's what your doing with vampires, so I'd like to make sure I'm keeping your double standards straight.

or this bit:

Also, based on how many times you brought it up, it seems your argument hinges on the word mysterious. This guy said mysterious, over and over again, two years with the cases and it is mysterious. It must be aliens.

The funny thing is, if the available evidence was so completely unique and unearthly, I think he would have described it as a little more than simply 'mysterious.'Why wouldn't he come right out and say "I have never seen anything like this ever. I can't fathom what earthly source could have caused this." Why'd he leave it at just 'mysterious?'

That is an asinine statement. You want me to capture a UFO and park it on your front lawn is all your saying.Funny I don't remember saying that, but that would solve the problem wouldn't it?

No, I remember asking for any shred of evidence. All you have is double standards, half truths, and a complete lack of understanding of basic physics. Instead of making your case, you applied your blinders and threw away every other rational explanation. You want it to be aliens, so you ignore any data that doesn't fit that idea. You are delusional.

again".That period should be inside the quotation marks, therefore your entire, well thought out post is irrelevant. :p

No! You are the one continiously lying about what I said!

"I'm not lying" cried Pinnochio.

Too bad your nose doesn't get any longer when you do it. We've all seen what you've said here in the past 50 odd pages. A load of rubbish and lies. You want to claim your lies aren't lies, go find a bunch of pre-schoolers to fool.

That period should be inside the quotation marks, therefore your entire, well thought out post is irrelevant. :p

Haha. As it happens, however, I wasn't quoting a full sentence, which would carry its own punctuation with it, but simply a sentence fragment. As a result, the placement of that full stop is simply a matter of style, not rules, and thus placing it following the quotation marks was quite acceptable. :p

Grammar nazi? Two can play at being grammar nazis

UvV, you seem to be a major physics buff, and this thread is going fuck nowhere, so I have a question that's slightly related.

When we say that the speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second, by what frame of reference do we measure that? I'll explain what I'm talking about.

In an airplane, you have five types of speed, but I'm only going to reference two - true airspeed, and ground speed.

True airspeed is the speed of the aircraft relative to the parcel of air which it is in. Ground speed, of course, is the speed of the aircraft relative to the ground. Unless there is no wind, these two speeds will always be different (or if the wind is at a specific speed coming from a very specific angle).

So, for instance, if our solar system was moving in direction A at 0.1c (which I know to be false, but please accept for the purposes of the question), and we could make 0.85c, that would give us a forward velocity of 0.85c from the frame of reference of our solar system. However, if another solar system was stationary, it would be 0.95c in relation to it. If that solar system was moving in direction B (180 degrees opposed, or directly at us) at 0.1c, then we would have a relative velocity of 1.05c to that system, and we break physics.


Did my question make any sense, or do I need to hit myself in the face with a hammer again?

When we say that the speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second, by what frame of reference do we measure that?
Relative to the observer regardless of how the observer is moving or where he is.

As far as I know, the measured speed of light in vacuum is a constant completely irrelevant of the movement & position of the observer.


A quality which leads to the weird shit that's the whole relativity shebang.

Relative to the observer regardless of how the observer is moving or where he is.

As far as I know, the measured speed of light in vacuum is a constant completely irrelevant of the movement & position of the observer.

I can't say I understand that.

Wouldn't that mean that, if we did have really fuck big engines and the whole... well, starship thing going on, we could simply keep accelerating forever? After all, we would never hit the speed of light ourselves, since we would always appear to be at 0c by our own reference, but we also recede from earth at 23987982734987203587298570987235 meters per second, so we would be FTL from their perspective?

A quality which leads to the weird shit that's the whole relativity shebang.

Shebang :)

UvV, you seem to be a major physics buff, and this thread is going fuck nowhere, so I have a question that's slightly related.

Full disclosure - I'm not, really. I'm reasonable at classical mechanics, but for any serious physics, such as relativity, you want someone with a degree in the stuff, and I'm just a secondary school student on the road to being a maths major.


When we say that the speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second, by what frame of reference do we measure that? I'll explain what I'm talking about.

Any frame of reference.


In an airplane, you have five types of speed, but I'm only going to reference two - true airspeed, and ground speed.

True airspeed is the speed of the aircraft relative to the parcel of air which it is in. Ground speed, of course, is the speed of the aircraft relative to the ground. Unless there is no wind, these two speeds will always be different (or if the wind is at a specific speed coming from a very specific angle).

So, for instance, if our solar system was moving in direction A at 0.1c (which I know to be false, but please accept for the purposes of the question), and we could make 0.85c, that would give us a forward velocity of 0.85c from the frame of reference of our solar system. However, if another solar system was stationary, it would be 0.95c in relation to it. If that solar system was moving in direction B (180 degrees opposed, or directly at us) at 0.1c, then we would have a relative velocity of 1.05c to that system, and we break physics.


Did my question make any sense, or do I need to hit myself in the face with a hammer again?

It makes sense. Basically, when you get to velocities close to the speed of light, relativity starts to kick in, and various very weird effects conspire to keep your velocity relative to the observer lower than that of light. This is not a good explanation, or even an explanation at all, but I don't know enough to provide one straight off.

If you take a very big engine and keep accelerating, you will never see Earth appear to recede at a faster apparent velocity than that of light. What does start to happen is your mass increases, your ship flattens out, and the entire universe appears to squash down in the direction you're moving. Again, no explanation here, but...

I am now going to go do some research, and also cast "Summon physics graduate", so someone who actually knows what they're talking about at more than an amateur level can correct my mistakes. More content will be edited into here when I a) know what to say and b) know how to say it (and c) have finished writing up some maths I'm working on).

Edit: Okay, I can see G3N13 has already mentioned this. I shall, briefly, address the question you gave us.

We shall change the situation just slightly. Let us assume we are sitting on a little planet, marked A. Some distance away, there is another little planet marked B, and to us, it appears to be approaching at 0.2c. The people on B decide to come visit us, so they launch a spaceship, S, at 0.9c relative to them. How fast is the spaceship approaching us?


A S B
us <- 0.9c relative to B <- 0.2c relative to A


Well, it looks like a fairly simple problem:

(1) s = u + v

The apparent velocity with which they approach us, s, is equal to their apparent velocity relative to B, u, plus B's apparent velocity relative to us, v. All very simple, so let us plug the numbers into (1).

s = 0.9 + 0.2 = 1.1c

Oh dear - from relativity, they can't appear to be approaching any faster than 1c. The way we deal with this is quite simple, our basic intuitive formula (1) is incorrect. It's an excellent approximation for fairly low relative velocities, but it breaks down at high speeds. The correct one is


u + v
(2) s = ------------
1 - (uv/c^2)


If we insert the same original numbers into (2), we get

s = (0.2 + 0.9)/(1 + 0.2*0.9) = 0.932c

So, rather counterintuitively, the spacecraft appears to be approaching our little planet at A at a velocity of 0.932c.

And no, I can't actually explain why this happens. It works, the numbers work out, and the equations agree with experiment. Beyond this, you do need someone with a physics degree.

I am now going to go do some research, and also cast "Summon physics graduate", so someone who actually knows what they're talking about at more than an amateur level can correct my mistakes. More content will be edited into here when I a) know what to say and b) know how to say it (and c) have finished writing up some maths I'm working on).

Remember, that spell requires the reagent "large pizza" so you'll have to cast "Summon Dominos" prior to casting it.

Well, yes - it accepts science, and looks at what that implies. Really, without starting from a principle like that, there's not much of a useful discussion you can have.
That's true of course but I still feel the perspective is, how would I put it, bit narrow.

Well, a fusion drive system (hence "torchship") tops out, from here (http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3c2.html#table), at about 500,000 Gigawatts, which is 500TW or, more usefully, 5*10^14 W. That does pale in comparison to a sun-like star, which is around the area of 5*10^25 W.
A nuclear impulse drive - like envisioned in Project Orion (and further advanced in Project Daedalus) - could theoretically have much higher peak power.

According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(power)):
Yottawatt (10^24 watts)
5.3 YW - tech: power produced by the Tsar Bomba fusion bomb, the most powerful man made device

Of course the average output of such a drive would be considerably less and any feasibly constructible engine would use lot less powerful bombs.

Working from the trajectory you give in just a moment, and on a scale of 1AU -> 1mm, you'll spend 20-25 meters accelerating. Given that the diameter of a star system on this scale is about 10cm, you're well clear of it and still going for maximum burn.
Right you are.

You can't stay covered by the stellar disc for long, the parallax movement caused by Earth would cause the spaceship to become visible before long.

But the real question would be: At what range are we be able to detect, for example, a sub-kiloton class nuclear explosion?

From a fusion drive or nuclear drive of any sort, that unidirectional stream of particles - the reaction mass - will be at several hundred to several thousand K, and radiating appropriately. There aren't many other possible drive systems...
The mass driver idea was electro-magnetically accelerated pellets/particles whose internal temperature or density wouldn't necessarily be high, only the relative velocity between the ship and the thrust particle.

An advanced "ion engine" of sorts.

Nice try. When vampires, werewolves or a walking dead Richard Nixon get their own S.E.T.I., get back to me.

Don't forget, S.E.T.I. has so far not found evidence of extra terrestrial intelligence.

I can't say I understand that.

Wouldn't that mean that, if we did have really fuck big engines and the whole... well, starship thing going on, we could simply keep accelerating forever? After all, we would never hit the speed of light ourselves, since we would always appear to be at 0c by our own reference, but we also recede from earth at 23987982734987203587298570987235 meters per second, so we would be FTL from their perspective?
No, consider observers A, B & C.

A is the baseline point of reference: A person on a planet.

B&C are on a two stage space ship launched at 0.5c from perspective of A.

Now, some time in the flight spaceship is divided with B continuing travelling at ½ c while the half of ship where C is resting is further launched at ½ c relative to the space ship B is on.

Now, you'd normally think the velocity of C relative to A would be ½c + ½c = c however the speed which A would detect C to be would be considerably less around 0.8c (using the formula found here (http://home.att.net/~numericana/answer/relativity.htm)).


Or, to put it more simply...

Relative to A, B is Launched at ½ c

Relative to B, C is Launched at ½ c

Velocity of C relative to A is 0.8 c BUT the velocity of A & C relative to B is 0.5c

No, consider observers A, B & C.

A is the baseline point of reference: A person on a planet.

B&C are on a two stage space ship launched at 0.5c from perspective of A.

Now, some time in the flight spaceship is divided with B continuing travelling at ½ c while the half of ship where C is resting is further launched at ½ c relative to the space ship B is on.

Now, you'd normally think the velocity of C relative to A would be ½c + ½c = c however the speed which A would detect C to be would be considerably less around 0.8c (using the formula found here (http://home.att.net/~numericana/answer/relativity.htm)).


Or, to put it more simply...

Relative to A, B is Launched at ½ c

Relative to B, C is Launched at ½ c

Velocity of C relative to A is 0.8 c BUT the velocity of A & C relative to B is 0.5c

http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd89/Victory0985/Epic%20Lulz/asplode2.gif?t=1241708304

http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd89/Victory0985/Epic%20Lulz/asplode2.gif?t=1241708304

Be happy you're not a physics student. I know I am.

Be happy you're not a physics student. I know I am.

I would really like to understand this, but I feel like a deaf man trying to appreciate a concert.

Don't forget, S.E.T.I. has so far not found evidence of extra terrestrial intelligence.

Of course, S.E.T.I. has only had so much time to look, and given the sheer scope of the universe, said time isn't even remotely worth using as a measure of their effectiveness. And there are other possible factors, such as the strength of radio signals, other species intentionally keeping quiet, etc etc.

Don't forget, S.E.T.I. has so far not found evidence of extra terrestrial intelligence.
Most likely it* will never detect evidence of ETI.

The rules are so asinine that an advanced civilization specifically sending out 70 hour blip to the direction of our solar system - from the thin band Arecibo telescope draws in the sky - would be dismissed.

Also, any detected candidate signal has to be confirmed at a later date...So the alien civilization would have to beam out years'n years worth of signal to our direction before it would be accepted.


So in short: Not bloody likely to happen...

...of course that doesn't stop me from crunching SETI@Home project with BOINC ;)

*
Talking about the biggest & prettiest SETI project here.

Of course, S.E.T.I. has only had so much time to look, and given the sheer scope of the universe, said time isn't even remotely worth using as a measure of their effectiveness. And there are other possible factors, such as the strength of radio signals, other species intentionally keeping quiet, etc etc.

Oh noes. Now that you mention the possibility of nearby alien civilisations hiding from us DT will surely take it to be fact.

Oh noes. Now that you mention the possibility of nearby alien civilisations hiding from us DT will surely take it to be fact.
Who?

Relative to A, B is Launched at ½ c

Relative to B, C is Launched at ½ c

Velocity of C relative to A is 0.8 c BUT the velocity of A & C relative to B is 0.5c

Ok, considered... ultimate question.

If B is approaching target planet at .5c, and C is approaching the same planet 0.5c faster than that, which appears to be .8c from the origin planet, when will spaceship C actually get there?

That's true of course but I still feel the perspective is, how would I put it, bit narrow.

Maybe so - I like fantasy as much as the next guy. But if we discard science, I claim that all the aliens have time travel, FTL travel, inertialess drives, can violate all the laws of thermodynamics, and so on. It isn't a very good start for a discussion, unless we only break physics in extremely clear and well defined ways, which is remarkably hard to do without unforseen consequences.


A nuclear impulse drive - like envisioned in Project Orion (and further advanced in Project Daedalus) - could theoretically have much higher peak power.

According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(power)):
Yottawatt (10^24 watts)
5.3 YW - tech: power produced by the Tsar Bomba fusion bomb, the most powerful man made device

Of course the average output of such a drive would be considerably less and any feasibly constructible engine would use lot less powerful bombs.

Peak power is less useful - we've built lasers which deliver insane peak power, by only pulsing for tiny fractions of a second. What's important from a drive system is the overall energy you put into your ship from your drive.


Right you are.

You can't stay covered by the stellar disc for long, the parallax movement caused by Earth would cause the spaceship to become visible before long.

But the real question would be: At what range are we be able to detect, for example, a sub-kiloton class nuclear explosion?

Even presuming we can't detect you while you're accelerating (which I consider unlikely - such a power output would be a massively visible point source), you need to do equal work to decelerate your ship again. Firing an Orion drive anywhere near the solar system would make you rather easily detectable, bearing in mind that modern technology can detect Space shuttle main engines at Pluto range.


The mass driver idea was electro-magnetically accelerated pellets/particles whose internal temperature or density wouldn't necessarily be high, only the relative velocity between the ship and the thrust particle.

An advanced "ion engine" of sorts.

I think I originally mentioned that one, somewhere way back in the thread.

The fact that the 'exhaust' is cold doesn't help. Every bit of heat your ship generates has to leave the ship, or else you cook. If it doesn't leave in your reaction mass itself, it has to be radiated away. This will also cause you to stand out like a sore thumb to anyone taking a glance around in the infrared spectrum.

On the positive side, using mass drivers as engines does provide a very nice demonstration of the Kzinti lesson.

Who?The antagonist of this thread. Dragontide.

Who?

Dragontide - has been spending the vast part of this thread being aggressively anti-scientific and failing completely to comprehend, understand, or even properly respond to his defeated arguments.

Ok, considered... ultimate question.

If B is approaching target planet at .5c, and C is approaching the same planet 0.5c faster than that, which appears to be .8c from the origin planet, when will spaceship C actually get there?

Who are we asking this question? From the perspective of the planet it's rather easy, I think - a simple matter of the distance the spaceship travels and the speed it approaches at. Indeed, it works like this for each observer - someone on planet A, on planet B, and on spaceship C. But you will get different answers for each observer, all of which are equally valid. Time is no longer constant in relativity.

Edit: The best way to think about this is as follows:

Space-time is four dimensional - three dimensions of space, and one of time. The magnitude of anything's velocity through all four of these dimensions is always exactly c. As a result, the faster something moves through the three spatial dimensions, the slower it will move through the time dimension. In the limit, when moving at the speed of light through space, time will effectively halt.

Any body with rest mass must always be moving through time, and thus can never be moving at the speed of light through space. That's basically it, but understanding why these are true is rather more complicated (and beyond me at this time).

Who are we asking this question? From the perspective of the planet it's rather easy, I think - a simple matter of the distance the spaceship travels and the speed it approaches at. Indeed, it works like this for each observer - someone on planet A, on planet B, and on spaceship C. But you will get different answers for each observer, all of which are equally valid. Time is no longer constant in relativity.

http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd89/Victory0985/Epic%20Lulz/asplode2.gif?t=1241708304

A couple of questions without all the cutting, pasting and quotes:

Deceleration detection: Could the energy usage be eclipsed from detection? (like from the other side of Jupiter)

If a ship is in fact traveling FTL, could it not -in theory- arrive before it leaves like what a tachyon - in theory- does? (you would later detect something but would not be able to confirm anything)

A couple of questions without all the cutting, pasting and quotes:

Deceleration detection: Could the energy usage be eclipsed from detection? (like from the other side of Jupiter)
I don't know about this one, but...

If a ship is in fact traveling FTL, could it not -in theory- arrive before it leaves like what a tachyon - in theory- does? (you would later detect something but would not be able to confirm anything)

Now they're time travelling FTL aliens? Which laws of physics will we be ignoring next?

A couple of questions without all the cutting, pasting and quotes:

Deceleration detection: Could the energy usage be eclipsed from detection? (like from the other side of Jupiter)

If a ship is in fact traveling FTL, could it not -in theory- arrive before it leaves like what a tachyon - in theory- does? (you would later detect something but would not be able to confirm anything)

Ifreann has already dealt adequately with the second one. As for the first, there's a maximum possible deceleration a ship has, based on the power of its engines. It follows that, for any remotely plausible interstellar velocity, the ship will be spending many times the radius of the solar system decelerating (at an absolute minimum, the same distance it spent accelerating). This cannot be totally hidden behind Jupiter - for one, the motion of the Earth during this time frame would easily move past it.

So no, this isn't a practical method.

Now would you care to concede?

I don't know about this one, but...



Now they're time travelling FTL aliens? Which laws of physics will we be ignoring next?Well he's referring to the theoretical tachyon particle. Which supposedly travels faster than light, so if one were to shoot toward you, as it passed you would see an image of it arriving and one of it leaving simultaneously.

But to answer DT's question, from this site: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/ParticleAndNuclear/tachyons.html

The bottom line is that you can't use tachyons to send information faster than the speed of light from one place to another.

No.

Although I could be completely wrong. This is me browsing the internet for a few minutes. I'm far from an expert on the subject.

And if Wikipedia can be trusted, they have a nice little article on the tachyon:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tachyon

Ifreann has already dealt adequately with the second one. As for the first, there's a maximum possible deceleration a ship has, based on the power of its engines. It follows that, for any remotely plausible interstellar velocity, the ship will be spending many times the radius of the solar system decelerating (at an absolute minimum, the same distance it spent accelerating). This cannot be totally hidden behind Jupiter - for one, the motion of the Earth during this time frame would easily move past it.

So no, this isn't a practical method.

Now would you care to concede?

I'll concede when SETI does thank you very much.

What I'm suggesting are different processes of acceleration and decelleration. A boost from point A and sort of slamming on the breaks at point B. (allowing those detectable thrusters but powereful enough so that speeding up and slowing down is not a 50-50 process) And then not detectable on Earth because the energy burst is eclipsed behind a planet.

I'll concede when SETI does thank you very much.SETI is searching for ET. You claim to have already found it.

Space-time is four dimensional - three dimensions of space, and one of time. The magnitude of anything's velocity through all four of these dimensions is always exactly c. As a result, the faster something moves through the three spatial dimensions, the slower it will move through the time dimension. In the limit, when moving at the speed of light through space, time will effectively halt.

I'm just getting more and more confused. According to wiki (which I was just browsing), they postulate that there are galaxies that are moving away from us at over 3c, but seem to be moving away at less.

Where is this point of reference where we can say "Ok, that's not moving in 3 dimensional space, so it's moving fastest through time"? That's what boggles my mind.

Any body with rest mass must always be moving through time, and thus can never be moving at the speed of light through space. That's basically it, but understanding why these are true is rather more complicated (and beyond me at this time).

What you've said so far is beyond me, but I keep asking questions and trying.

Well he's referring to the theoretical tachyon particle. Which supposedly travels faster than light, so if one were to shoot toward you, as it passed you would see an image of it arriving and one of it leaving simultaneously.

Tachyons may be an exception to the speed of light rule, but the rule is still there.
I'll concede when SETI does thank you very much.
You seem to be ignorant about what SETI stands for. Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence. They haven't found it yet. According to you, extra terrestrial intelligence* has visited earth several times. You can see the difference, I'm sure.




*I use the term loosely. If aliens are mutilating cattle randomly, then I'm in no rush to call them intelligent :p

Tachyons may be an exception to the speed of light rule, but the rule is still there.I understand, I was just trying to clarify (not agree with) his position.

(allowing those detectable thrusters but powereful enough so that speeding up and slowing down is not a 50-50 process)

What? Unless I'm understanding this very badly, it sounds like you're suggesting that sufficiently powerful thrusters could be used to decelerate a vessel and could do this with less energy than it took to accelerate it. Surely if something is accelerated to X speed in a vacuum then it will take exactly the same amount of energy in the exact opposite direction to get it to stop? There isn't some tricky complicated bit of physics I'm ignorant of that would allow something like this, is there?

Tachyons may be an exception to the speed of light rule, but the rule is still there. (in theory)
Fixed

You seem to be ignorant about what SETI stands for. Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence. They haven't found it yet.

That;s why we have been discussing stelth and detection.

According to you, extra terrestrial intelligence* has visited earth several times.

According to thousands of reported sightings and unexplained events.

That;s why we have been discussing stelth and detection.


According to thousands of reported sightings and unexplained events.So they're stealthy enough to avoid SETI, but not enough to fool common folk with shoddy camera skills?

What? Unless I'm understanding this very badly, it sounds like you're suggesting that sufficiently powerful thrusters could be used to decelerate a vessel and could do this with less energy than it took to accelerate it. No. Not a less amount of energy. But still undetectable if eclipsed. (not a statement....still part of the question)

Fixed
Don't make me explain to you the difference between scientific theory and theory in the layman's sense of the word.


That;s why we have been discussing stelth and detection.
Yes, and you keep insisting that we ignore everything we know about the universe so that aliens could have visited earth invisibly.


According to thousands of reported sightings and unexplained events.

Emphasis mine. How can you suggest that aliens are responsible for unexplained events?
No. Not a less amount of energy. But still undetectable if eclipsed. (not a statement....still part of the question)

Ah, well then UvV's point still applies, I believe.

So they're stealthy enough to avoid SETI, but not enough to fool common folk with shoddy camera skills?

Good thing the military does not think in those terms. Electronic detection and visual detection are qiute different.

No. Not a less amount of energy. But still undetectable if eclipsed. (not a statement....still part of the question)But this raises the question, why are these aliens going to such great lengths to be undetected on their approach to Earth, but being carelessly obvious when actually inside our atmosphere?

Good thing the military does not think in those terms. Electronic detection and visual detection are qiute different.

SETI is not a military group.

Don't make me explain to you the difference between scientific theory and theory in the layman's sense of the word.
Dont go claiming Einstein's theories are the absolute truth.


Emphasis mine. How can you suggest that aliens are responsible for unexplained events?

Reported sightings, coinciding with unexplained events. (People in Alabama so pissed off about losing cattle while seeing UFO's they actually shoot at the sheriff's helicopter while the sheriff is investigating mutilations..... I have links for that if I have not posted them)

I'll concede when SETI does thank you very much.

What I'm suggesting are different processes of acceleration and decelleration. A boost from point A and sort of slamming on the breaks at point B. (allowing those detectable thrusters but powereful enough so that speeding up and slowing down is not a 50-50 process) And then not detectable on Earth because the energy burst is eclipsed behind a planet.

What are you going to slam on the brakes against? It's a vacuum - there is literally nothing to resist your motion. If you turn on your engine for one minute full power to accelerate you, you need to point in the opposite direction and run it for another minute to cancel that velocity. No exceptions.

On a road, it's possible to brake a lot faster than you can accelerate. On a road, you'll also coast to a stop if you turn off your engine. Neither of these are possible in vacuum - if you turn off your spacecraft's engines, you'll gently coast off to infinity.

What you're suggesting would be, I suppose, possible - but quite why one would carry a wimpy little ion drive for accelerating between the stars, then a massive antimatter drive to stop you behind a single planet, I couldn't say. It combines the worst of both possible worlds.

I'm just getting more and more confused. According to wiki (which I was just browsing), they postulate that there are galaxies that are moving away from us at over 3c, but seem to be moving away at less.

Where is this point of reference where we can say "Ok, that's not moving in 3 dimensional space, so it's moving fastest through time"? That's what boggles my mind.

What you've said so far is beyond me, but I keep asking questions and trying.

That's slightly different, and is basically due to the expansion of space itself. This doesn't violate the lightspeed limit, because space isn't a thing. You can also never go to such a galaxy, or even confirm its existence. To see why, think about a photon emitted from this galaxy, and presume the galaxy starts 10 light years away. After one year, the photon thinks it has travelled one light year. But it is now 3 light years away from its starting galaxy, and still has 27 left to cover to reach us. It clearly follows that it can never cover the entire distance. At this point, consult a real physicist if you want to know more - my knowledge has run out.

What? Unless I'm understanding this very badly, it sounds like you're suggesting that sufficiently powerful thrusters could be used to decelerate a vessel and could do this with less energy than it took to accelerate it. Surely if something is accelerated to X speed in a vacuum then it will take exactly the same amount of energy in the exact opposite direction to get it to stop? There isn't some tricky complicated bit of physics I'm ignorant of that would allow something like this, is there?

No, he's just wrong, and completely misunderstanding how maneuvering in vacuum actually works. Can't blame him, poor chap - he probably got his idea of starships from watching "Star Trek".

SETI is not a military group.

But still know the difference between sight and what a machine is trying to tell them.

Dont go claiming Einstein's theories are the absolute truth.
Don't go ignoring all the evidence that supports them. That's why they're theories, you see, and not hypotheses.


Reported sightings, coinciding with unexplained events. (People in Alabama so pissed off about losing cattle while seeing UFO's they actually shoot at the sheriff's helicopter while the sheriff is investigating mutilations..... I have links for that if I have not posted them)

How can you suggest that aliens are responsible for unexplained events, including sightings of unidentified flying objects?
But still know the difference between sight and what a machine is trying to tell them.
And therefore what?

Dont go claiming Einstein's theories are the absolute truth. Don't claim the theory is wrong without evidence.

How can you suggest that aliens are responsible for unexplained events, including sightings of unidentified flying objects?

With all the recent wars, we have seen what man can achieve in the air. Beyond that there is the F-22. (never been in combat) If any reported sightings are real and have still not been identified as man made then nothing else but aliens are possible.

And therefore what?

An explination as to why SETI cannont detect them but sightings continue.
*scratches head*....I thought I just said that.

With all the recent wars, we have seen what man can achieve in the air. Beyond that there is the F-22. (never been in combat) If any reported sightings are real and have still not been identified as man made then nothing else but aliens are possible.This simply isn't true, and the fact that you have decided that only aliens can be the answer shows that you want confirmation of your idea more than the truth.

This simply isn't true, and the fact that you have decided that only aliens can be the answer shows that you want conformation of your idea more than the truth.

Well I sure do want conformation. I mean WTF?? The cards are on the table. War is all over the place. The US military has very few secrets left to keep. The information act needs to be expanded. And I just could not believe they would test top secret equipment over a populated area.

Well I sure do want conformation. I mean WTF?? The cards are on the table. War is all over the place. The US military has very few secrets left to keep. The information act needs to be expanded. And I just could not believe they would test top secret equipment over a populated area.We all would like confirmation. But you want it so much it seems, that you are willing to ignore evidence to the contrary.

And any comment on this:

But this raises the question, why are these aliens going to such great lengths to be undetected on their approach [referring to the eclipsing method] to Earth, but being carelessly obvious when actually inside our atmosphere?

But this raises the question, why are these aliens going to such great lengths to be undetected on their approach [referring to the eclipsing method] to Earth, but being carelessly obvious when actually inside our atmosphere?



If all the alarms statred going off then everybody would be looking up. If they want less attention, they would try to avoid that. My guess is they do the best they can to do whatever they're doing, but they cannot become invisible to the naked eye.

If all the alarms statred going off then everybody would be looking up. If they want less attention, they would try to avoid that. My guess is they do the best they can to do whatever they're doing, but they cannot become invisible to the naked eye.They make a painstakingly long and precise course to completely avoid detection en route to Earth, but once they get here fly around witnesses(abducting some, supposedly flying up to other aircraft in other instances) leaving crop circles and mutilated cows? Real subtle aliens.

With all the recent wars, we have seen what man can achieve in the air. Beyond that there is the F-22. (never been in combat) If any reported sightings are real and have still not been identified as man made then nothing else but aliens are possible.

Not proof of aliens. Try again.

But this raises the question, why are these aliens going to such great lengths to be undetected on their approach to Earth, but being carelessly obvious when actually inside our atmosphere?

More seriously, such an eclipsing method is completely impossible.

http://www.sydneyobservatory.com.au/blog/wp-content/uploads//2009/02/aerial-view-of-otford-solar-system.jpg (http://www.sydneyobservatory.com.au/blog/wp-content/uploads//2009/02/aerial-view-of-otford-solar-system.jpg)

This is a scale view of the orbits of the inner planets. On this scale, the Earth is a small speck of dust, and Jupiter is a marble about 100m away from the Sun.

From Earth, Jupiter subtends (at closest approach) an angle of less than 0.014 degrees. If we assume all of the planets are stationary, this implies all your braking needs to take place within this cone, else we can easily observe it from Earth. Because you can't make any maneuvers while not hidden by Jupiter, you will also need to begin your journey, many light years away, precisely and perfectly aimed, and at exactly the right speed, to arrive here at exactly this time. Furthermore, you have to travel very slowly, unless you arrive from a very particular direction. As a result, you have to set out on this journey far before Earth even had life, and still intend to arrive in system to perfectly shield yourself from observation by a single planet - a nonsensical proposition. And the fact that the planets are moving compounds it even more, because the relative orbital velocities of Earth and Jupiter means that this cone of invisibility moves rather rapidly across the sky.

Anyway, let us presume you, for some reason, do all of this, and end up now matching velocities and orbits with Jupiter, without being observed from Earth. Congratulations. You now have to repeat the feat, to get from Jupiter to Earth. And this time, you don't even have anything handy to hide behind while you accelerate or decelerate. So it's still impossible to get to Earth without being observed.

Isn't orbital mechanics fun?

This is proof aliens exist.

This simply isn't true, and the fact that you have decided that only aliens can be the answer shows that you want confirmation of your idea more than the truth.

In order for me to be wrong, some of these will have to be proved (according to this thread):

Time and time again over a 2 year period the NM State Police would not have a necropsy preformed (even though it is recomended) and would have done an incredibly un-thorough job involving several felonies.

Einstien has to be perfect.

FTL only has a few exceptions like tachyons.

Nothing in our galaxy could live for millions of years.

The military has conducted tests with their most secret equipments over populated areas.

In order for me to be wrong, some of these will have to be proved (according to this thread):

No - you have things backwards. You are claiming that aliens have visited Earth. We have raised numerous objections - in my case, based on the physics involved - while others have brought up other problems. The evidence you have provided has been shown irrelevant or flat out wrong.

You made the claim, we have pointed out the problems. If you wish to, for example, challenge the science I have used to destroy your points, you have to demonstrate compelling evidence that the science is wrong. I do not have to demonstrate that it is right - you made the positive claim, you have to prove it.

You have singularly failed to do so.


Time and time again over a 2 year period the NM State Police would not have a necropsy preformed (even though it is recomended) and would have done an incredibly un-thorough job involving several felonies.

See later comments on military aircraft.


Einstien has to be perfect.

No - the theory of relativity, a theory confirmed by every experiment yet done to support it - has to be fundamentally incorrect. This is a massive claim, and one you provide no proof for. Without proof, it is a worthless claim on your part.


FTL only has a few exceptions like tachyons.

See before. Furthermore, tachyons do not exist, and you cannot provide any sort of proof that they do. At best, tachyons are an oddity of the equations, a result of someone looking at the formulae and thinking "hey, that could be kinda cool". There is less evidence to suggest their existence than there is to suggest the existence of a Yeti.


Nothing in our galaxy could live for millions of years.

Irrelevant - I have spent my last 20 posts showing that even if beings could live for millions of years, major problems still exist with them travelling sneakily to earth. You still haven't blocked these. Furthermore, you have still missed that natural lifespan doesn't matter if your life support systems fail - the natural lifespan of humanity is 80 years, but that doesn't mean we can put you in a leaky tin can, send you on a 1 year round trip to Mars, and expect you to survive.


The military has conducted tests with their most secret equipments over populated areas.

I'm only touching on the science here, as, by demonstrating the key factors of your argument impossible, I do not need to worry about the rest of this. If, for example, it is impossible for aliens to have visited us - and you have singularly failed to disprove or even address my posts about this - then there must be an alternate explanation. What that explanation actually is is irrelevant to the debate.

Sorry guys, I tried to make this thread useful, interesting, and productive.

Unfortunately, this is NSG.

No - the theory of relativity, a theory confirmed by every experiment yet done to support it -

Incorrect:
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/faq/invalidation.html

Question - (2-A)
Why should we believe that Einstein's theory of relativity is wrong?
A. - Because several experiments have shown very clearly that the results are not compatible with Einstein's predictions of general relativity. One can also think of other important reasons, (like the non-conservation of momentum and mass-energy in general relativity)

tachyons do not exist


Maybe. Maybe not.
http://askus.wikispaces.com/Physics

http://www.springerlink.com/content/t14811087281j07j/

http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/970612b.html


Irrelevant - I have spent my last 20 posts showing that even if beings could live for millions of years, major problems still exist with them travelling sneakily to earth. You still haven't blocked these. Furthermore, you have still missed that natural lifespan doesn't matter if your life support systems fail - the natural lifespan of humanity is 80 years, but that doesn't mean we can put you in a leaky tin can, send you on a 1 year round trip to Mars, and expect you to survive.


Back to leaky tin can spaceships again even though things like steel are becoming obsolete. Why should their life support have to be what mankind would need?

Sorry guys, I tried to make this thread useful, interesting, and productive.

Unfortunately, this is NSG.

Well, you were doing an excellent job of it, until DT turned up again.

Having said that, it's been useful, interesting, and productive for some of us - I, for one, have found it quite useful for practice, and picking up extra information about some of the more interesting bits of physics.

Incorrect:
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/faq/invalidation.html

This site has nothing whatsoever to do with actual science, and makes fantastical claims with no grounding in reality. It is useless as a source.


Maybe. Maybe not.
http://askus.wikispaces.com/Physics

The author of this site can't even get the makeup of a neutron correct. Ey knows nothing about actual subatomic physics.


http://www.springerlink.com/content/t14811087281j07j/

This is purely a theoretical paper, and as such falls into the part of my sentence you conveniently snipped out.


http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/970612b.html

This site outright admits that there is no experimental proof whatsoever of tachyons, without which they are merely so much mental masturbation. It then goes on to say that "There seems to be a lot of bogus science on the Web surrounding the subject of tachyons.", rather relevant given your earlier links.

So, now that we've dealt with this round of complete failure to actually source your claims, would you like to try again, and maybe read and understand the post you're debating this time?

Edit: Furthermore, could you stop editing things into your posts partway through? Write the full post, then dump it up, or make it very clear the post is a work in progress.

Anyway,


Back to leaky tin can spaceships again even though things like steel are becoming obsolete. Why should their life support have to be what mankind would need?

That was what you might call an illustrative example, demonstrating the need for life support. Even without assuming too much about alien physiology, we can assume that an intelligent living being will require a few key things, namely a) an atmosphere, and b) sustenance - nutrients, water (or equivalent), etc. To provide these for a million year journey, without any flaws, is an immensely challenging task even for a hyper-advanced species. Furthermore, the most advanced options to make this easy would necessitate vast power sources, completely destroying any attempt at stealth.

This statement from the NASA link gives credibility to a lot I have said:

"If they do exist, tachyons would be extremely difficult to utilize under our current understanding of physics."

This statement from the NASA link gives credibility to a lot I have said:

"If they do exist, tachyons would be extremely difficult to utilize under our current understanding of physics."

Allow me to change the emphasis, to show you the important part of that sentence.

"If they do exist, tachyons would be extremely difficult to utilize under our current understanding of physics."

The second clause, which you misleadingly bolded one half of, speaks about potentially using tachyons for some purpose (it has been noted upthread that tachyon interactions have been shown, theoretically speaking, to obey the lightspeed limit for information transfer). The first clause outright admits they may or may not exist, and in science, we presume things nonexistant or false until experimental evidence demonstrates otherwise.

Edit: It is quite literally impossible for a lot of what you have said to be credible, particularly in the debates between you and I. After all, every one of your claims so far has been shown to be misleading or simply flat out wrong, and not one of your sources about physics has been both a) any sort of valid source, and b) backed you up. You have, in short, utterly no credibility.

Allow me to change the emphasis, to show you the important part of that sentence.

"If they do exist, tachyons would be extremely difficult to utilize under our current understanding of physics."

The second clause, which you misleadingly bolded one half of, speaks about potentially using tachyons for some purpose (it has been noted upthread that tachyon interactions have been shown, theoretically speaking, to obey the lightspeed limit for information transfer). The first clause outright admits they may or may not exist, and in science, we presume things nonexistant or false until experimental evidence demonstrates otherwise.

Fair enough. However I was refering to the the fact that an astrophysicist chose to use the words "current understanding of physics" and not words to indicate a "set in stone" mindset. Back to the zoo then. You put a mirror in front of some breeds of monkeys and they see another monkey. (even get violent at times) Other kinds use the mirror to groom themselves. Chances are, there are a lot of things we just cannot understand.

In order for me to be wrong, some of these will have to be proved (according to this thread):

Time and time again over a 2 year period the NM State Police would not have a necropsy preformed (even though it is recomended) and would have done an incredibly un-thorough job involving several felonies.

Einstien has to be perfect.

FTL only has a few exceptions like tachyons.

Nothing in our galaxy could live for millions of years.

The military has conducted tests with their most secret equipments over populated areas.Stop with the damn strawmans. UvV covered these, but I'll emphasize his point: the onus is on you to prove your claim. You haven't done that or indeed come anywhere close to doing that.

Stop with the damn strawmans. UvV covered these, but I'll emphasize his point: the onus is on you to prove your claim. You haven't done that or indeed come anywhere close to doing that.

I still think it's Dracula.

Fair enough. However I was refering to the the fact that an astrophysicist chose to use the words "current understanding of physics" and not words to indicate a "set in stone" mindset. Back to the zoo then. You put a mirror in front of some breeds of monkeys and they see another monkey. (even get violent at times) Other kinds use the mirror to groom themselves. Chances are, there are a lot of things we just cannot understand.Nice strawman... again.

No one has said any theory is 'set in stone.' That undermines the very purpose of science. We've only said that unless you have compelling evidence, these theories stand.

I still think it's Dracula.

It is Dracula. Undeniably so. All the (non-)evidence is there. You'd have to be a fool to doubt it.

I still think it's Dracula.It's more likely than aliens. At least we know Dracula was based on someone who actually existed. One step ahead of aliens.

Nice strawman... again.

We've only said that unless you have compelling evidence, these theories stand.

So man does in fact know the entire nature of the universe?

No one has said any theory is 'set in stone.' That undermines the very purpose of science.


Opps. No man does not. Pick one and stick to it please.

So man does in fact know the entire nature of the universe?

Man does not know the entire nature of the universe. This is not evidence of aliens, however.

So man does in fact know the entire nature of the universe?


Opps. No man does not. Pick one and stick to it please.It's like you don't even read the post you are responding to.

Those aren't contradicting.

Theories require evidence.

The Theories of General and Special Relativity have an abundance of evidence. This does not make them infallible. The fact that they could one day be changed or altogether obsolete because of future data and evidence does not make your 'aliens visit us breaking all the laws of physics' idea any more credible.

Present some evidence, or you are just like the other tunnel-visioned crackpots.

It's like you don't even read the post you are responding to.

It's exactly that. Dragontide has demonstrated that the only thing he knows or at least willing to do is to flap his mouth and spew trash the same way Rush Limbaugh does. He can't, or doesn't read, repeats the same debunked rubbish over and over again, and hopes that by speaking the same lies over and over again, he can follow in G.W. Bush's footsteps and catapult his brand of brainless propaganda.

He's not arguing us. He's patting himself on the back.

Incorrect:
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/faq/invalidation.html

I can't be bothered to do anything to the rest of this post, but for this one snippet: the site is complete bunk. The experiment they mention consists of firing a laser to a satellite, and reflecting it of a series of satellites back to where the firer is.

So, let us begin.

Einstein's Theory claims that there is no possible way to detect the ABSOLUTE velocity of the Earth.

Not quite. Relativity states that there is no absolute velocity. All motion is measured relative to a reference point. On Earth, we use the Earth. In the solar system, we use the sun. For the galaxy, we'd use the galactic core. It's not that you can't detect absolute motion, it's that there is no such thing.

The very use of the expression RELATIVITY comes from Einstein's hypothesis that parameters, like VELOCITY, are relative so that any absolute motion (like absolute velocity) is meaningless.

This is true, but that wont last.

However, we see above, that the velocity of Earth is responsible for the change of time light takes to go around the Earth.

This is referring to the experiment mentioned. If you reflect the laser east, it takes a different time from if you reflect it west.

The statement is not quite true. The rotation of the Earth relative to the satellites is responsible for the change in time. If the satellites were fixed (relative to the Earth) this effect would not be seen. There would be no difference, because the satellites would be in the same motion as the Earth, and it would just measure the diameter of the Earth (plus a bit) instead.

From a fixed location on Earth, we can detect the Earth's motion.

Nope. From a fixed location on Earth, we can detect the satellites motion relative to the Earth, try again.

Therefore, contrary to Einstein principle of relativity, the velocity of light is not relative to the observer.

One of the central points of relativity is that the speed of light is absolute. For any observer wishing to measure it, it's the same. This would not be a disproof of relativity, but more evidence for it.

One must conclude that the Sagnac effect contradicts Einstein's hypothesis of General Relativity.

Firstly, it's a theory not a hypothesis. Secondly, this wasn't a disproof. This was just very poor understanding of relativity.

It's exactly that. Dragontide has demonstrated that the only thing he knows or at least willing to do is to flap his mouth and spew trash the same way Rush Limbaugh does. He can't, or doesn't read, repeats the same debunked rubbish over and over again, and hopes that by speaking the same lies over and over again, he can follow in G.W. Bush's footsteps and catapult his brand of brainless propaganda.

He's not arguing us. He's patting himself on the back.

I would have said he was doing something else to himself, but there you are.

It's like you don't even read the post you are responding to.

Those aren't contradicting.

Theories require evidence.

The Theories of General and Special Relativity have an abundance of evidence. This does not make them infallible. The fact that they could one day be changed or altogether obsolete because of future data and evidence does not make your 'aliens visit us breaking all the laws of physics' idea any more credible.

Present some evidence, or you are just like the other tunnel-visioned crackpots.

That's just it. Calling them "laws of physics" is not correct. When they are set in stone some day, then you can make claims of what is or is not credible.

That's just it. Calling them "laws of physics" is not correct. When they are set in stone some day, then you can make claims of what is or is not credible.Yes. Yes it is correct to call them that.

Go educate yourself on the terminology before you make even more of a fool out of yourself.

And you are, once again, missing the entire point. All theses theories have copious amounts of evidence to support them. When new evidence is found, if it lines up good, if not the theory either adapts or is thrown out. (this is an oversimplification of it)

You are suggesting that we should throw out several theories(backed by mounds of evidence) in favor of your idea about magic aliens which has no evidence.

I'm not sure how you are still not getting this. Honestly, if this doesn't work I might have to break out the puppets.

I'm not sure how you are still not getting this. Honestly, if this doesn't work I might have to break out the puppets.

He might or might not understand puppets. It wouldn't make a whit of difference. Don't you see? Dragontide doesn't want an argument. He doesn't want facts. He doesn't want debate. He simply isn't listening. I doubt you were around at the time, but Andaras was the same with his fanatical adherence to his viewpoints and dogmatic rejection of everything else, except his poison was in Stalinist flavor.

You could bring back Einstein from the dead and every single physicist who ever was and he'd still insist that he was being right. Dragontide is a living example of the idiot the universe produces to defeat the engineers why try to build a better idiot proof world.

You are suggesting that we should throw out several theories(backed by mounds of evidence) in favor of your idea about magic aliens which has no evidence.

It's just too far over your head. Isnt it? I never said the study of physics should move backwards. I have been trying to tell you and others that man's complete understanding of science is a finish line that is far off in the distance. I am not claiming that this alone means aliens visit Earth. But rather the posibility cannot be discarded just because man has not figured out how to sail the stars with formulas that still have the experts crunching the numbers and scratching their heads.

It's just too far over your head. Isnt it? I never said the study of physics should move backwards. I have been trying to tell you and others that man's complete understanding of science is a finish line that is far off in the distance. I am not claiming that this alone means aliens visit Earth. But rather the posibility cannot be discarded just because man has not figured out how to sail the stars with formulas that still have the experts crunching the numbers and scratching their heads.

You make misleading claims. I have not been saying "We can't do it, so it's impossible". I have been saying "There are the following scientific problems with any being travelling from another star system to Earth", and you have been completely ignoring those objections.

You make misleading claims. I have not been saying "We can't do it, so it's impossible". I have been saying "There are the following scientific problems with any being travelling from another star system to Earth", and you have been completely ignoring those objections.

Yes. And you have done a good job of explaining what man is capable of if given the same circumstances as an alien. But that might not be applicable.

One thing that has been a common statement from reported sightings is that no sound was coming from the (alleged) UFO. Man just cannot do anything like that unless it is something obvious like a balloon/zeppelin. It only takes one of them to be the real deal to make what man thinks he knows in search of lots of new answers.

Yes. And you have done a good job of explaining what man is capable of if given the same circumstances as an alien. But that might not be applicable.

One thing that has been a common statement from reported sightings is that no sound was coming from the (alleged) UFO. Man just cannot do anything like that unless it is something obvious like a balloon/zeppelin. It only takes one of them to be the real deal to make what man thinks he knows in search of lots of new answers.

True, it would only take one. Remember, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. You can't claim aliens have been here and expect to get away with just saying, "Well, what if ..." to all objections. The burden of proof is on you. I personally would be thrilled if just one of the sightings was proved to really be aliens, but I'm still waiting.

True, it would only take one. Remember, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. You can't claim aliens have been here and expect to get away with just saying, "Well, what if ..."

Agreed.

But what I am saying (to sum it up) is:

"What if" on the science/travel part.

That could explain reported sightings, unsolved livestock mutilations and such. (pieces of a larger puzzle that could fit together)

Making the claim "it cant be done because man has not figured it out" is nothing but that stale old "Earth is the center of the universe" mindset. I don't buy it.

Yes. And you have done a good job of explaining what man is capable of if given the same circumstances as an alien. But that might not be applicable.

One thing that has been a common statement from reported sightings is that no sound was coming from the (alleged) UFO. Man just cannot do anything like that unless it is something obvious like a balloon/zeppelin. It only takes one of them to be the real deal to make what man thinks he knows in search of lots of new answers.

Opening Remarks
No. You still haven't been reading what I've actually been saying.

I haven't been saying "If we were to travel between the stars, the following would have to be true." I am dealing, very specifically, with your claims about what aliens would do, and am showing those claims false by reference to well respected and well defended scientific theories.

Argument 1
If you are on a starship, every bit of heat you produce has to leave again as radiation. Otherwise you'll fry. No alien species can get around this - claiming they could is approximately like saying "well, you can't prove vampires don't exist, so maybe they do". If you do a particular amount of work accelerating a starship, you have to do the same amount to decelerate it. No alien species can get around this - claiming they can't is like saying "well, maybe all humans can levitate, just no-one has worked out how to".

And as a consequence of these two, if you are travelling between star systems, you will have to be visible to any technological species in the system you arrive in. It doesn't matter if you're man or aliens doing the travelling - it's a result of the laws of physics. You have still failed to provide any serious or useful evidence to suggest any mistakes in my claims, and you have also failed to demonstrate any errors in my logic.

Argument 2
I have also been dealing with specific aspects of your claims, and showing the problems with those - a good example is your suggestion that they might be able to shield their braking behind Jupiter. I showed why this wouldn't be practical; showed why it would never be used; and showed why, even if both of the previous objections didn't apply, you still wouldn't be able to reach the Earth without being seen. You have yet to provide any sort of refutation of these points.

Argument 3
Furthermore, your specific claims have generally been nonsensical. For example, let us pick up on the stealth issue. You would have us believe that these aliens are a fantastically advanced species, capable of constructing craft which can easily traverse the distances between stars and maneuver astonishingly in atmosphere. Furthermore, you claim that, while they go to incredible (indeed, impossible) lengths to remain unseen in their approach while in space - the safe part of the journey - they discard all such attempts at stealth as soon as they reach the Earth's atmosphere - the more dangerous part. The problems with your 'logic' here should be evident.

Argument 4
It is true that, if you totally ignore science, then it is possible for aliens to be visiting Earth rather regularly. Of course, if you totally ignore science, I claim that there are no such things as aliens, and all sightings of UFOs are actually people mistakenly witnessing secret magickal duels. Because we've completely discarded any semblance of logic or reason, both these explanations are equally valid. As you reject the second as nonsense on the grounds of science, you must also, in order to be consistent, reject the first on the same grounds.

Final Remarks
Now, care to actually address any of this? I've even numbered the sections of this argument so you can refer to each one separately, and so we can call you on them when you ignore them. If you insist, I can even dig back through this thread, and refer you to the expanded posts I explained each of these in.

It's just too far over your head. Isnt it? I never said the study of physics should move backwards. I have been trying to tell you and others that man's complete understanding of science is a finish line that is far off in the distance. I am not claiming that this alone means aliens visit Earth. But rather the posibility cannot be discarded just because man has not figured out how to sail the stars with formulas that still have the experts crunching the numbers and scratching their heads.I never said backwards. Read. The. Post. You. Are. Responding. To.

That's all well and good. No one is saying we have a complete knowledge of the universe. But the knowledge we have is the best we've come up with. It fits the available data. Your 'what ifs' might make an interesting story, but lack any credibility and have been debunked based on what we know to be true.

New theories topple old ones, that is a given. But they don't do so without evidence. Einstein didn't just wake up one morning, say Newton fucked up, and everyone fell in line behind him. He formed a hypothesis, he tested it, he painstakingly gathered the evidence, it lined up with his predictions. It has been verified over and over. True it will probably be tweaked in the future if not rewritten, but that will only happen after more evidence comes to light. You keep skipping that part and acting like it's alright.

He might or might not understand puppets. It wouldn't make a whit of difference. Don't you see? Dragontide doesn't want an argument. He doesn't want facts. He doesn't want debate. He simply isn't listening. I doubt you were around at the time, but Andaras was the same with his fanatical adherence to his viewpoints and dogmatic rejection of everything else, except his poison was in Stalinist flavor.

You could bring back Einstein from the dead and every single physicist who ever was and he'd still insist that he was being right. Dragontide is a living example of the idiot the universe produces to defeat the engineers why try to build a better idiot proof world.I remember Andaras. I didn't post much back then, hell I still don't. But yes, it is a bit like deja vu.

<snip>

New theories topple old ones, that is a given. But they don't do so without evidence. Einstein didn't just wake up one morning, say Newton fucked up, and everyone fell in line behind him. He formed a hypothesis, he tested it, he painstakingly gathered the evidence, it lined up with his predictions. It has been verified over and over. True it will probably be tweaked in the future if not rewritten, but that will only happen after more evidence comes to light. You keep skipping that part and acting like it's alright.

<snip>

Just to springboard off this a little bit more, one of the most important things for any new theory, in physics or any of the other hard sciences, is that it must provide the same predictions for the experiments already done. So, even if something is to replace relativity one day, whatever it is must still confirm most of basic principles of relativity, as these are supported by vast numbers of experiments, and used in many parts of modern science and technology. Unfortunately, this includes those parts about light-speed limits and the like.

Opening Remarks
No. You still haven't been reading what I've actually been saying.

I haven't been saying "If we were to travel between the stars, the following would have to be true." I am dealing, very specifically, with your claims about what aliens would do, and am showing those claims false by reference to well respected and well defended scientific theories.

Argument 1
If you are on a starship, every bit of heat you produce has to leave again as radiation. Otherwise you'll fry. No alien species can get around this - claiming they could is approximately like saying "well, you can't prove vampires don't exist, so maybe they do". If you do a particular amount of work accelerating a starship, you have to do the same amount to decelerate it. No alien species can get around this - claiming they can't is like saying "well, maybe all humans can levitate, just no-one has worked out how to".

And as a consequence of these two, if you are travelling between star systems, you will have to be visible to any technological species in the system you arrive in. It doesn't matter if you're man or aliens doing the travelling - it's a result of the laws of physics. You have still failed to provide any serious or useful evidence to suggest any mistakes in my claims, and you have also failed to demonstrate any errors in my logic.


Dont know if I have mentioned it or not but light sails would not produce exhaust.

And why does there have to be a detectable exhaust? Why cannot a ship have a section of the ship made out of -whatever- that would store exhaust/heat? (so that they might not be detected by other possible space faring races)


Argument 2
I have also been dealing with specific aspects of your claims, and showing the problems with those - a good example is your suggestion that they might be able to shield their braking behind Jupiter. I showed why this wouldn't be practical; showed why it would never be used; and showed why, even if both of the previous objections didn't apply, you still wouldn't be able to reach the Earth without being seen. You have yet to provide any sort of refutation of these points.


Was thinking that Jupiter could be a good place to apply thrust against for slowing down and if it were eclipsed to us, we would not detect the reverse thrust. But that idea does have too many flaws as to the use I was suggesting. (maybe for an emergency procedure)

Argument 3
Furthermore, your specific claims have generally been nonsensical. For example, let us pick up on the stealth issue. You would have us believe that these aliens are a fantastically advanced species, capable of constructing craft which can easily traverse the distances between stars and maneuver astonishingly in atmosphere. Furthermore, you claim that, while they go to incredible (indeed, impossible) lengths to remain unseen in their approach while in space - the safe part of the journey - they discard all such attempts at stealth as soon as they reach the Earth's atmosphere - the more dangerous part. The problems with your 'logic' here should be evident.
I believed I mentioned the possibility of dimentional travel. But might not have given a link:
http://www.nasca.org.uk/String/string.html


Argument 4
It is true that, if you totally ignore science, then it is possible for aliens to be visiting Earth rather regularly. Of course, if you totally ignore science, I claim that there are no such things as aliens, and all sightings of UFOs are actually people mistakenly witnessing secret magickal duels. Because we've completely discarded any semblance of logic or reason, both these explanations are equally valid. As you reject the second as nonsense on the grounds of science, you must also, in order to be consistent, reject the first on the same grounds.


Pardon me but how did you come to the conclusion that I am ignoring science from statements like: "Making the claim "it cant be done because man has not figured it out" is nothing but that stale old "Earth is the center of the universe" mindset. I don't buy it. "
:confused:
I totally agree with you that given the same circumstances, man would be stranded on whatever rock and unable to reach Earth undetected. But the book on science/physics is not yet closed and may never be.

I am going to rearrange your paragraphs just a little, I hope you don't mind too much.

Dont know if I have mentioned it or not but light sails would not produce exhaust.

And why does there have to be a detectable exhaust? Why cannot a ship have a section of the ship made out of -whatever- that would store exhaust/heat? (so that they might not be detected by other possible space faring races)

Thermodynamics - you produce the heat, it either leaves the ship, or melts the ship.

You could, theoretically, store the waste heat in some sort of heat sink, such as an asteroid. However, every bit of mass in your heat sink has to also be accelerated, causing you to require more energy, and thus produce more waste heat. Furthermore, you will only be able to do this until the temperature of your heat sink equals that of your power source - after this, you will need to produce more waste heat to pump it in. Over a long distance journey, this still requires you to dispose of heat by radiating it away into space.


Was thinking that Jupiter could be a good place to apply thrust against for slowing down and if it were eclipsed to us, we would not detect the reverse thrust. But that idea does have too many flaws as to the use I was suggesting. (maybe for an emergency procedure)

No - it is even less likely as an emergency procedure. In space, you can't let emergency procedures happen - you do not have enough time to slow down to stop yourself hitting something. Elaborate maneuvers are only the province of pre-planning.


Pardon me but how did you come to the conclusion that I am ignoring science from statements like: "Making the claim "it cant be done because man has not figured it out" is nothing but that stale old "Earth is the center of the universe" mindset. I don't buy it. "
:confused:


Because you post places like this as sources, that's why.


I believed I mentioned the possibility of dimentional travel. But might not have given a link:
http://www.nasca.org.uk/String/string.html

While mildly interesting, this has nothing whatsoever to do with actual science - it is merely an entertaining fiction.


I totally agree with you that given the same circumstances, man would be stranded on whatever rock and unable to reach Earth undetected. But the book on science/physics is not yet closed and may never be.

It doesn't have to be. Whatever new theories we devise in the future to deal with the gaps in relativity or thermodynamics, they will need to agree with all of the experimental results we have so far produced. Given that my demonstrations of the flaws in your arguments rest on parts of these theories confirmed by experimental results, my attacks will stand even if a replacement for relativity is found tomorrow.

While mildly interesting, this has nothing whatsoever to do with actual science - it is merely an entertaining fiction.

Just have time to address this for now.

These particle colliders are just a bit more than entertaining fiction. The Swiss are going to try again in a few months.

Just have time to address this for now.

These particle colliders are just a bit more than entertaining fiction. The Swiss are going to try again in a few months.

I was talking about your actual source, the website. Which is nothing more than an entertaining fiction, given that they also believe that astrology works (http://www.nasca.org.uk/Astrology/astrology.html), that there are antigravity hills (http://www.nasca.org.uk/Strange_relics_/antigravity/antigravity.html) (so nonsensical as to not even need bothering with), that there will be a calamity in 2012 (http://www.nasca.org.uk/Asian_disaster/2012/2012.html), and that 666 is a mystical number underlying all of reality (http://www.nasca.org.uk/666/666.html).

If there were actually anything to what they say about strings or dimensions, you would surely be able to provide a slightly more reliable source? As it stands, a combination of a couple books of background reading and a few news articles, plus a cursory skimming of your link, is quite sufficient to show they have no idea what they are talking about.

Agreed.

But what I am saying (to sum it up) is:

"What if" on the science/travel part.

That could explain reported sightings, unsolved livestock mutilations and such. (pieces of a larger puzzle that could fit together)

Making the claim "it cant be done because man has not figured it out" is nothing but that stale old "Earth is the center of the universe" mindset. I don't buy it.

In order for aliens to get here with any degree of regularity, they'd either have to be setting off blind on phenomenally long journeys, with extraordinarily long lifespans... or they'd have to have some form of travel far beyond the speed of light.

Either of which is a pretty extraordinary claim - which is why the burden of proof is on you to SUPPORT those claims.

Thus far, you've not managed to prove anything like... no, I take that back. Thus far, you've not been able to prove anything.

Dont know if I have mentioned it or not but light sails would not produce exhaust.


'Light sails' would also be an incredibly slow method of interstellar travel, if they were practical, at all.

Maybe so - I like fantasy as much as the next guy. But if we discard science, I claim that all the aliens have time travel, FTL travel, inertialess drives, can violate all the laws of thermodynamics, and so on. It isn't a very good start for a discussion, unless we only break physics in extremely clear and well defined ways, which is remarkably hard to do without unforseen consequences.
You misunderstood me.

The point I was trying to make was that the site has a preference to what we can envision now - which is completely understandable - but doesn't really describe what could be possible later.
Peak power is less useful
Less useful, perhaps, but that was not my meaning...

When a star pulses 1% (if detectable) every Xth second there might be a reason to suspect an artificial source. ;)
such a power output would be a massively visible point source), you need to do equal work to decelerate your ship again. Firing an Orion drive anywhere near the solar system would make you rather easily detectable, bearing in mind that modern technology can detect Space shuttle main engines at Pluto range.
...but only when we know what for and - more importantly - where to look at.

Although it's completely true that, say, we can detect Voyager II which is sending signals at less power than 10 normal lightbulbs, the real question is: At what range would a standard nuclear impulse drive be -.not detectable but - detected?


My point? While we can detect a 500 watt source at a specific location light hours away, randomly detecting - for example - Pluto requires some work from the observer.

The fact that the 'exhaust' is cold doesn't help. Every bit of heat your ship generates has to leave the ship, or else you cook.
This is completely true.

If it doesn't leave in your reaction mass itself, it has to be radiated away. This will also cause you to stand out like a sore thumb to anyone taking a glance around in the infrared spectrum.
This however appears misleading and would depend IMO entirely on the efficiency, power & cooling of the engine.

An engine running at any efficiency would ambidirectionally heat the ship at a rate of (1 - efficiency) of the engine output....

...of which only a very minor part of might be directed at the direction of the target: For example, if the numbers were 99%/1%/0.001% (efficiency/waste heat/radiation passing the directional cover [ie. advanced aluminum foil (reverse) umbrella]) a terawatt engine would appear as a 100 kW source* from the point of view of the observer


* For comparison, Earth is (according to Wiki (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Breakdown_of_the_incoming_solar_energy.svg)) a 12 thousand kilometer sphere radiating 173 petawatts of energy (~350 W/m^2)

On the positive side, using mass drivers as engines does provide a very nice demonstration of the Kzinti lesson.
As much as it saddens me, Niven is not on my list of authors that I've read..Although, he's definitely been on 'must read' list for quite a while...

...infact ever since I saw the reviews of a Ringworld game in the early 90s (two of those reviews did get me into authors: Betrayal at Krondor & Gateway by, respectively, Raymond E Feist & Frederick Pohl). :D


On the other hand, may I suggest Alastair Reynold's Revelation Space (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revelation_Space_universe) series.

I was talking about your actual source, the website. Which is nothing more than an entertaining fiction, given that they also believe that astrology works (http://www.nasca.org.uk/Astrology/astrology.html), that there are antigravity hills (http://www.nasca.org.uk/Strange_relics_/antigravity/antigravity.html) (so nonsensical as to not even need bothering with), that there will be a calamity in 2012 (http://www.nasca.org.uk/Asian_disaster/2012/2012.html), and that 666 is a mystical number underlying all of reality (http://www.nasca.org.uk/666/666.html).

If there were actually anything to what they say about strings or dimensions, you would surely be able to provide a slightly more reliable source? As it stands, a combination of a couple books of background reading and a few news articles, plus a cursory skimming of your link, is quite sufficient to show they have no idea what they are talking about.

Sorry Charlie but your not going to be able to hide an LHC in the garage! *scootches all the 666 - I'm Elvis on a unicorn stuff out of the way*:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider

Are there extra dimensions,[11] as predicted by various models inspired by string theory, and can we detect them? ...

ATLAS – one of two general purpose detectors. ATLAS will be used to look for signs of new physics, including the origins of mass and extra dimensions


http://ncronline.org/node/1786

Lots of links about the LHC.

EDIT: This thread brought to a screeching halt by a tabloid link? ...I don't care what anybody says! That's funny!
:tongue:

Pretty interesting study going on at at Baylor:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090507175838.htm

ScienceDaily (May 8, 2009) — With the new movie ‘Star Trek’ opening in theaters across the nation, one thing movie goers will undoubtedly see is the Starship Enterprise racing across the galaxy at the speed of light. But can traveling at warp speed ever become a reality?

Two Baylor University physicists believe they have an idea that can turn traveling at the speed of light from science fiction to science, and their idea does not break any laws of physics.
Dr. Gerald Cleaver, associate professor of physics at Baylor, and Dr. Richard Obousy, a Baylor post-doctoral student, theorize that by manipulating the space-time dimensions around the spaceship with a massive amount of energy, it would create a “bubble” that could push the ship faster than the speed of light. To create this bubble, the Baylor physicists believe manipulating the 11-dimension would create dark energy. Cleaver said positive dark energy is responsible for speeding up the universe as time moves on, just like it did after the Big Bang, when the universe expanded faster than the speed of light.

“Think of it like a surfer riding a wave,” said Cleaver, who co-authored the paper with Obousy about the new method. “The ship would be pushed by the bubble and the bubble would be traveling faster than the speed of light.”

The method is based on the Alcubierre drive, which proposes expanding the fabric of space behind a ship into a bubble and shrinking space-time in front of the ship. The ship would not actually move, rather the ship would sit in between the expanding and shrinking space-time dimensions. Since space would move around the ship, the theory does not violate Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, which states that it would take an infinite amount of energy to accelerate an object faster than the speed of light.

String theory suggests the universe is made up of multiple dimensions. Height, width and length are three dimensions, and time is the fourth dimension. Scientists believe that there are a total of 10 dimensions, with six other dimensions that we can not yet identify. A new theory, called M-theory, takes string theory one step farther and states that the “strings” actually vibrate in an 11-dimensional space. It is this 11th dimension that the Baylor researchers believe could help propel a ship faster than the speed of light.


Need to cite this story in your essay, paper, or report? Use one of the following formats:
APA

MLA Baylor University (2009, May 8). 'Star Trek' Warp Speed? Physicists Have New Idea That Could Make It So. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 10, 2009, from http://www.sciencedaily.com* /releases/2009/05/090507175838.htm



Maybe someday it will actually be humans that show aliens how to zip around the stars!
:D