h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This will be my first response to the subject line. Nothing interesting is happening here and I will be taking my time.

There is an invasion of in Cabin 13 (V) The Lighthouse Bar and an extremely humorous thread 'The New World Order Is On Our Doorstep - We Need To Wake Up!'.

But apart from that I don't know.

I've noted the thread you refer to, and my first response to people who think on it seriously, but in the traditionally wrong-headed way is to try to set them straight. Then I gather my senses and move on.

I punctuated that rather oddly and forgot , but we move along.
I'm rather convinced that superstring theory is close to the truth; but I'm not an expert, rather interpreting the scientific history and some of the things the superstring approach appears to explain (from multiple sources--my library is enormous, and I have done some layperson explaining of the theory).

There are likely to be multiple universes, or a "megaverse" from one recently read book, and superstring theory is attached to some plausible mechanistic arguing (Chaotic Inflation and such).

See what comes out of my part of the conversation "What's Just Happened?"Several pages from the end now is where I start factoring the posting numbers, and, as if inspired, claim to have made a prediction on the fact that it would take a while longer than might reasonably be expected.

Hello Julzes.

I notice that you are fairly new here on h2g2 and that your Personal Space has been hidden. I tried to post this message at your personal space, but I couldn't, so I'm posting it here.

Your space being hidden can mean one of two things.

It's possible that something you wrote on your Personal Space upset somebody and it has been referred to the Editors for them to decide whether it is OK or not. If this is the case, then you will have received an e-mail from the moderators explaining the problem and what you should do to fix it. If you don't agree with what they say, reply to the e-mail and discuss it with them.

The other more likely possibility is that you've been hit by a bug in the h2g2 system. In this case you will receive no e-mail and the Personal Space will sit like that indefinitely. You should send an e-mail to the editors at [email protected] explaining that your page is hidden and that you didn't receive any e-mail about it. They'll be able to sort it out in no time.

It is unfortunate that you should experience this bug when you're only a beginner in the world of h2g2. It could put a lot of people off. I hope it doesn't discourage you.

Éowyn

Thank you, very much. This is much clearer now.

Fermi Paradox, is that right? I'm pre-occupied with a new camera with a hundred or so buttons so I'm only here for a few minutes a day at the moment.

What assumptions are made for the Fermi paradox to hold? Is it space is assumed to be 3-D, uniformly distributed, time is fixed, the edges of the universe are expanding faster than the speed of light? What?

It is much too much for me to imagine, to talk of an edge when the universe may fold round in 4-D.

Well off to be confused with my new old camera.

Please take me off your friends list

Now, that should be settled. No invited friends, and so nobody to insult me here without prior permission. There is a good book on the so-called edge in time--beginning of the Universe--that could have been his only reference (having nothing to do with the Fermi Paradox): "Before the Big Bang" from Springer Verlag. It's not very technical.

It deals with, I'm afraid I'm going senile--goodbye.

Mmmm, no.

As for the question, now...
My answer is that the laws of the Universe are well established for the relevant part of the Universe, our own galaxy. No assumptions are made that are not backed by fairly strong empirical evidence, as far as I can tell on first thinking about it. Tipler and Barrow, in their highly controversial "The Anthropic Cosmological Principle", claim a proof that there is no other intelligent life in the Milky Way, which I know to be hogwash. They make an assumption right at the beginning of the critical chapter about something called The Zoo Hypothesis making an analogy with preventing all crime, and I just say maybe that too is possible.

Interesting, but some academics say they already have found extra terrestrial life.

On the other hand, there are lots of opposing sound arguments from the referenced book. The paradox comes from accepting these and having to resort to some kind of assumption like the zoo hypothesis. There is a full range of analysis at that rival, as I infer you have noticed (or you wouldn't have asked me about it). That's the current status of this thread. I brought up the string theory stuff to start before life, in my opinion. The book I mentioned is good. Some specific-religion stuff that I found slightly ridiculous at the end, but not a big deal.

You buy that, then, or...no you are posing a counter-argument for claiming a paradox on that grounds. "Some academics" are proposing that Jesus really walked on water and raised the dead, and I know you don't think that's critical to a discussion of the truth of the matter.

Yes I buy that.

Well, I have always wondered about von Daniken (spelling?) and his "Chariots of the Gods", but I have not looked into the matter. I really don't believe the on-going stuff to be more than a projection of mutual wishes of some kind, though, because space travel will never be that cheap and easy. I am reconsidering that as I write, though. Interesting thoughts going by a bit fast. Sorry. Will catch up with them later.