As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/
Options

Mods know too much about the [Conspiracy Theories] thread

18283858788100

Posts

  • Options
    ArbitraryDescriptorArbitraryDescriptor changed Registered User regular
    Gvzbgul wrote: »

    It blew my mind a little when I realized they were describing a dowsing rod. I learned about those in first grade. What kind of rube, let alone a national government, would
    Smrtnik wrote: »
    Can't wait for Trump to start pushing this as the right COVID test to use.

    Fuck

  • Options
    GvzbgulGvzbgul Registered User regular
    It was a huge scandal back when it first happened in Iraq. But then it just keeps happening!

  • Options
    EncEnc A Fool with Compassion Pronouns: He, Him, HisRegistered User regular
    Gvzbgul wrote: »

    It blew my mind a little when I realized they were describing a dowsing rod. I learned about those in first grade. What kind of rube, let alone a national government, would
    Smrtnik wrote: »
    Can't wait for Trump to start pushing this as the right COVID test to use.

    Fuck

    Keep in mind, it's not used with the understanding that it is a real tool that does real science. These are used as tools to:
    • fool people into thinking that the government has control of the situation when they dont
    • fool people into thinking that government purges of people have a basis in science rather than just pointing the buzzer at a person they want to get rid of and doing so.

  • Options
    IncenjucarIncenjucar VChatter Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    ...so those are dousing rods. Geeze.

  • Options
    ZavianZavian universal peace sounds better than forever war Registered User regular
    We obviously need dousing rod powered brain detectors

  • Options
    ArbitraryDescriptorArbitraryDescriptor changed Registered User regular
    Enc wrote: »
    Gvzbgul wrote: »

    It blew my mind a little when I realized they were describing a dowsing rod. I learned about those in first grade. What kind of rube, let alone a national government, would
    Smrtnik wrote: »
    Can't wait for Trump to start pushing this as the right COVID test to use.

    Fuck

    Keep in mind, it's not used with the understanding that it is a real tool that does real science. These are used as tools to:
    • fool people into thinking that the government has control of the situation when they dont
    • fool people into thinking that government purges of people have a basis in science rather than just pointing the buzzer at a person they want to get rid of and doing so.

    I considered this, but wasn't sure if it was better.

    It would probably be a bit of both if someone ran a COVID detector up the qanon hashtag and Trump saw it.

  • Options
    Jealous DevaJealous Deva Registered User regular
    edited April 2020
    Hevach wrote: »
    Yes, but the equation didn't account for the suitability of the parent star - flare stars, complex multiary systems, etc.

    It also gave 1.0 on two coefficients that make the biggest difference: habitable planets that develop life, and planets with life that develop intelligent life. Our own solar system belies the first, with three habitable zone planets, one utterly hostile to life and one bitterly indifferent.

    The second ignores the consideration of time. Earth will exist for around 10 billion years total and didn't have intelligent life for the first 4.5 billion, and will be uninhabitable between 5 and 6 billion as the sun warms. So even if we assume all life bearing planets will have intelligence at some point, it is likely the majority will not have it at a given point in time. However, even that assumption is questionable because the complexity to produce a human level brain seems to have existed for many millions of years without the right combination of selective pressure lining up.

    Yeah.

    If you ask yourself how long has earth been theoretically capable of producing an intelligent life form, and measuring that by having land animals of roughly equivalent complexity to the ones today, well, you can go back pretty damn far. If you took therapsids and sauropsids from the late permian and transported them to the present, they wouldn’t really look that different from modern mammals and reptiles. There were warm blooded mammal-like animals running around by the triassic, but that may not even necessarily be a requirement for intelligence.

    So being a bit generous, how long has Earth had the basic elements in place for a species to evolve that is capable of rudimentary space flight? 300 million years or so, give or take 100 million? And how many years has a spacefaring race existed out of that time? 70?

    (Spacefaring being key, there could have been a civilization of medieval dinosaurs running around at some point 100 million years ago, but they would have not left behind much that we would recognize or have been very relevant on a long term, a spacefaring race that had even been to the moon 100 million years ago would likely have left behind recognizable space junk somewhere, because space preserves a lot better than the surface of the earth.)

    Jealous Deva on
  • Options
    ZavianZavian universal peace sounds better than forever war Registered User regular
    edited April 2020
    Hevach wrote: »
    Yes, but the equation didn't account for the suitability of the parent star - flare stars, complex multiary systems, etc.

    It also gave 1.0 on two coefficients that make the biggest difference: habitable planets that develop life, and planets with life that develop intelligent life. Our own solar system belies the first, with three habitable zone planets, one utterly hostile to life and one bitterly indifferent.

    The second ignores the consideration of time. Earth will exist for around 10 billion years total and didn't have intelligent life for the first 4.5 billion, and will be uninhabitable between 5 and 6 billion as the sun warms. So even if we assume all life bearing planets will have intelligence at some point, it is likely the majority will not have it at a given point in time. However, even that assumption is questionable because the complexity to produce a human level brain seems to have existed for many millions of years without the right combination of selective pressure lining up.

    Yeah.

    If you ask yourself how long has earth been theoretically capable of producing an intelligent life form, and measuring that by having land animals of roughly equivalent complexity to the ones today, well, you can go back pretty damn far. If you took therapsids and sauraupsids from the late permian and transported them to the present, they wouldn’t really look that different from modern mammals and reptiles. There were warm blooded mammal-like animals running around by the triassic, but that may not even necessarily be a requirement for intelligence.

    So being a bit generous, how long has Earth had the basic elements in place for a species to evolve that is capable of rudimentary space flight? 300 million years or so, give or take 100 million? And how many years has a spacefaring race existed out of that time? 70?

    (Spacefaring being key, there could have been a civilization of medieval dinosaurs running around at some point 100 million years ago, but they would have not left behind much that we would recognize or have been very relevant on a long term, a spacefaring race that had even been to the moon 100 million years ago would likely have left behind recognizable space junk somewhere, because space preserves a lot better than the surface of the earth.)

    If an asteroid wiped out humanity tomorrow, eventually all the space junk would burn up in our atmosphere, and after millions of years of plate tectonics there wouldn’t be much trace left on Earth, and the moon having no atmosphere also gets more impacts which could wipe out the few sites there with human evidence. Not that I’m saying there were space faring lizard people, but even humans would need to establish more extraterrestrial bases and stuff before we’d leave traces of us that would last millions or billions of years

    Zavian on
  • Options
    I ZimbraI Zimbra Worst song, played on ugliest guitar Registered User regular
    Zavian wrote: »
    We obviously need dousing rod powered brain detectors

    Thankfully I have come up with this handheld dowsing rod detector that I can sell for the low, low price of $2999

  • Options
    Giggles_FunsworthGiggles_Funsworth Blight on Discourse Bay Area SprawlRegistered User regular
    Hevach wrote: »
    Yes, but the equation didn't account for the suitability of the parent star - flare stars, complex multiary systems, etc.

    It also gave 1.0 on two coefficients that make the biggest difference: habitable planets that develop life, and planets with life that develop intelligent life. Our own solar system belies the first, with three habitable zone planets, one utterly hostile to life and one bitterly indifferent.

    The second ignores the consideration of time. Earth will exist for around 10 billion years total and didn't have intelligent life for the first 4.5 billion, and will be uninhabitable between 5 and 6 billion as the sun warms. So even if we assume all life bearing planets will have intelligence at some point, it is likely the majority will not have it at a given point in time. However, even that assumption is questionable because the complexity to produce a human level brain seems to have existed for many millions of years without the right combination of selective pressure lining up.

    Yeah.

    If you ask yourself how long has earth been theoretically capable of producing an intelligent life form, and measuring that by having land animals of roughly equivalent complexity to the ones today, well, you can go back pretty damn far. If you took therapsids and sauropsids from the late permian and transported them to the present, they wouldn’t really look that different from modern mammals and reptiles. There were warm blooded mammal-like animals running around by the triassic, but that may not even necessarily be a requirement for intelligence.

    So being a bit generous, how long has Earth had the basic elements in place for a species to evolve that is capable of rudimentary space flight? 300 million years or so, give or take 100 million? And how many years has a spacefaring race existed out of that time? 70?

    (Spacefaring being key, there could have been a civilization of medieval dinosaurs running around at some point 100 million years ago, but they would have not left behind much that we would recognize or have been very relevant on a long term, a spacefaring race that had even been to the moon 100 million years ago would likely have left behind recognizable space junk somewhere, because space preserves a lot better than the surface of the earth.)

    I don't know that that last part in parens is actually true. Our modern technology and building materials are way less durable than stuff like the cyclopean architecture the Minoans used. Paper and plastics rot, metal rusts, our roads and buildings fall to pieces without regular maintenance, especially in areas that aren't arid.

  • Options
    Ninja Snarl PNinja Snarl P My helmet is my burden. Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered User regular
    Hevach wrote: »
    Yes, but the equation didn't account for the suitability of the parent star - flare stars, complex multiary systems, etc.

    It also gave 1.0 on two coefficients that make the biggest difference: habitable planets that develop life, and planets with life that develop intelligent life. Our own solar system belies the first, with three habitable zone planets, one utterly hostile to life and one bitterly indifferent.

    The second ignores the consideration of time. Earth will exist for around 10 billion years total and didn't have intelligent life for the first 4.5 billion, and will be uninhabitable between 5 and 6 billion as the sun warms. So even if we assume all life bearing planets will have intelligence at some point, it is likely the majority will not have it at a given point in time. However, even that assumption is questionable because the complexity to produce a human level brain seems to have existed for many millions of years without the right combination of selective pressure lining up.

    Yeah.

    If you ask yourself how long has earth been theoretically capable of producing an intelligent life form, and measuring that by having land animals of roughly equivalent complexity to the ones today, well, you can go back pretty damn far. If you took therapsids and sauropsids from the late permian and transported them to the present, they wouldn’t really look that different from modern mammals and reptiles. There were warm blooded mammal-like animals running around by the triassic, but that may not even necessarily be a requirement for intelligence.

    So being a bit generous, how long has Earth had the basic elements in place for a species to evolve that is capable of rudimentary space flight? 300 million years or so, give or take 100 million? And how many years has a spacefaring race existed out of that time? 70?

    (Spacefaring being key, there could have been a civilization of medieval dinosaurs running around at some point 100 million years ago, but they would have not left behind much that we would recognize or have been very relevant on a long term, a spacefaring race that had even been to the moon 100 million years ago would likely have left behind recognizable space junk somewhere, because space preserves a lot better than the surface of the earth.)

    I don't know that that last part in parens is actually true. Our modern technology and building materials are way less durable than stuff like the cyclopean architecture the Minoans used. Paper and plastics rot, metal rusts, our roads and buildings fall to pieces without regular maintenance, especially in areas that aren't arid.

    What? Stuff left in space is basically there forever. Something built on the surface of the moon would only be a real risk of destruction from things like meteor strikes. The astronauts footprints could conceivably last over a million years, and anything durable enough to not get rotted by UV could potentially be up there for virtually forever. And the further you get from the sun, the less UV exposure; park a durable man-made object under some permanent solar shade where it get some protection from impacts and there's literally no telling how many millions of years it might sit there.

    And even the extremely slow erosion things get in space would still leave objects that would be clearly artificial in nature. A ship or satellite weathered into a lump is still going to have obvious indicators that it was manufactured and not artificial. If aliens had visited our Moon to any notable extent, the junk they would've left still would get picked up by the detection systems we have now.

  • Options
    ZavianZavian universal peace sounds better than forever war Registered User regular
    Hevach wrote: »
    Yes, but the equation didn't account for the suitability of the parent star - flare stars, complex multiary systems, etc.

    It also gave 1.0 on two coefficients that make the biggest difference: habitable planets that develop life, and planets with life that develop intelligent life. Our own solar system belies the first, with three habitable zone planets, one utterly hostile to life and one bitterly indifferent.

    The second ignores the consideration of time. Earth will exist for around 10 billion years total and didn't have intelligent life for the first 4.5 billion, and will be uninhabitable between 5 and 6 billion as the sun warms. So even if we assume all life bearing planets will have intelligence at some point, it is likely the majority will not have it at a given point in time. However, even that assumption is questionable because the complexity to produce a human level brain seems to have existed for many millions of years without the right combination of selective pressure lining up.

    Yeah.

    If you ask yourself how long has earth been theoretically capable of producing an intelligent life form, and measuring that by having land animals of roughly equivalent complexity to the ones today, well, you can go back pretty damn far. If you took therapsids and sauropsids from the late permian and transported them to the present, they wouldn’t really look that different from modern mammals and reptiles. There were warm blooded mammal-like animals running around by the triassic, but that may not even necessarily be a requirement for intelligence.

    So being a bit generous, how long has Earth had the basic elements in place for a species to evolve that is capable of rudimentary space flight? 300 million years or so, give or take 100 million? And how many years has a spacefaring race existed out of that time? 70?

    (Spacefaring being key, there could have been a civilization of medieval dinosaurs running around at some point 100 million years ago, but they would have not left behind much that we would recognize or have been very relevant on a long term, a spacefaring race that had even been to the moon 100 million years ago would likely have left behind recognizable space junk somewhere, because space preserves a lot better than the surface of the earth.)

    I don't know that that last part in parens is actually true. Our modern technology and building materials are way less durable than stuff like the cyclopean architecture the Minoans used. Paper and plastics rot, metal rusts, our roads and buildings fall to pieces without regular maintenance, especially in areas that aren't arid.

    What? Stuff left in space is basically there forever. Something built on the surface of the moon would only be a real risk of destruction from things like meteor strikes. The astronauts footprints could conceivably last over a million years, and anything durable enough to not get rotted by UV could potentially be up there for virtually forever. And the further you get from the sun, the less UV exposure; park a durable man-made object under some permanent solar shade where it get some protection from impacts and there's literally no telling how many millions of years it might sit there.

    And even the extremely slow erosion things get in space would still leave objects that would be clearly artificial in nature. A ship or satellite weathered into a lump is still going to have obvious indicators that it was manufactured and not artificial. If aliens had visited our Moon to any notable extent, the junk they would've left still would get picked up by the detection systems we have now.

    If aliens from another solar system did visit the moon, they likely wouldn’t have left a lot of junk, assuming they would use probes like we do. It would be a lot easier and economical to send out unmanned observation drones that run back and forth than manned missions. Which IMO leans towards potential aliens being communist hive minds; capitalist aliens obviously would already have luxury moon mansions by now to watch the reality TV earth news broadcasts in their Spacebnbs

  • Options
    jothkijothki Registered User regular
    I'd think that a more obvious indication that there's never been any other forms of civilization on our planet is the fact that when we started out fossil fuels still existed. Unless it takes them billions of years, any civilization after ours will have to deal with a vastly depleted stockpile.

  • Options
    BloodySlothBloodySloth Registered User regular
    jothki wrote: »
    I'd think that a more obvious indication that there's never been any other forms of civilization on our planet is the fact that when we started out fossil fuels still existed. Unless it takes them billions of years, any civilization after ours will have to deal with a vastly depleted stockpile.

    Obviously they just did the good guy thing and refilled the tank after borrowing the planet

  • Options
    ZavianZavian universal peace sounds better than forever war Registered User regular
    edited April 2020
    jothki wrote: »
    I'd think that a more obvious indication that there's never been any other forms of civilization on our planet is the fact that when we started out fossil fuels still existed. Unless it takes them billions of years, any civilization after ours will have to deal with a vastly depleted stockpile.

    No you see we’ll become the new fossil fuels

    Invest in graveyards!

    Zavian on
  • Options
    Jealous DevaJealous Deva Registered User regular
    edited April 2020
    jothki wrote: »
    I'd think that a more obvious indication that there's never been any other forms of civilization on our planet is the fact that when we started out fossil fuels still existed. Unless it takes them billions of years, any civilization after ours will have to deal with a vastly depleted stockpile.

    Most of the fossil fuel beds we use are around 100 million years old, with a few dating back to around two or three times that far. So a theoretical civilization 100 million years from now may notice discrepancies with what they expect to find in certain areas but they would still have plenty to work with.

    Edit: and on the other side of the question would we really notice if there were a civilization 100 or 200 million years ago and some fossil fuels and things like helium were less than they “should be” theoretically? Probably not. Its actually pretty difficult to completely rule out the existence of a home-grown intelligent civilization in earth’s past farther back than 100 or so million years ago(though obviously there’s no particular reason to believe there was one), but if there was they didn’t reach the point of establishing a permanent space presence.

    Jealous Deva on
  • Options
    GoumindongGoumindong Registered User regular
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    wbBv3fj.png
  • Options
    OrcaOrca Also known as Espressosaurus WrexRegistered User regular
    edited April 2020
    We're not in a heavy bombardment; something on the moon could last millions of years. Or toss something in the Lagrange points; aren't those reasonably stable? What about landing something on Pluto? I can't imagine much altering it on the order of megayears, if not gigayears.

    Orca on
  • Options
    Jealous DevaJealous Deva Registered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

  • Options
    GoumindongGoumindong Registered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We find bones from 100m years ago. We can find steel. Well maybe not the steel itself, but the remnants of it. We could find hewn rock, after all we find fossils and these are more fragile. We could find formations of objects or remnants that woud indicate civilization.

    While its true that the earth isnt that hospitable we are also aware of its inhospitability and can potentially compensate.

    wbBv3fj.png
  • Options
    Giggles_FunsworthGiggles_Funsworth Blight on Discourse Bay Area SprawlRegistered User regular
    Zavian wrote: »
    jothki wrote: »
    I'd think that a more obvious indication that there's never been any other forms of civilization on our planet is the fact that when we started out fossil fuels still existed. Unless it takes them billions of years, any civilization after ours will have to deal with a vastly depleted stockpile.

    No you see we’ll become the new fossil fuels

    Invest in graveyards!

    Fr tho this is kinda what is happening with the rainforests rn. 😬

  • Options
    Giggles_FunsworthGiggles_Funsworth Blight on Discourse Bay Area SprawlRegistered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We find bones from 100m years ago. We can find steel. Well maybe not the steel itself, but the remnants of it. We could find hewn rock, after all we find fossils and these are more fragile. We could find formations of objects or remnants that woud indicate civilization.

    While its true that the earth isnt that hospitable we are also aware of its inhospitability and can potentially compensate.

    Have you ever seen a Viking sword? You are overestimating how long metal lasts by a pretty wide margin. Steel's a hell of a lot better than iron but it still rusts and a million years is a long ass fucking time. And 100? No way in hell that stuff's still around.

  • Options
    Giggles_FunsworthGiggles_Funsworth Blight on Discourse Bay Area SprawlRegistered User regular
    Alex Jones showed up to one of the right wing protests.



    What a friendly guy, shaking everybody's hand before he left.

  • Options
    GvzbgulGvzbgul Registered User regular
    Well, that'll be fun.

  • Options
    jothkijothki Registered User regular
    I'll have to be sure not to closely associate with anyone who likes Alex Jones.

  • Options
    -Loki--Loki- Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining. Registered User regular
    So check back in 2 weeks for news?

  • Options
    ProhassProhass Registered User regular
    I wouldn’t hold your breath, people like Alex Jones tend to have the luck of the devil with this kind of thing. I’m sure he’ll be fine. His elderly followers tho..

  • Options
    Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    Gvzbgul wrote: »
    It was a huge scandal back when it first happened in Iraq. But then it just keeps happening!
    It's like the placebo affect, but for physics, and only affecting staggeringly dumb/uneducated people.

    It's kind of hilarious this scam is still going, only with new players, some knowing, some unknowing.

  • Options
    Jealous DevaJealous Deva Registered User regular
    edited April 2020
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We find bones from 100m years ago. We can find steel. Well maybe not the steel itself, but the remnants of it. We could find hewn rock, after all we find fossils and these are more fragile. We could find formations of objects or remnants that woud indicate civilization.

    While its true that the earth isnt that hospitable we are also aware of its inhospitability and can potentially compensate.

    We don’t really find bones, we find stone that looks like bone because it infiltrated the bones as they decayed, or voids in rocks that look like bone. And it is rare, there are entire species that may have had millions or even billions of animals running around that we know of because they had a single animal get fossilized.

    So from humans? anything metal is gone, not going to last even long enough for stone to form around it. Plastic, wood, or other organics? Same. Glass and stone? Sure maybe, although glass may degrade ever millions of years due to lattice degradation, we are not really sure. Anything exposed to the surface is gone though, weathering will destroy it. So no sphynx or pyramids a million years from now. Anything in a building is probably gone, the building will decay and expose it to the elements. Stone sculptures? Maybe, although they are ususually in museums on the surface that will be destroyed, we don’t usually dump art en masse into bogs and mud pits.

    Maybe some landfill sites would keep recognizable glass or stone objects for millions of years? Its hard to say. But assume that 99.99% of what you think would be around in a million years won’t actually be around in a million years.

    Jealous Deva on
  • Options
    SoggybiscuitSoggybiscuit Tandem Electrostatic Accelerator Registered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We produce one artifact that's a really convenient indicator of a species of about our level of development and it has a nice long lifetime: depleted uranium.

    Hypothetically, say we are exploring the galaxy we find a system with a habitable planet, and while teeming with life, no intelligent life appears to be present, and yet we want to check for potential intelligent life in the past ~200 million years or so. Measure the U-235/U-238 ratio in some space rocks, then look for depleted uranium on the ground. You wouldn't even need to dig at first! We're getting pretty good at detecting neutrinos, so locating large deposits of uranium/ore to within a few 10s of km shouldn't be too difficult given enough time and measurements.

    Once you've located uranium deposits, dig and measure the U-235/U-238 ratio. If U-235 is severely depleted, it's a good indication that some form of intelligent life was present on that planet at one point in time.

    Obviously, this won't always work, as other methods of energy production from fission exist. Natural reactors (like Oklo exist, and while they are rare on Earth, they may be more common elsewhere. Additionally, depending on the dust cloud the solar system formed from, its possible that uranium simply wasn't that common in the cloud.

    It's not a perfect method by any means, but it does offer some possibilities.

    Steam - Synthetic Violence | XBOX Live - Cannonfuse | PSN - CastleBravo | Twitch - SoggybiscuitPA
  • Options
    Jealous DevaJealous Deva Registered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We produce one artifact that's a really convenient indicator of a species of about our level of development and it has a nice long lifetime: depleted uranium.

    Hypothetically, say we are exploring the galaxy we find a system with a habitable planet, and while teeming with life, no intelligent life appears to be present, and yet we want to check for potential intelligent life in the past ~200 million years or so. Measure the U-235/U-238 ratio in some space rocks, then look for depleted uranium on the ground. You wouldn't even need to dig at first! We're getting pretty good at detecting neutrinos, so locating large deposits of uranium/ore to within a few 10s of km shouldn't be too difficult given enough time and measurements.

    Once you've located uranium deposits, dig and measure the U-235/U-238 ratio. If U-235 is severely depleted, it's a good indication that some form of intelligent life was present on that planet at one point in time.

    Obviously, this won't always work, as other methods of energy production from fission exist. Natural reactors (like Oklo exist, and while they are rare on Earth, they may be more common elsewhere. Additionally, depending on the dust cloud the solar system formed from, its possible that uranium simply wasn't that common in the cloud.

    It's not a perfect method by any means, but it does offer some possibilities.

    That would be a great indicator, yeah. Though anyone who discovered fission and didn’t blow themselves up within 50 years or so is probably going to have stuff in space within a couple of years... though maybe not, an aquatic intelligent animal would have a hell of a time getting into space but could probably manage fission just fine.

  • Options
    TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    jothki wrote: »
    I'd think that a more obvious indication that there's never been any other forms of civilization on our planet is the fact that when we started out fossil fuels still existed. Unless it takes them billions of years, any civilization after ours will have to deal with a vastly depleted stockpile.

    Most of the fossil fuel beds we use are around 100 million years old, with a few dating back to around two or three times that far. So a theoretical civilization 100 million years from now may notice discrepancies with what they expect to find in certain areas but they would still have plenty to work with.

    Edit: and on the other side of the question would we really notice if there were a civilization 100 or 200 million years ago and some fossil fuels and things like helium were less than they “should be” theoretically? Probably not. Its actually pretty difficult to completely rule out the existence of a home-grown intelligent civilization in earth’s past farther back than 100 or so million years ago(though obviously there’s no particular reason to believe there was one), but if there was they didn’t reach the point of establishing a permanent space presence.

    Isn't coal from a specific time period, where plants had developed lignin to protect themselves before anything evolved to digest it?
    That doesn't seem like the thing you'd go looking for if you didn't already know that it existed.

  • Options
    CelestialBadgerCelestialBadger Registered User regular
    Prohass wrote: »
    I wouldn’t hold your breath, people like Alex Jones tend to have the luck of the devil with this kind of thing. I’m sure he’ll be fine. His elderly followers tho..

    Also they are all quite mad. So if Alex Jones and 20 followers catch Covid-19 in 2 weeks, it'll be because of the 5G towers and Hillary Clinton and the Conspiracy! not the obvious.

  • Options
    DarkPrimusDarkPrimus Registered User regular
    Coal takes time to form because it takes time for the deposits of organic matter to be subsumed to such a level that it is exposed to the pressure and heat required to experience coalification.

  • Options
    NyysjanNyysjan FinlandRegistered User regular
    jothki wrote: »
    I'll have to be sure not to closely associate with anyone who likes Alex Jones.
    That has generally been the wise policy.
    Being near such people can rot your brains.

  • Options
    GoumindongGoumindong Registered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We find bones from 100m years ago. We can find steel. Well maybe not the steel itself, but the remnants of it. We could find hewn rock, after all we find fossils and these are more fragile. We could find formations of objects or remnants that woud indicate civilization.

    While its true that the earth isnt that hospitable we are also aware of its inhospitability and can potentially compensate.

    Have you ever seen a Viking sword? You are overestimating how long metal lasts by a pretty wide margin. Steel's a hell of a lot better than iron but it still rusts and a million years is a long ass fucking time. And 100? No way in hell that stuff's still around.

    Yup. But just like bones become fossils i am sure we would find some strange building shaped rust pockets. We dont have to find a lot. We just have to find a few. And more importantly its more likely than finding something in space after 100m years

    wbBv3fj.png
  • Options
    Typhoid MannyTyphoid Manny Registered User regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Its more likely you would find evidence in the fossil layer than in space. Things in orbit would eventually fall into the atmosphere and burn up or leave orbit and either fall into the sun or collide with another planet. If not that then they might be thrown free or fade into the asteroid background. If we did find them it likely wouldnt be until the point where we might have trouble determining whether it was an artifact of ours or before us.

    Things on the moon would likely be burried in debris or destoryed by meteorites. Preserved maybe but we would have to go dig them up to fine them. Which is kind of hard right now.

    But things buried are most likely to be preserved, in a position were we could actually find them, and where we could be reasonably positive it wasn’t ours.

    What kind of things would we find buried? The only real artifacts we produce right now that would survive even a million years would be pieces of glass. The earth isn’t a friendly chemical environment over long periods, even underground.

    We find bones from 100m years ago. We can find steel. Well maybe not the steel itself, but the remnants of it. We could find hewn rock, after all we find fossils and these are more fragile. We could find formations of objects or remnants that woud indicate civilization.

    While its true that the earth isnt that hospitable we are also aware of its inhospitability and can potentially compensate.

    Have you ever seen a Viking sword? You are overestimating how long metal lasts by a pretty wide margin. Steel's a hell of a lot better than iron but it still rusts and a million years is a long ass fucking time. And 100? No way in hell that stuff's still around.

    hey cool an opportunity for me to be a nerd about ironworking!

    in most cases steel actually will rust much more readily than wrought or pure iron, those viking swords would have long since crumbled away to dust if they'd been made from modern-type homogeneous steel

    and that's with a large amount of migration era norse stuff we dig up getting found in bogs and such in a very cold climate, which is basically as ideal as you can get for preserving metal in an atmosphere that has oxygen

    from each according to his ability, to each according to his need
    hitting hot metal with hammers
  • Options
    DocDoc Registered User, ClubPA regular
    I've seen this posted a bit:

    https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/harvard-university-professor-and-two-chinese-nationals-charged-three-separate-china-related

    Harvard Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology was arrested, along with a Chinese national, for illegally working with/smuggling biological materials.
    Enc wrote: »
    Gvzbgul wrote: »

    It blew my mind a little when I realized they were describing a dowsing rod. I learned about those in first grade. What kind of rube, let alone a national government, would
    Smrtnik wrote: »
    Can't wait for Trump to start pushing this as the right COVID test to use.

    Fuck

    Keep in mind, it's not used with the understanding that it is a real tool that does real science. These are used as tools to:
    • fool people into thinking that the government has control of the situation when they dont
    • fool people into thinking that government purges of people have a basis in science rather than just pointing the buzzer at a person they want to get rid of and doing so.

    That's what a polygraph/lie detector is, too. An interrogation tool.

  • Options
    HevachHevach Registered User regular
    That kind of thing is sadly pretty common in academics. A Canadian lab had similar arrests last year linked to equipment upgrades at the Wuhan BSL4 lab. A few years ago it was Iran, before that Russia/USSR, if you go back far enough Germany.

    Governments won't let certain knowledge cross certain borders. A lot of academics have actively resisted the idea, and a lot more have just been careless about it because they weren't working with either government in any capacity.

  • Options
    TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    Hevach wrote: »
    That kind of thing is sadly pretty common in academics. A Canadian lab had similar arrests last year linked to equipment upgrades at the Wuhan BSL4 lab. A few years ago it was Iran, before that Russia/USSR, if you go back far enough Germany.

    Governments won't let certain knowledge cross certain borders. A lot of academics have actively resisted the idea, and a lot more have just been careless about it because they weren't working with either government in any capacity.

    They're problem solving people at their very core, and if the red tape becomes too much of a problem - there's usually a few obvious solutions just staring at you in the face...

This discussion has been closed.