Could "aliens" be visitors from the future??

Wibbs

Dr_Phil wrote: »

Yeah, I think they can be us in XXX years, coming back like we would, just to see how was it in 897 in example. That would also explain why they are not allowed to contact us. Getting to know about us is learning about them.

If we do invent a tardis in the future, one that could go back beyond the point of its invention, then would it not be safer to send probes? Less chance of screwing with timelines. then again if we got to that point maybe we discover causality is not so big a deal or at least you would have to do something hellishly major to cause an issue. Even if you did, would you notice you did when you came back to your own time? Meh I suppose you would because you would be outside that timeline. Kinda like when homer's toaster threw him through time. Lots of Doh! moments

bonkey

Wibbs wrote: »

With respect humanji if any poster brings their opinion to the table, then surely it is the very point of discussion that they will explain their reasoning and why they came to that reasoning? Obviously dont be a dick applies of course.

I'd agree with this, but point out that the topic of the thread should take precedence over any tangential discussion....which I believe is what humanji was saying. There is a topic here...and its important we don't lose sight of it

indough

Flamed Diving wrote: »

So, getting back to reality. How do people feel about a determined future, as a consequence of time-travelling aliens?

ok so if time travel were possible then that would mean all time must already exist right? ie in order for it to be possible for you to travel forward in time then that time must alreasy exist, or else there wouldnt be any way you could go there

doesnt that mean then that if everything has already happened then there is no changing events if you do travel back? as in, if you travelled back and tried to change events you would end up causing the thing you tried to change, like the way in terminator

the time travelling to stop the machines/kill john connor actually causes the machines and connor to be created

, its also a plot device used in 12 monkeys, i think its some variation on the novikov self-consistency principle

my wording of the above is probably poor but understandable given the topic i think

Dr_Phil

Wibbs wrote: »

If we do invent a tardis in the future, one that could go back beyond the point of its invention, then would it not be safer to send probes? Less chance of screwing with timelines. then again if we got to that point maybe we discover causality is not so big a deal or at least you would have to do something hellishly major to cause an issue. Even if you did, would you notice you did when you came back to your own time? Meh I suppose you would because you would be outside that timeline. Kinda like when homer's toaster threw him through time. Lots of Doh! moments

I could say I sort of agree, but... Debating about time travels by us, now, is comparable to debate about quantum physics and nature of the dark matter by a group of australopithecuses.

studiorat

There's also a thing called imaginary time. It's a mathematical model, like an imaginary number. It's similar to consider time as well as moving backwards and forwards on a horizontal axis it moves in the perpendicular axis as well.

And what about Minus time?

Flamed Diving

studiorat wrote: »

There's also a thing called imaginary time. It's a mathematical model, like an imaginary number. It's similar to consider time as well as moving backwards and forwards on a horizontal axis it moves in the perpendicular axis as well.

And what about Minus time?

I thought minus time was the past?

(-inf)

---

> us

---

> (+inf)

Undergod

Wibbs wrote: »

Maybe. I dunno. If you look at life on earth over the eons you can see some patterns in response to environments. So majorly unrelated species come up with the same solutions to the same problems. Fish look like sharks who look like ichthyosaurs who look like dolphins.

It is possible that they only look similar to us in our frame of reference though. Head shape is completely different, dolphins don't have those pelvic fins that the other two have, their caudal fins are aligned differently, dolphins' eyes are positioned differently to the other two, all three have different head shapes.

I mean they are all basically fish shaped, but within that there is a huge range of shapes and designs.

seamus

Undergod wrote: »

It is possible that they only look similar to us in our frame of reference though. Head shape is completely different, dolphins don't have those pelvic fins that the other two have, their caudal fins are aligned differently, dolphins' eyes are positioned differently to the other two, all three have different head shapes.

I mean they are all basically fish shaped, but within that there is a huge range of shapes and designs.

I don't think he's trying to say that they are the same, but rather that over the eons of time, evolution has driven many animals to come up with similar solutions to the same problem. Convergence, I think it's called.

On a physiological level, dolphins have more in common with Men than they do with sharks - you can map almost every part of a Dolphins body in a one-to-one relationship to a part on a mammal's body.

I think Wibbs point is that mammals came out of the water, followed a massively divergent evolutionary path to fish, but then some mammals went back into the water. They didn't de-evolve back into fish but instead they developed new solutions to problems which are not entirely dissimilar to the solutions that fish developed to those problems.

This means that if life was to evolve on a planet not entirely dissimilar to earth it's likely that many/most of the life on that planet wouldn't seem all too alien to us. Proportions and colours would most likely be different, but at the same time we would probably see large tree-shaped plants with green leaves and all of the types of life that they give rise to.

The evolutionary convergence theory means that if an earth-like planet exists, it's not only plausible, it's likely that bipedal humanoids have also evolved there in response to the same environmental challenges faced. Whether or not they would have evolved our level of intelligence is another question entirely - is our level of intelligence a natural evolutionary solution to some problem of bipedalism or was it simply a freak that bipedals developed it before therapods (for example)?

That said, though they would be "humanoid", their underlying physiology would be completely alien and unrecognisable by any human.

Bruthal

seamus wrote: »

I don't think he's trying to say that they are the same, but rather that over the eons of time, evolution has driven many animals to come up with similar solutions to the same problem. Convergence, I think it's called.

On a physiological level, dolphins have more in common with Men than they do with sharks - you can map almost every part of a Dolphins body in a one-to-one relationship to a part on a mammal's body.

I think Wibbs point is that mammals came out of the water, followed a massively divergent evolutionary path to fish, but then some mammals went back into the water. They didn't de-evolve back into fish but instead they developed new solutions to problems which are not entirely dissimilar to the solutions that fish developed to those problems.

This means that if life was to evolve on a planet not entirely dissimilar to earth it's likely that many/most of the life on that planet wouldn't seem all too alien to us. Proportions and colours would most likely be different, but at the same time we would probably see large tree-shaped plants with green leaves and all of the types of life that they give rise to.

The evolutionary convergence theory means that if an earth-like planet exists, it's not only plausible, it's likely that bipedal humanoids have also evolved there in response to the same environmental challenges faced. Whether or not they would have evolved our level of intelligence is another question entirely - is our level of intelligence a natural evolutionary solution to some problem of bipedalism or was it simply a freak that bipedals developed it before therapods (for example)?

That said, though they would be "humanoid", their underlying physiology would be completely alien and unrecognisable by any human.

Yes id agree with all that, the fact the dolphins have indeed evolved to a not only similar design to sharks, but very close match in reality, and they are possibly a long way behind sharks on the evolutionary scale just in the aquatic part of their evolution, and sharks themselves have changed little in millions of years because their design is probably close to perfect for marine survival. They seem to have gotten smaller maybe.

So an alien planet similar to earth in gravity etc would likely have somewhat similar life forms. But it could also be possible we could have a planet billions of years behind ours in evolutionary terms, or millions, maybe there`s a t-rex somewhere.

PirateShampoo

Undergod wrote: »

It is possible that they only look similar to us in our frame of reference though. Head shape is completely different, dolphins don't have those pelvic fins that the other two have, their caudal fins are aligned differently, dolphins' eyes are positioned differently to the other two, all three have different head shapes.

I mean they are all basically fish shaped, but within that there is a huge range of shapes and designs.

But it would have at some point in its history, hence the fact that Dolphins have a pelvic bone.

studiorat

Flamed Diving wrote: »

I thought minus time was the past?

(-inf)

---

> us

---

> (+inf)

I suppose it depends on where you measure it from. If we count towards an event in the future minus time is the present.

Here's a head melter, on the subject.
http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/13898/Stephen-Hawking-s-Imaginary-time

Undergod

All that shows is that dolphins share a common evolutionary ancestor with sharks- we knew that already. I don't think this can be used as evidence to say extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

Bruthal

Undergod wrote: »

All that shows is that dolphins share a common evolutionary ancestor with sharks- we knew that already. I don't think this can be used as evidence to say extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

So you reckon dolphins are closer related to sharks than to elephants or cattle or us? I have to differ on that one.

seamus

Undergod wrote: »

All that shows is that dolphins share a common evolutionary ancestor with sharks- we knew that already. I don't think this can be used as evidence to say extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

It doesn't show that at all.

All life on this planet shares a common evolutionary ancestor, that doesn't need proving.

What it does prove is that dolphins and sharks aren't any more closely related than humans and sharks, which is the key here - that development of characteristics isn't limited to any particular ancestral line and that two completely disparate and separated lines of evolution can come to the same (or a similar) conclusion.

Torakx

Well dolphins are racist so they are more closer to humans than sharks
They kill i think porposes or something on sight without provocation.

PirateShampoo

Undergod wrote: »

All that shows is that dolphins share a common evolutionary ancestor with sharks- we knew that already. I don't think this can be used as evidence to say extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

Actually it doesn't, it shows that Dolphins had Hind legs at some point in there evolution where lad based Mammals.

Same goes for whales who in some species there hind legs are still present inside there bodies.

I'm fairly sure Cetacean's and Sharks don't share a common ancestry. The only thing they do share is a Convergent evolution.

Bruthal

Torakx wrote: »

Well dolphins are racist so they are more closer to humans than sharks
They kill i think porposes or something on sight without provocation.

Good point, although sharks kill without discrimination, i wonder could that also relate to some humans:rolleyes:

PirateShampoo

I think he means Sharks kill to feed, Dolphins and some Whales have been knows to kill for fun.

Bruthal

PirateShampoo wrote: »

I think he means Sharks kill to feed, Dolphins and some Whales have been knows to kill for fun.

I realise that, i think i may have being havin a bit of a joke. The same as he was himself.

fontanalis

By comparing dolphins and sharks can get things going in a misleading direction, the whole fish and mammlal thing. Both have adapted to swimming but obviously from different perspectives, as someone said sharks have been around for eons. Also by looking at them you can see the dolphins tail and the way they propell themselves involve the same motions on their backbone as a mammal running.
I think I read somewhere that the closest living relative to a whale is a hippo.

Bruthal

fontanalis wrote: »

By comparing dolphins and sharks can get things going in a misleading direction, the whole fish and mammlal thing. Both have adapted to swimming but obviously from different perspectives, as someone said sharks have been around for eons. Also by looking at them you can see the dolphins tail and the way they propell themselves involve the same motions on their backbone as a mammal running.
I think I read somewhere that the closest living relative to a whale is a hippo.

Hard to know what the closest relative is to anything possibly. Even this thread does`t seem related to what it was yesterday, it has evolved.

Flamed Diving

robbie7730 wrote: »

Hard to know what the closest relative is to anything possibly. Even this thread does`t seem related to what it was yesterday, it has evolved.

No, we can tell with quite some accuracy how genetically related all life is. Chimps and Humans are roughly 98.6% identical, genetically. Only 1.4% difference...

Bruthal

Flamed Diving wrote: »

No, we can tell with quite some accuracy how genetically related all life is. Chimps and Humans are roughly 98.6% identical, genetically. Only 1.4% difference...

Whats the genetic difference between a dolphin and a hippo so, or a hippo and mouse,

When comparisons are done to show us the 98.6 match, its only based on a tiny percentage of the genome, and also these matches could possibly come about through similar evolutionary development, but independent of evolutionary relationship.

Now while its likely chimps are closely related, it could be possible for complete independant evolutionary lines to be genetically similar. Even totally different living things will have a 25% match or so they say. A man and a daffodil i thought i seen one time.

I certainly dont disagree with what you said, it might be hard to say a whales closest relative is a hippo, but it could be.

When you say `how genitically related all life is` id say that must be true

Flamed Diving

I don't know if that information is available. To crack open the genome of an animal takes years using powerful computers and labs and what-not. It could take until the sun dies to crack them all.

Flamed Diving

Phylogenetic relationships among cetartiodactyls based on insertions of short and long interpersed elements: Hippopotamuses are the closest extant relatives of whales

http://www.pnas.org/content/96/18/10261.full.pdf+html

Dont have time to read this, but it is peer-reviewed and from a top journal.

Bruthal

Flamed Diving wrote: »

I don't know if that information is available. To crack open the genome of an animal takes years using powerful computers and labs and what-not. It could take until the sun dies to crack them all.

Which is why only a tiny percentage of it has been done, thats probably why we wont see jurrasic park for a while, although i think jurrasic was the wrong time for the t-rex etc, although it probably sounded better that triassic park or whatever the time was. Its all only man made names at the end of the day. Good names though.

seamus

robbie7730 wrote: »

Now while its likely chimps are closely related, it could be possible for complete independant evolutionary lines to be genetically similar.

Possible, of course, but exceedingly unlikely. Interestingly enough, a particular trait, say for example a fin, doesn't require the dolphin and the shark to have the exact same DNA sequences in their genome - the coding for "make a fin" isn't restricted to some exact sequence of base pairs - difference genome/base pair sequences have been shown to create the same outcome in different species.

Of course, there's an easier way to create a genetic map, and it's known as the "genetic clock" which looks at the genes which *don't* do anything. These genes survive through evolution because they have no positive or negative effects on the survival of the animal and so won't be "shed" by a species in favour of other genes. By looking at these genes, we can see along which evolutionary path a particular species has developed, and what's more, how far along that path they've developed.

And last but not least, there's a form of triangulation. If you take an oak tree, a daffodil and a dog, and do a comparison on a tiny % of the genome, it's extremely unlikely that the comparison will show that the oak tree and the dog are close matches, however if it does, the odds are astronomical that the dog and the daffodil will also closely match. However, the daffodil and the oak aren't a million miles from eachother, therefore we could infer (from comparisons with more plants) that the similarity between the oak and the dog is a genetic fluke or a sampling error.

Man, we're way off topic.

Bruthal

seamus wrote: »

Possible, of course, but exceedingly unlikely. Interestingly enough, a particular trait, say for example a fin, doesn't require the dolphin and the shark to have the exact same DNA sequences in their genome - the coding for "make a fin" isn't restricted to some exact sequence of base pairs - difference genome/base pair sequences have been shown to create the same outcome in different species.

Thats true, but the coding to make fins on 2 different lines is more likely to be different than the code to `make an arm complete with 4 fingers and thumb` - as in a fin is so simple that it could maybe more easilly develop in very unrelated evolutionary lines, certainly in a shorter timeline at least.

Way of topic is right, what will it be about this time tomorrow, aliens maybe

PirateShampoo

Species don't need the same DNA or come from the same distant relative to have similar traits.

Its called Convergent evolution, where they may look similar, but it's not because they're close relatives. Instead, they've evolved similar adaptations because they occupy similar niches, If you take below picture for example





They don't share a ancestor, but they all have 2 wings, this is because of the physical restraints of the wing. Same goes for Dolphins and Sharks.

Basically its nature picking the best possible design for the environment its living in.

Bruthal

PirateShampoo wrote: »

.

Basically its nature picking the best possible design for the environment its living in.

Of course. Evolutionary traits converge, it is random mutations which just by luck favour the animals which have them, it gives them fractionally more chance of survival, and so they are more likely to reach breeding age and pass on the mutation where as the same species which did`t have a slight change are at a slight disadvantage and so they over time die off leaving the mutated ones to continue on.

And unrelated species left independently in the same enviroment will develop the same type of evolutionary developments because over time they will have random mutations also, and the ones that are similary an advantage will develop the same or similar to the unrelated species.

If dolphins have enough time to continue to evolve (if we dont destroy the planet) they may well look even more similar to sharks in time.The sharks are more likely to remain the same as they are because they are perfect for their enviroment, more perfect than dolphins, although dolphins are near perfect as they are.

TheCapedCrusade

Ok, well then let's go with this theory of time travelling humans. The only way I could ever believe this theory is: if these Humans did spend the time to create a time machine, they would need an extremely good reason. Maybe in the distant future, the Iraq war leads into something more, nuclear power may turn the worlds most powerful against each other.

The consequences of this may be like that of Fallout 3's storyline, except this time there is no way out. So, I dunno, some lads deceide they they should try and change these events, and so the idea of a time machine is born. But this gets passed down through generations until the humans buildeing have been underground for so long that muscles, like ours today, are no longer needed. Therefore the ridiculously skinny bodies of aliens we see in the tabloids and movies today...

But anyway, that's just a theory which probably sounds ridiculous.

PirateShampoo

TheCapedCrusade wrote: »

Ok, well then let's go with this theory of time travelling humans. The only way I could ever believe this theory is: if these Humans did spend the time to create a time machine, they would need an extremely good reason. Maybe in the distant future, the Iraq war leads into something more, nuclear power may turn the worlds most powerful against each other.


.

Havent you ever wanted to go back in time to a certian time period to see how people lived?

What better way to study the past than to actually visit it.

Undergod

PirateShampoo wrote: »

Species don't need the same DNA or come from the same distant relative to have similar traits.

Its called Convergent evolution, where they may look similar, but it's not because they're close relatives. Instead, they've evolved similar adaptations because they occupy similar niches, If you take below picture for example





They don't share a ancestor, but they all have 2 wings, this is because of the physical restraints of the wing. Same goes for Dolphins and Sharks.

Basically its nature picking the best possible design for the environment its living in.

They're all vertebrates, so they do share a distant ancestor. All vertebrates are four limbed, and it's merely due to physics and the skeletons of vertebrates that the front libs are best designed for flight.

Does not mean extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

PirateShampoo

Undergod wrote: »

Does not mean extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

Ive never claimed it was.

I only said i liked the theory.

Did you even look up the theroy behind Convergent evolution? Because id really like to hear what the common ancestor to the falcon and bat is.

Bruthal

Undergod wrote: »

They're all vertebrates, so they do share a distant ancestor. All vertebrates are four limbed, and it's merely due to physics and the skeletons of vertebrates that the front libs are best designed for flight.

Does not mean extraterrestrial life is likely to be humanoid.

Does all living animals not share a distant ancestor at sometime, or did live start off itself a few times.

I did`t think fish were 4 limbed, i could be wrong as usual though.

fontanalis

robbie7730 wrote: »

Does all living animals not share a distant ancestor at sometime, or did live start off itself a few times.

I did`t think fish were 4 limbed, i could be wrong as usual though.

Limbs/fins. Though I think there may have been a couple branching off points for fish. Something to do with ray finned and something else. Someone else probably knows better.

fontanalis

PirateShampoo wrote: »

Ive never claimed it was.

I only said i liked the theory.

Did you even look up the theroy behind Convergent evolution? Because id really like to hear what the common ancestor to the falcon and bat is.

Bats are mammals, falcons are birds. You won't see a cross between a abt and a bird. You're common ancestor would be the branching off mammals and birds.

bonkey

Guys - this isn't the forum for a discussion on the theory of evolution.

We're getting a bit far off the track here. The topic had little if anything to do with Conspiracy Theories from the outset, and it seems that we've headed even further away from that since then

Undergod

PirateShampoo wrote: »

Ive never claimed it was.

I only said i liked the theory.

Did you even look up the theroy behind Convergent evolution? Because id really like to hear what the common ancestor to the falcon and bat is.

But that was what I read from Wibbs' original post that I replied to, sparking off this tangent.

Yes, I have read about convergent evolution. And as I said, falcons and bats have a common ancestor because they are both vertebrates. Mammals and reptiles diverged someplace millions of years ago- it's generally accepted that birds evolved from reptiles.

PirateShampoo

I dont even know what we are trying to establish anymore.

All i was trying to prove was the only reason Dolphins are sharks look similar is because that is the best design for there enviroment.

studiorat

PirateShampoo wrote: »

All i was trying to prove was the only reason Dolphins are sharks look similar is because that is the best design for there enviroment.

Flamed Diving

bonkey wrote: »

Guys - this isn't the forum for a discussion on the theory of evolution.

We're getting a bit far off the track here. The topic had little if anything to do with Conspiracy Theories from the outset, and it seems that we've headed even further away from that since then

I tried a couple of times to challenge the notion using some basics physics concepts. As to date, not a single CT'er has bothered to even reply to my offering on this topic. Instead, they would prefer to talk about Dolphins being aliens from other worlds.

What can ya do?

squod

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loDoCZ6cutU

I recieved a copy of the radar report from (petes?) airforce base. Where they had tracked an unidentified craft at 2.14am........ It was not a fantasy it was a real experience. I believe I have enough evidence to establish that.

Part of the theory put foward that aliens are just aliens from like, somewhere else. Zeta reticuli, in this case.

bonkey

OK...I think we're done here