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From: Larry Hatch <larryhat@jps.net>
Date: Sat, 13 Nov 1999 05:34:32 -0800
Fwd Date: Sun, 14 Nov 1999 00:28:47 -0500
Subject: Re: Are we Alone?


 >Subject: Re: Are we Alone?
 >From: Mark Cashman <mcashman@ix.netcom.com>
 >Date: Fri, 12 Nov 1999 18:17:01 -0500
 >To: UFO UpDates - Toronto <updates@globalserve.net>

 >>From: Graeme Best <graemebest@hotmail.com>
 >>To: updates@globalserve.net
 >>Subject: Re: Are we Alone?
 >>Date: Fri, 12 Nov 1999 03:33:47 EST

 >>Paul Davies article in Melbourne Age

 >>But even if life obligingly pops up on other earth-like planets,
 >>there is no known law that compels it to develop in the
 >>direction of intelligence. Evolution is ruled by blind chance.
 >>The popular notion that life emerges from the slime and then
 >>strives for advancement has no scientific basis.

 >Neither does the above author's notion that evolution is ruled
 >by "blind chance". Evolution is the cumulative selection of
 >natural variation. Every evolutionary model leads to organisms
 >of greater complexity over time. This strongly suggests the
 >potential for the evolution of intellignce in any evolutionary
 >system.

 >------
 >Mark Cashman, creator of The Temporal Doorway at
 >http://www.temporaldoorway.com
 >- Original digital art, writing, music and UFO research -

 >UFO cases, analysis, classification systems, and more...
 >http://www.temporaldoorway.com/ufo/index.htm
 >------

Dear Mark:

I must agree with you of course.

Rather than resort to the large number argument, (astronomically
large numbers I might add!) I suggest the following Gedanken
experiment:

   Only True Gedankeners will have the means to do the following
   of course! Dem Non-Gedankenen sind too busy Gebrewing Gegood
   Gebieren!


1)  Find a nice Earthlike planet. It may be far away, but I
presume there are more than a few out there.

2)  Locate a field full of grain, grass or equivalent.

3)  Remove all the mice, or mice-like critters that live off
such resources.

4)  Repopulate the same field with two strains of the very same
critters: One being slightly more intelligent than the other,
as determined by the ability to find food.

5)  Come back in six months and see which population prospered,
and which was "marginalized" if not driven to extinction.

Now comes the fun part.

Do the same thing a jillion times in a jillion places, i.e. much
like the multi-billion year natural history of planet #3 here.

I would wager that this could eventually lead to a relatively
"intelligent" set of organisms! Failing that, my present boss at
work might show up at least.

He went to get his cat "missy" spayed. It turned out that Missy
was a Mister, and that saved him a few dollars. I think he's
still pissed-off at me for laughing, but I digress..

Try the opposite hypothesis, that stupidity and lack of
intelligence are naturally selected. I have heard of military
services and other situations where such obtains, but these are
inevitably *forced* situations; unnatural setups which would
never arise in nature.

Nobody can sensibly deny the role of chance, dumb luck. I sure
don't.

What gets forgotten is the role of the "odds".

Lets say a rock is on a steep cliff. Its going to fall down the
precipice sooner or later as the sand beneath it erodes away.

Where will it go? I assure you that a random distribution on an
X-Y scale is the VERY LEAST likely thing. A dart-toss is the
world's worst representation of the final resting place for such
rocks!

Instead, it will tend to follow the natural furrows, obeying the
laws of gravity and the "lay of the land".

By analogy, evolution (and all related) will take certain paths
which present themselves by accident. In a few cases, these
could be highly favorable to life.

In those cases, intelligent life would tend to prevail over that
which is less intelligent.

In those-those cases, whole societies might develop, email, tax
forms and all.

If any one of those societies should survive its sophomoric
(warlike) years, it should ensure its own survival by all
possible means.

Given all the above, one or more societies could easily exist in
this Galaxy. There is no need to look further away.

Given this rash speculation,  and the fact that societies could
have existed millions of years ago,  one might easily posit such
societies being thousands or millions of years in advance of ours.

Given THAT rash assumption,  one might wonder if they would
not send out probes to examine stars which looked anything like
their own. Time would be no object to a society which had
long since unraveled the biological clock. Heck, Earth scientists
are working on that now, right here.

What I cannot see is all this fuss, just to play games with some
self-appointed "contactee". Think of it. If you were in any
position to do the sorts of things I described above,  would you
waste a millisecond on (names deleted)  ???

I think not.

Here's what I would do:

1)  Gather as much scientific, practical and real information as
possible.

2)  Minimize self-exposure at all costs, for obvious reasons.

3)  Set up methods and means to monitor conditions and status of
the "Earth" and its denizens for the long term, perhaps
millenia.

4)  Try to find somebody who believes me.


Very best wishes

- Larry Hatch.

=   =  =  =  =  =


Larry Hatch's highly self-recommended website is
at:    http://www.jps.net/larryhat