Re: Hugh Ross's flat prediction

I think it's sorta interesting that the anthropic principle (in its
various forms) is appealing to many, but at the same time, there is
significant hesitancy to follow that line of thinking beyond a
perception of our uniqueness. JimA

Dawsonzhu@aol.com wrote:

>
> Burgy wrote:
>
>> I do think it is a virtual certainty that at some point SETI or a like
>> research programme will conclude that extraterrestrial life does exist
>> (it may be a false positive, of course). At that point Ross will find
>> himself in arguments he really does not want to pursue.
>
>
>
> By now, with a large part of the emr band scanned over
> the last 50 years, it would seem like we are rather
> "isolated" so I am not so persuaded that they will
> find something. Nevertheless, even if SETI doesn't
> find anything, that does not mean that life does not
> exist anywhere else in the universe.
>
> One of the optimistic parameters in the Drake equation
> that Carl Sagan & co used involved the survival of
> an advanced civilization. Ross also manipulates the
> Drake equation to his own purposes. Clearly, Sagan
> was far too optimistic in his estimates, but I am
> not sure if Ross is swinging the other way. It seems
> the truth is that we just don't know and the error
> bars should be drawn very wide on a logarithmic plot.
>
> By Grace alone we proceed,
> Wayne
Received on Sun Mar 28 18:13:11 2004