/sci/ - Science & Math

>>6223844
I disagree with your pessimistic view.

I would probably assumed they had too much time on their hands, but at the end I would respect them if I sense they have passion for what they learned.

Most people just see degrees as a medium to a job and money. That's sad, although understandable.

If I had the money to study as much as possible, I would. Sadly, I have to work to be able to live decently, so that consumes precious time I would otherwise spend delving into wonderful subjects.

And yes, I would go to college for that. Although I could learn it on my own by reading books, I find learning through human interactions more pleasurable.

Time for a thought experiment, /sci/

Imagine an alien comes to visit us. While talking to him you use the word "consciousness" and the alien asks you to explain what it means. What would you say?

I collect a human. Warp him 20000 light years away to planet Merlock, and release him.
What happens to him?

>>3706516
Protip: things get even bigger in the SY08 region.

Hohoho

>>3691919
That's the spirit young one

The ultimate proof that aliens exist:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4QYkrp44us

Puny humans can't even figure out how to reach superluminal velocities.

WE GOT A SIGNAL!
WE GOT A SIGNAL!
WE GOT A SIGNAL!
WE GOT A SIGNAL!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/alien-radio-signal-received-12845178
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/alien-radio-signal-received-12845178
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/alien-radio-signal-received-12845178

The true form of alien life.

As humans we are biased. When we think of extraterrestrials we immediately visualize beings, personified, with legs, hips, abdomen, chest, neck and back straight, with head perched atop fully dressed with typical features by way of face; ears, nose, eyes, mouth, etc...

These are the only possible features we can picture sentient beings to possess. When we think of imaginary beings, generic people, or even gods, we picture an entity with a standard face, most likely a composite face, fragmented from our surroundings.

These patterns we have evolved to recognize and appropriate because any other such qualities of living, intelligent matter are immaterial to our reproductive fitness. Biomechanical energy would be wasted on imagining beings devoid of properties of a standard terrestrial creature. Therefore its understandable we do not have the capacity to create a being in our mind that transcends existence. We can't envision nothing or god. How could we possibly have any confidence in conjuring up anatomical forms of extraterrestrial beings?

Of the infinite anatomical structures an organism could have, many of the organisms on earth have canalized their phenotype. Over time, anatomical qualities have been constrained to a basic framework across the different phyla, for arthropods its equi-segmentation with exoskeleton fused to produce discrete bodily units, for chordates (vertebrates mostly) its 4 appendages, back, standard face, position of ears...et al

Out of all the possible directions anatomy could have possibly taken, there is no reason whatsoever to insists that extraterrestrial life (intelligent or no), would in any way resemble what we consider as a typical product of life. Perhaps some extraterrestrials organisms are so beyond what we could comprehend we would hardly recognize it is a functioning entity.

Come on /sci/, use your imagination. What might be the real features of an alien