Since all of this discussion is on extraterrestial life or intelligent Extraterrestrial life and Theory of Evolution, why not totally agree with it.
Why not this idea, as it would sum up everything.
About 700 Million years ago, an advance space traveling civilization existed. This species was exploring the Sol system, having arrived from the Alpha Centuari Binary System. As they needed supplies, water resources or some other chemicals, they landed on the second "Pale Blue Dot" from the Star. With the technological advance machines the aliens, took some water from 'Earth'. While walking around various mud puddles, one of the aliens 'spat' into the pool of water. The aliens, in their advance space craft, continued upon their journey into the vast beyond of space, eventually to become extinct and all traces of their technology, destroyed by geological process throughout the universe.
Panspermia--bacterial life, is thus true.
The rise of life, the PreCambrian Explosion, is thus true.
The Theory of Evolution, is thus true, as species radiate out into ecological niches and adapting to new habitat.
Eventually, a reptilian species, evolves with the potential of becoming Earth's first intelligent species. Unfortunately, an asteroid or secondary moonlet orbit is degrading and within some geological time will collide with the Earth, destroying the reptilian species and leaving fury mammalians to begin the new process of genetic changes.
Overtime, another species has the potential for intelligent developments--primates. This species, developes into H. sapiens neanderthalis and H. sapiens sapiens, of which the later wins the 'brainy' contest. Unfortunately, H. sapiens sapiens developed and relied upon technology, building atomic bombs and antibacterial soaps. The species, didn't develop into a Spacefaring Planetary Terraforming species. It didn't allocate resources to build secondary colonies on Mars, or attempt to terraform Venus--the cost basis was too high. Therefore, H. sapiens sapiens, continued to have political, ethical and religious debates within its society. The population continued to increase, natural resouces and environments were depleted. The population rose to 7.5 billion individuals, beyond the carrying capacity of 3.8 billion individuals of the Earth. The H. sapiens sapiens species sufferred a population crash, wiping it into extinction.

Dust to Dust, ashes to ashes...the little bacterium and microbe swim in a mud puddle!

I certainly believe that intelligent mortals exist elsewhere, why not? I do also believe that any such civilisation capable of surmounting the time/space constraints to get in touch would definitely be more technically advanced than us. Finally, it follows that any such advanced aliens would definitely be more sophisticated (mentally) than we are and most certainly be anything else than the images of our exaggerated pop culture. And that's why we should pursue the SETI project vigorously because we have a lot to learn from a higher technical civilisation.

There are many things we are ask to believe. The possibility we are not alone.Our star is young in the universe. We are in fact children in the time frame. Some believe they are already here. With reason
they should be heard. The worst part is the fact we can not get along with each other. How would we be with an advanced race who found us to be the children we are?
Can we honestly hope to make contact when the government of America can not be honest with the people? And let our finest fight a war based on a lie. For a people who do not want us there.It would seem the government is unable to deliver the truth.To be counted we only have to stand and say our troops mean more than the politician glory hunters.
God bless America.

To be the Devil's Advocate here, but I have three questions:

1) Does the term "Cargo Cult" mean anything to y'all?

2) Stipulating that it is Generically Good to have contact with other folk, does it automatically follow that it would be Good for that to happen today?

3) Does what we 'want' really matter in this equation anyways?

I read a comment earlier regarding the appalling proclivity of some nations to spend so much on military technologies that have no real scientific -- or even useful -- value. Our current society is turned so far into what we fear about ourselves that we are already neglecting the necessity of the survival of our species. We face significant problems here, in regards to our environment and the planet's long-term habitability, even without fear of the 'other' complicating matters.

These problems will take generations to solve, but we must start now if we are to solve them. One often-cited reason that relates to this desire for immediate results is that investments in space, SETI and other exploration programs are not likely to return on their investments for many, many years to come, or even within our lifetimes.

It is unfortunate that most SETI research will not likely be fruitful within our lifetimes. Does that mean we should stop trying? Of course not. Our progeny may one day make that greatest of discoveries, and it can all start with what our generation does now. The rewards of our efforts today could enrich our civilization's awareness of our place in the Universe immeasurably.

It will be difficult to get the funding that such exploration programs really need, but it is imperative that both the scientific community, and we, as global citizens, convince this planet's governments to fund such explorations. We need to show that we think the long term benefit will far outweigh the short term costs. Above all, we must be patient, and show that unlike politicians, we are willing to wait for these results.

I am not sure we're going in the right direction as far as finding or detecting for other life signs by determining if there are similar earthal conditions in other planets. We know so very well how nature is adaptable and smartly evolving around and with existing conditions. Why couldn't be life where life, according to our earthly standards, is unthinkable or not even possible? Just a thought. So why look for signs of life and not signs of lifesustaning conditions? Just a thought. I am no scientist I would not know. All I can do is wonder.

Here is my selection.

Sylvie

Clearly the odds favorable that there are many other species in the universe, some of them intelligent--to think otherwise is to continue mankind's traditional egocentricity (Earth is the center of the Universe, The Sun is the center of the Universe, Man is God's highest creation, etc). The numbers also dictate that the odds of encountering them are miniscule. I think it's worth pursuing at least the intentional and continuous transmission of meaningful information that might be interpretable by others. They will have a hard time deciphering what we are like if they are picking up Flintstones reruns.
I agree with Mr Evans, that the absurd and wasteful expeditures on the military could be far better spent if directed at useful or purely scientific research towards nonmilitary ends. Star Wars Missle Defense? A robotic soldier? More billion dollar subs? Do these people have any idea what problems most people are struggling with?
As for aliens coming to harm this planet and it's people, we need have no fear---we seem to be doing a bang up job of this already, all by ourselves, in case no one noticed.

I think that our existence is already known by others...but they are not communicating with us because they are waiting until we progress further as a species. It's possible that our ideology and current level of compassion for all in the world is perceived by extraterrestrials as vastly un-evolved (or de-volved),much as Darwin looked upon the amoeba.

I belong to the school of thought, that life is Not Neccessarily based on our chemistry(carbon-based).life can possibly be based on other so-called "exotic" chemistries such as silicon and hydrogen,dependent on the laws of physics.It may be the inherent nature of matter to procuor life,life that we may not recoginize as life,and life,that does not recoginize us as life.Life as we now know it,is very diverse and remarkable,indicating to us that life may not be limited to the chemistry we know as making up life.

I need to preface my comments by saying that I am a SETI supporter, because I want to make the possibly pessimistic point that until we can broadcast successfully, we probably can’t contact successfully. We can’t ask of others (aliens) what we cannot do ourselves.

As an American citizen, I find it more than a little unsettling that we are responsible for about one half the entire world’s military budget. One country, ONE HALF. Are we afraid we may have to take on the rest of the world at some point? It is absurd to me that some of those countless billions of government dollars do not get directed toward a scientific discovery that could so radically change public perception, military spending becomes a shameful human embarrassment from the past.

I think most people agree that there are intelligent beings and civilizations out there somewhere. Space is just too unbelievably vast for the odds to work out that we are the only ones. However, the amount of energy required to effectively and continually broadcast omni-directional signals into the bewilderingly large volume of space to be caught by potential alien receivers is a huge, troubling hurdle. The paradox of searching for signals that we ourselves cannot produce is now probably more of a convenient excuse for politicians to ignore funding SETI than the flat-out “waste-of-time-and-money-finding-little-green-men-that-aren’t-there” argument of past decades, which most people no longer accept. If we are only going to undertake state-of-the-art listening efforts, due to time, money, and energy constraints, do we not have to assume alien civilizations also will be pigeonholed into listening-only projects? They do live in the same universe, after all, and are subject to the same physical laws.

Something has to break for SETI to be a success. Either some genius has to come along and give us the magical, “free ride”, cheap way to broadcast signals into space that our politicians want, and most likely alien politicians want, or we as a society have to get over our addiction to defense spending and pour those bountiful resources into an expensive broadcasting effort. We can theorize till the cows come home about what technologies aliens will use as their signal medium, and try to tune our receivers accordingly, but until we get our hands dirty and undertake a continuous broadcasting effort ourselves, I have serious doubts. It’s always in the hands-on “doing” that you discover and work out the real problems. And, yes, we will waste a lot of money pursuing dead-ends, but we will never eclipse wasted military spending.

In the early 70's, while 6 of us were waiting for the school bus, we all saw something so incredible that we were paralyzed. No one moved until it was gone.We never talked about again after that morning because we knew no one would believe us. To this day, it's as vivid in my mind as if it were yesterday. I believe that we've already had signals heard and I believe we should continuously send signals out. To think that we're(Earth)the only inhabited planet is so narrow minded. Fear of the unknown is paralyzing but if we don't explore it, no one will and we'll never find out.

May 26, 2005

America Weighs in on Extraterrestrial Life

"The poll released today by National Geographic Channel and University of Connecticut about people's beliefs in Extraterrestrials confirms that the majority of Americans are convinced that extraterrestrial life exists. But it's interesting to find that the overwhelming majority of those folk would also be "excited and hopeful" if we discover it." Seth Shostak

Extraterrestrial Blog http://blogs2.nationalgeographic.com/extraterrestrial/

SETH: There are several reasons why we haven’t mounted a massive transmitting project. Part of it is money. All SETI experiments in the United States are funded with private donations, and there’s barely enough to undertake a state-of-the-art listening effort.

FRANCIS: I think the experiments are important enough to be again funded by the Federal Government or even the UN; since the majority of people hold an interest... Maybe the National Graphics poll cited above should have asked the question: "Should our government and governments around the globe fund a broader SETI endeavor?" That should be an indication to Congress... We're asking for 1 billion to conduct the research properly.

SETH: Since any transmitting scheme would take many years to pay off (perhaps a millennium or more if the nearest extraterrestrials are many hundreds of light-years away),

FRANCIS: We must consider what Astrophysicist, Dr. Michio Kaku said on The Peter Jennings Report "UFO's; Seeing is Believing"; We can easily postulate that a superior civilization out there might have figured out time/space jumps...(Kaku's sheet of paper representing the universe; folded and doubly hole-punched to a show jump on the space grid). However, to avoid the problem of waiting for light year transmissions, I feel Solar System SETI has found its time... This gives SETV (visitation) an advantage.

SETH cont.: ...there’s a greater incentive to spend the money on experiments that might succeed this week, or at least within a few decades.

FRANCIS: Precisely! Solar System SETI becomes all the more relevant. We can viably reach such destinations NOW if we were to pick something up or our probes find evidence of artifacts. In weighing the possible "Long shots", as is all of SETI, there is only to make a best of choices. It makes good sense today to look right here in our neighborhood as well as the deep vastness of space. Fermi's Paradox for visitation would imply grounds to implement Solar System search technology at the present time. I do hope Scot Stride (JPL engineer and SETI investigator) and Dr. Bruce Cornet's ideas are highly considered to implement such a plan through the ATA program, as they are now proposing. Jill Tarter; Phoenix Project Director, also supports the theory of robotic probes in our Solar System. With water being found on nearby planets and moons our vision can indeed change...

SETH: Also, some people worry that broadcasting might be dangerous, as it would alert unknown societies to our existence and coordinates. “Who knows what’s out there,” these folks declaim. However, this argument ignores the fact that continuous, high-powered broadcasts have been leaking off Earth for more than a half-century. Our FM radio, television, and radar transmissions have already flooded the nearest several thousand star systems, and there’s no retrieving these unintentional transmissions.

FRANCIS: Right. The DOD needs to know it's already too late... and besides, they shouldn't be messing with our God-given human manifest destiny into Space... Seth, a radio show covering a historical review of modern SETI can only be helpful to your organization...

Francis C. P. Knize
Producer
Open Science Advocate
Public Outreach Organizer

I, too, would welcome contact with any friendly life forms that are out there. I think it would be a huge event that would startle our world into seeing how small we actually are, and that all our money chasing and power plays and pop culture are just idling compared to the whole wide scheme of things.

I think we would have to very self centered to think as vast as space is that we are the only living intellegent beings. Nothing is to say they resemble us in any way, but some sort of beings. I remember when Flash Gordon came out and everyone said it was just science fiction that it could never happen and look at us now. Going into space almost as Flash Gordon's adventures.

We have been broadcasting out into space for a very long time already, so what's the fuss all about?
And if not in this country there are radio stations in other parts of the world that have been sending out powerful signals for years. I can remember years ago listening to [AM] radio from Mexico up in Washington State, my fist exposure to Wolfman Jack if any of you remember him. If memory serves he was pushing out at more than 50,000 watts, or was it 100,000, its been a long time. Those signals were also going straight up, right out of the solar system. We have already reached out about 100 light years with radio. We have also been sending out TV signals for well over 50 years now, most of that should scare any aliens away. As what has gone out is not what most might consider to be our best foot forward, especially the news, no matter what country it is. So if anything those who have been picking up our signals are probably posting notices to avoid this area altogether as far to dangerous to visit. I mean how many movies are there where we do not kill all the Aliens?

The fact is our planet exists for all to see, means that in itself could be a threat for hijacking aliens, so sending radio signals is harmless in comparison. We are on the verge of spotting other Earth-like planets and we have only just began. So if they can see Earth with their own much more advanced telescopes and haven't came here like pirates jumping ship in the last few billion years, then that's a promising argument against hostile aliens. If they are capable of intersellar travel then its fair to assume they would make good attempts to map out parts of the galaxy as best they can. But we still don't know if they exist even if they know we exist, so lets send them a message as well as listening!