we are gonna be Aliens!!! yay ^_^

[Jack's Smirking Revenge]

Seriously, give up the idea that science fiction has put in your head. We can't just merely "make contact" with them. It's a lot more complex than that. It's hard enough to send messages to satellites orbiting the Earth. Messages to this other planet would take centuries just to reach them.
The chances that there is intelligent life on this planet is pretty good, since the conditions suggest that it's a similar planet to Earth, but any contact or anything we may have with them isn't likely in the near, or even distant future.

 

[Cactuar]

Oh god, if that planet is indeed habitable, and even if we don't get there in the next 200 years, this will be the order in which the first contact will happen:

Firstly, a Tescos superstore will be built...
Then, a Starbucks and McDonalds in every square mile
Lastly, everyone will be killed for some obscure reason, as a certain nation milks the planet dry of oil.

 

[Saix]

If we're going stupidly sci-fi here, say we DO land. What then? Do you think we'd just get some kind of tea-party ready for us? Bleh.

It's a bloody surprise we're alive in this Galaxy, let alone other beings on a planet possibly further away form the sun than we are. We exist by chance: of which I'd say had impossibly small odds for our existence. Should we land, there probably wouldn't be any life there other than fungal growth or something.

As Matrix-ish as it sounds, humans are a plague. Once we land and we find that the environment is indeed similar to our own, we're going to want to settle there. Once we make successful settlements, we'll multiply and consume the resources of that planet.

That sounds more 'Independence Day' to me. Y'know, with the aliens doing that an' all.

 

[Jazzel]

Messages to this other planet would take centuries just to reach them.

Those nice scientists at SETI have already thought about that. We've been transmitting radio waves since 1960. Have you heard about Arecibo message transmitted in 1977? Go check out! By now, the message will have travelled a radius of thirty light years from Earth.

So really, we've been transmitting intentional signals in search of life for the last 47 years. That means any planet 47 light years from us has received the message. Considering current values given in Drake's equatin, we should give it another 30 years before, theoritically, an advanced civilzation picks it up .

Also, look up the Wow! signal. Intresting in light of this.

But really, I agree with Pooley on this. Don't get your hopes up yet people. I don't think the Federation will be established soon .

 

[Jack's Smirking Revenge]

That whole thing is pretty much flawed though. By the time any civilization does receive that message, and by the time it is deciphered, replied to and then deciphered at the other end, the messages will be irrelevant.

 

[Rockman X]

That whole thing is pretty much flawed though. By the time any civilization does receive that message, and by the time it is deciphered, replied to and then deciphered at the other end, the messages will be irrelevant.

Like the number of the population. I'm sure the earth's population has increased dramatically since the 1970's.

As you said in a previous post, it would take an extremely long time for us to contact the planet. I really do wish we'd start funding our space program more. It's kind of pathetic that we landed on the moon in '69, but in the past couple years every time we try to send something into space it either blows up or pieces of it fly off.

 

[dimmufan]

Those nice scientists at SETI have already thought about that. We've been transmitting radio waves since 1960. Have you heard about Arecibo message transmitted in 1977? Go check out! By now, the message will have travelled a radius of thirty light years from Earth.

So really, we've been transmitting intentional signals in search of life for the last 47 years. That means any planet 47 light years from us has received the message. Considering current values given in Drake's equatin, we should give it another 30 years before, theoritically, an advanced civilzation picks it up .

Also, look up the Wow! signal. Intresting in light of this.

Actually we've been sending signals unintentionally for about 70 years since the 1940's or even earlier. Since the television first came out.

And that Wow! signal was actually just some cosmic noise coming from an actual star. If I'm not mistaken the star was located in the constellation Vega. I might have to read up on that, though.

 

[Cactuar]

Actually, funding the space program is probably the only wothwhile thing to do atm, the majority of the world's spending is on arms..., the 'world' that society has created for us is rather simple...we live, we work, we contribute, we die....sorry for sounding so bleak, whats the point...my philosophy is to experience as much as i can during my life...things that are real.....nature and stuff...so yeah exploring what is around us, and understanding it, would be the first priority....not sorting out the worlds problems, we cant seem to manage to do it...