The Ambiguity Problem

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What kind of evidence would be needed to convince the world of alien life? Sagan said that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence", but what exactly is "extraordinary"? Today we explore the difficult problem of dealing with potentially ambiguous evidence and how it might affect our search for life.
Written & presented by Prof. David Kipping. Edited by Jorge Casas.
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THANK-YOU to D. Smith, M. Sloan, L. Sanborn, C. Bottaccini, D. Daughaday, A. Jones, S. Brownlee, N. Kildal, Z. Star, E. West, T. Zajonc, C. Wolfred, L. Skov, G. Benson, A. De Vaal, M. Elliott, B. Daniluk, M. Forbes, S. Vystoropskyi, S. Lee, Z. Danielson, C. Fitzgerald, C. Souter, M. Gillette, T. Jeffcoat, J. Rockett, D. Murphree, T. Donkin, K. Myers, A. Schoen, K. Dabrowski, J. Black, R. Ramezankhani, J. Armstrong, K. Weber, S. Marks, L. Robinson, S. Roulier, B. Smith, J. Cassese, J. Kruger, S. Way, P. Finch, S. Applegate, L. Watson, E. Zahnle, N. Gebben, J. Bergman, E. Dessoi, C. Macdonald, M. Hedlund, P. Kaup, C. Hays, W. Evans, D. Bansal, J. Curtin, J. Sturm, RAND Corp., M. Donovan, N. Corwin, M. Mangione, K. Howard, L. Deacon, G. Metts, G. Genova, R. Provost, B. Sigurjonsson, G. Fullwood, B. Walford, J. Boyd, N. De Haan, J. Gillmer, R. Williams, E. Garland, A. Leishman, A. Phan Le, R. Lovely, M. Spoto, A. Steele, M. Varenka, K. Yarbrough, A. Cornejo, D. Compos, F. Demopoulos, G. Bylinsky, J. Werner, B. Pearson, S. Thayer, T. Edris, A. Harrison, B. Seeley, F. Blood, M. O'Brien, P. Muzyka, E. Loomans, D. Lee, J. Sargent, M. Czirr, F. Krotzer, I. Williams, J. Sattler, & J. Smallbon.
REFERENCES
► Brzycki, B. et al. 2023, "On Detecting Interstellar Scintillation in Narrowband Radio SETI", ApJ, 952, 46: arxiv.org/abs/2307.08793
► Davenport, J. et al. 2023, "Searching the SETI Ellipsoid with Gaia", AJ, 164, 117: arxiv.org/abs/2206.04092
MUSIC
Licensed by SoundStripe.com (SS) [shorturl.at/ptBHI], Artlist.io, via CC Attribution License (creativecommons.org/licenses/...) or with permission from the artist.
CHAPTERS
0:00 Diversified Alien Hunting
2:33 NordVPN
3:43 Priors
9:45 Disambiguation
13:04 New Tricks
16:07 Outro & Credits

КОМЕНТАРІ: 1 100

@figplucker908 7 місяців тому

An alien ship landing in a major city and a creature steps out. That would be fairly convincing.

@stewpitt8388 7 місяців тому

For about 5 minutes,until somebody killed it and jacked its flying saucer.

@emilhuzjak7053 6 місяців тому

Honestly anything short of lifting a mountain or teleporting objects can be explained as a secret government project. If the phenomenon has any chance of having an earthly origin, theres a possibility that its not aliens.

@botezsimp5808 3 місяці тому

People would just think it's some AI generated video.

@Mystipaoniz 2 місяці тому

HACKHACKHACKHACKHACK That would convince me alright ^^

@Trollgernautt Місяць тому

Aliens could slap a skeptic in the face with their 3 headed 14kg penis and some scientist would come up with a "solution". Proof may come someday, but it will takes YEARS to convince everybody. Even if it is a alien ship landind in a major city and a creature steps out.

@Shanghaimartin 7 місяців тому

I used to watch Ghost Caught On Camera videos and would laugh and debunk every single one. And at some point I started wondering, what would it actually take for me to believe one? In this day and age, where everyone has access to excellent video editing software, I came to the conclusion, there is nothing I could see on video that would convince me. It would have to be a personal experience.

@stewpitt8388 7 місяців тому

@Shanghaimartin But would you be convinced then? Maybe somebody slipped you some acid or you had a momentary psychotic break. Even a personal experience can leave room for doubt if you don't have the ability to have an open mind about a subject.

@johnatchason6506 6 місяців тому

You are correct. The only way to convince yourself is to either a) accidentally move in to a haunted house like I did and notice how different it is from all the non-haunted houses you've lived in previously or b) actually join one of those ghost hunting groups and go out looking for a personal experience... you acquire some creepy audio or video artifact that you personally know you didn't fake, then show it to your friends who will predictably NOT be impressed. You reach a "dead end" with it and move on with your life knowing ghosts are real, but not knowing much more than that. Now you're "in the club", but so what?

@jaydils9680 6 місяців тому

💯. I paranormal investigated hundreds of locations and could find anything that was not explainable

@AllyMonsters 6 місяців тому

It would be easy, theoretically (at least for ghosts). If you can have a location that has a reliable event that happens on a trigger. That sounds a little mechanical for a ghost though. That way you can have a literal line for people to go through like an attraction (for the cynical reasons of course) or a team study it. But the implications of ghosts raises another problem... does that means that if since the dawn of humanity, we've had ghosts... wouldn't that make trillions or more of them around by now?

@hedgehog3180 5 місяців тому

The key thing for me would be reproduceability and instrument data, combined with an actual physically possible theory for how ghosts could exist. Though arguably we do have the latter, it's just that the brain is fallible and is liable to make the kind of mistakes people percieve as ghosts because it is hyper tuned to finding other humans.

@jamesmungall6669 7 місяців тому

I’m a geologist and I’ve always thought that an incontrovertible piece of evidence would be the chance discovery of some random chunk of scrap metal weathering out of an outcrop of ancient sedimentary rock. Not that I expect to find one, but you couldn’t beat it as proof we were visited long ago 😀

@asafry2873 7 місяців тому

That would be a real interesting find in the right situation, amd esoecially if the alloy had interesting peoperties. Of course if it was only done once the probability of finding it would be low.

@jamese9283 7 місяців тому

How would you know the scrap wasn't injected there after the rock was formed?

@6ixpool520 7 місяців тому

What do you think of the Klerksdorp spheres? The hypothesis for their natural formation has always struck me as a stretch at best

@jamesmungall6669 7 місяців тому

@@6ixpool520 I don’t see those conceptions as anything unnatural. I’ve seen lots of concretions and there are similar ones in many localities. The normal explanation is that during diagenesis migrating pore fluids are mildly supersaturated with a mineral like calcite,pyrite or siderite but nucleation is inhibited so once a grain forms it will grow radially to make a spheroid. Rings form if the layers of sediment have differing permeability allowing addition of nutrient to the spheroid concretions at different rates in different layers.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

Love it - great idea

@Hydde87 7 місяців тому

Never heard about the concept of Schelling Points in astrophysics but they're definitely intriguing. You see something significant happening in the sky, you instantly relay that to other stars that have yet to witness that event. If those stars then have intelligent life on them that assume you might be doing this, then as soon as they see the event they know exactly when to potentially expect interesting signals coming from your direction. It's pretty clever and could tell us which stars to look out for based on the supernova we see and have seen in the past. Or we could be sending out messages ourselves. "Hey lads, any of you seen Betelgeuse finally pop, that was pretty wild right?"

@rosyidharyadi7871 7 місяців тому

Wouldn't it be interesting if the transmitter also includes base common language for next communication, say the supernova dominated by iron, and then the signal contains several pulses that indicates iron atom number. Something like that. It would be super slow cosmic online 'language learning' though.

@danibitt59 7 місяців тому

@Hydde87 Wait, never heard about the concept of Schelling Points in astrophysics, or never heard about the concept of Schelling Points?

@matthewyabsley 7 місяців тому

@@rosyidharyadi7871- I’m sure we would learn things like “F off” quite quickly though… ;-)

@kirkpetersjr 7 місяців тому

If they saw betel go super then when they told us they either saw it before us and they tell us and then we have seen it, or vice versa. Light from betel hits them, then they at that moment relay that, but their message hits us at the same time we see betel go super, and likewise with characters flipped.

@Hydde87 7 місяців тому

@@rosyidharyadi7871 Definitely, anything that increases the odds of it not being perceived as random noise, and atom numbers are an excellent candidate for communication as both sides almost certainly have common understanding on it.

@cheshire1 7 місяців тому

I've always interpreted Sagan's mantra as a call for a certain kind of prior: complex claims with lots of components (i.e. extraordinary claims) have low prior probability. It's Occam's razor.

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

That's why I believe that absolutely everything exists - because one specific universe coming from nothing requires some kind of initial condition that resulted in this specific reality. Absolutely everythingness from nothingness requires less to explain than one specific something from nothingness.

@sidsuspicious 7 місяців тому

@@JohnnyWednesday Belief is not facts or evidence no matter what mental gymnastics you use to get the answer you desperately want. The something from nothing fallacy rears it's ugly head once again, oh dear. Where is your proof this occurred? Or do you just wish it to be true?

@gert-janbonnema 7 місяців тому

@@JohnnyWednesdayThat's what I also believe. But I also think that 'nothing' cant exist. If is did, It would also be kind of something... So everything exists, forever.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

I think you could legitimately view it that way, I don’t know if that’s what Sagan really meant though. A counter example might be reverse gravity. Negative mass has no more complexity than positive mass. Yet I think we should rationally demand higher evidence for it since we have no prior experience of such a thing, but huge amounts for positive mass.

@xBINARYGODx 7 місяців тому

@@JohnnyWednesday None of the accepted models of the universe are something from nothing, you have effectively been lied to, and probably by some smart people who know better but are very bad at making these complex things clear to people more laymen than they are. The universe, for as far back as our models permit us to "look" and make highly educated guesses, was something akin to a singularity which for some reason expanded outward, which is still happening right now. There are no concrete answers for why, and claiming anything else is tantamount to religion given current actual data and testable theorems.

@tipufitzherbert1088 7 місяців тому

I think an overlooked challenge is how to define life in the first place. How different or unrecognisable does it have to be to Earth's life to be considered inanimate?

@Leyrann 7 місяців тому

The simplest definition of life would be a molecular (or more complex) structure that uses it's own structure to reproduce itself (potentially with some adjustments - aka mutations). Although I do believe there are a few strange cases where a molecule can do this but wouldn't be ordinarily considered life, but this is where you can go into more complex definitions; I don't have enough knowledge of the matter to make a sensible statement on that level, though.

@Ebonmoth 7 місяців тому

Our definition of life at present is, despite the highly diverse expressions of it here on Earth, rather narrow. It is certainly challenging to consider what life beyond our present experiences would look like, how it would function, and how we might go about identifying it. I suspect the answer would simply be to watch and learn, just how we've had to do with all previous discoveries that blew our minds. I would also like to posit that we cannot discount that the very chemistry which allows us to be alive is also happening in other locations. If the atoms which form the molecular structures of life as we know it are also forming out in other star systems and distant galaxies, it stands to reason that the same chemical reactions can be considered as a probability, and also very likely on exoplanets similar to our home here. I think what we need to come down to, in order to remain rational and reasonable, is to say, "I don't know right now, but I am open to trying to find out. Let's develop technology that can help us perceive the world, and the rest of our universe, more accurately."

@daarom3472 7 місяців тому

there are plenty of molecules that we would say are alive that can't reproduce. There are even entire organisms that cannot do it (sterile ones). I think it's mostly to do with a structure being able to compute beyond the laws of physics that guide the molecular substructure.

@Ken-fh4jc 7 місяців тому

@daarom3472 Reproduction is only one criteria.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

Oh wow that’s a whole other major problem! No good answers but perhaps I’ll do a video on this in the future

@wildoskistudios9217 7 місяців тому

An awesomely written and beautifully spoken script. I love how you really get your hands into these ideas and stretch them out.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

🙏

@tanishqgandas2633 7 місяців тому

they copied an article on aeon esaays website by jamie greene called "uncertain contact" it was released 4 days before this video and is obviously the same .

@uzeustosun 7 місяців тому

So beautifully presented and written. Not to mention the soothing effect of your voice. Beautiful. Thank you

@iceman5413 7 місяців тому

This goes for every issue in the world. Especially in today's landscape, where influencers are more powerful that we give them credit for.

@XOPOIIIO 7 місяців тому

It ridiculous that even the very term "Fermi paradox" doesn't makes sense, because it implies that there should be extraterrestrial civilizations. The fact that it is called "paradox" is from the believe that they should exist.

@friskeysunset Місяць тому

The fallacy leading to the paradox is the 'prior' that the scale of the universe is so great that life *must* be out there. No, it mustn't. We have a data point of one. There is no prior, because uniqueness is a possible condition.

@XOPOIIIO Місяць тому

@@friskeysunset Exactly. And it's not just one data point, it's the data point that directly depends on the very fact of observation. This data point is biased to our existence so it doesn't give even approximation of the chances. Because observer will observe itself regardless of how small or high chances are.

@emzywillrich7243 7 місяців тому

Thank you ror this discussion, Dr. Kipping!

@Cycyryable 7 місяців тому

I think what matters even more than the type of evidence, is the consistency of it. There are dozens of points of evidence, each ranging from plausible to very unlikely, but they're all different. One wow-signal can be marked up as 'well maybe it was a russian spy satellite', but a wow-signal once a week for a year will be a lot harder to ignore / write off. The problem with this strategy is that we'd have to very seriously look at all points of evidence to see if something repeats, which might not be feasible.

@gustavopaez2444 7 місяців тому

Excellent video, I always enjoy the way you narrate them, it gives me peace and always teaches me something new, as for aliens, I have an astrophysicist bakground and so I too shared into the bleack realization that we might be very alone.

@MasterBlaster3545 7 місяців тому

Probably not but it is very likely that other civilisations past, present and in the future will ever go interstellar or intergalactic for many reasons. Some reasons are costs, distances, time and the science to name a few. There must be many life giving worlds out there but far fewer in percentage terms of intelligence like us. That makes any near us virtually non existent, so alien craft roaming around our atmosphere is just in believers minds. Basically a religion for minds that can’t really critically think. We have only just become able to look out into the cosmos and all of a sudden not just one unlikely alien craft is flying around aimlessly, but millions all in peoples minds. It is mind boggling that so many of my fellow man are just not able to think things through and just believe so much that it becomes fact to them.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

🌏 Get exclusive NordVPN deal here ➵ NordVPN.com/coolworlds It’s risk free with Nord’s 30 day money-back guarantee!✌ Hope you enjoyed the video - let me know your thoughts on the ambiguity problem and how much evidence you think is needed?

@woodypigeon 7 місяців тому

@@Ge0Ken True that. And the bullshit infomercials that will continue to play long after the advertiser has moved on or ceased to exist. This channel used to be a lot better.

@inspilo3778 7 місяців тому

what is the music called when the ad starts?

@jamesrey3221 7 місяців тому

Ufology are filled with people like Greer, Corbell, Elizondo, Avi Loeb, etc....and now Grusch and his Skinwalker buddies. . the cast of History's Channel fantasy TV show. The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch (TV Series 2020- ) Jay Stratton as Self - Former Director, UAP Task Force. (Stratton, Grusch former boss), Travis Taylor (Mr. Wormhole) Chief scientist, George Knapp UFO journalist and story teller, etc. They are ghost hunters, werewolves, UFO's and other crazy stuffs...not really to be taken seriously. They are regulars at AlienCon. No serous scientist or researcher will touch these with a telephone pole. How many times must the Pentagon and NASA officially say that these UFO's are not ET's.

@erberIsSillyhawk 7 місяців тому

i believe in math, and i simply don't think a race would use all their world's resources and invest generations of their lives in space to visit earth. Considering they wouldn't even be able to see human Light from their home planets Location. So because of that and many other factors i believe there's ZERO chance of Aliens.

@melgross 7 місяців тому

It’s always going to be ambiguous unless we do find life somewhere else. And what is life? Well, I suppose it might be one of those things that we can’t describe but that we will recognize when we see it. But there’s a difference between just “life” and high technological life. The first may be difficult to recognize, but the second should be far easier. One would think, that no matter how differently aliens might think, math and physics remain the same. Whatever technology they may use will be something that we can imagine even if we can’t duplicate it yet. We seem to be looking for signals that are very simple. Why? Making the assumption that they know we’re here seems to be illogical. If these civilizations exist, can they really travel between star systems? Would they communicate between these systems somehow? If so, they’re likely using tight beams of some sort. The likelihood that we would fall in that beam is almost zero. And if we’re not, we won’t detect it.

@theodoresweger4948 7 місяців тому

Talking about belief systems enlightened me about my mystery of politics, not going there but now understand more. Thanks, love your articles..

@hunterholliday8560 6 місяців тому

Dr Kipping, I’ve been watching for a long time, and I just wanted to thank you for these. Many topics go over my head, and what I tend to do is pause the video, look up the topic or point presented to gain a general understanding, then return to the video. I’ve learned so much about the universe from this channel and I am so grateful for you planting that seed of curiosity. I only wish I had pursued this curiosity when I was younger!

@CoolWorldsLab 6 місяців тому

Thanks Hunter, it’s great to know what we make helps people discover the universe

@kenn743 7 місяців тому

Are we alone? There’s a reason why this question is so intriguing; it defines how we see ourselves. Finding life would greatly alter our worldview and our place in the cosmos.

@elitecoder955 7 місяців тому

It wouldn't

@Mossyz. 7 місяців тому

Politics and the Elite would no longer be in power .

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

It'd be great - all the bigots would focus on aliens and we'd finally have peace.

@Twisted4k 7 місяців тому

Very good points, two different people can look at the same alleged evidence but come to the exact opposite conclusions; I feel it's often not so much what we're presented with but rather what our already-established beliefs happen to be.

@juliankirby9880 7 місяців тому

I used this to explain to someone something about politics. My uncle. Can hear the audio clips of DJT bragging about being a sex criminal, and an admission of guilt is not enough for him, a retired cop. My dad, also a retired cop, heard those and said any person who could support a person that does that kind of thing is unworthy of kindness. 2 people, same upbringing, incredibly similar life experiences, and one person chooses moral evil, the other chooses moral good.

@adityakulkarni9455 7 місяців тому

That’s why Dr Avi Loeb is the legend in saying “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidences, but extraordinary evidences require extraordinary funding”.

@carlosvasquez9890 6 місяців тому

...and so, the scam is revealed. Lets face it...the guy is either on severe mental decline (hey..it happens in Harvard too...) or just a fraud. Probably...a bit of both.

@WackyAmoebatrons 4 місяці тому

"... and that funding should be for me, an old almost cranky man, to study my pet fantasy."

@genegray9895 3 місяці тому

@@WackyAmoebatronsyou're right, no other scientist in history has ever taken seriously the possibility of alien life. It would be totally arbitrary and meaningless to do even the most low hanging fruit investigations into this question, since nobody asks the question except for Avi Loeb. Thanks for educating us

@MrCombs234 7 місяців тому

I love that you came to that conclusion on how we should feel about the possibility of alien life or being alone. It's exactly how I've felt for years now. I truly have no idea and I'm absolutely open minded to either possibility and I'll give any and all 'evidence' of either a look or study and decide if i believe that's false or possible.

@thetopfootycoach 7 місяців тому

I love this channel and I love the content. Every time I watch a video (except the one where you didn't get acceptance to use JWST) I feel happiness and calm. It feels weird writing this but thank you for sharing your knowledge on something that's interested, amazed and fascinated me since I was a child but didn't have the balls nor intelligence to pursue as a study and career.

@danceswithcritters 7 місяців тому

Still the main obstacle to detecting other civilizations is time itself. Just because we see no sign of it doesn't mean it's not there now, we just don't know yet.

@daarom3472 7 місяців тому

this. It's not impossible, it's possibly likely but impossible to truly calculate how likely it is.

@hedgehog3180 5 місяців тому

We've only really been detectable as a civilization for 150 years at most so even a relatively close by alien civilization wouldn't be able to see us.

@Somethirdthing 7 місяців тому

This was a lot of fun, thanks!

@sambamiam 2 місяці тому

Top UKposts channel. The only notification I have ever turned on. Please discuss in depth the Miller-Urey experiment.

@folcwinep.pywackett8517 7 місяців тому

Agree fully, being Agnostic is the most honest reaction to a lack of evidence. When I was a kid, I believed that intelligent life must exist everywhere and that as soon as Astronomers began to seriously look and listen, they would start to find those civilizations. The silence since, has been deafening. I don't want hints that might be evidence, I want real evidence. We don't even know the probability of us being here!

@ntal5859 7 місяців тому

2 billion stars per galaxy X 2 trillion galaxies X say least one Goldie locks planet per star.... And we got a handful of telescopes capable of looking at each system...it's not that there is no life out there it's we just aren't really looking.

@lewis7515 7 місяців тому

@@ntal5859That is actually a false logic that distorts the field - that's at the heart of that person's quite beautifully direct observation... None of your numbers, in reply, matter even one bit - they're just comforting and soothing of a human perspective. If the probability of life is significantly less than the likelihood of places that could support life, your musings on numbers are meaningless? That is: while we can surmise a number that reflects the number of places life could exist, etc, etc, etc - we have no idea, whatsoever, what the probability of Life actually is. We have one example, our own - and we're not even in a position to make perfect sense of how we got here, ourselves. We can make sound estimates of what was required, in general - that follow human reason and expectations - but we could not possibly map the exact sequence of events and specific requirements, not significant order of those things that would have been necessary to produce us, so we have no clue what the probability of Life is: and our reason and expectation may not necessarily mean anything to the Universe. For all we know, Life might be a statistical anomaly that's so unlikely that it shouldn't really be possible at all - and if it dies occur, it's of an order of probability that means we should only expect it at a frequency if once in any given Universe - or once in every 100,000 Universes!.. We Do. Not. Know - and we're not in a position to say otherwise: everything else is really just what we may enjoy the sound of - but that actually doesn't then mean a, "goldilocks zone", or a, "2 x Trillions", actually has any value in the discussion. In reality, it might just be some nice-sounding stuff - significant of absolutely, nothing.

@folcwinep.pywackett8517 6 місяців тому

@@ntal5859 Yes, I used to believe as you do, but the lack of evidence has persisted for far too long. There have also been many discoveries about the Earth which seem to make it unique. Why does the Earth have massive plate tectonics, and Venus and Mars do not? Why is Jupiter so far away from its star? And on and on. The only thing that statistics prove is that the possibility of Alien life is non zero. We do not know the probability of Earth life! Yes, the Universe is big, really big as Adams says, but the reality of the probability of Earth life could be larger still. As a result I have moved from belief to agnosticism on the issue.

@Mahlak_Mriuani_Anatman 5 місяців тому

Its said that a person existing is 1 in 400T So there is that

@kevinsayes 7 місяців тому

If we weren’t fighting wars over which Bronze Age magic man is the right one and imaginary lines on landmasses, among other absurdities, maybe we could afford to explore all the claims, and much more

@elitecoder955 3 місяці тому

That's stupid and naive

@brendanthedreamer 2 місяці тому

and ironically a perfect demonstration of the kind of obstinance the video is talking about.@@elitecoder955

@freetolisten Місяць тому

Bronze age magic man. Love it

@A_Stereotypical_Guy Місяць тому

Borders are absurd? Democrat detected

@theropilane4812 6 місяців тому

I love this channel so much man. I appreciate the content

@petepasowicz7984 7 місяців тому

this. in every context. smart man, thank you.

@KimblesTheBrave 7 місяців тому

Excellent video. I've been thinking about this recently because of the Nazca mummies.... I don't particularly believe that they're real, but it's interesting/scary to think that we _could_ be presented with real evidence of something so absurd and outside of our expectations that it's literally impossible for us to take it seriously. Past a certain level of craziness all of the scientists would look at it and collectively say, "nope. nah, that's fake" and move on with their lives. But what if reality really was that stupid?? LMAO I agree with the need to be selective in what we study especially when testing is expensive, but yeah. Hopefully enough of us can keep an open mind so we don't dismiss any real bombshells if they do show up!

@spindoctor6385 7 місяців тому

Sagan's quote was never meant to stop people from studying anything, it was a call to find the extraordinary evidence. If your prior assumption is that aliens exist then no extraordinary claim has been made so no extraordinary evidence is needed, so once again, that is not a problem with Sagan's quote, it does not even apply.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

Indeed but it has been misused in certain cases

@spindoctor6385 7 місяців тому

@@CoolWorldsLab Yes, I just don't see the problem is with quote, it is the misuse of it that is the issue. Awesome video again, I have come to expect nothing less, thank you.

@MKIVD 2 місяці тому

This is how I go about things, and it came from you as well when you said it's so arrogant for us to thing that we're the only ones around without any evidence to claim as such. It's better to say "I don't know" rather than a yes or a no for things that we truly do not have an answer to. The lack of evidence on something does not mean it does not exist.

@Dave_of_Mordor Місяць тому

I'm getting really tired of this "arrogant" argument. Why don't you ask them how they come to that conclusion rather than just assume what they think? You guys needs to get off your high horses. Also saying "I don't know" doesn't make you humble. Not even in the slightest

@latenightwithedmoney956 7 місяців тому

Love the videos, closes thing to the Cosmos series I grew up watching. Well done and keep up the great work. I may not agree with everything you present but still love the videos. Keep on keeping on!

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

Thanks, pleased you sometimes disagree with me too - we need independent thinking

@yahccs1 7 місяців тому

Yes I enjoyed that series too, it got me fascinated enough to read the book 'Cosmos', which was such a huge challenge (not all at once, I don't think!) Loved the artists' impressions of alien worlds and the bits of maths at the end :)

@Tayken9127 7 місяців тому

Love me a new Cool Worlds video!

@TheEternalHyperborean 7 місяців тому

I just can't get over the fact that it looks like paper mache.

@EddieLF 7 місяців тому

You make some good points about how you must balance cost and benefit for a scientific investigation and how the priors you begin with affect your threshold for accepting evidence. As far as low hanging fruit go, I like the idea of the Galileo project, although I don't think they have actually released any data yet. They have set up a station on top of Harvard which watches the sky 24/7. It collects high quality sensor and video data to be processed by computer vision / machine learning algorithms that are trained to recognize and classify objects in the sky. Obviously it isn't cheap or easy to do something like this, but with the advent of AI technology it seems like a very sensible approach to investigating UAP claims. In a similar vein, there was an interesting paper from earlier this year that used machine learning to trawl through old stellar observations from the Breakthrough Listen project, looking for anything abnormal in the data. Ma and Ng, I believe they found several candidate signals with this very simple approach. They also appeared on Event Horizon which is where I learned about it.

@X1Y0Z0 4 місяці тому

Love, love, love your content & presentations

@dylananderson7658 7 місяців тому

Thank you for the time you put into making such meaningful content - really - it's a treat, every time.

@ppenmudera4687 7 місяців тому

I so want alien civilisations to be real and yet I feel like I would still doubt their existence even if one is standing right in front of me lol

@distantraveller9876 7 місяців тому

Maybe they're hidding in plain sight.

@usernname1 7 місяців тому

asymptotically - in such a way as to approach a given value, point, level, etc., continuously without ever reaching it. Cool new word. Good video as always. Thanks.

@robertcoleman349 7 місяців тому

Fascinating.

@chrimony 7 місяців тому

The problem with narrow-band signals is that they require huge amounts of energy from the sender and timing. Those are big assumptions. That's why I like the broadening out of looking for technological and biological signatures.

@mydogniko 7 місяців тому

Only Cool Worlds can make ambiguity interesting. I'm all in.

@WyzrdCat 7 місяців тому

Idk, ambiguity can be kind of interesting at the same time not so much.

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

What kind of ambiguity?

@Purpleturtlehurtler 7 місяців тому

@WyzrdCat I mean, kinda?

@tanishqgandas2633 7 місяців тому

they copied an article on aeon esaays website by jamie greene called "uncertain contact" it was released 4 days before this video and is obviously the same .

@MOJO-xi3wf 6 місяців тому

My buddies & I were there. 3rd row centre floor Maple Leaf Gardens. Awesome show. 🎉

@clintsheppard9699 7 місяців тому

I always really enjoy your opinion pieces!!

@cabanford 7 місяців тому

I love listening to your amazing thoughts combined with the approachable manner that you deliver them in. Epic.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

👍

@brick6347 7 місяців тому

The thumbnail made me chuckle. Is there evidence of extraterrestrial life? Perhaps, but it's definitely not a piñata. That thing would make the person doing the sfx for a 1970s episode of Dr Who cringe.

@FOWST 7 місяців тому

Thanks for the agnostic approach.

@kpsting 4 місяці тому

Cool video and a good starting point to a discussion. Although I would substitute 'prior belief' for 'prior experience' in your example in the beginning

@bkbland1626 7 місяців тому

I STILL maintain that "belief" is the first step down the trail of horse shit. I'm not interested or compelled by belief. I want evidence. Sagan is correct.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

I think many get confused by this but belief is not being used in the colloquial sense here but rather in the Bayesian sense which has rigorous meaning assigning the probability of something be true.

@dyotoorion1835 7 місяців тому

The point made in this video that I really loved was 9:19 "... Is to tacitly adopt this narcissistic notion that your reasoning abilitys are superior to that of your peers even though they have undergone the same intellectual training as that of yourself." If some people didn't think like that there wouldn't be so much disagreement about what is true.

@timd3469 7 місяців тому

I wonder how Galileo would answer that.

@Leyrann 7 місяців тому

At the same time, it is also important to not fall into the _opposite_ trap of believing that the majority is always right. One should always keep a balance between "my own reasoning is sound" and "the majority probably arrived at the correct conclusion". (as examples of the majority being wrong, consider the belief that the earth is the center of the solar system, or that the Milky Way galaxy is the entire universe)

@simontmn 7 місяців тому

Some people have better reasoning than others. And most people will suppress their reasoning in order to fit in with the group. After all we are evolved to survive and reproduce, not to be reasoning machines.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

@@Leyrannye for sure, but I think for scientists will have trusted colleagues they can talk to, not just yes men but people who will give a frank and honest assessment of their data and argument. At the end of the day it all comes down to reproducible evidence which by it’s nature it’s incontrovertible

@Sajuuk 7 місяців тому

The problem with labelling "prior belief" as dogmatic when discussing the possibility of life in the universe is that the universe is so large it could take centuries or millennia or longer before life is found...or not, depending on whether life is common...or not. The simple fact the universe is almost infinitely large practically guarantees life exists somewhere, even at the smallest possibility, even if millennia of exploration says otherwise. We just don't live long enough for "based on current evidence" to give us the facts or "truth" regarding this topic. Current evidence may never give us the truth, at any time in the future.

@edwardrivera4730 5 місяців тому

Not being certain one way or the other whether we are the only species examining the universe, I feel that it’s a shame that we devalue ourselves and gamble with our own survival so carelessly. If we ARE alone and we squander our chance to understand what we are a part of, the universe perhaps looses its only chance to know itself. I call this Fermi’s Wager.

@xBINARYGODx 7 місяців тому

"I want to believe." is a hell of a drug.

@n-steam 7 місяців тому

At some point, everyone should always honestly ask themselves "what would it take for me to change my opinion on this". Then you also need to be self-aware enough to realise that when that objective is acheived, that you shift your goalposts. If you're honest with yourself on these, at the very least you'll know whether your own opinion is biased and untrustworthy.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

Yes important self reflection. One reason I keep saying I’m agnostic is because I think when one publicly states an opinion there’s a psychological urge to appear self consistent and thus you keep reaffirming it without question. It’s a dangerous cycle. Stating agnosticism fights that spiral.

@OllamhDrab 7 місяців тому

Though having just gotten here it'll take more than a contrivance from a known fraudster and politicians I don't find paragons of honesty on some other subjects, as the thumbnail image goes for example. :) Some things even large social and political and economic forces want me to at least pretend to believe, about, say, cosmic religious stuff, well, I'm not going to trust people I know lie to my face about things more easilly verified, or say my own life, to have any deep insight or honest 'evidence' of what we *can't* verify, or that it would mean what they say if they tried presenting something as such. As for my opinion on *aliens,* well, to simplify that, I assume there's aliens somewhere. Whether or not they're *here getting semi-discovered and flying spaceships into things, * yaknow, I just don't believe a lot of claims. As for are people seeing what they think they're seeing or detecting or what it means, when it's pretty marginal, I'd at least need more data and such to even say 'Are we sure we're seeing physics we don't understand and how do you really verify physics you don't understand. :) '

@michaelburke750 7 місяців тому

One problem with the Ellipsoid… What is the association between the super nova and a signal received from a different source? Could be coincidence if the message content is indecipherable. If it IS decipherable, you don’t need the association with the super nova. Another problem is repeatability. If the signal doesn’t repeat, it’s ambiguous. If it does repeat and is indecipherable, well, it simply is most likely some natural phenomenon for which we have no explanation. If it is decipherable, again we have no need of the super nova.

@uktenatsila9168 7 місяців тому

Perfect. Stay the course. No need to have a riot over every scrap thrown our way. Thank you.

@Bow-to-the-absurd 7 місяців тому

Some dna proof would be nice. Or anything other than blurred pictures!

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

Maybe their ships are just very blurry

@rfjohns1 5 місяців тому

One way to convince people would be to have actual aliens and not obviously fake aliens

@rickythe2nd63 Місяць тому

💯😂

@bosstowndynamics5488 7 місяців тому

A set of terms used in the context of tests on humans might be useful in some of these discussions - sensitivity and specificity. Essentially, the sensitivity of a test is the chance of catching any given positive result, while the specificity is the chance that a positive result is correct (a highly sensitive test will catch all positive results but also usually incorrectly label some negative results as positive, a highly specific test will produce false positives very rarely but typically miss true positive results more often). Right now we have highly sensitive tests for aliens (the extremely broad category of potential technosignatures and biosignatures) and some highly specific follow up tests (explicitly proving that no natural phenomenon could account for the result), but no tests with a good balance that will exclude most false positives while still retaining the true positives.

@JamesDavenport 7 місяців тому

👏👏👏 I want everyone to think of signals to search for, and broaden the endeavor! I think there’s no bad ideas, if we can make computers do the work!

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

👍

@squintsyadams8463 7 місяців тому

Avi Loeb is awssome.

@Luitschez 7 місяців тому

🛸 My favorite topic: aliens! 👽

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

Space people!

@AndrewJohnson-oy8oj 2 місяці тому

"To ignore others' conclusions is to kind of tacitly adopt this narcissistic assumption that your reasoning abilities are superior to that of your peers" that is a quote that is going to live inside my mind for a long time rent-free.

@jamesholland5761 7 місяців тому

I'm always amazed how you can open my mind to the thought process that I haven't considered before! Great video! Thank you!

@tanishqgandas2633 7 місяців тому

they copied an article on aeon esaays website by jamie greene called "uncertain contact" it was released 4 days before this video and is obviously the same .

@deepquake9 7 місяців тому

My daddy taught me (I was 5) that “never believe anything you hear and only half of what you see’ I’ve learned to query most everything. Lol

@holmavik6756 7 місяців тому

Using statistical arguments in this case is highly questionable. Because we have only one observation it doesn’t matter if we take a Baysean or frequentistic approach

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

I think if we got our hands on a piece of technology that’s outrageously advanced it’s pretty much unambiguous that’s alien. Single data point can be plenty.

@lucofparis4819 7 місяців тому

Hum hum... ▪︎ A prior species of Earthlings who have developed advanced technology before their extinction. (Fairly plausible, given geological times and the extreme difficulty of finding traces of anything past a certain amount of time) ▪︎ Humans from the far future who finally invented some way to travel back in time, yet had some malfunction with their chronocraft. (Who might as well look like humanoid aliens to us) ▪︎ A secretive civilisation of humans who developed advanced technology ahead of the others and chose clandestine lifestyles. (The Atlantis legend and the likes, or Wakanda to reference a more recent work of fiction) Hence I don't think alien visitation would be the only reasonable hypothesis upon the discovery of a staggeringly advanced piece of technology on Earth.

@lucofparis4819 7 місяців тому

Addendum: what _would_ count as a convincing datum I think would be some analysis of its composition revealing ratios of isotopes that aren't found on our Solar System.

@holmavik6756 7 місяців тому

@@CoolWorldsLab but if we find such a piece of technology, which is unquestionably of extraterrestial origin, then we would have Two ”observations”.

@LongDongJohnson0705 4 місяці тому

Theres always a need for evidence to believe anything imo...but also to completely dismiss. Love when you said about being 'forcibly agnostic ".

@Mike-iv3hy 7 місяців тому

OK, Let's talk about Aliens. Back in the 1970s I was going to visit a friend at his house. It was just after dark and all the stars were out. We lived very close to the Ocean in Nova Scotia Canada. I was looking up at the sky, because it was a beautiful night in Oct. When I noticed a cigar shaped object move across the sky ! I was moving from south to North ! Before I could point at it and say LOOK, it had gone from one side of the horizon to off the other side ! it was glowing blue and made no sound, it must have been very big , because it looked small against the sky ! 10yr later the Russians showed a pic of the same ship, that got caught under a Russian satillite mapping the terrain of Mars ! It was shown on CBC news at 10 pm.( canadian Broadcasting Corporation) It was the same UFO I had seen 10 years ago. only it was in black and white ! I was astonished to see it again ! I expected it to be a once in a life time thing ! So, don't tell me UFO don't exist, and there are no such things, because, I have seen them with my OWN eyes !😮 on 2 occasions . But I suppose comming from someone who has NEVER seen one, It must be impossible to believe. BELIEVE bud, because they DO exist I call them the Watchers. They have no ill intent, they just want to watch us advance , in case we do become dangerous to them. Mike.😮

@SafeAndEffectiveTheySaid 7 місяців тому

I don't think such advanced technology would allow a spade ship crash right at our doors steeps neither I believe that silicon based technology is going to get us far enough into space

@christopherbillups7562 7 місяців тому

@CoolWorldsLab Thank you for talking about this honestly. As on of those who believe alien life has been here long before human civilization, I appreciate people in the scientific community being, at least, willing to discuss the topic. Thumbs up. Carry on.

@friskeysunset Місяць тому

Dr Kipping is great at the astrophysical wonders he presents to us, of course. But his segues into the philosophy of science itself that i get the most from, because it's so fundamental to the entire enterprise and it's constantly taking a beating from cranks.

@Aprylnators 7 місяців тому

I love that you went with the thumbnail I chose on Twitter & I felt this was an important video to put out, especially with so many posts & claims lately that offer little evidence & lot's of hype. I had been hoping you'd make a video like this! When I think about the limited resource issue, crowd sourced research like Planet Hunters comes to mind, although I did look into that & it was intimidating for me to jump into. It still seems like more programs like this could help further explore data we already have.

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

Thanks for the help!

@nias2631 7 місяців тому

@@Hippz118You can keep hoping the military will release the supposed information. If it were true that they had something you might be waiting a while. Or... NASA just gave two talks asking for citizen scientists to step up and help out with gathering data. They even gave examples of phenomena you can debunk yourself and help filter the data and improve your scientific ability in this endeavor. The US military is not omnipresent all over the world. So if they can find these events and document them so can an army of citizen scientists. It will just take some effort on your part, or maybe ask Bigelow Aerospace what they have.

@75YBA 7 місяців тому

Nobody is stopping Loeb from wasting his $. 😂😂😂

@christopherbillups7562 7 місяців тому

I think a perfect cartoon to describe this anomaly is a scientist looking through a telescope with an alien standing under the telescope and the human declaring that there is no alien life.

@KdotLINE 7 місяців тому

Sounds like you didn't listen to a single thing he said in this video.

@christopherbillups7562 7 місяців тому

More of a general thought. I thought he did a fantastic job of trying to be objective. A lot better than many others have done. I appreciate his effort.@@KdotLINE

@Tinil0 7 місяців тому

Sadly I've found that almost no one out there is ok with the idea of accepting that the "things you believe as strongly as you can possibly believe something" still don't have a 100% chance to be true. Everyone WANTS to know what the "answer" is to anything and everything and refuse to accept ambiguity or nuance.

@michaelryan2717 7 місяців тому

Totally expected a masterworks ad when I heard financial advice being mentioned

@michaelcarlin6049 7 місяців тому

Avi is an intelligent scientist whose views are unwelcome by many. I personally agree with his scientific approach to this topic. I praise him for his courage. I welcome his ideas and it's only a matter of time before his funding will increase. This is a new age of scientific research. We have the tools and the resources to approach this like intelligent beings. Thank you for mentioning Avi and thank you for real science that will only lead to discoveries we cannot even fathom.

@user-gf3lw5pi4t 7 місяців тому

He’s trying to boost his bank account !

@cptjockitch 7 місяців тому

Avi Loeb is a scammer. Im not sure why nobody says it. Just because he graduated from Harvard doesnt mean hes not a scammer.

@ChopperChad 7 місяців тому

He always trying to hype something up to sell a book.

@spindoctor6385 7 місяців тому

Yeah, how dare he put out alternative theories for others to debate and critique. That's not how science works.

@T.M.... 7 місяців тому

I agree. Everytime I read something promising, then I see his name. I instantly leave and keep scrolling because I know it's going to be full of BS.

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

@@ChopperChad - How do you earn money? does your need to eat mean you scam everybody through your work?

@mattpeacock5208 7 місяців тому

Sadly, a degree from Harvard doesn't mean that much any more

@tobyjessup6483 7 місяців тому

Build two SETI radio antennas at sufficient baseline distance that always observe as a synchronized pair. A comparison analysis can resolve any new “wow” signal origin.

@captindo 7 місяців тому

Long story short, keep an open mind, I fully agree.

@user-gf3lw5pi4t 7 місяців тому

Loeb is a Book huckster, not a scientist !

@JohnnyWednesday 7 місяців тому

"A Brief History of time" is a book isn't it... that you had to buy?

@user-gf3lw5pi4t 7 місяців тому

@@JohnnyWednesday ?

@emzywillrich7243 7 місяців тому

You obviously don't know much about him. When Ukrainian Astronomers said that Alien Spacecraft were monitoring their nuclear reactors, the U.S. government went to Prodessor Loeb to get his opinion. His books are extraordinary! Try reading one!!

@KazukoKodo 7 місяців тому

I've got to point out that just because you're agnostic about something, doesn't mean the probabilities are 50/50. That was just one throwaway comment in an otherwise great video, but that mindset is very dangerous in today's world where plenty of people are "just asking questions". That 50/50 mindset can easily lead you into confirmation bias and conspiracy theories.

@jesnoggle13 7 місяців тому

Insomnia and cool worlds. Perfect.

@Hazk1ant 7 місяців тому

As always many great points I agree with. And as always a couple things where I think otherwise. Thank you for sharing your pov.

@BloggerNate89 6 місяців тому

We question what is presented to us, which is a great factor in our thinking. What is "extraordinary evidence"? Simple, it is yourself. I recently discovered that if you go out of your way, and find the evidence yourself, it will actually work. Although in my case, it was many years of built up knowledge and mental preparation from what I'm perceiving and rationalize what I am looking at. I am skeptic in many ways, since it is a part of my nature. That way, I can filter out the truth, and I have finally stumbled upon interesting evidence because I went out of my way to do so. This is why many people are frustrated because they don't have "solid" evidence presented to them, when in reality, they haven't tried looking for it themselves.

@azdgariarada 7 місяців тому

Finally! Zero crash zooms! A highly enjoyable viewing experience. I'm curious, what sort of analysis could be done on the Mexican aliens to authenticate them, or do you think it would even be possible?

@CoolWorldsLab 7 місяців тому

I think it were still living or recently deceased it might be possible. I’m not sure something in this condition could be a tenable path to an unambiguous detection but not my expertise.

@GentleReader01 7 місяців тому

A chance to verify they’re not paper mache or anything like that would be a good start. A chain of custody would also be good, even though it’s of course not always possible. A chance to verify. That the people involved don’t have a history of fraud is also important - con artists can end up with the most important evidence of our time but probably haven’t. Testing specimens to destruction is obviously a bad idea with genuinely unique specimens. But things like analysis of their surfaces, X-rays and other internal scans - the kinds of things we do on unidentified corpses, fossils, etc. - should be possibilities. All of this is actually *ordinary* evidence, not extraordinary at all.

@SlickDangler10 7 місяців тому

I f'ing love this channel!

@royalminstrel 6 місяців тому

In essence, the first part of this video could boil down to people's opinion of the first instance of "extraordinary" in Sagan's quote. If you think aliens are commonplace and all around us, you don't think the claim is extraordinary and thus don't need extraordinary evidence. And vice versa.

@mandelbraught2728 7 місяців тому

I liked this video very much, of course I really like all of your videos. But I liked this one because, as opposed to Avi Loeb's approach , it takes Carl Sagan's admonition seriously but also takes the search seriously. I do feel like the stigma around the question has prevented this approach for many years. I guess it might not be feasible, but if SETI had multiple detectors far enough away from each other, would that give enough of a baseline to show that the signal was not coming from nearby? I also feel like the expansion into looking for evidence in ways other than direct signaling seems more likely to bear fruit and I'm *very* glad that SETI is also considering this. I think ML searches for anomalous patterns in stars, or galaxies would at least address the question of so-called Type II or III civilizations and could be unambiguous

@scubasteve2169 6 місяців тому

Sagan said claims require extraordinary evidence, he didn't say not to investigate questions. If you make a claim, have the evidence to back it, but if you have a question, then yes, absolutely,look into it. As long as you're not claiming it's true based on sketchy evidence.

@perkytxgirl 23 дні тому

It wasn't a surprise that exoplanets exist but it still required rigorous scientific evidence and multiple confirmation methods.

@AlgorithmicPain 7 місяців тому

I love this channel.

@keep_walking_on_grass 6 місяців тому

When it comes to the questions of the origin of life, whether there is life anywhere else but here, and what is the origin of the universe, there are only 2 statements that tell you, that the scientist is telling you undeniable facts: "I don't know" and "We don't know".

@cpti8736 7 місяців тому

I find fascinating that entities already alive in the universe, living in a biosphere populated with millions of different living species, are still looking for evidences that life can exist in our universe...

@DaveTexas 7 місяців тому

There seem to be two separate parts to this argument. One is about scientists quibbling over details, such as what atmospheric composition on an exoplanet is sufficient to make the case for life being present there. To me this isn’t what Carl Sagan was talking about in his "extraordinary evidence" statement. A reasonable argument based on careful scientific analysis by those who the foremost experts in the field isn’t what I’d call an "extraordinary claim." It’s still a claim, but not one that requires one to abandon all prior beliefs in order to accept. Carl Sagan seemed to be addressing the claims of those who see something in the sky and immediately jump to the conclusion that it’s an alien spacecraft. When someone lacks education in an area, doesn’t look for alternative explanations, or simply doesn’t produce any evidence whatsoever, then you have an "extraordinary claim." It’s like the person who is diagnosed with cancer, goes to a major oncology treatment facility, receives state-of-the-art treatment, is cured, and then claims that their god of choice performed a miracle and saved them. They’ve kept to a conclusion without bothering to take any other possibilities into consideration. Note that I’m only talking about Sagan’s statement here, not about the need to investigate reasonable claims, no matter how unlikely they seem. We do need to find more ways to research a diverse range of ideas/possibilities/claims. They need to be claims that aren’t just someone jumping to an uneducated conclusion, though.

@jeffmckinnon5842 2 місяці тому

We know about the Earth only, but it is a pretty good indicator that all sorts of things can happen, and have happened here, more than once. I would ask those who believe we are "unique" to the universe, "To which time frame, are they referring?" The Earth shows us that life wants to happen, in as many ways as we seem to be able to imagine. It found what it needed here, regardless of our beliefs. There is no reason to think that other worlds, with similar conditions, would not yield similar results.

@rickybobby5153 9 днів тому

Name one other species on this planet that has achieved anything even remotely comparable to us and there’s your answer

@Justin-pb8sx 7 місяців тому

11:25 I hear your skepticism😀

@bigjermboktown6976 7 місяців тому

I will be buying one of those hoodies! That is nice!

@emzywillrich7243 7 місяців тому

Me too!

@shawnz5272 7 місяців тому

The way life came about on our planet and then the series of impossibly lucky events that led to humanity seems like a fluke. In a seemingly endless universe it is statistically impossible that life didn't arise elsewhere in the universe. In my opinion life is all over the universe but we will probably never discover it because of the vast distances.