Timothy Birdnow

The problem with this is that the study's authors do not have a definition of consciousness and think it merely a biproduct of material order. This certainly flies in the face of Christian religious beliefs that consciousness is a thing tied to an immaterial soul.

We know from near death experiences (NDE's) that people experience out of body episodes where their consciousness has varying degrees of interactions with the world and with other places. That strongly suggests consciousness is NOT a biproduct of a vastly complex brain but rather that the vastly complex brain is a biproduct of a far more complex soul. By putting the cart before the horse these researchers are simply speculating wildly.

These researchers simply ignore NDE's and they do so out of fear they will lose their street creds as scientists. But NDE's are ubiquitous, universal, and cannot be ignored as phenomenon. If these researchers were truly honest brokers and wanted to take an honest look at consciousness they would take this into account. NDE's are absolutely about consciousness even if you do not believe they are evidence of life after death. Many NDE folks have heard and seen things that they should not have in their condition and placement in hospitals or whatnot.

The authors of this study appeal to a rather tired principle - the Copernican Principle. Once we realized the Earth revolved around the sun and not the other way around science became absolutely determined to show we had no special place whatsoever. Yes, physically we do not; our planet is a rather minor one in a vast universe, and we are out in the mid-latitude of our galaxy, a typical helical spire type. But that does not change some fundamental facts.

As far as we can tell there is no life in the solar system except here. There may be microbes elsewhere, or even floating critters in the gas giants, but nothing conscious. And we have the Fermi Paradox; there is no credible evidence of life around other stars, especially intelligent life. WE are actively trying to contact anyone out there with no luck. IF there were intelligent life out there we should pick up a radio transmission, or find a candy bar wrapper or Big Mac box somewhere on Earth that a careless visitor dropped. We have yet to find any such things.

And the Copernican Principle is crap anyway. Earth is quite unique.

First, nine out of every ten stars are red dwarfs, which are largely unsuited to life as we know it. They have very strong solar winds which strip atmospheres from terrestrial type planets. Those planets would have to be very close to such stars and so would be airless. And most are flare suns, meaning high levels of radiation would scour life from their surfaces. Maybe some life could live underground but it's doubtful you'd find intelligence there.

Second, the Earth's sun is very stable as stars go, being a .4 variable, meaning it very rarely misbehaves. That is very rare.

Third, from what we know about exoplanetary systems, most stars have "hot Jupiters" in close orbits. This gobbles up a lot of terrestrial matter and it also makes the host star flare a lot. And what ends up happening is "super Earth's form in the sweet spot where temperatures are right and Earth-sized planets tend to form too far out. They are iceball planets. Granted, it's possible life could form on a superEarth but it would be quite squat and low to the ground. It seems less likely life would flourish on such a world - and it seems likely the high gravity would mean a much denser atmosphere, a Venusian type atmosphere.

Then too the Earth has a full planet orbiting her. The Moon stabilizes the Earth;'s axial tilt. Without it our planet would suffer ferocious winds and any life would have to be in the seas or low to the ground. It is doubtful sea life would develop high technology; they ca't use fire in the depths. And it would be hard to make fire with hurricane winds blowing. Fire is the most fundamental tool humanity has and ever has had.

The moon also gives us tides which help mix the oceans. Without tides we likely would see huge algae blooms that would choke out much of the life. And it gives us light at night.

Except for the dwarf planets of Pluto and Charon the Earth's moon is wholly unique in our solar system and as far as we know in the galaxy in general.

Our position in the galaxy is unique too; we are far enough out to not be cooked by radiation but well protected by the galactic magnetic field.

So we are not a "garden variety" world as my old astronomy textbook claimed. We have many unique attributes that made life - and intelligence - possible.

And we've never found any evidence of aliens. It may be they communicate in a different way - say, using gravity waves. But we've watched for such things and have not found anything to suggest they are. Certainly they aren't broadcasting anything on the radio bands. There should be a top forty station on, say, Tau Ceti that we should pick up. We don't. They would pick up OUR broadcasts though.

Me, I suspect consciousness transcends our human bodies, which are a reflection of our consciousness as opposed to the creator of it, and I further think if there IS alien life out there it is either just simple organisms, mindless, or if they are intelligent they are, like us, the children of God, made in God's image as are we.

So, did Jesus visit them and offer them salvation too? Or are they in need of Christ?

Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle wrote Footfall and delved into this question. In the end the aliens were in need of Christ's salvation same as we, and their attempt to conquer us was God's providence to offer that salvation to them. They lost the war when they decided to replace God with themselves on the theory that we lacked someone to lead us and invented a fiction of such a leader. One of the aliens asked "are you sure this God of which they speak is a fiction?" and the other one said "He must be or He would not tolerate our attacking His people". In the end He did not.

The aliens were seen as a punishment on Mankind.

At any rate I am of the opinion that this study simply fails because it makes assumptions which are not provable and which are probably wrong. Not that alien intelligence is impossible, and especially not that life is impossible in other forms, but that consciousness is something defined by the brain or some other thinking structure. That is the real hubris of our modern era, and it is the true violation of the Copernican Principle.

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