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> And why not? Occam's razor. Until now zero ET have been found, thus it has the same likelihood as being Santa Claus.

jstummbillig 7y ago
That must be technically incorrect, because the theoretical amount of ETs is infinitely bigger than the theoretical amount of Santa Clauses (which his capped at 1) :^)
- adrianmonk 7y ago
  On the other hand, our best available information is that Santa Claus has a surprising ability to appear in many locations within a short period of time (at least on one night per year). Also, these are red and Santa Claus is red.
  - imiric 7y ago
    > Also, these are red and Santa Claus is red. Rudolph's nose, most likely.
    - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
      Yes, when Rudolph turns away from us the light goes out, and when he turns toward us, the light abruptly appears.
- rumanator 7y ago
  > because the theoretical amount of ETs You're referring to a theoretical model which is not backed up by any empirical proof other than the fact that there is life on Earth. Thus the model is yet to be validated, thus as far as we know it outputs nonsense. Until then we only have empirical proof, and so far the count of proven alien contact is zero.
robbrown451 7y ago
I don't think that's how probability works. There are lots of things that are hypothesized, and later found to exist (sometimes after explicitly searching, sometimes not). Comparing to Santa Claus without taking into account things like laws of physics/magic/supernatural doesn't make a lot of sense. Also, "zero ET" have been found because, although we are speaking of life, you have explicitly defined it as excluding the one example of life we know about, that on Earth. That seems a bit unfair. Given that we know of one example, hypothesizing another example isn't that extreme.
- rumanator 7y ago
  > I don't think that's how probability works. It actually is. Currently the empirical distribution for the likelihood of ET sightings stands as a big ass step function that reaches 100% at zero sightings. It's exactly equal to the likelihood of seeing santa. There is no way around it. > Comparing to Santa Claus without taking into account things like laws of physics/magic/supernatural Your assertion is simply wrong. So far the odds you come across an ET is a big fat zero. That's because in reality zero ETs have been confirmed to exists. There is no way around it. You may argue that there might be theoretical models that suggest X or Y but reality does not lie and ETs are as frequent as flying spaghetti monsters and santa claus, thus it makes as much sense to pin the blame on santa claus and the flying spaghetti monsters as ETs.

That must be technically incorrect, because the theoretical amount of ETs is infinitely bigger than the theoretical amount of Santa Clauses (which his capped at 1) :^)

adrianmonk 7y ago
On the other hand, our best available information is that Santa Claus has a surprising ability to appear in many locations within a short period of time (at least on one night per year). Also, these are red and Santa Claus is red.
- imiric 7y ago
  > Also, these are red and Santa Claus is red. Rudolph's nose, most likely.
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    Yes, when Rudolph turns away from us the light goes out, and when he turns toward us, the light abruptly appears.
rumanator 7y ago
> because the theoretical amount of ETs You're referring to a theoretical model which is not backed up by any empirical proof other than the fact that there is life on Earth. Thus the model is yet to be validated, thus as far as we know it outputs nonsense. Until then we only have empirical proof, and so far the count of proven alien contact is zero.

robbrown451 7y ago

I don't think that's how probability works. There are lots of things that are hypothesized, and later found to exist (sometimes after explicitly searching, sometimes not). Comparing to Santa Claus without taking into account things like laws of physics/magic/supernatural doesn't make a lot of sense. Also, "zero ET" have been found because, although we are speaking of life, you have explicitly defined it as excluding the one example of life we know about, that on Earth. That seems a bit unfair. Given that we know of one example, hypothesizing another example isn't that extreme.

rumanator 7y ago
> I don't think that's how probability works. It actually is. Currently the empirical distribution for the likelihood of ET sightings stands as a big ass step function that reaches 100% at zero sightings. It's exactly equal to the likelihood of seeing santa. There is no way around it. > Comparing to Santa Claus without taking into account things like laws of physics/magic/supernatural Your assertion is simply wrong. So far the odds you come across an ET is a big fat zero. That's because in reality zero ETs have been confirmed to exists. There is no way around it. You may argue that there might be theoretical models that suggest X or Y but reality does not lie and ETs are as frequent as flying spaghetti monsters and santa claus, thus it makes as much sense to pin the blame on santa claus and the flying spaghetti monsters as ETs.