How humanity came THIS |..| close to extinction

[TFOGGER]

Heck, if natural space junk isn't enough to do the job, maybe this will...


http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/10...e_comes_rosat/

[Ridge]

Nah, ROSAT is like a quarter the size of the one that came down a few weeks ago.

And that one either hit nothing, or there were no survivors. Not sure yet.

[Hoosier]

I can't use terms of certainty to say ET is out there. But if we're all alone, it seems like a mighty big waste of space.

Anyway, what I came here to post was this:

www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=drake+equation

It's Wolfram Alpha displaying the Drake Equation. Note that you can adjust any of the values, so you can change values and see in real time how it affects the result.

H.

[TFOGGER]

Nah, ROSAT is like a quarter the size of the one that came down a few weeks ago.

And that one either hit nothing, or there were no survivors. Not sure yet.

The media reported initially that that one splashed down in the Pacific, then they said it might have impacted in Canada. It's a little concerning that after all the hooplah, nobody seems to know where 6 tons of metal came to rest...

[Ronin13]

More recently there were two instances where humanity was almost brought to complete annihilation: Cuban Missile Crisis, and the launch of a US satellite in 1986 that showed up on USSR Missile Defense radar.

[Ridge]

The media reported initially that that one splashed down in the Pacific, then they said it might have impacted in Canada. It's a little concerning that after all the hooplah, nobody seems to know where 6 tons of metal came to rest...

[Not_A_Llama]

I'm sure there are numerous instances of near death experiences as well as planet destruction throughout history. I really do believe it's miraculous that nothing happened.

I'd suggest that perspective is backwards: If anything had happened, we wouldn't be here discussing it.

Also why I disagree with the notion of only looking for life on planets meeting criteria like Earth.

[Byte Stryke]

I'd suggest that perspective is backwards: If anything had happened, we wouldn't be here discussing it.

Also why I disagree with the notion of only looking for life on planets meeting criteria like Earth.

and if anything had happened it wouldn't have mattered anyways because no one would have been able to do anything about it anyways.

[Ronin13]

and if anything had happened it wouldn't have mattered anyways because no one would have been able to do anything about it anyways.

Hence why it doesn't bother me... impact event, alien death ray blowing up Earth (ala Death Star style), etc. It'll happen fast, I won't know until it's too late, nothing you can do, best to enjoy this life while it lasts... By the way, life is not short, it's the longest thing you'll ever do.