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Dawn, that is a fascinating belief - thanks for sharing. I've never heard that idea before. And you're right, I've been scarce on yim lately... and I'm afraid I'm still gonna be scarce for awhile. But we'll catch up soon, yes we will.

Thanks, everyone!!

I find it really cool that out of all the votes, no one has voted a flat no.

I voted that we can't know for now. So far, we have no evidence that suggests that. So far, if we're looking for life like us or like we have on earth, we're finding that the right conditions are mind-numbingly rare.

Do I think the possibility exists? I guess, but so far, nothing.

I know what belief you're talking about Dawn, and I would say that I agree with you, probably.

I think what people have called interactions with aliens are actually probably interactions with demons, since we have no empirical evidence to suggest actual alien lifeform contact. (At least none that the government is sharing with us. )

Either that, or they're psychologically disturbed. Or they have had some kind of unexplained interaction with some unknown form of life.



I simply can't know for sure.

Do you think, then, Dawn, that when the rapture occurs, people will chalk it up to a massive alien abduction? I've read that theory, too.

I, personally, think alien life would be kind of cool, if they weren't, you know, heck-bent on eating us or something. It would be interesting to see what else God had created and how their society developed.


Lali

Dear me. Get thee behind me, temptation!!!

I shall refrain.

Behave. These are some of the theories circulating out there. I'm not saying I necessarily believe them. I might, I might not. Like the question of the existence of aliens, I can't know for sure what is actually going on in these "alien abductions," and I can't know for sure how the endtimes will go. We're just trying to frame explanations from a Christian perspective.

If aliens don't exist, then what explains alien abductions?

We believe in demons, so could these "aliens" actually be demons?

If the rapture occurs and millions of people suddenly disappear, how will those left explain it?

Could the current widespread acceptance of the possibility of alien life and the increase in purported alien abductions/interactions somehow play into that explanation?

If aliens do exist, what does that mean to a Christian?

Those are the kinds of questions that I ask myself.


Lali

LalaithUrwen wrote:

I think what people have called interactions with aliens are actually probably interactions with demons, since we have no empirical evidence to suggest actual alien lifeform contact. (At least none that the government is sharing with us. )

Not to labour the obvious, but we don't exactly have empirical evidence of Demons either.

Oh, yeah, I know. Thought of that already.

That's why I said, from a "Christian perspective." Christians should already believe in demons, since they are part of the Christian belief system. (See: the Bible. )

Unless Christians don't believe in demons. If not, why not? Why believe in God, Jesus, and angels and choose not to believe in demons or Satan?

In any case, that's also why I said we simply can't know for sure either way.


Lali

We know about inner demons, like wanting to murder people and so on.
People who do drugs (succumbing to temptation, inner demon) might have experiences that they later attribute to alien encounters. Therefore, they have had a demonic encounter, that is disguised as an alien one.

I think it makes sense... I think...

Well shoot! I should have combined my two poll threads into one: aliens and demons. I'm really enjoying your views on this, Lali and Dawn.

Back in the day when I considered myself a very fundamentalist Christian, I often wondered what the possibilities would be if a whole new alien race were discovered. What would the implications be? Would Jesus have died for their sins as well? Or perhaps they would simply be animals because they were un-human and therefore without souls.

But if these non-human congnizants were part of God's plan of salvation through Christ, that would raise the question whether or not "Earth Christians" were called to evangalize to them. Lord knows in any case it would happen. Or did God send Himself as a savior to them in a different form on THEIR Earth? Think Aslan in Narnia. Or maybe they were still an unfallen race - which would be cool.

I remember my church teaching that there were likely other unfallen peoples strewn about the universe. I think that supposedly they would watch us and cry.

In Robert Asprin's "Myth" series people from other dimensions are called "demons", short for "dimensional traveler".

It's a light comedy/fantasy sort of series, an old favorite. It puts a whole new perspective on the "demon" issue, though, when the main characters move to another dimension and the locals react in terror and scream "Demons!" and run, because the main characters are really quite nice people doing good deeds.

Well, I do not believe in demons, I do not believe in angels. I also do not believe in alien abductions. People can convince themselves of all sorts of things that do not exist.

I believe that there is a strong likelihood of other life elsewhere in the universe, but contact with them at least on our end is extremely unlikely at this time, unless perchance we find microbes on Mars or something along those lines.

But, think of the odds of an intelligent alien species being able to survive on Earth, even if they were to share even remotely similar DNA - the microbes and chemicals in our air, water and soil would probably be quite dangerous to such beings, given that humans cannot even travel from place to place on our planet without facing all sorts of problems dealing with local waters, insect life, etc.

Then, look at what we know about Earth itself which makes it conducive to life as we know it - a stable orbit well within the temperate zone for water to be in liquid form, a large moon that steadies otherwise planetary wobbles that throw stable climates out the window, a natural electromagnetic shield that protects earth from dangerous solar radiation due to the planet's iron core, etc...

While life may exist many other places in the universe, I do not think that intelligent life is anywhere NEAR as common, and that the distances involved and our current understanding of the limitations of Physics make contact a VERY remote possibility currently.

And I think we know a lot less than we think we do.

Quote:

The Top 12 Theories Developed by Carl Sagan While Stoned




The period of rotation of Pulsar JC9270 totally synchs up with the drum solo in In A Gadda Da Vida, man!

"Twinkies, Twinkies, little stars; seem so close, yet are so far."

The Theory of Munchitivity: At times, peanut butter is more valuable than gold.

The sensor casing from a mass spectrometer makes a handy roach clip.

"Some day, with all of our advances in science and technology, we'll be able to land a man on the sun."

The Big Bong Theory

If you took a hit while travelling at the speed of light, you'd get one major rush, dude.

Betty Crocker brownies > Duncan Hines brownies

"Theory of Joint Relativity": A complex quantum physics equation that proves that the more pot you smoke, the slower your automobile travels with you at the wheel.

Floyd rocks!

A single "You Are Here" sign will work EVERYwhere.

and the Number 1 Theory Developed by Carl Sagan While Stoned...


Wow, man! There are, like, a LOT of stars. There must be *hundreds* of 'em. Maybe even *thousands*. No... millions and millions! Wait -- I'm onto something here...

An interesting article....
http://www.astronomybuff.com/it-will-ta ... or-aliens/

Opens can of worms.

your welcome.

Anywho....

What if way back in the day, aliens landed and tried to communicate with humans, and the humans were afraid by what they saw. Not that the aliens were mean, but more advanced and not understandable by the human race at that time. Knowing the human mind as it works, we tend to make things we don't understand evil or bad. So...maybe the aliens were aliens that were labeled demons because we humans had no firm understanding of what they were at the time and we were afraid.

One has to wonder because of all the stuff out there on earth. How did the lines in Peru get done, the people of the time did not have airplanes and could not possibly see what they were drawing (sort of hard to draw something without seeing it).

Anyway there's that can of worms.

Have a great day.

Does God count as an Alien?



If so, then yes.

Otherwise, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, no I do not believe in aliens. Though I would like to. There's a certain level of fantasy to believing in aliens, to believe there's other creatures on other planets. Its something fun to think about, the inspiration behind so many amazing novels and films. But no, I don't believe in aliens any more than I believe in hobbits.

I think the issue is with the word "believe".

I believe alien life is possible. I don't "believe" as in "accept with absolutely no empirical evidence that even the meanest intelligence would accept" in "aliens" as they are commonly known hereabouts.

As for demons, I have to stay out of that discussion as I have no wish to upset or annoy or insult anyone here.

But there was a very good story written about a priest who got to a planet where there was no concept of God and never had been and he decided that it must, therefore, be a construct of Satan's, and he exorcised it and it vanished.

But then, that was only a sorta well-written story.

In order to make an educated guess on the subject, you need to know something about how frequently life emerges and how long it usually lasts once it does. We don't have enough data to even ballpark either one, so we can't really do anything but imagine and speculate.

Let's not forget that an alien life-form may not require the same ecosphere as us. Plants, for example, inhale carbon dioxide and exhale oxygen. Fish filter oxygen from the water that they take in.

An alien life form will have adapted and evloved to fit into life on it's planet, so maw not require an earth like planet at all.

So yes, I believe in the possibility of aliens.

vison wrote:

I think the issue is with the word "believe".

I believe alien life is possible. I don't "believe" as in "accept with absolutely no empirical evidence that even the meanest intelligence would accept" in "aliens" as they are commonly known hereabouts.

As for demons, I have to stay out of that discussion as I have no wish to upset or annoy or insult anyone here.

But there was a very good story written about a priest who got to a planet where there was no concept of God and never had been and he decided that it must, therefore, be a construct of Satan's, and he exorcised it and it vanished.

But then, that was only a sorta well-written story.

The priest, or the planet? :D

The planet!!!

I thought this story had been written by Clifford Simak, but apparently not.