a FAILED mathematical approach into the search for the E.T.

Are we alone?

Scientists have been searching for another form of intelligent life for decades now. We have searched and have failed, we have the evidence and yet do not understand what they are.
Numerous Physicists, Astronomers, Conspiracy theorists and even common man ( :p ) have spent most or a significant time of their lives looking into the big blue sky and asking the question, “Am I alone?”
This sounds highly unlikely that we are the ONLY intelligent form of life in this huge universe.
I don’t care if the probability of any life in this universe, other than us, is $\rightarrow 0$, until and unless it is not $0$, I want to keep looking.
There have been so many things, let us take the Nazka lines of Peru. There are usually called Geoglyphs. These took a lot of time to come in light, Pedro Cieza de León mistook them as trail marks; some people mistook them as irrigation lines.
It was not until the days of flights and aeroplanes, when people saw these clearly; that is when they understood that these were not trail marks or anything. These were signs and drawings.
The one I like the most is as follows:



Now, what I ask is,
- How did they make these?
- Who did they make these for?
Unfortunately, these answers are not yet answered.

Some archeologists and geologists studied these lines and the results are shocking. These are not just lines with some nonsensical scribbling; these are made to last for a long time. Let alone the design; the methodology of design is scientific too. An excerpt from wikipedia is says the following,

On the ground, most of the lines are formed by a shallow trench with a
depth between 10 and 15 cm (4 and 6 in). Such trenches were made by
removing the reddish-brown iron oxide-coated pebbles that cover the
surface of the Nazca Desert. When this gravel is removed, the
light-colored clay earth which is exposed in the bottom of the trench
produces lines which contrast sharply in color and tone with the
surrounding land surface. This sublayer contains high amounts of lime
which, with the morning mist, hardens to form a protective layer that
shields the lines from winds, thereby preventing erosion.

Are these just drawings after all?
These are maps, some theorists say. Don’t believe them? have a look at the image below.




One of my favorite conspiracy theory is by Erich von Däniken, it is called the Cargo Cult

Erich von Däniken’s theory is the most famous approach to solve the
mystery of Nazca. He had the idea that long time ago visitors from
other stars visited the earth and naturally Nazca. At this place they
landed, during the landing stones was blown away by the power of
rocket propulsion. By approaching more the power was increasing and
the cleaned band broader. In this way the first trapezes emerged.
Later the Aliens disappeared and left confused people. Like in the
modern cargo cults they tried to call the Gods back by drawing lines,
figures and trapezes. Never Däniken said the formations was made by
Aliens. He discovered the GGF/Mandala/Zodiac and the mirror -
Formation and compares them with modern VASIS or PAPI-Signs.

To read more please visit : Conspiracy theories of Nazca Lines.

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Mathematics:

There is a mathematical formula by American Astronomer and Astrophysicist Frank Drake [3]. He is hugely regarded as the father of modern SETI(Search for extraterrestrial intelligence).
The criticism related to Drake’s equation is not about the correctness of the equation itself, but about the highly ambiguous estimations of the various variable used in the equation.
The equation is as follows,
$$N = R^* \times f_p \times n_e \times f_l \times f_i \times f_c \times L$$
Here,
$N$ = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible (i.e. which are on our current past light cone);
$R*$ = the average rate of star formation in our galaxy
$f_p$ = the fraction of those stars that have planets
$n_e$ = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets
$f_l$ = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point
$f_i$ = the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life (civilizations)
$f_c$ = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space
$L$ = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space

For people wondering what is a light cone, here is a picture. This is
a gloried way of looking into the dynamics of time.


In special and general relativity, a light cone is the path that a flash of light, emanating from a single event (localized to a single point in space and a single moment in time) and traveling in all directions, would take through spacetime

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Criticism:

1. One major setback of this equation is that it takes no account of the cosmological developmental phases and time, the value of $N$ would heavily rely on the speed of cosmological development[1].
2. There is no derivation or methodology of how this equation came into being; which suggests that it is just a stab in the dark.
3. The factor $n_e$ determines habitability; how in the fuck’s world do you find that? Oxygen and Water makes Earth habitable for humans; and probably in some planet $\mathcal{X}$, Nitrogen and Alcohol makes it habitable [2].

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Here is a beautiful image about Drake’s equation,

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Conclusion:

1. This is a very badly written equation; not because it is wrong. But, because it has no methodology involved. Looks like couple of fresh college graduates wrote this while having some really potent weed.
   2.Drake’s equation is therefore a Fermi Paradox.

The Fermi paradox or Fermi’s paradox, named after physicist Enrico
Fermi, is the apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence and
high probability estimates, e.g., those given by the Drake equation,
for the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations.

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An interesting coming from xkcd[3], it added another term $B_6$ which is the amount of bull shit you are gonna buy from the the drake equation.

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Cheers!