Re: SETI sci.astro.seti newsgroup created

Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Mon, 01 Nov 1999 13:48:09 -0600

hal@finney.org wrote:
>
> I don't see how you avoid this slippery slope once you assent to the
> view that ETs are among us. Is there anyone here who denies the truth
> of biblical miracles yet maintains that there is a real probability that
> extraterrestrial intelligences are monitoring us right here and now?
> How can you reconcile these views?

Considering the sheer oddness of the Fermi Paradox, I'd say that any theory with a self-consistent, cognitively plausible, and evidence-consistent account of how the aliens *are* here deserves serious consideration. And I should think that most believers in the Judeo-Christian tradition would regard the suggestion that *any* miracle was produced by mortal-level aliens as being blasphemy.

This is like attacking quantum physics on the grounds that one or two New Agers have tried to use it to rationalize Buddhism. 

-- 
           sentience@pobox.com          Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
        http://pobox.com/~sentience/tmol-faq/meaningoflife.html
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