> "Not likely" means you never know.  After all, magic space aliens 
> could show
> up and tell us how.  The probabilility of that happening would be 
> 0.000(lots
> of zeros)0001%.  See, not 0%.

The following is, obviously, flippant, but far from pointless (IMHO 
:-) ).


Fermi (THE Fermi) said essentially "Where are they?

IF there are magic space aliens they are well well well overdue.
If there is life anywhere else it should be essentially everywhere 
else and it should have visited us here and on a regular basis.

One conclusion is that we are it or a product of it.
Another is that there are no magic space aliens.

However, if there are, then they could be here anytime soon and, 
unless there are significant factors which we are unaware of  (which 
is certain to be the case) then they will be. Anytime soon is probably 
usefully measured in units of millions of years or thereabouts. Where 
something is usefully measured in units of a certain size, attempting 
to specify events etc in very small subdivisions of the useful unit 
usually doesn't make much sense. eg "Could I have two pieces of fish 
and $2.379845467 worth of chips please."

So [ :-) ]

Odds are the chances of magic space aliens arriving is in the range of 
0.1 to 1, in this current million year quantum.

If less than that, just increase the quantum unit by a factor of 100 
and reiterate.

If a quantum unit greater than the age of the universe is reached, 
conclude that there are NO magic space aliens.

God knows what the real answer is.



        Russell 

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