Okay. My 2 cents on alien life forms in general.

Anyone who expects that an alien intelligent species will have bipedal locomotion, centrilised neuron cortex, vocal cords, the same as human VIS spectrum, similar bone structure and body dimorphism and the list goes on - doesn't know jack'poo about evolution.

Food for thought: http://www.thecephalopodpage.org/cephschool/ColorChangeInCephalopods.pdf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cephalopod_intelligence#Tool_use So yeah.

However, Evolution is a theory. Therefore it may or may not be true.

Edit: I'm not saying I don't believe in Evolution or anything, I'm just saying who really knows.

true but who's to say that humans originated here on Earth? I won't get into a lengthy discussion citing sources and whatnot but in a nutshell I believe the religious stories of "being created in gods image" and our accelerated evolution all tie into a form of "human" ancient astronauts visiting earth long ago, finding a species with a similar makeup (apes) and doing experiments on them.

As for this story, i'm still skeptical that this is real and i'm leaning towards hoax or inaccurate facts...it's most likely fake or a fetus

This is either a hoax or shrunken down human remains.

The reason that there was never a creature alive of that size and appearance is because the human form has evolved to fit our dimensions.

A much smaller (or bigger) humanesque body simply doesnt function very well.

Take for instance the difference between surface and volume. Say something becomes twice as tall. That means that its new surface is its old one squared, but its volume is cubed.

You get tremendous problems with heat loss, (or retention, depending if you go bigger or smaller) the heart will either pump blood too slow to sustain life or it will explode trying to beat too fast. There are myriad problems that emerge trying to scale a biological form up or down, which is why you dont see it done in nature.

All dolphins are of a particular size range, as are all beetles. Beetles used to be bigger a long time ago, but there was more oxygen in the atmosphere then, which supported a bigger form.

All humans are of a particular size range as well. In our own species we see the health problems that come from giantism or dwarfism and that is, comparetively, not even such a huge size difference.

I'm afraid all sf stories of humans being shrunk to travel inside someone elses body or 50ft women are total and utter bunk.

And this, whatever it is, was never alive in the form as displayed in that photograph.

I believe we've talked about convergent evolution and evolutionary parochials before?

We can most certainly expect certain things about hypothetical alien life forms, such as two eyes at the front of the body near the mouth, an internal or external (or both) support structure, even vocal cords should be recognisable. They will likely display dimorphism, trimorphism or modular structure.

Edit: This new quote system is infuriating!

For the life of me I cant get the name of the person I'm quoting to appear. Ill edit it in manually ><.

.......... Okay. That's stupid.

Human knowledge in general is based on 3 assertions.

1) This Universe is real.

2) We can prove that what we observe in this universe is true

3) Our method works.

Those are the three only guesses in our knowledge. You can't prove them.

That's philosophy 101.

Theory is by the definition of American Association for the Advancement of Science: "a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on a body of facts that have been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experiment. Such fact-supported theories are not "guesses" but reliable accounts of the real world."

Gravity is a theory, Metabolism is a theory, sixual dimorphism is a theory, Duality of light is a theory. You see where I am going here? By your logic, everything that was based on a theory. From computers, microwaves, fridges to basic school education and me typing this comment may or may not be true, and we got lucky every time.

Science knows. We have proven natural selection by devolving corn by deliberately preserving the worst parts of a crop.

we're one of the most evolved species on our planet and still walk on 2 legs with no reason to stop walking yet...what makes you so sure that any being capable of interstellar travel wouldn't walk?

Aliens are actually tacos that crap ice cream..... I dont know how South Park got that kind of inside information because their depiction was dead on.

Depends on a lot of things, like the gravity of the planet they are from. If it is a high gravity environment then they might move like a slug to prevent breaking bones when falling.

Still, until we see an alien species and observe how things happen on their planet, much of what we know could or could not make more sense.

What would we say if we found some very human like aliens on some other planet?

As humans we just work on the principles we believe we know until something else proves them wrong, or just expands upon a concept.

Just take gravity for instance. What if some additional force was at work there too, but our current understanding of physics doesn't let us see it or whatever. But 100 years from now scientists figure it out, and consider us fools for believing in what gravity is now.

Thank you.

We do get into a lot of trouble because the common usage definition of 'theory' has changed slightly in the past 200 years, dont we?

As opposed to the scientific definition, which hasnt.

When something is called a theory in science, it means "according to our current knowledge, this is how it works".

It may not have all the correct details, but the principle has been proven.

It was a freakish accident that we are bipedal. It has nothing to do with our brain getting bigger, and more complex. I am not saying that it's not possible, but seeing how it has little to do with brain complexity it's unlikely. Penguins are bipedal and they are dumb as hell (compared to us). Crows on the other hand have the same basic bone structure as later Carnivorous dinosaurs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGPGknpq3e0

One of the most compelling explanation of our bipedality is that our ancestor where squatting gatherers like modern day chimpanzees . This lead to deformity in spines (from natural selection - those with a deformity of feet and spine that could squat longer , would survive and reproduce more frequently). This selected a group with a more S like looking spine and flat feet that lead to our bipedal frontal movement.

Opposite thumbs and the invention of cooking get us, where we are now.

That's a fallacy.http://chem.tufts.edu/answersinscience/relativityofwrong.htm

By that logic you're saying everything is wrong because it might be proven wrong/theory changed in the future.

You could technically think like that, but denying anything is true on that basis isn't going to be taken seriously by any scientists who base their research on observed phenomena as opposed to just thinking "This must be wrong because it's a theory"

Furthermore, based on our scientific methods, the chances of something being so flat out wrong we are considered as big a fools as the guy who said apples fall when they want to is virtually zero. The theories might be expanded on or amended, but they aren't going to be thrown out.

Ancient Aliens is a cool show.

Also, anyone who finds crop circles intriguing may want to check this out....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMgtdcX6S4c

May seem far fetched to some but I find it fascinating.

I believe a sounder hypothesis is that of the 'aquatic ape, ' because that one explains other peculiarities in our form as well.

We are the least hairy of all apes and what fur we do have streamilines under water, uniquely for apes.

As only ape, our newborns can swim and instinctively hold their breath. A baby chimp would drown. We have a nose bridge, again unique under the apes, which functions as a diving clock, keeping water out of our nasal cavity when submerged. We love seafood and plenty of people seem to think that when the sun shines, the beach is the place to be.

To me it is clear, we are apes that after the tundra spent some time on the beaches.

This also explains our gait, similar to a dolphin or seal our back legs have begun protruding alongside our spine, rather than be positioned at an angle.

I dont think there is one peculiarity of the human form as opposed to other apes that can not be explained by this hypothesis.

It's not my logic, it is just counter-logic.

Everything we do know could be wrong, or just limited to what it really is. How would one know?

Scientists also work to discover new things. If they all just believed evolution was the sure-fire way that everything came about then they could have all just stopped there.

Sorry but it was dissproven, years ago. That woman just holds up to it like a Koala bear.

The fist wave of emigration of what we can call Homo sapiens traveled to Saudi Arabia, where we lost our hair (which isn't a feet, gens that are for hair growth are still present in our genome the same way as they were in H.Erectus, they were just inactivated by a process called methylation. It could be easly proven on a modern African Elephant to force him to grow hair in one generation).

I liked her idea, but she had the bad luck to invent it, just before epigenetics hit the scientiffic community with a frying pan of knowledge to the face.

No, saying something could be different is not counter-logic its being contrary.

For it to be counter-logic you have to present alternative hyptheses that lead to a different theory.

Convergent evolution and evolutionary parochials are well-understood mechanisms. We can make sound educated guesses on how alien life will function and look.

How was this disproven?

As a hypothesis it has some very strong proof in its favour. Clearly our bodies have evolved to function more in an aquatic environment than those of any of the other apes.

Alright then, what if some higher being created everything on Earth and has figured out how most things will play out whether it is some super intelligent alien species or a deity.

Billions of people believe in God's of various religions which give their own theory as to how the Earth and life was created.

Well she shot herself in the foot. She didn't took into concideration the absence of evidence that australopithecine underwent any adaptations to water enviroment. Which leads to that this hypothesis can't be verified. But to her credit: She shutted up Paleogeologist and the "To savannah we go" hypothesis. She is a great scientist. But there are no compelling evidence for the aquating ape.

deformities brought about by natural selection sounds like a form of evolution to me, not some freak of nature

we're talking about beings that we have no idea about, they might have evolved beyond speech and such but might need to walk to breathe or something along those lines.

The funny thing about man is that we're a "know it all" kid who finds out later in life that we were just young and dumb as we learn and grow. Many of todays facts are found to be false tomorrow. We presume to know the universe when we still can't fully understand lightning or what lies deep in the ocean

Not really. What if my theory is a deity created everything, the end. That's about as simple as it gets.

Just wait until your dead, and then whether it is true or not will be revealed I guess. Then bad thing is one can't tell if it is true or not as they are dead.

Im not sure if were allowed to discuss this but its my understanding that religion doesnt, or shouldnt attempt to, do that.

Religion deals with humanity, with enlightenment and salvation.

Its a completely different field from science with its own applications and inherent worth.

Biologists cant attempt to eff the nature of the ineffable or consider the spiritual future of humanity. Conversely, priests dont explain molecular biology. Its not their respective fields.

You dont teach chemistry in French class, you dont conjugate irregular verbs in chemistry.

Both dsiciplines are great endevours of the human spirit but they deal with completely different things and shouldnt attempt to overlap.

I can talk more on this in pm if you like, as I said, Im unsure as to how the rules work in this instance.