Maybe we are late in the universe, perhaps universe used to be a lively and vibrant place homing millions of civilizations. Now, we stand as the last remnants, hence, possibly the most advanced.
Maybe we are late in the universe, perhaps universe used to be a lively and vibrant place homing millions of civilizations. Now, we stand as the last remnants, hence, possibly the most advanced.
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Maybe. There are so many possible explanations for the Fermi Paradox.
- Radio signals may just become too incoherent at great distances that we cannot recognise meaning from noise. The evidence is too hard to detect.
- Alien civilizations that are more advanced than us, could be using energy and communication methods we haven't even thought to try to detect yet. We're looking for the wrong evidence.
- advanced technology for communication, travel and energy could also be much more efficient - maybe there is nothing to detect. There is no evidence to find sitting on earth.
- in theory a civilization travelling at sub light speed could cplonize the galaxy with self replicating machines in 0.5 million years. Where are they? Well what if we ourselves are the product? Life on earth seeded from elsewhere? We are the evidence?
- maybe they're around us in space but not interested in us - we're ants to them.
- maybe they're around us in space but don't want to contaminate us, letting us reach them when we're ready.they are hiding form us.
- maybe space is vastly more dangerous than we can comprehend and civilizations keep quiet to avoid predator species - the dark forest theory
- maybe life is extremely rare and spread out, and we are an aborrhation- the great filter
The Fermi Paradox is an interesting question, but it is not an answer in itself.
The Great Filter makes the most sense to me. The traits that make a species likely to be space faring are the same ones like to cause it to filter themselves out of the future.
This is one of my favorite conundrums about life you touched on above with another comment and this one. Does an advanced society really exist fully "in sync" with their environment? Probably no space program if so, technological progression is slowed to thousands or millions of years (think of only harvesting resources deposited by natural water flows etc). Or do successful lifeforms use up their planets (then solar systems) resources with enough time to get out of dodge?
Every planet and star system will kill their inhabitants sooner or later. Any culture that is gravity bound will surely perish without advances. The "Fermi Paradox" has always been more about threading a needle than a true/false statement for me.
The “Fermi Paradox” has always been more about threading a needle than a true/false statement for me.
totally
Maybe they're all around us right now, but we can't see/interact with them for some reason.
My favorite hypothesis is we just didn't invent something akin to subspace radio yet. It's like thinking your little remote island is the only populated place in the world because no one responds to your smoke signals, while the rest of the world uses radio.
Or, we could be first.
Someone is/was.
The dark forest theory seems unlikely, since we've been broadcasting our presence for as long as we've been able to, with nothing as a result. I suppose it's possible that they're headed our way now. Or that they don't have FTL so they won't get here for hundreds of years.