The Fermi Paradox — Where Are All The Aliens?

originally posted by: JadeStar

The universe is expanding not shrinking.

Ironically unversal inflation is one thing which lead to the idea of "warp drives" being viable.

How do you know for sure it is expanding?

We know the universe is expanding because the guy who the Hubble Space Telescope was named after. Edwin Hubble.

Basically he proved the universe was expanding due to observing the light from distant galaxies was redshifted. The rate of expansion is also named after him. It's called the Hubble Constant.

I know all that stuff, but it's possible Hubble was correct, but did not realize that in fact the universe is shrinking. Due to the distance between stars, and due to Newtons proportional effect on distance, gravitational, so what leaves out galactic shrinking?

If all Galaxies rotate at the same speed innermost, and outermost, it can be explained as an optical illusion due to time and distance traveled ? Thanks to Vera Rubin for this discovery. This was something Hubble never came up with an answer to.

Thanks for boggling my mind

The OP video on the topic made a good point the distance between galaxies is vast, and impossible to transverse even at the fastest speeds let say warp 10.

You could have the Fermi paradox going on in just the Milky Way galaxy alone. Literally the only life because of the special Goldilocks zone within the galaxy the earth finds itself in.
You could also have a "Star Wars" type civilizations / galaxy, 5 galaxies away, teaming with all kinds of life and we would never meet.

I also have another theory, the colonization of the universe has only just begun, that's why there is nothing out there.

originally posted by: kloejen

originally posted by: JadeStar

The universe is expanding not shrinking.

Ironically unversal inflation is one thing which lead to the idea of "warp drives" being viable.

How do you know for sure it is expanding?

We know the universe is expanding because the guy who the Hubble Space Telescope was named after. Edwin Hubble.

Basically he proved the universe was expanding due to observing the light from distant galaxies was redshifted. The rate of expansion is also named after him. It's called the Hubble Constant.

I know all that stuff, but it's possible Hubble was correct, but did not realize that in fact the universe is shrinking. Due to the distance between stars, and due to Newtons proportional effect on distance, gravitational, so what leaves out galactic shrinking?

Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation

The universe is not shrinking. It's not even a question at this point. Its like questioning if things actually fall up because we're oriented to believe up is down.

Or that dark a form of radiation rather than darkness simply being the absence of light.

SETI and the Fermi paradox both have several unstated assumptions.
1) Life as we know it. We are only considering life like us or similar. ET might not come here because Oxygen isn't their thing. What happens if life starts in the Oort belt. Cold is their domain going close to the sun for any amount of time would be fatal. So if there was a civilization our there they would have no reason to visit close to the sun. Or the inverse could be true life too close to the sun wouldn't or couldn't go into the cold.
2) Civilization and tech as we know it. There could be many different ways of achieving tech. Our method and viewpoint is fixed. Possibly a different starting point would create different results. Perhaps better.
3) Speed of life. Our fixed life speed as others have suggested here might be very slow or very fast compared to theirs. When your life time is measured in eons compared to us why go to explore. Until the yokels can come to them they want nothing to do with us primitives.

I think the answer to the Fermi paradox are three fold:

1. We are a quarantined planet (for whatever reason)
2. Life forms that develop any kind of tech capable of interstellar communication is rare.
3. Life forms quickly find a means of communication that we do not utilize today. (quickly, like within a hundred or so years....look how fast we have come).

I don't subscribe to being alone, its pretty much impossible in my book, given the odds.

Considering that the universe is 14 billion years old and life as we know it could have arisen in the last 5 billion at least and looking how far life has come in the last billion here, then I wouldn't hold my breath that we are going to have contact in the next billion years, expecting it to happen in your lifetime is really optimistic.

To think that our planet is quarantined or the first to have life capable of radio communication is thinking that we are special, and if there was intelligent life on other planets, the odds are that we are not.

originally posted by: Sublimecraft
a reply to: Gemwolf

Flora are natural to this planet needing only the sustenance the planet and sun provides.

Fauna appears to cope very well with the planets environment and has evolved and adapted to the planets changes with time.

There is only one species that appears out of place, for instance, with it's natural "skin" this species gets sunburnt easily and can die with minutes in cold environments. So, to adapt, it has done what no other species needs to do - it has created artificial environments on this planet to survive - a fundamental requirement of this is the destruction of the planets natural flora and fauna.

This species I talk of, in my opinion, is not native to this planet but has been introduced to it and is therefore the aliens we are searching for. Maybe we are looking at this whole scenario incorrectly.

Can you guess the species I speak of?, they are destructive yet ironically amazingly loving and do not have the capability to yet find who or what actually placed them on the planet because their philosophers and scientists think each other are wrong when both are correct..........soon though.

Domestic cats of course ! But yeah I think that you are right about us in some way also. Perhaps we can really trace our strange and multi tweaked existence to a few different and separate `aliens` after all. But of course that cant be real science , right (all the practical minds nod here plz) and then agree with themselves and I understand that and in what they are saying I cant even disagree. And as for the fermi paradox its self, they are here all the time I think. Here and there and everywhere. They just sometimes hide extremely well. Thats just my personal two cents for tonight.

Any intelligent alien race would have to know making contact with us now would do more harm than good. I believe true space faring races exist and are 99.9% peaceful so it's very unlikely we will get a phone call until we stop acting like lunatics.
If they can get all the way here then I assume they can remain hidden with technology beyond our comprehension.

My thoughts?

a reply to: Cinrad

Not arguing, I could see it that way. But by your own admission "how far we came in 1 billion" vs 5 tells me that your still playing the odds game. And I just don't think the odds hold up well.

I think "in our lifetimes" is a key point though. We may or might not be around to find out if that's true....

...but my gut is telling me we will. I think it will only be a matter of time before computer simulations, quantum everything (electronics, communications) tell us just how alone we are.

My best bet is communications from alien civilizations go to the quantum level in a short period of time (if we are still using our planet as the yard stick). And that means no eaves dropping of any kind. We have teleported light, I would think teleporting at least photons might be a sign post to that direction.

...but that's all just my own theory, nothing to back that up.

There is no Fermi Paradox
Literally every Civilization throughout history has had interaction with Extraterrestrials. Including Us in this Century.

Just because they don't interact with us according to what we think they should...Boo Whoo

a reply to: sirChill

One can not eliminate the very real possibility that we are living in a computer simulation also. And if that is indeed the case then I guess all bets are really off! Fun question and great thread all around.

originally posted by: pheonix358
The day we discover something like sub space, someone will likely come along and ask us why we are on channel 12365 because it is reserved for Star Ships in quadrant 6.

I laughed more than I should have at this haha

a reply to: n00bUK

The other possibility is that a civilization flourished during the last period between ice coverage. So roughly 110,000 years ago. The lost city of Atlantis, just to give them a name. If they left Earth rather than endure 100,000 years of ice, they could well be out there.

You know those few people that never want to go when an evacuation is called, we are their descendants in this scenario. If those other people that left are still out there, and there is no reason they should not be, they may well be watching from within our society. They could well be the Illuminati.

Science only knows one way to get off the Earth, by Star Ship. There could be many many others. Just because we don't know them, does not mean they do not exist.

As a Sci Fi author, I have always considered magic as just another branch of science ... one that we have yet to discover. History has so many unanswered questions, many have already been covered well in this thread by others.

Many ancient societies new more of the heavens than we do now. It seems like we are just starting to equal their knowledge. It gives credence to previous civs being much more advanced than we give them credit for.

P

Perhaps we are considered a no-go planet filled to the brim with dangerous and unpredictable murderous savages...maybe only the brave ETs and some scientist types venture here to observe us, and the odd few intergalactic criminal gangs who come to steal genetic material.

There may be a technological filter of some unknown type, put in place so its able to filter out all intelligent signals from ET and prevent us detecting them, however hard we look.

I don't see any reason why they would come here. Aside from "us".

Most precious metals would be much easier to obtain from asteroids or a satellite around larger planets. Water apparently is everywhere in our galaxy. So that makes our water world not so unique.

The only other scenario, if an alien race was similar enough to us. Biologically. Or something on this planet. They could come here and farm DNA / blood plasma / items of that sort. Material not found on a desolate asteroid.

I personally would love to live in a time where STARTREK, or STARWARS, was not fantasy. But in this case, I believe we got a bad hand. I have a strong feeling we live in a rather bleak and empty part of the "Galaxy / Universe" I think the life "boom" happened long ago.. and those times are probably far in our distant past.

a reply to: Gemwolf

I think we overestimate our importance. There are thousands of galaxies and possibly hundreds of billions of habitable planets-what makes our planet and our species so remarkable that aliens need to drop what they are doing, break the laws of physics as we know it and fly light years just to honk their horn at the locals?

a reply to: Gemwolf

Everyone focuses their attention on other planets. Of course, this is purely hypothetical but what if they were on Earth before we were? We know very little about our oceans and while I doubt the hollow Earth theory, anything is possible. Witnesses have reported UFOs emerging from the ocean and some speak of underwater bases.
Before you dismiss the idea or call BS, can you prove that my musings are fantasy? No. You cannot. So, keep an open mind. I've grown weary of people who shoot down other people's opinions without actually knowing the truth themselves. That happens A LOT on this web site.

a reply to: Thecakeisalie

Perhaps they created us and they continue to come back to monitor. It would explain an awful lot. Even the Sumarians claimed Man was created in clay jars. Google Enoch. It was a gospel written by someone who was "taken away" by "God" (abducted). Lol
I laugh because it sounds ridiculous but again, anything is possible.

Since we don't know the true nature of reality, we can only guess how other life might exist. If we are found to be living in a simulated reality then what does that mean? Maybe other life exists that created us in a virtual environment for their amusement, seeing how far we can advance.

Here's a thought. What if we get to a point that we can create self aware AI people, and a world running on a PC? Would have we created what is basically us but trapped inside a fake place? But would we be cruel enough to make only 1 world with life on it?

Some theories sound too far out there, i wish we knew more though.