The Fermi Paradox - What It Is and Categories

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People
I knew most people in this thread weren't interested in discussing realities/facts/certainties (that don't fit with the imaginations and speculations they want to talk about that are in line with philosophical naturalism). I was merely adding the one consideration that wasn't even alllowed to be contemplated it seems from the OP (or at least it didn't come up in anyone's mind as a consideration on the first few pages that I read, so whether or not intended that way, it has had that effect; perhaps "allowed to" wasn't the best choice of words but I'm sticking with it). The routine of putting rational reasonable conclusions, thoughts and considerations on the same footing as pure fantasy and wishful thinking (philosophical naturalism, by referring to both as "speculative") is not particularly helpful, rational or reasonable. I've heard it all before. Anything is possible right? Pink unicorns, flying spaghetti monsters, etc. Who knows...

Well, I do. I know at least some things about what's possible and what's not in relation to this topic of life on other planets. I also know the difference between fact and fiction when it comes to those talking about these things and this subject (and I'm not the only one). But I guess I don't count as part of "we" in the slogan of convenience* 'we don't know' (*: in the denial of realities to open the door for pure imagination and to continue clinging to philosophical naturalism as if it's "science"). Your circular argument concerning the topic of fine-tuning is discussed in the 2nd part of that video you were responding to.

The OP only listed options in light of philosophical naturalism. The basis for your thinking is flawed. I think I might be the first one in this thread to suggest that assuming that life will evolve* by natural processes alone on other planets as long as you have enough planets (and enough variety) is an irrational path to go down. It blatantly ignores all facts related to this topic that don't work well for the storyline: 'Nature did it'.

*: the word "evolve" in that sentence is used in the same manner as Haldane and Oparin used it in their explanations of what they referred to as "the chemical evolution theory of life" as that terminology can be found on the wikipedia page for abiogenesis a.k.a. "chemical evolution" (along with 109 instances of "evol..." and 15 occurances of the word "panspermia" and 4 occurances of "biological evolution").

TEOTWAWKIAIFF beat me to it. This is a great article
www.abovetopsecret.com...

The existence of life is no mystery or lucky break, he told Quanta in 2014, but rather follows from general physical principles and “should be as unsurprising as rocks rolling downhill.”

I think one of the answers to the Fermi Paradox must be technology and detectability - are we equipped to discover other forms of life? Are they right in front of our noses and yet we can't detect them? And it works both ways for us and for alien life. We're looking for self-similar, recognizable forms of life when in fact alien biochemistry may not be detectable at all to us. There's still a lot of debate as to whether the universe is fractal. If it is fractal, then the probability of similar life out there should be high. If it isn't fractal, then all bets are off. Right now all we have are different forms of spectroscopy to investigate other worlds. Maybe there's a limit to how far our technology can take us i.e. an inherent limitation of our life form.

NASA's Exoplanet Archive is very interesting - There's no shortage of detectable planets and more being discovered every month. Where are the aliens? We may be looking right at them and not know it.



exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu...

Is NASA and SETI the onlY entities in the world actively searching for intelligent life out there? Do we know if China, Russia or any European countries is also doing it?

They might have a different Intel on the subject matter.

a reply to: IQPREREQUISITE

I think most developed nations have some projects that explore the possibilities of life in the observable universe. There are also citizen astronomer groups like Planet Hunters which search for exoplanets in habitable zones. Universities have invested in observatories across the world and help to make the searches into international efforts.

Next year's launch of the James Webb Space Telescope is a multi-national affair that promises culture-changing imagery like the early Hubble. It's an exciting prospect.

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus
a reply to: eriktheawful

This is a really good thread. I tend to lean towards the rare earth scenario modified by the thought that intelligent life is not necessarily an evolutionary goal

That is an interesting thought..

That plenty of otherworldly life exists, but that "intelligent" "advanced" technologically capable civilizations are an anomaly.

Wouldn't that be a painful discovery? That creation prioritizes simple life..and us humans are an anomaly and our sophistication is akin to a rare disease, rather than an evolutionary intent? We aren't exactly living in a symbiotic relationship with the rest of simple life forms on this rock Hell...lots of people encourage space exploration so that we have options once we ruin this planet...sounds like a spreading disease? Is it possible that creation simply doesn't value technological advancement?

...or it could be that we are a park reserve....Aliens could very well be observing us from a distance the way biologists study wolves..stay out of site, but once in a while fly up, dart one and take blood samples etc.

originally posted by: soberbacchus
Wouldn't that be a painful discovery? That creation prioritizes simple life..and us humans are an anomaly and our sophistication is akin to a rare disease, rather than an evolutionary intent?

That's pretty much what I believe, that we'll find life is fairly ubiquitous and tenacious but evolved intelligence is an anomaly. All the more reason to not blow ourselves up.

a reply to: eriktheawful

Love the post. Really well thought out and presented!

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus

originally posted by: soberbacchus
Wouldn't that be a painful discovery? That creation prioritizes simple life..and us humans are an anomaly and our sophistication is akin to a rare disease, rather than an evolutionary intent?

That's pretty much what I believe, that we'll find life is fairly ubiquitous and tenacious but evolved intelligence is an anomaly. All the more reason to not blow ourselves up.

I agree, but I'll add this:

Even if evolved intelligence is an anomaly, the size of the universe virtually guarantees that there is other intelligent life out there existing at this moment. However, for the same reason (the size of the universe) the distances between any two examples of intelligent life might be so great that they may never meet nor have contact with each other.

I love this topic - I've done some idle speculation on this which has led me to my personal belief on the Paradox.

I think it is AI, though not necessarily in the way that many people thing. AI is all but necessary in order to supply a huge and growing population. The down side is that it gives "people" too much time on their hands. Idle hands are the devil's playthings, so the popular phrase goes, and I don't mean this in the strictly theological term.

People have enough time to get take offense to everything everyone else says, and with time to nurture that grudge (along with the counter grudges), things escalate horribly and people wipe themselves out.

That is the extent of my hobby of futurism.

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Space.comScience & Astronomy
Some Alien Planets May Bypass Habitability
By Charles Q. Choi, Space.com Contributor | August 7, 2017 05:00pm ET
34 8 MORE
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Some Alien Planets May Bypass Habitability
An artist's illustration of an ice- and snow-covered exoplanet.
Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab
Earth's orbit within the sun's habitable zone means its temperatures are just right for life. But icy worlds located within their star's habitable zone may abruptly skip from too cold to too hot without going through a habitable stage, a new study finds.

The finding suggests that there may be fewer potentially habitable worlds than scientists previously thought, the researchers said.

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Whereas Venus seems too hot for life and Mars seems too cold, Earth lies between Venus and Mars, where temperatures have the potential to be just right for its surface to possess liquid water. This "Goldilocks" zone is also known as the habitable zone, because on Earth, there is life virtually wherever there is liquid water.

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Stars like the sun brighten over time. This raises the possibility that a planet or moon that starts out cold and icy around a young dim star, such as early Earth, may eventually warm to a stable habitable state as the star grows more luminous. [How Habitable Zones for Alien Planets and Stars Work (Infographic)]

However, the new study finds that some planets may go directly from a Mars-like icehouse stage to a Venus-like hothouse phase, bypassing Earth-like habitable conditions.

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"Previously, studies suggested that icy planets and moons, such as [Jupiter's moon] Europa, will become habitable for life after their surface ice or snow melts," said study lead author Jun Yang, of Peking University in Beijing. "Our work shows that this will not happen."

The climate of a water-rich planet depends on at least two factors. One is how much ice covers its surface. Ice has a high albedo, meaning it reflects much of the light that falls onto it back to space before the light can warm the planet's surface. In this way, the ice cools the planet, which leads to the formation of more ice and makes the planet even colder. The second factor is the amount of water vapor in the planet's atmosphere; water vapor is a greenhouse gas that traps heat, warming a planet, which leads more water to evaporate and makes the planet even warmer.

The albedo of ice plays a dominant role in the climate of icy planets. A 2004 study suggested that Earth escaped a possible "snowball phase" because the sun brightened over time and because volcanic activity on Earth released carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that helped the planet retain heat.

In contrast, many icy bodies, such as Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus, do not release large amounts of greenhouse gases via volcanoes. As such, researchers wanted to see how these worlds evolved if they had only the light of their stars to help warm them.

In the new study, the scientists developed a global climate model that simulated the evolution of the climate of an icy planet lacking greenhouse gases other than water vapor. This 3D computer model included multiple layers of the atmosphere, as well as winds and their effects on temperatures, clouds, water vapor, snow and ice, according to the study.

The researchers found that, without the presence of greenhouse gases besides water vapor, icy bodies needed a lot of energy from their stars before they started melting — about 10 to 40 percent more than Earth gets from the sun. When the ice finally did melt in simulations, the resulting drop in albedo made these worlds much warmer very quickly. This rapid warming often led to greenhouse stages in which most or all of the water oceans vaporized, rendering these worlds uninhabitable for water-based life as it is known on Earth.

"The finding suggests the number of potentially habitable planets and moons may be less than previously estimated, especially for small icy planets and icy moons," Yang told Space.com.

The paper detailing the new findings was published online July 31 in the journal Nature Geoscience.

Follow Charles Q. Choi on Twitter @cqchoi. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+.Original article on Space.com.

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Charles Q. Choi, Space.com Contributor
Charles Q. Choi is a contributing writer for Space.com and Live Science. He covers all things human origins and astronomy as well as physics, animals and general science topics. Charles has a Master of Arts degree from the University of Missouri-Columbia, School of Journalism and a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of South Florida. Charles has visited every continent on Earth, drinking rancid yak butter tea in Lhasa, snorkeling with sea lions in the Galapagos and even climbing an iceberg in Antarctica.

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Space.comScience & Astronomy
Some Alien Planets May Bypass Habitability
By Charles Q. Choi, Space.com Contributor | August 7, 2017 05:00pm ET
34 8 MORE
Partner Series
Some Alien Planets May Bypass Habitability
An artist's illustration of an ice- and snow-covered exoplanet.
Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab
Earth's orbit within the sun's habitable zone means its temperatures are just right for life. But icy worlds located within their star's habitable zone may abruptly skip from too cold to too hot without going through a habitable stage, a new study finds.

The finding suggests that there may be fewer potentially habitable worlds than scientists previously thought, the researchers s

The Dyson Sphere thing has me thinking: what if the reason we don't see aliens is because as their technology advances, they truly transcend beyond the need or desire for physical existence?

Suppose computer technology progressed so far along that your entire brain could be converted to data? Then instead of playing an online MMORPG from your computer, your consciousness would actually be in the game/VR world. Maybe these VR worlds are really good.

They might have the technology to grow themselves a new body in a cloning vat anytime they want, and be able to go back into the physical world. But hardly any of them ever take the opportunity. (Just like how many people nowadays play video games instead of going for a walk in the park. )

So for all intents and purposes, their ecological footprint is limited to just the needs of the massive computer servers that are hosting their consciousnesses.

And come to think of it: those servers are probably not located in places that are hospitable to life. But rather places that are very energy rich, like very large stars. Or other big sources of energy. Places that suit the needs of a massive computing machine.

Going a bit further on the Dyson Sphere question:

Why would you build a Dyson Sphere around the star in your home system?

Why not go deeper into space, and find a bigger star that puts off more energy, and build your solar arrays there? Then set up some anitmatter factories, and send the antimatter back to your home world?


Maybe those are the kinds of resources aliens fight over. The "oil fields" of the intergalactic community.

That would explain why nobody has contacted Earth. There's nothing here for them to be fighting over. No reason to trouble us. Just like how on Earth, those aboriginal tribes who live on land that has nothing of value are the safest from the Colonial powers.


Earth has no "unobtainium".

S&F. This is a great thread. I would have to go with the idea that they are here but observing us as we would a tribe in Africa or in South America that hadn't seen an advanced civilization before. It's good to keep a distance to avoid disrupting their progression.

a reply to: eriktheawful

originally posted by: verschickter
a reply to: AugustusMasonicus
1) No, I´m not speculating that like we, the hypothetical alien, would be made out of 90% acid or alkalic metals, but it very well could be they use compounts in their system. You are not made out of water 100%, don´t be so close minded.

2) These are not the only examples, there are other non acidic and alkalic compounts that also will react extremly volatile when It even comes into contact with water vapor in the air. There are other reactions going on too. For example dissolving something in water is also a chemical reaction.

3) I was not suggesting it, UpIsNowDown brought it up.

4) We are sitting here on earth and we don´t know # about most of what´s really going on out there.

5) Mind you, habitable zones are defined along our own specifications, what we encounter here on earth as life.

However, one could argue now that the definition of life is aligned with our experience of what life is, then of course the whole point is moot.

You can´t disproof it and he/I can´t bring evidence as of now, so all that´s left is the point where you think water is so harmless. I disproofed you on that for sure.

Those hypothetical life forms do not even need to have any reactants in it, it would be enough if the molecular structur is broken down meaning dissolving. That happens everytime you mix something with water.

Anything else?

This is only half true. Any metal or semi-metal is going to have limited possibilities for interaction compared with the non-metals. And carbon is considered the most "free loving" of them all.

Also, with 118 known elements it should be seen as no coincidence that the ones that gave rise to life fit very near the bottom of the list. Carbon being "6". Oxygen being "8". Hydrogen being "1".

Undiscovered elements have to have an atomic number greater than 118 at this point. All the gaps have been filled below that number. (And no unexpected gaps are possible. The number of protons is the ONLY trait that defines an element. All other attributes, such as electrons or neutrons are just to describe the "average" example of that element.)



However, there's no saying for sure that carbon would still be the most "free loving" at a higher pressure. Like say down near the core of Jupiter, where hydrogen gets compressed to the point of becoming metallic.

Maybe some other element is better for life in an environment like that. It's hard to test for that possibility in a laboratory because such extreme pressures are too hard to create and sustain.

However, an alien life form that originated in that kind of an environment would have a very hard time traveling around in space. Their space ships would have to simulate the pressure of their home world.

a reply to: bloodymarvelous

The smart people have been talking about this for years and it's becoming a clearer possibility as our technology advances.

The way I look at it is we'll see a form of AI in the next few decades. I don't mean what we currently call AI, but an obviously free-thinking AI capable of coherent, original thought - sentient. It'll need a container, a power source and some means of perceiving the world.

By the time we're communicating with conscious AIs mapped onto hardware, I believe we'll be thereabouts to doing the same with ours. What will separate us then? If we're approaching such a circumstance, it's a proof of concept that others could too

Perhaps a Dyson-capable civilisation will have left behind the biological sphere millennia earlier and would thus never need one. Blahdy blah etc. I enjoyed your ideas in this thread.

Two distinct groups of stars based on chemical composition were discovered: one set rich in α-elements such as oxygen, magnesium, and silicon, and another one more rich in iron.

While the reason behind the stark difference between the two groups used to be unclear, Masafumi Noguchi, an astronomer from Tohoku University and lead author of the new study, believes that his new model offers a plausible explanation.

The Milky Way's First, Second Lives

According to Tohoku University, Noguchi analyzed the galaxy's history over a 10 billion-year period, starting from the time cold gas streams entered the galaxy and stars began to form from the gas. This period included many short-lived Type II supernovae, which ejected plenty of α-elements into space. These elements quickly became part of the gas streams and eventually formed the first-generation stars.

Then 3 billion years later, shock waves appeared and heated the gas, which spurred the gas to stop flowing into the galaxy. As a consequence, the formation of stars ceased as well, and the Milky Way "died."

Things remained relatively quiet for 2 billion years until another round of explosions — this time from long-lived Type Ia supernovae — spewed out iron. The gas, at this point cooled down by emitting radiation, began streaming back into the Milky Way, sparking it back to life.

Just like what happened in the earlier days of the galaxy, stars began to form, this time rich in iron. One of these stars is the sun.

natureworldnews.com, Aug. 24, 2018 - The Milky Way 'Died' Once And The Solar System Is Living Through Its Revival.

I ran across this as I was searching for the evolution of the Milky Way (MW) the other day.

It seems the MW has several dwarf galaxies surrounding it. The MW has fed off these before, or the least, interacted with them (i.e., collided).

It goes something like this. The MW was a whirling galaxy giving birth to stars and being drawn towards our local cluster. But after a spurt of activity creating hot, blue stars, that activity leveled off when a dwarf galaxy hit the food supply for the MW. Another dwarf galaxy, called Sagittarius spheroidal dwarf galaxy (Sag dSph), which, when compared to the plane of the MW, goes "polar" in orbit (i.e., above and below the plane), passed through the MW disk, jump started another star creating period (that is what the above article is hypothesizing) that we are currently in.

The original stars of the MW are too hot and young (hey, my eyes are up here!!) to support life. But what if the dwarf galaxy stars are not? And what if, just maybe, the MW captured an entire star system from one of these iron rich dwarf galaxies, that from their standpoint, makes them see the MW spiral arm tilted at a 60 - 90 degree angle?

We are special because we are not from the Milky Way! We are the aliens from galaxy Sag dSph. We are alone because we have not been invited over for drinks, yet. Or, the MW is too young to house aliens and we lucked out by being plucked into this region of the spiral arm.

Gaia Sees Effects of Milky Way’s Close Encounter with Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy.

It will be a couple more years before Gaia DR3 becomes available.

phys.org, Jan 2, 2019 - NASA's technosignatures report: every way to find evidence of an intelligent civilization.

This is addressing the similar question as the Fermi Paradox, the Drake Equation. The article is a nice, lazy, weekend afternoon, read. A lot of information is covered. This is actually a cover of a paper at the arXiv.org site from November.

One of the better takeaways is "technosignature" which are analogous to "bio signature" but instead of looking for "respiration" and chemical signature of known biological processes, the same is applied to technologies and the signatures they might give off. If one of the signatures is detected you work backwards and infer the level of intelligence the civilization is at that made it.

A nice, if long, read! The link at phys.org to the arXiv is to a more structured PDF of the same ideas (it was a conference), if that is more your thing.

Glad to see a scientific approach to the subject instead of scorn and ridicule! And relatively recent!