Where are the Aliens? Fermi Paradox. Great Filter. Are we alone?

[Otaku.edc]

Fermi Paradox

Where is everybody?

TLDR above link:

Given a certain set of parameters based on Intelligent Life on Earth that get inputted into something called the DRAKE'S equation, there should be 1000 Galaxy spanning civilizations just in the Milky Way galaxy. But that begs the question: WHERE IS EVERYBODY?

Theory: There is a Great Filter that we are not taking into account that is either behind us, with us, or ahead of us that precludes a civilization from becoming one of the 1000. Behind us is good, with us makes for 'interesting times,' and ahead of us would kinda suck. Lots of theories on what the filters could be.

Earlier this month, a team from the Oxford University Future of Humanity Institute put out a paper stating that attempts to dissolve the Fermi Paradox by stating that the parameters of the Drake's equation are faulty and when it you put in actual realistic numbers into the equation, the likelihood that WE ARE ALONE is extremely high.

Thoughts?

My favorite video on the Fermi Paradox is an OLD TED Talk here:

[Bigghoss]

The Universe is big. Really, really, really big. Inconceivably big. I think there's life out there but everything is so far apart we'll probably never make contact. Even if we could travel at the speed of light, even if we could open wormholes at will or any of that stuff, we'd never be able to explore most of the universe.

[5pins]

The problem with the Drake equation is there’s not enough information for it to work. We can only partially answer the first three questions in the equation. If you answer 4 through 7 with what we actually know then the answer is = we are alone. If you speculate (WAG) 4 through 7 then you can come up with any number you want.

(skip to 2:40)

[BehindBlueI's]

We examine these parameters, incorporating models of chemicaland genetic transitions on paths to the origin of life, and show thatextant scientific knowledge corresponds to uncertainties that span multipleorders of magnitude. This makes a stark difference. When the modelis recast to represent realistic distributions of uncertainty, we find a substantialex ante probability of there being no other intelligent life in ourobservable universe, and thus that there should be little surprise whenwe fail to detect any signs of it.

When we update this prior in light of the Fermi observation, we find asubstantial probability that we are alone in our galaxy, and perhaps even in ourobservable universe (53%–99.6% and 39%–85% respectively). ’Where are they?’— probably extremely far away, and quite possibly beyond the cosmologicalhorizon and forever unreachable.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1806.02404.pdf

[NH Shooter]

Will the extinction of humanity make any noise?

If a tree falls in the middle of a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make any noise?

If there is a God, is he/she/it the least bit embarrassed about how badly this little experiment has gone?

If there is a God and if I ever get to meet him/her/it, I'm going to give the sonofabitch a piece of my mind...

There, I feel SO much better now! :-)

[blues]

It's hard enough to find intelligent life across the street...let alone in the vastness of the known, and as yet unexplored recesses of the universe.

[GardoneVT]

It's hard enough to find intelligent life across the street...let alone in the vastness of the known, and as yet unexplored recesses of the universe.

The WalMart paradox- Any civilization advanced enough to visit other planets would also be smart enough to avoid this one.

[blues]

The WalMart paradox- Any civilization advanced enough to visit other planets would also be smart enough to avoid this one.

Unless, as in Vonnegut's "The Sirens of Titan", the intelligent aliens were stranded in space and needed to wait out the development of human intelligence until someone could fly out and bring them a wrench.

[olstyn]

Unless, as in Vonnegut's "The Sirens of Titan", the intelligent aliens were stranded in space and needed to wait out the development of human intelligence until someone could fly out and bring them a wrench.

Or, as in Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," one visits here in an attempt to do research and gets stuck until a fleet of spaceships arrives intent on destroying Earth in an interstellar example of eminent domain, and is then able to hitch a ride with the fleet's kitchen staff. :P

[Wondering Beard]

Douglas Adams has a few things to say about all that:

"For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much — the wheel, New York, wars and so on — whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man — for precisely the same reasons."

"It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination."