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The problem with this (very interesting and fun) theory is that Earth would have to somehow be the very last planet to develop such intelligence amongst the lar

The problem with this (very interesting and fun) theory is that Earth would have to somehow be the very last planet to develop such intelligence amongst the large list of planets within detection range, which seems unlikely.

dylan604 7y ago
Why unlikely? Someone has to be last
- jacobtwotwo 7y ago
  > Someone has to be last That makes it possible, not likely. For any population N > 2, it's less likely that you'll be last than that you will not be last.
  - dylan604 7y ago
    looking at the data, it’s like we’re trying our damndest to be last. Defunding education, limiting what can be taught (ex: Texas removing critical thinking), etc all seem like we just enjoy tripping on our own shoe laces
    - Supermancho 7y ago
      You're focusing on the wrong scale. Intelligence has skyrocketed in the past thousand years. Policy decisions in our lifetime, do not matter or they end all human matters at once.
      - moate 7y ago
        Certain policy decisions matter on a larger scale. Killing off millions of people has to have some meaning on future abilities, right? I think that generally I agree with you, but I would tend to say you have a small (but >0) number of things that would have huge long term ripples.
    - JudgeWapner 7y ago
      > Defunding education, limiting what can be taught Many people became educated and even advanced science before the government got involved in education.
      - JackFr 7y ago
        Indeed who's to say if the current worldview we share is a knowledge maximizing one.
  - JackFr 7y ago
    Actually someone has to be latest, and rather each civilization for some time t will have its turn at being the latest.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
kolinko 7y ago
Well, another option is that it takes - say - 200 years to get from the stage of "we're producing enough radio output to be visible" to "we developed cloaking" or "we switch to other tech that is intentionally or not - not visible". If that's true, only a very small fraction of planets with intelligent life would land in the window where we can observe them. Another option is that you might have many civilisations that are just as intelligent, and just as developed, but not in the same fashion - imagine 99% of intelligent species out there are more like dolphins than like humans. Or their atmosphere is just a bit more hazy than ours, so they are not aware of the night sky filled with sky, so with less curiosity to imagine the world outside of theirs.
jerf 7y ago
Well, if you want to get technical, the major problem with this theory is that MACHOs are not a good candidate for dark matter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_compact_halo_object#Theoretical_considerations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_compact_halo_object#Th... Even if you imagine they were all hiding, their previous effects on the universe are missing.
- rossdavidh 7y ago
  Aha, you must need to erase yourself from your timeline, else the EAILD will find you from your past traces.
lisper 7y ago
Another problem is that the effectiveness of the cloaking devices would have to be extraordinarily high across an extraordinarily large number of instances.

dylan604 7y ago

Why unlikely? Someone has to be last

jacobtwotwo 7y ago
> Someone has to be last That makes it possible, not likely. For any population N > 2, it's less likely that you'll be last than that you will not be last.
- dylan604 7y ago
  looking at the data, it’s like we’re trying our damndest to be last. Defunding education, limiting what can be taught (ex: Texas removing critical thinking), etc all seem like we just enjoy tripping on our own shoe laces
  - Supermancho 7y ago
    You're focusing on the wrong scale. Intelligence has skyrocketed in the past thousand years. Policy decisions in our lifetime, do not matter or they end all human matters at once.
    - moate 7y ago
      Certain policy decisions matter on a larger scale. Killing off millions of people has to have some meaning on future abilities, right? I think that generally I agree with you, but I would tend to say you have a small (but >0) number of things that would have huge long term ripples.
  - JudgeWapner 7y ago
    > Defunding education, limiting what can be taught Many people became educated and even advanced science before the government got involved in education.
    - JackFr 7y ago
      Indeed who's to say if the current worldview we share is a knowledge maximizing one.
- JackFr 7y ago
  Actually someone has to be latest, and rather each civilization for some time t will have its turn at being the latest.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

kolinko 7y ago

Well, another option is that it takes - say - 200 years to get from the stage of "we're producing enough radio output to be visible" to "we developed cloaking" or "we switch to other tech that is intentionally or not - not visible". If that's true, only a very small fraction of planets with intelligent life would land in the window where we can observe them. Another option is that you might have many civilisations that are just as intelligent, and just as developed, but not in the same fashion - imagine 99% of intelligent species out there are more like dolphins than like humans. Or their atmosphere is just a bit more hazy than ours, so they are not aware of the night sky filled with sky, so with less curiosity to imagine the world outside of theirs.

jerf 7y ago

Well, if you want to get technical, the major problem with this theory is that MACHOs are not a good candidate for dark matter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_compact_halo_object#Theoretical_considerations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_compact_halo_object#Th... Even if you imagine they were all hiding, their previous effects on the universe are missing.

rossdavidh 7y ago
Aha, you must need to erase yourself from your timeline, else the EAILD will find you from your past traces.

lisper 7y ago

Another problem is that the effectiveness of the cloaking devices would have to be extraordinarily high across an extraordinarily large number of instances.