9 ms·

We do know the probability life appears is non-zero though, because it has happened. I don't know why all 9 steps to colonization can't be considered improbable

We do know the probability life appears is non-zero though, because it has happened. I don't know why all 9 steps to colonization can't be considered improbable, and therefore the filter be behind us and in front of us. We don't even know all the steps between "Step 8: Where we are" and "Step 9: Colonization." Maybe a moon is required for it. Maybe materials not found on this earth are required for it. I think we as a species have decided that colonizing Mars is possible. It might not be probable, but we can do it. We know how, we just haven't yet. Humans just might be the first intelligent life. If the Milky Way was already colonized, some civilization made the first leap to another planet. It's manifest destiny. We have to colonize the universe. It's our moral duty as an intelligent species to maintain awareness of the universe.

PeterisP 7y ago
"Humans just might be the first intelligent life." is incompatible with the notion that life is common (which may or may not be true) - our planet is a bit older than the average (e.g. the examples in the article are suns/planets which have already gone through all the lifecycle that Earth will have eventually), so it's probable that we're the first intelligent life in the galaxy if and only if it's likely that we're the only intelligent life that the galaxy will ever spawn. If there's no great filter before our current stage, then it's extremely unlikely that we're the first intelligent life in galaxy, and either there's a great filter after that or many civilizations have risen already (and have had more than enough time to colonize the whole galaxy a thousand times over at a relaxed, leisurely slow pace, if any of these civilizations wanted to) but we just don't see them for some reason.
- blackflame 7y ago
  Just because something is unlikely doesn't mean it can't happen. Furthermore, there could be something very special about Earth's position that makes it far more likely than we initially calculate. It doesn't make sense to dismiss theories as 'unlikely' when our degree of understanding of that probability is absurdly primitive.
  - PeterisP 7y ago
    "something very special about Earth's position that makes it far more likely than we initially calculate" - makes what far more likely ? Spawning life? If so, then that special factor, whatever it is, would simply be an example of a great filter behind us. I'm not saying that we can't be the first ones, I'm just noting that us being the first implies that we're alone in the galaxy. To make that point perhaps more clearly, let's say that before and including us, our galaxy has had X planets like Earth. Whatever that X is (1 or 1000 or billions), the total number of such planets that our galaxy will ever have is less than 2X. That doesn't rely on any poorly understood theories, that doesn't rely on any aspects of how life or intelligence might form - the lifecycle of stars is well understood, the age of universe is well understood, and the future has less new stars and planets than the past; we're currently past the midpoint of star/planet forming and that's that, most of the planets that will ever exist in our galaxy either exist right now (most of them for longer than Earth) or are gone already. So whatever the "dice" of a suitable planet existing and creating intelligent life are - if we're the first ones (and I'm not making a point whether we are or aren't, whether that's likely or not, that "if" is an assumption), if X rolls of dice resulted in just a single success - then the remaining less than X rolls simply won't suddenly roll a hundred more successes; if the total number of spawned civilizations until us is 1, then that means that the total number of spawned civilizations until end of the universe would be 1 or 2 - and if it's 2, then it would be a hit-by-a-lightning-while-typing-this level of coincidence is that second one happened to arise at the same insignificantly tiny moment in time that constitutes the existence of homo sapiens until now, just some tiny 100 000 years after us instead of some 10 000 000 or much more years after us. OR, possibly, there are and will be much more civilizations than that - but then some of them have been long before us.
    - K0SM0S 7y ago
      “if X rolls of dice resulted in just a single success - then the remaining less than X rolls simply won't suddenly roll a hundred more successes” Mmhh.. not so sure you can conclude this. You assume all rolls of the dice are identical (same likeliness of all outcomes), but this ignores the fact that the universe is ever-changing from a particular state towards its inevitable fate. Consider for instance the "pulse" of galaxies as they collide and 'ignite' their central quasars anew — this coincides with extremely harsh local conditions for said galaxy merger, which becomes likely very unhospitable to life. Conversely, when the jets calm down (mature) and winds recede, star formation kicks back up and a new galactic cycle begins until the next merger (if ever). This mechanism alone could paint a very asymmetric past and future set of conditions (relatively to our rather 'calm' present, but it's actually a cycle). Some of these conditions would definitely affect life (for instance, during its active phase, we suspect that a galaxy's quasar might be strong enough to blow away planets atmospheres). There's just too many unknowns at this point. Drake's famous equation was actually meant to expose this fact (he actually knew it was flawed/impossible to solve, but felt it was a meaningful thought experiment, iirc).
- weare138 7y ago
  > our planet is a bit older than the average But our galaxy and solar system is relatively young compared to the universe. Plus the universe is massive. There's approximately 10 billion galaxies in the observable universe with and average of 100 billion stars per galaxy. At that scale the processes that created life on Earth would have happened countless times before. The building blocks for life are common in the universe but weren't common on the early, inhospitable Earth. It was brought to our planet from comets which is where the Earth's water came from. https://helios.gsfc.nasa.gov/qa_star.html#howmany https://helios.gsfc.nasa.gov/qa_star.html#howmany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia
  - ahje 7y ago
    I'm not an expert, but didn't it take quite some time for stars to create heavier elements like iron, go nova, spread the star-stuff across the Universe, and then repeat until we have the current mix of light/heavy elements? Combine that with: * The fact that life on Earth was possibly dependent on life from other planets to form. * Has had multiple near-total extinction events during it's time. * We're outright dependant on fossil fuels left over from previous cycles in order to get to where we are now. * Our own species have been close to extinction multiple times far before we reached our current technological level. * Our own emissions most likely blends with the background noise and are probably not detectable that far out. * It's taken us countless millennia just to get to the point where we're approaching a technology level that will allow a fraction of our population to scan parts of our closest galactic neighbourhood for disproportionately large signal sources that happens to be on the bands we find to be most convenient. To me, it sounds like it's quite plausible that we could be amongst the first to spread on an interplanetary scale (assuming we actually manage to do that), or that something happens and we go back to pre-industrial levels, leaving the aliens on the next habitable planet wondering why the level of noise from group of stars a few hundred light-years away suddenly grew quieter.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
keyle 7y ago
"It's our moral duty as an intelligent species to maintain awareness of the universe." Interesting justification for colonising the universe. If you were from another civilisation, more advanced, you could see humans as a bunch of parasites taking over planets and destroying other life and themselves in the process. This grand justification of maintaining the awareness of the universe is a bit of a stretch.
- astrobe_ 7y ago
  If we want to colonize anything outside our orbit, we should start with solving our basic earthly problems. Like stop fighting for territory, power, money or to prove who believes in the right God(s). But I guess it would make us an "advanced" civilization.
  - XorNot 7y ago
    It's naive to presume that one problem doesn't beget solving the other. Humans, for example, almost to a tee, define ourselves in terms of others - tribal heritage I guess. How long do "nations" drawn on 2D boundaries survive once there's tribes which operate in 3D space on other planets, or spread out through the solar system? Which is to say nothing of the riches that await us if we can solve orbital and deep space access problems. If you can get to Mars, you can get to a bunch of asteroids with enough gold and platinum to ensure only the rich will have things made of wood.
    - debbiedowner 7y ago
      What riches are there to be found in space and brought back to earth to sell for economic gain? I thought space flight is too expensive and unobtanium is yet to be discovered?
    - michannne 7y ago
      Who's to say country X won't nuke you out of the sky before you have a chance at mining those materials? Whether we like it or not, international politics will dictate the course of humanity when it comes to space, unless some isolated group manages to do it in secret. Further, even if a group manages to secure trillions of tons of common materials for us today, who's to say it will be given out for free? If it is, well, maybe I want you to give my country a bit more of the share than other countries, or I'll take their share by force. Even if we emerge a united world after something like that, we may find that we've developed far superior technology that has no use for the materials you've acquired. There are tons of real-world questions that have to be answered, and it doesn't matter if we don't have time to come up with a good one, because someone will pull the trigger first.

PeterisP 7y ago

"Humans just might be the first intelligent life." is incompatible with the notion that life is common (which may or may not be true) - our planet is a bit older than the average (e.g. the examples in the article are suns/planets which have already gone through all the lifecycle that Earth will have eventually), so it's probable that we're the first intelligent life in the galaxy if and only if it's likely that we're the only intelligent life that the galaxy will ever spawn. If there's no great filter before our current stage, then it's extremely unlikely that we're the first intelligent life in galaxy, and either there's a great filter after that or many civilizations have risen already (and have had more than enough time to colonize the whole galaxy a thousand times over at a relaxed, leisurely slow pace, if any of these civilizations wanted to) but we just don't see them for some reason.

blackflame 7y ago
Just because something is unlikely doesn't mean it can't happen. Furthermore, there could be something very special about Earth's position that makes it far more likely than we initially calculate. It doesn't make sense to dismiss theories as 'unlikely' when our degree of understanding of that probability is absurdly primitive.
- PeterisP 7y ago
  "something very special about Earth's position that makes it far more likely than we initially calculate" - makes what far more likely ? Spawning life? If so, then that special factor, whatever it is, would simply be an example of a great filter behind us. I'm not saying that we can't be the first ones, I'm just noting that us being the first implies that we're alone in the galaxy. To make that point perhaps more clearly, let's say that before and including us, our galaxy has had X planets like Earth. Whatever that X is (1 or 1000 or billions), the total number of such planets that our galaxy will ever have is less than 2X. That doesn't rely on any poorly understood theories, that doesn't rely on any aspects of how life or intelligence might form - the lifecycle of stars is well understood, the age of universe is well understood, and the future has less new stars and planets than the past; we're currently past the midpoint of star/planet forming and that's that, most of the planets that will ever exist in our galaxy either exist right now (most of them for longer than Earth) or are gone already. So whatever the "dice" of a suitable planet existing and creating intelligent life are - if we're the first ones (and I'm not making a point whether we are or aren't, whether that's likely or not, that "if" is an assumption), if X rolls of dice resulted in just a single success - then the remaining less than X rolls simply won't suddenly roll a hundred more successes; if the total number of spawned civilizations until us is 1, then that means that the total number of spawned civilizations until end of the universe would be 1 or 2 - and if it's 2, then it would be a hit-by-a-lightning-while-typing-this level of coincidence is that second one happened to arise at the same insignificantly tiny moment in time that constitutes the existence of homo sapiens until now, just some tiny 100 000 years after us instead of some 10 000 000 or much more years after us. OR, possibly, there are and will be much more civilizations than that - but then some of them have been long before us.
  - K0SM0S 7y ago
    “if X rolls of dice resulted in just a single success - then the remaining less than X rolls simply won't suddenly roll a hundred more successes” Mmhh.. not so sure you can conclude this. You assume all rolls of the dice are identical (same likeliness of all outcomes), but this ignores the fact that the universe is ever-changing from a particular state towards its inevitable fate. Consider for instance the "pulse" of galaxies as they collide and 'ignite' their central quasars anew — this coincides with extremely harsh local conditions for said galaxy merger, which becomes likely very unhospitable to life. Conversely, when the jets calm down (mature) and winds recede, star formation kicks back up and a new galactic cycle begins until the next merger (if ever). This mechanism alone could paint a very asymmetric past and future set of conditions (relatively to our rather 'calm' present, but it's actually a cycle). Some of these conditions would definitely affect life (for instance, during its active phase, we suspect that a galaxy's quasar might be strong enough to blow away planets atmospheres). There's just too many unknowns at this point. Drake's famous equation was actually meant to expose this fact (he actually knew it was flawed/impossible to solve, but felt it was a meaningful thought experiment, iirc).
weare138 7y ago
> our planet is a bit older than the average But our galaxy and solar system is relatively young compared to the universe. Plus the universe is massive. There's approximately 10 billion galaxies in the observable universe with and average of 100 billion stars per galaxy. At that scale the processes that created life on Earth would have happened countless times before. The building blocks for life are common in the universe but weren't common on the early, inhospitable Earth. It was brought to our planet from comets which is where the Earth's water came from. https://helios.gsfc.nasa.gov/qa_star.html#howmany https://helios.gsfc.nasa.gov/qa_star.html#howmany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia
- ahje 7y ago
  I'm not an expert, but didn't it take quite some time for stars to create heavier elements like iron, go nova, spread the star-stuff across the Universe, and then repeat until we have the current mix of light/heavy elements? Combine that with: * The fact that life on Earth was possibly dependent on life from other planets to form. * Has had multiple near-total extinction events during it's time. * We're outright dependant on fossil fuels left over from previous cycles in order to get to where we are now. * Our own species have been close to extinction multiple times far before we reached our current technological level. * Our own emissions most likely blends with the background noise and are probably not detectable that far out. * It's taken us countless millennia just to get to the point where we're approaching a technology level that will allow a fraction of our population to scan parts of our closest galactic neighbourhood for disproportionately large signal sources that happens to be on the bands we find to be most convenient. To me, it sounds like it's quite plausible that we could be amongst the first to spread on an interplanetary scale (assuming we actually manage to do that), or that something happens and we go back to pre-industrial levels, leaving the aliens on the next habitable planet wondering why the level of noise from group of stars a few hundred light-years away suddenly grew quieter.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

keyle 7y ago

"It's our moral duty as an intelligent species to maintain awareness of the universe." Interesting justification for colonising the universe. If you were from another civilisation, more advanced, you could see humans as a bunch of parasites taking over planets and destroying other life and themselves in the process. This grand justification of maintaining the awareness of the universe is a bit of a stretch.

astrobe_ 7y ago
If we want to colonize anything outside our orbit, we should start with solving our basic earthly problems. Like stop fighting for territory, power, money or to prove who believes in the right God(s). But I guess it would make us an "advanced" civilization.
- XorNot 7y ago
  It's naive to presume that one problem doesn't beget solving the other. Humans, for example, almost to a tee, define ourselves in terms of others - tribal heritage I guess. How long do "nations" drawn on 2D boundaries survive once there's tribes which operate in 3D space on other planets, or spread out through the solar system? Which is to say nothing of the riches that await us if we can solve orbital and deep space access problems. If you can get to Mars, you can get to a bunch of asteroids with enough gold and platinum to ensure only the rich will have things made of wood.
  - debbiedowner 7y ago
    What riches are there to be found in space and brought back to earth to sell for economic gain? I thought space flight is too expensive and unobtanium is yet to be discovered?
  - michannne 7y ago
    Who's to say country X won't nuke you out of the sky before you have a chance at mining those materials? Whether we like it or not, international politics will dictate the course of humanity when it comes to space, unless some isolated group manages to do it in secret. Further, even if a group manages to secure trillions of tons of common materials for us today, who's to say it will be given out for free? If it is, well, maybe I want you to give my country a bit more of the share than other countries, or I'll take their share by force. Even if we emerge a united world after something like that, we may find that we've developed far superior technology that has no use for the materials you've acquired. There are tons of real-world questions that have to be answered, and it doesn't matter if we don't have time to come up with a good one, because someone will pull the trigger first.