As an aside: The technology / evolutionary differences are likely to be immense. Imagine trying to have a 'first contact' with an ant in your backyard. Honestly

As an aside: The technology / evolutionary differences are likely to be immense. Imagine trying to have a 'first contact' with an ant in your backyard. Honestly, for most humans, it's not even close to worth the time or energy to 'talk' with something like that. We don't even consider a single ant worth of much study at all. Now imagine a people as far advanced of us, as that ant is to you. Now imagine that 10,000 times more advanced. Or 100 million times more. That is the kind of difference we have to consider. The unfortunate reality may be that other civilizations are so far advanced from us (100x? 10,000x? 10 billion?) that we are effectively 'alone' all the same. Like an ant pondering the garden hoses, BBQs, or fence posts of the universe.