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I think that ubiquitous global communication is the "Great Filter" that prevents intelligent civilizations from colonizing the universe. Before any intelligen

I think that ubiquitous global communication is the "Great Filter" that prevents intelligent civilizations from colonizing the universe. Before any intelligent species can hope to tackle a problem like that, they invent something like the internet. And once they've invented an internet, they become addicted to low latency communication and will never stray far from it, at least not in significant numbers. Even one year of latency becomes utterly intolerable once an intelligent species has been using an internet for a few generations.

birdyrooster 5y ago
Humans will never make it, but our computers will. The internet is the singularity now.
- bckr 5y ago
  This comment is probably about 3 or 4 decades too early.
  - birdyrooster 5y ago
    You had to say probably. For me, that's enough. It could have already happened.
    - bckr 5y ago
      > You had to say probably. For me, that's enough. It could have already happened. This is the inverse of the intended interpretation. By "probably x decades early", I mean "at least x decades early". I did not mean "it has probably not happened". The singularity is not guaranteed to happen and with a high confidence has not already happened.
marcosdumay 5y ago
> at least not in significant numbers That's ok. Insignificant numbers are more than enough to colonize an entire galaxy on geologic timescales. The thing about the "Great Filter" is that it is great. If you can even imagine an exception for your candidate filter, then it's not great enough.
- slipframe 5y ago
  I'm thinking that if you sent a dozen people to Alpha Centari, it wouldn't make any difference because that is under the threshold of people that would be required to establish a self-sustaining colony that, in turn, sends out similar expeditions in the future. Do that sort of stunt as much as you like, it won't become something more. It's like trying to jump over a building by hopping a bunch. You can hop one time or one billion times, you won't clear the building because after each failed hop you're back to square one.
  - nitrogen 5y ago
    under the threshold of people that would be required to establish a self-sustaining colony Such a small group of people, armed with current genetic engineering and future artificial means of reproduction, could bring with them enough genetic diversity and reproductive capacity to reach colonizing scale. You can hop one time or one billion times, you won't clear the building because after each failed hop you're back to square one. Despite the first part of my reply, this point about minimum activation energy is relevant to a lot of contexts, from escaping poverty to switching careers, from getting fit to overcoming medical conditions. This is a pretty good analogy that I might use in the future.
    - slipframe 5y ago
      I think genetics is actually the easy part. A few dozen or so people, selected for strong health, probably contain enough genetic material in their groins to start a colony. More would doubtlessly be better, but I think such things have been done by humans on earth before. Frozen eggs/sperm and women willing to be surrogate mothers help a lot too; you wouldn't need artificial womb technology, necessarily. The hard part I think is "playing factorio IRL" on a planet we weren't evolved to cope with. Bootstrapping industry sufficient even to create additional shelters would be very challenging. Maybe we could practice this on Mars.
      - erik_seaberg 5y ago
        I want to see it, but does a Mars colony have any chance before we’ve tested solutions for the major issues that Biosphere 2 quickly ran into?
throwaaskjdfh 5y ago
I suspect the Great Filter is that sufficiently intelligent life has no interest in expansion, and doesn't communicate at all.
- ben_w 5y ago
  Only stable if the whole society can force itself to not even want to expand. If 1 per billion wants to expand, out of a population of 8 billion, you have 8 expansionists. If each of them breaks the social conventions and have twice as many offspring as the sustainers (and if the desire is heritable), after 30 generations they’re now equal in number to the sustainers. Cambridge University is in the order of 30 generations old. https://isogg.org/wiki/How_long_is_a_generation%3F_Science_provides_an_answer https://isogg.org/wiki/How_long_is_a_generation%3F_Science_p...

birdyrooster 5y ago

Humans will never make it, but our computers will. The internet is the singularity now.

bckr 5y ago
This comment is probably about 3 or 4 decades too early.
- birdyrooster 5y ago
  You had to say probably. For me, that's enough. It could have already happened.
  - bckr 5y ago
    > You had to say probably. For me, that's enough. It could have already happened. This is the inverse of the intended interpretation. By "probably x decades early", I mean "at least x decades early". I did not mean "it has probably not happened". The singularity is not guaranteed to happen and with a high confidence has not already happened.

marcosdumay 5y ago

> at least not in significant numbers That's ok. Insignificant numbers are more than enough to colonize an entire galaxy on geologic timescales. The thing about the "Great Filter" is that it is great. If you can even imagine an exception for your candidate filter, then it's not great enough.

slipframe 5y ago
I'm thinking that if you sent a dozen people to Alpha Centari, it wouldn't make any difference because that is under the threshold of people that would be required to establish a self-sustaining colony that, in turn, sends out similar expeditions in the future. Do that sort of stunt as much as you like, it won't become something more. It's like trying to jump over a building by hopping a bunch. You can hop one time or one billion times, you won't clear the building because after each failed hop you're back to square one.
- nitrogen 5y ago
  under the threshold of people that would be required to establish a self-sustaining colony Such a small group of people, armed with current genetic engineering and future artificial means of reproduction, could bring with them enough genetic diversity and reproductive capacity to reach colonizing scale. You can hop one time or one billion times, you won't clear the building because after each failed hop you're back to square one. Despite the first part of my reply, this point about minimum activation energy is relevant to a lot of contexts, from escaping poverty to switching careers, from getting fit to overcoming medical conditions. This is a pretty good analogy that I might use in the future.
  - slipframe 5y ago
    I think genetics is actually the easy part. A few dozen or so people, selected for strong health, probably contain enough genetic material in their groins to start a colony. More would doubtlessly be better, but I think such things have been done by humans on earth before. Frozen eggs/sperm and women willing to be surrogate mothers help a lot too; you wouldn't need artificial womb technology, necessarily. The hard part I think is "playing factorio IRL" on a planet we weren't evolved to cope with. Bootstrapping industry sufficient even to create additional shelters would be very challenging. Maybe we could practice this on Mars.
    - erik_seaberg 5y ago
      I want to see it, but does a Mars colony have any chance before we’ve tested solutions for the major issues that Biosphere 2 quickly ran into?

throwaaskjdfh 5y ago

I suspect the Great Filter is that sufficiently intelligent life has no interest in expansion, and doesn't communicate at all.

ben_w 5y ago
Only stable if the whole society can force itself to not even want to expand. If 1 per billion wants to expand, out of a population of 8 billion, you have 8 expansionists. If each of them breaks the social conventions and have twice as many offspring as the sustainers (and if the desire is heritable), after 30 generations they’re now equal in number to the sustainers. Cambridge University is in the order of 30 generations old. https://isogg.org/wiki/How_long_is_a_generation%3F_Science_provides_an_answer https://isogg.org/wiki/How_long_is_a_generation%3F_Science_p...