9 ms·

I mean, maybe. Honestly hard for me to imagine war actually going on between two interstellar civilizations. But even if it did, it seems like in 99% of all c

I mean, maybe. Honestly hard for me to imagine war actually going on between two interstellar civilizations. But even if it did, it seems like in 99% of all cases, that would leave at least one of the two civilizations still around. We're looking for explanations, in this hypothesis, that leave 98% of all time with no civilizations.

kadoban 5y ago
Maybe war between two spacefaring civilizations is too "easy". eg something like: throwing asteroids at ~the speed of light is necessarily a cheap thing to do once you're at that level, and everyone just dies. Like if on Earth nukes were something everyone could cook up in their backyard in an afternoon, we'd all be gone pretty quick. Not sure that really makes any sense though.
- tjalfi 5y ago
  > Maybe war between two spacefaring civilizations is too "easy". eg something like: throwing asteroids at ~the speed of light is necessarily a cheap thing to do once you're at that level, and everyone just dies. The Killing Star[0] and Flying to Valhalla by Charles Pellegrino are based around the idea that it's natural for a species to annihilate all other sentient species. The characters define three rules that an alien species may be operating by. Rule 1. Aliens will believe their survival is more important than our survival. Rule 2. Wimps don't become top dogs. Rule 3. Aliens will assume that the first two rules apply to us as well. [0] https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/TheKillingStar https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/TheKilling...
  - Supermancho 5y ago
    Given the relative emptiness of observed space, im not convinced that a civilization A would try to annihilate all life but would maybe war with others in their light cone who threaten civA goals/expansion. If you can traverse interstellar space you can probably make home most anywhere further reducing the amount of potential conflict.
    - kadoban 5y ago
      How likely does it seem that if you can traverse interstellar space, your civilization splinters over time and your potential for internal conflict just grows without bound?
      - pharke 5y ago
        If you can traverse interstellar space you are pretty much required to "live off the land" as you go and especially so once you reach your destination. This means you possess the ability to produce all of the energy, food, material, etc. required for a civilization to exist from what is present in either interstellar space or a solar system. If we put our sci-fi hats on we can imagine a perfect system of recycling and matter conversion that can keep a massive generational ship functioning with the only input being hydrogen scooped from the space it crosses. If you possess that level of sophistication then you really could live anywhere. That gives you plenty of living space with little motivation to pre-emptively attack others.
- babelfish 5y ago
  Spoilers for The Dark Forest and The Remembrance of Earth's Past Trilogy below. In the book that the OP article is based on, humanity is doing anything and everything to prevent/defend themselves against an alien invasion happening ~400 years in the future. The character who coins "Dark Forest" theory in the book proposes sending a 'spell' (just a signal containing coordinates) to a nearby star, which is then amplified throughout the universe via "Sci-Fi science". This reveals the location of the star, and shortly after the star is destroyed by some comet-sized object moving at the speed of light. It's later revealed that some other civilization listens for broadcasts on every spectrum, decodes them for coordinates, then destroys the ones that seem to have actually been sent by intelligent life. I thought this made perfect sense - why wouldn't another intelligent species do this if they possess the technology? I personally agree with "Dark Forest" theory and think that we should /never/ make first contact (lest we are destroyed), but if we were to attempt first contact, we should at the very least have a weapon like you described available to us first.
  - pharke 5y ago
    > why wouldn't another intelligent species do this if they possess the technology? I think the only question we can ask here is "Would we do this if we possessed the technology?". We only have ourselves as an example of intelligent life.
- zarzavat 5y ago
  You may be on to something there. Nukes aren't something that you can cook up in your back yard yet but it seems inevitable that at a certain level of technology they will be. The same is even more true for biological warfare. Society probably only functions below a certain level of technological advancement before everybody dies to an onslaught of engineered diseases.

kadoban 5y ago

Maybe war between two spacefaring civilizations is too "easy". eg something like: throwing asteroids at ~the speed of light is necessarily a cheap thing to do once you're at that level, and everyone just dies. Like if on Earth nukes were something everyone could cook up in their backyard in an afternoon, we'd all be gone pretty quick. Not sure that really makes any sense though.

tjalfi 5y ago
> Maybe war between two spacefaring civilizations is too "easy". eg something like: throwing asteroids at ~the speed of light is necessarily a cheap thing to do once you're at that level, and everyone just dies. The Killing Star[0] and Flying to Valhalla by Charles Pellegrino are based around the idea that it's natural for a species to annihilate all other sentient species. The characters define three rules that an alien species may be operating by. Rule 1. Aliens will believe their survival is more important than our survival. Rule 2. Wimps don't become top dogs. Rule 3. Aliens will assume that the first two rules apply to us as well. [0] https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/TheKillingStar https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/TheKilling...
- Supermancho 5y ago
  Given the relative emptiness of observed space, im not convinced that a civilization A would try to annihilate all life but would maybe war with others in their light cone who threaten civA goals/expansion. If you can traverse interstellar space you can probably make home most anywhere further reducing the amount of potential conflict.
  - kadoban 5y ago
    How likely does it seem that if you can traverse interstellar space, your civilization splinters over time and your potential for internal conflict just grows without bound?
    - pharke 5y ago
      If you can traverse interstellar space you are pretty much required to "live off the land" as you go and especially so once you reach your destination. This means you possess the ability to produce all of the energy, food, material, etc. required for a civilization to exist from what is present in either interstellar space or a solar system. If we put our sci-fi hats on we can imagine a perfect system of recycling and matter conversion that can keep a massive generational ship functioning with the only input being hydrogen scooped from the space it crosses. If you possess that level of sophistication then you really could live anywhere. That gives you plenty of living space with little motivation to pre-emptively attack others.
babelfish 5y ago
Spoilers for The Dark Forest and The Remembrance of Earth's Past Trilogy below. In the book that the OP article is based on, humanity is doing anything and everything to prevent/defend themselves against an alien invasion happening ~400 years in the future. The character who coins "Dark Forest" theory in the book proposes sending a 'spell' (just a signal containing coordinates) to a nearby star, which is then amplified throughout the universe via "Sci-Fi science". This reveals the location of the star, and shortly after the star is destroyed by some comet-sized object moving at the speed of light. It's later revealed that some other civilization listens for broadcasts on every spectrum, decodes them for coordinates, then destroys the ones that seem to have actually been sent by intelligent life. I thought this made perfect sense - why wouldn't another intelligent species do this if they possess the technology? I personally agree with "Dark Forest" theory and think that we should /never/ make first contact (lest we are destroyed), but if we were to attempt first contact, we should at the very least have a weapon like you described available to us first.
- pharke 5y ago
  > why wouldn't another intelligent species do this if they possess the technology? I think the only question we can ask here is "Would we do this if we possessed the technology?". We only have ourselves as an example of intelligent life.
zarzavat 5y ago
You may be on to something there. Nukes aren't something that you can cook up in your back yard yet but it seems inevitable that at a certain level of technology they will be. The same is even more true for biological warfare. Society probably only functions below a certain level of technological advancement before everybody dies to an onslaught of engineered diseases.