4 ms·
The Fermi paradox assumes that "intelligent" is one threshold, and we are beyond it. We couldn't communicate with the most advanced primates from a million yea
by _tom_ 4y ago
The Fermi paradox assumes that "intelligent" is one threshold, and we are beyond it.
We couldn't communicate with the most advanced primates from a million years ago. A civilization a million years past ours would be unlikely to want to talk to us. The average star in our galaxy is a billion years older than our sun.
You can only communicate with civilizations near your level, which are inherently much rarer.
We aren't old/developed enough to be interesting to talk to.
- kiba 4y agoWe couldn't communicate with the most advanced primates from a million years ago. A civilization a million years past ours would be unlikely to want to talk to us. The average star in our galaxy is a billion years older than our sun. Based on what? Just because a civilization is extremely sophisticated doesn't mean we have nothing to offer. We still study primates and ants. Hell, we even desire that we could communicate with chimps and dolphins. Communication is impossible with primates and ants simply because they lack the hardware to engage in abstract communication.
- serpix 4y agoWe as a species are very hostile towards all forms of life on earth. Some of us are scientists and open to communication and peaceful existence. Some of us are locusts, everything is devoured for personal gain. Our track record for meeting other species and other human cultures is such that were the roles reversed, meeting a human traveller from another star system would better be met with armed resistance.
- ProAm 4y agoIt really comes down to distance and timing. Space is too big and the speed of light is too slow.
- saalweachter 4y agoSo a fun thing to try to think about is "What's missing from our intelligence?" Our brains may just be made up of lumps of neurons, but we can break out various capabilities we have: * language * tool use * memory * ability to think about hypothetical situations * ability to think about abstract concepts * theory of mind We can think about what alien creatures or civilizations are like that lack them. A civilization without tool use, a civilization without language, a creature with no memory. But thinking about capabilities we don't have is really hard, because, you know, if they exist, my brain isn't equipped to think about them. I can think about having a perfect memory, or being able to think about N things in parallel, or being able to learn things by directly copying the information to my brain. Are those good enough to be new capabilities, or are they just minor variations of the capabilities I already have?
- anotherman554 4y agoIf you look at animals on earth, they just aren't curious about many of the things we are curious about. My cats for example don't find television interesting. Suppose there's some property of physics that looks like random noise to us (maybe like a TV looks like random noise to a cat) but to a different species they see it's something they can model and understand while our species just ignores it?
- withinboredom 4y agoYour cats don’t find the tv interesting because they can’t even see it. Their visual refresh rate is different enough from humans that they just see flashes of images (a refresh rate above 100hz is needed for cats to watch tv or see a screen, IIRC).
- anotherman554 4y agoI don't think making Youtube videos go at 4x speed will result in more interest from the cats, but I'll test it later. Of course the TV thing was just an example, cats don't pass the mirror test (If you put red dye on one part of their face they show no interest in how their face looks different when looking in a mirror).
- withinboredom 4y agoThe speed of the YouTube video doesn’t matter, it’s the refresh rate of the tv or monitor that matter. With a tube tv or older lcd screen, it just looks like a flashing gizmo.
- anotherman554 4y agoI have a 120 hz Oled Android TV. Unless Youtube drops frames speeding up a 30 FPS video 4x should hit 120 FPS. I've never heard of someone filming a video for cats in 4x slow motion and asking people to play it at 4x to entertain a cat, so I'm assuming this experiment has been tried and doesn't work, but I'll give it a shot. (It occurs to me I would need to confirm the Android Youtube app supports 120 FPS otherwise I'd need to play something through a PC).
- yreg 4y agoIf someone built Dyson spheres / swarms, they cannot hide from us even now. Unless it's possible to cheat thermodynamics.