> That we see nothing implies intellgent life is rare, short lived, or we're early in the age of the universe. Or it implies that not everybody's first instinc

> That we see nothing implies intellgent life is rare, short lived, or we're early in the age of the universe. Or it implies that not everybody's first instinct on seeing a vast galaxy is to try to take it over ASAP. If you want resources for quality of life— Gas giants are a thing. If you're an explorer driven by curiosity, then take only samples, leave only memories, right. If you want money— Century-long shipping times with civilization-scaled fuel costs tend to eat into profit margins. If you're worried about survival— genuinely worried about survival, on a level personal enough to motivate action, not just academically or for fun— then the focus is on people you know and care about; all of those are here. In fact, I suspect the ones that see other stars and immediately think "Mine mine all mine!" probably have a higher chance of nuking themselves before they even get out of their star system.