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> complex highly intelligent life capable of space flight is extraordinarily rare in space and time That feels right to me especially given the timescales we a
by adriand 2y ago
> complex highly intelligent life capable of space flight is extraordinarily rare in space and time
That feels right to me especially given the timescales we are dealing with when we consider things even just in a galactic context. Heck, even the timescales on this planet alone are such that there could be multiple complex intelligent life forms on earth separated by sufficient time that they are never known to one another! Not to mention the fact that there are intelligent life forms on earth right now that we barely understand. For all these reasons It seems to me that we are far more likely to come across an alien artifact than an alien, and we haven’t started looking for these.
- AlexAndScripts 2y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silurian_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silurian_hypothesis Would we know if they went to space? How long would a geostationary satellite remain? It's both haunting and brilliant to think about the idea of entire other intelligent species and civilisations having lived on this planet without us ever knowing. Fire and iron and cities and empires and "great people", cultures and religions and stories and families... Civilisations and species rising and falling throughout the eons. It feels a little reminiscent of Sagan's "Pale Blue Dot", but on the scale of time, not space. I wonder if they might have considered this too.
- Aerroon 2y agoFrom what I understand an industrial civilization would've left evidence that would've been found by now. Building ruins, mines, unnatural concentrations of certain elements that let us determine atmospheric composition etc.