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I wonder about all the extraterrestrial AI swarms that have already imaged earth. Surely it has happened. They must have all spotted our planet millions of yea

by echelon 3mo ago

I wonder about all the extraterrestrial AI swarms that have already imaged earth. Surely it has happened. They must have all spotted our planet millions of years ago and must be watching us with a continuous high-resolution feed. They've seen our dinosaurs. Their interest will really be piqued when they finally see us invent electricity, though that might be some time in the future for them. Perhaps even gravitational lensing is primitive to them. Perhaps they're able to break and manipulate physics and peer directly into our light cone, breaking the speed of light. Perhaps through direct wormholes they're already here - computronium in the very oxygen atoms that surround us. In rock silicates, in the air you breathe, in your hemes, in your brain. Calculating. But perhaps we're the only intelligent species in the entire universe. That is also a possibility. Some big names in astrophysics, such as David Kipping, suggest strongly that we should not rule out that hypothesis. I find his suggestions haunting and beautiful at the same time. You need to watch his videos, and this is a good start: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqEmYU8Y_rI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqEmYU8Y_rI And finally, it may be that we're all just a historical simulation. Or maybe that's ascribing too much importance to ourselves. Maybe we're just a slop simulation on some AI's plaything, existing for no reason at all. Background NPCs with self-importance, ephemeral existences. But procedural generation at scale isn't really all too different from the laws of the physical universe itself. The scale of the universe fills me with awe. Every time I think about it, my worries about random algo-rage and clickbait fades away to nothing. It deeply contextualizes our short time here.

imjonse 3mo ago
>But perhaps we're the only intelligent species in the entire universe. That is also a possibility. Some big names in astrophysics, such as David Kipping, suggest strongly that we should not rule out that hypothesis They may be planted by alien AI to lull us into false sense of security.
conductr 3mo ago
This comment encapsulates how poorly we humans are at accepting unknowns. For me, that explains a lot of our belief systems. The fact we can’t just take the unknown but instead have to fill in the blanks with what ifs. and create a narrative like we know anything about the unknown thing. It helps us feel like we understand it more. That’s literally how religions and a lot of other things get created, it’s a pattern, then the logical person sees the patterns and say it’s a simulation. A quite predictable filling of another blank.
- The_Blade 3mo ago
  [flagged]
  - ethersteeds 3mo ago
    That would be me.
  - adamredwoods 3mo ago
    Abdication syndrome.
  - deleted 3mo ago
    [deleted]
- mlyle 3mo ago
  > and create a narrative like we know anything about the unknown thing. It helps us feel like we understand it more. In fairness, this very often helps us understand the unknown thing more.
- kelipso 3mo ago
  It’s how science and discoveries are done too…
- jaapz 3mo ago
  "dunno" is just a really unsatisfying answer to anything Currently we don't know a lot of things - but without trying out new ideas how are you ever going to know?
  - conductr 3mo ago
    Trying is fine. Saying you don’t know or don’t understand something is not mutually exclusive with trying to learn more
- fwip 3mo ago
  I'd argue that it's this same pattern-seeking drive that undergirds science. "Zeus sends the lightning, his wrath darkening the very sky," is an understandable model that connects "dark storm clouds" to a likely prediction of lightning. That urge to explain the surprising, to find the pattern, leads directly to our understanding of the cosmos.
awfulneutral 3mo ago
If they let me watch the videos of our dinosaurs, I would happily let them use my hemes for their calculations.
jzu48 3mo ago
As Lynn Margulis reminded us we are not the main show. Our individual intelligence is highly over rated. The brain itself is kludge upon kludge accumulating over thousands of years, to solve problems that keep changing with time and environmental changes. Its quite a piece of crap actually if you tabulate all the accumulated junk. We arent as interesting as we think we are. Some of the tech and knowledge generated might be interesting. But compare it with to photosynthesis or butterfly metamorphosis or the fact that microbes can double their population in a few hours, all of which is happening without needing any human intelligence. So they may very well be watching but are more curious about a rose or a redwood tree than all the random and superficial activity the chimp brain produces.
- QuercusMax 3mo ago
  I'd be impressed if those microbes or butterflies visited the moon and came back to tell about it.
  - kakacik 3mo ago
    Maybe visiting moon is overrated. We can't know, we have very narrow tube vision centered around our rather primitive lives. Effectively immortal organisms may be more impressive. Or those surviving in anaerobis boiling water conditions. Or fixing radiation defects like its nothing. Or vacuum. Or...
- shevy-java 3mo ago
  > But compare it with to photosynthesis Artifical solar capture systems exist. Synthetic biology also bridges that gap as well and the genetic basis is known and has been manipulated. Granted, coming up with more efficient photosynthesis is very hard, but I don't share your "we humans are stupid" opinion here at all whatsoever. > or butterfly metamorphosis Nothing fascinating here. It is just a genetic program. Viruses have similar programs too - yes, no metamorphosis, but take retroviruses and the syncytium. Mammals only reproduce thanks to retroviruses (not 100% correct, but look at this here: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0707873105 https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0707873105) > or the fact that microbes can double their population in a few hours Wow, we humans surely do not have cells that double. Oh wait ... nevermind. Humans consist of cells. Who would have thought... Yes, microbes are much faster, but they don't have to coordinate as much as humans do in 3D, not even in a bacterial biofilm. And we have to double a lot more DNA than bacteria do, so of course they are faster. > about a rose or a redwood tree than all the random and superficial activity the chimp brain produces That comparison is weird. A rose is thinking as much as a chimp brain? The human brain is special. Chimps are very clever too but humans have very solid abstract thinking. Animals have this too, to some extent (predator hunting prey, chimps have hunting strategies) but e. g. look at mathematics - animals don't waste their time coming up with higher order theorems.
mr_toad 3mo ago
I doubt any new physics will be needed, just computational imaging, meta-optics, very long baselines (multi AU, or even light years).
ErigmolCt 3mo ago
I do not really believe the wormholes or computronium scenario, but letting my mind run through those possibilities resets my sense of scale
rixed 3mo ago
> all the extraterrestrial AI swarms It's expected that a human would associate life with intelligence, but it's also a bit of a contradiction because it does not seem very intelligent to do so given all we know about the history of life on our planet.

by echelon 3mo ago

imjonse 3mo ago

>But perhaps we're the only intelligent species in the entire universe. That is also a possibility. Some big names in astrophysics, such as David Kipping, suggest strongly that we should not rule out that hypothesis They may be planted by alien AI to lull us into false sense of security.

conductr 3mo ago

This comment encapsulates how poorly we humans are at accepting unknowns. For me, that explains a lot of our belief systems. The fact we can’t just take the unknown but instead have to fill in the blanks with what ifs. and create a narrative like we know anything about the unknown thing. It helps us feel like we understand it more. That’s literally how religions and a lot of other things get created, it’s a pattern, then the logical person sees the patterns and say it’s a simulation. A quite predictable filling of another blank.

The_Blade 3mo ago
[flagged]
- ethersteeds 3mo ago
  That would be me.
- adamredwoods 3mo ago
  Abdication syndrome.
- deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
mlyle 3mo ago
> and create a narrative like we know anything about the unknown thing. It helps us feel like we understand it more. In fairness, this very often helps us understand the unknown thing more.
kelipso 3mo ago
It’s how science and discoveries are done too…
jaapz 3mo ago
"dunno" is just a really unsatisfying answer to anything Currently we don't know a lot of things - but without trying out new ideas how are you ever going to know?
- conductr 3mo ago
  Trying is fine. Saying you don’t know or don’t understand something is not mutually exclusive with trying to learn more
fwip 3mo ago
I'd argue that it's this same pattern-seeking drive that undergirds science. "Zeus sends the lightning, his wrath darkening the very sky," is an understandable model that connects "dark storm clouds" to a likely prediction of lightning. That urge to explain the surprising, to find the pattern, leads directly to our understanding of the cosmos.

awfulneutral 3mo ago

If they let me watch the videos of our dinosaurs, I would happily let them use my hemes for their calculations.

jzu48 3mo ago

As Lynn Margulis reminded us we are not the main show. Our individual intelligence is highly over rated. The brain itself is kludge upon kludge accumulating over thousands of years, to solve problems that keep changing with time and environmental changes. Its quite a piece of crap actually if you tabulate all the accumulated junk. We arent as interesting as we think we are. Some of the tech and knowledge generated might be interesting. But compare it with to photosynthesis or butterfly metamorphosis or the fact that microbes can double their population in a few hours, all of which is happening without needing any human intelligence. So they may very well be watching but are more curious about a rose or a redwood tree than all the random and superficial activity the chimp brain produces.

QuercusMax 3mo ago
I'd be impressed if those microbes or butterflies visited the moon and came back to tell about it.
- kakacik 3mo ago
  Maybe visiting moon is overrated. We can't know, we have very narrow tube vision centered around our rather primitive lives. Effectively immortal organisms may be more impressive. Or those surviving in anaerobis boiling water conditions. Or fixing radiation defects like its nothing. Or vacuum. Or...
shevy-java 3mo ago
> But compare it with to photosynthesis Artifical solar capture systems exist. Synthetic biology also bridges that gap as well and the genetic basis is known and has been manipulated. Granted, coming up with more efficient photosynthesis is very hard, but I don't share your "we humans are stupid" opinion here at all whatsoever. > or butterfly metamorphosis Nothing fascinating here. It is just a genetic program. Viruses have similar programs too - yes, no metamorphosis, but take retroviruses and the syncytium. Mammals only reproduce thanks to retroviruses (not 100% correct, but look at this here: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0707873105 https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0707873105) > or the fact that microbes can double their population in a few hours Wow, we humans surely do not have cells that double. Oh wait ... nevermind. Humans consist of cells. Who would have thought... Yes, microbes are much faster, but they don't have to coordinate as much as humans do in 3D, not even in a bacterial biofilm. And we have to double a lot more DNA than bacteria do, so of course they are faster. > about a rose or a redwood tree than all the random and superficial activity the chimp brain produces That comparison is weird. A rose is thinking as much as a chimp brain? The human brain is special. Chimps are very clever too but humans have very solid abstract thinking. Animals have this too, to some extent (predator hunting prey, chimps have hunting strategies) but e. g. look at mathematics - animals don't waste their time coming up with higher order theorems.

mr_toad 3mo ago

I doubt any new physics will be needed, just computational imaging, meta-optics, very long baselines (multi AU, or even light years).

ErigmolCt 3mo ago

I do not really believe the wormholes or computronium scenario, but letting my mind run through those possibilities resets my sense of scale

rixed 3mo ago

> all the extraterrestrial AI swarms It's expected that a human would associate life with intelligence, but it's also a bit of a contradiction because it does not seem very intelligent to do so given all we know about the history of life on our planet.