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"...they might be looking too" I've postulated this once or twice on HN before: they're there, but they're not looking for us. Civilizations either self-destr
by dandrews 13y ago
"...they might be looking too"
I've postulated this once or twice on HN before: they're there, but they're not looking for us. Civilizations either self-destruct or they reach technological singularity. At that point, why explore the universe at the unbearable crawl of speed C, only to catalog endless permutations of the same old molecules, nothing to learn that you couldn't derive from first principles.
They spend their resources looking in the opposite direction: not outward, but inward. Down there, past ten or 11 dimensions of superstring theory, far beyond today's dimly seen fundament, beneath all those layers of turtles... that's the real frontier. Smaller, not bigger.
I think that alien civilizations just roll up into a ball and disappear from view, exploring the universe within.
- 3327 13y agoThis is an amazing point of view. Can you please provide any reference for further study?
- dandrews 13y agoNo, sorry - it's an original thought, half baked and poorly researched. Yudkowski's essays, written early in his career, introduced me to the potential of the technological singularity. I've intermittently contemplated what it means while I wait for it to get here. Kurzweil makes an effective and well reasoned case that it is indeed coming, but his fantastic description of life after uploading is cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. Invasion of the Body Snatchers was more prescient IMO: Kauffman: Love, desire, ambition, faith - without them, life's so simple, believe me. Bennell: I don't want any part of it. Kauffman: You're forgetting something, Miles. Bennell: What's that? Kauffman: You have no choice.