I'm not sure how your argument applies to what you cited of my post, but you are not wrong. You don't even need to consider exotic FTL communication, it could j

I'm not sure how your argument applies to what you cited of my post, but you are not wrong. You don't even need to consider exotic FTL communication, it could just be low-power directional radio traffic. In fact, if a full clone of Earth with exactly the same culture and technology as ours was located just a dozen light years from here, chances are we would not be able to detect that civilization. The media is always talking about our expanding radio sphere, but in reality this signal gets very weak and jumbled, very fast, with increasing distance. The means all the misinformed derps who believe aliens are coming to take our resources (a group which includes Stephen Hawking for some reason) can sleep pretty well at night knowing that we have not really advertised our existence yet.