Pre-spaceflight NPR?

[Person012345]

^^Fermi paradox

No, that's not it. That's saying they tend to die quickly based on lack of evidence of their existence isn't it? Unless there's some part of the fermi paradox I'm missing, that's not what I'm saying at all. I would be saying nothing on whether they do last long or not, but we're specifically talking about the time between when they become civilized and when they become trans-newtonian. The fermi paradox is not what I mean, although it may be tangentially related to the concept applied to the real world. But we're talking about a specific timeframe, anything outside of that is irrelevant.

Let me try and find out what it is called.

[Person012345]

I'm thinking I've heard of it referred to as the idea that any aliens around right now would either be ascended or amoeba. That is to say, they would be highly technologically advanced, or would be simple organisms.

Think of it like randomly putting dots or short lines on a mile long piece of paper - it's unlikely that any of them will overlap. Since we assume that it takes approximately 10,000 years for a civilization to become trans-newtonian (again, not based on the fermi anything, because that's irrelevant in a universe where we -have- found ET life, but based on the fact that the default start date in aurora is 2025 or w/e it is, and thus it would have taken humans that long), it spends only 10,000 years in a state of non-trans-newtonian civilization. That's 10,000 years in the 14 billion year history of the universe, or even just the 4 billion year history of the planet. If there was another planet created at the same time as earth, exactly like earth, there's no reason to think that it would have gained intelligence at the same time as us. If it had taken just 12,000 years longer to get there, we wouldn't be seeing it as a pre-trans-newtonian civilisation in aurora until the year 4000 or so. And much longer if we assume the pre-trans-newtonian race needs at least city-level technology. Whilst 12,000 years might seem like a long time to you, remember that the life on both planets has already been evolving for 4 billion years (4,000,000,000 years, to put it in perspective). For it to take an additional 12,000 is nothing.

Another way - if you had a program instructed to randomly generate a "special" point or 10,000 with a probability of it happening once every 4 billion points, it's unlikely that if you ran even a large number of the program, you would end up with any of the simulations overlapping the points with each other.

Although as I say, I didn't do that math, I don't know how many it would take to make it probable, or how many life-bearing planets there are.

[Havear]

I'm obligated to provide the following: http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/aliens.php

[DatAlien]

If I remember correctly, the precursor used to kill every civilization archiving spaceflight until recently when they were destroyed by the invader so we have no really far advanced civs.

[Person012345]

I'm obligated to provide the following: http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/aliens.php

Yeah, thanks, that's pretty much what I'm talking about.

[Haji]

No, that's not it. That's saying they tend to die quickly based on lack of evidence of their existence isn't it?

Far from it.

Generally any race with even limited inclination for exploration would overrun (as in: colonise every single planet) the galaxy within less than a million years, even assuming FTL travel is impossible. Considering our galaxy is eight billions years old and according to some equations life is pretty common (even intelligent one) the galaxy should be colonised a thousand times over - including Earth.

So where are all those civilizations? The paradox is more or less as follows: if intelligent aliens can exist, why haven't we found evidence of their existance? Becouse based on probabilities, if alien intelligence can exist at all, it should already have existed and filled the galaxy.

Note: I was going from my head, for more details consult wikipedia, I'm sure they'll have something on this.

[Person012345]

Far from it.

Generally any race with even limited inclination for exploration would overrun (as in: colonise every single planet) the galaxy within less than a million years, even assuming FTL travel is impossible. Considering our galaxy is eight billions years old and according to some equations life is pretty common (even intelligent one) the galaxy should be colonised a thousand times over - including Earth.

So where are all those civilizations? The paradox is more or less as follows: if intelligent aliens can exist, why haven't we found evidence of their existance? Becouse based on probabilities, if alien intelligence can exist at all, it should already have existed and filled the galaxy.

Note: I was going from my head, for more details consult wikipedia, I'm sure they'll have something on this.

Exactly. And therefore, it is reasoned, intelligent life must destroy itself before it gets the chance to overrun the galaxy.

[Haji]

Exactly. And therefore, it is reasoned, intelligent life must destroy itself before it gets the chance to overrun the galaxy.

A paradox is a "is a statement or group of statements that lead to a contradiction or a situation which (if true) defies logic or reason, similar to circular reasoning." (quote taken from wikipedia). What you describe is a theory (one that Fermi did not postulate) that the existance of Fermi's Paradox means civilizations had to destroy themselves. But that's only one of possible explanations. Other explanations (again, those were not postulated by Fermi; he marely formulised the paradox) are, for example, that the intelligent life other than humans never existed. Or that it was destroyed by outside force. Of that they did not die off, but ascended to higher plane of existance.

I guess I'm just nitpicking here, but it seems for me kinda... wrong for somone to just use their own theories and mis-label them as a concept developed by a great scientist. It's as if I have said that "gravity's goes left" is Newton's Law of Gravity.

[Person012345]

The fermi paradox is thus:
The Fermi paradox (Fermi's paradox or Fermi-paradox) is the apparent contradiction between high estimates of the probability of the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations and the lack of evidence for, or contact with, such civilizations.[1]

It says that life tends to expand and that we haven't met it contradicts the high estimates of probability. The implication, therefore, is that intelligent life doesn't tend to last very long. I'm aware that's not the only resolution of it, but whatever.

Regardless, it has nothing to do with what I'm saying.

[HaliRyan]

Exactly. And therefore, it is reasoned, intelligent life must destroy itself before it gets the chance to overrun the galaxy.

Or FTL is impossible and interstellar colonization is simply infeasible, leaving species to only ever exist on their home planet.

Example - How many people would sign up for a generational ship knowing they'll never see the planet they're going to and that everyone involved may die if they have too many breakdowns over the course of the trip (or are exceptionally unlucky and hit a small rock en route). Further, who's going to fund the trip? The investment is a total write-off if you stay behind as you'll never hear from the ship again and shipments of goods between colonies at sublight speeds are unlikely in the extreme, so the people taking the trip are almost certainly the ones who will need to fund it. But then you've got the issue of it being massively expensive, and that the people who can afford it are the least likely to be interested in doing it - Why would I spend the rest of my days in a giant metal coffin so that my children can maybe explore a new world when I can use my billions of dollars to provide a life of leisure for myself and them on Earth?

TLDR; races evolve and spend their entire existence in a single solar system, never overrunning the galaxy.

[Person012345]

Or FTL is impossible and interstellar colonization is simply infeasible, leaving species to only ever exist on their home planet.

Example - How many people would sign up for a generational ship knowing they'll never see the planet they're going to and that everyone involved may die if they have too many breakdowns over the course of the trip (or are exceptionally unlucky and hit a small rock en route). Further, who's going to fund the trip? The investment is a total write-off if you stay behind as you'll never hear from the ship again and shipments of goods between colonies at sublight speeds are unlikely in the extreme, so the people taking the trip are almost certainly the ones who will need to fund it. But then you've got the issue of it being massively expensive, and that the people who can afford it are the least likely to be interested in doing it - Why would I spend the rest of my days in a giant metal coffin so that my children can maybe explore a new world when I can use my billions of dollars to provide a life of leisure for myself and them on Earth?

TLDR; races evolve and spend their entire existence in a single solar system, never overrunning the galaxy.

I don't consider the fermi paradox as particularly strong. It seems to assume a biological imperative to expand life into every available area. Which I don't think is the case. We can, right now, get to alpha centauri in about 40 - 80 years. But we haven't. Because why would we? We don't know what's there, it would just be a huge waste. There's no reason to think an alien species would not behave similarly. There is something to be said for the idea as applied to radio signals - we've so far been able to detect diddly squat in the way of intelligent-appearing radio signals, and one would assume that aliens would at least be trying that much.

On the other hand, the thing that I mentioned, not the fermi paradox, is what pretty much put the final nail in the coffin of any ideas I might have had regarding finding intelligent life in my mind. Even just communication through radio signals and such.

[Nathan_]

We can, right now, get to alpha centauri in about 40 - 80 years. But we haven't. Because why would we?

The best we can theoretically do at the moment is 130 years, and there are numerous engineering problems to be solved even with that. Lastly is the little problem of our rocket violating every nuclear and space treaty ever signed. And all that is just to move a 300 ton probe, we are a long way off from moving anything geniunely meaningful between the stars, though I do believe it is ultimately possible.

[Person012345]

The best we can theoretically do at the moment is 130 years, and there are numerous engineering problems to be solved even with that. Lastly is the little problem of our rocket violating every nuclear and space treaty ever signed. And all that is just to move a 300 ton probe, we are a long way off from moving anything geniunely meaningful between the stars, though I do believe it is ultimately possible.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_%28nuclear_propulsion%29#Interstellar_missions

44 years at 0.1c, assuming saving fuel for slowdown it could take up to twice that. Using thermonuclear weapons. The designs for the orion that we can build right now could potentially be very meaningful. Your point about the treaty doesn't do anything to dispute what I said.

I believe the 130 figure is based on atomic weaponry. We of course have more efficient bombs than those now (as it mentiones below the table, my figure comes from later studies considering thermonuclear weapons).

[Haji]

I think people are approaching this discussion from the wrong angle.

When I look at most post I see sentences like: "Aliens are A or Aliens behave like B" or something like that. It's as if most people here threated thousand diffrent aliens like just faceless creations, each behaving in a preprogrammed way.

But that's the whole point. They aren't like that. If the equations about high life probability are right, then in the whole history of our galaxy there were thousands or even more species. Some were carnivores, some were herbivores, some were omnivores and most of aliens probably developed on planets so alien, that those classifications lose their meaning.

Simirarly, you can't just say: hey, look at us, stupid humans, we're still at home, so obviously ten thousand diffrent alien species from ten thousand diffrent planets would behave exactly like us.

I mean, look at Earth. There are over two hundred sovereign, political states, but how much more nations are there. How many diffrent philosophies. For every alien spiecies you consider, you probably have to consider hundreds of states and philosophies it created.

And that's the whole point of the paradox. Of all those possibilities, you only need a species with drive towards space exploration once. A single species, a single nation could overrun the galaxy in less than a million years. And according to the equations there should be thousands of aliens already.

So where are they?

This is probably the biggest problem I have with Person012345 statement. He just looks at empty skies, looks at Earth and says: oh, so all those alien species must be exactly the same and meet exactly the same end: self-termination before they could spread. I just can't accept that.

[Person012345]

This is probably the biggest problem I have with Person012345 statement. He just looks at empty skies, looks at Earth and says: oh, so all those alien species must be exactly the same and meet exactly the same end: self-termination before they could spread. I just can't accept that.

I'm sorry, are you reading a different discussion to the one i am? I've already said I don't believe the fermi paradox to be a strong argument against the existence of aliens for the exact reason you outlined above.

Please go back and read the conversation. I'm not supporting the fermi paradox. Someone mis-labelled my point as the fermi paradox.

my point is about the sheer improbability of two random periods of 10,000 years coinciding or overlapping in a galaxy that is 14 billion years old. Go back and read the link someone posted. The reason I am taking the 10,000 years is quite a simple one - the game, by default, is set in the year 2025. That means that humans have been around for about 10,000 years before going trans-newtonian. It is thus reasonable to assume that aliens would take a similar amount of time. Yes this is an assumption, but it's the only one we have evidence for. And even if some were slow, that's not going to matter. WHAT COMES AFTER AND HOW LONG THEY COULD TECHNICALLY CONTINUE IS IRRELEVANT.

Even if we don't take the default time of aurora, i highly doubt people regularly type a 6 figure number into the start date box. If we're talking thousands of years post-current-date, the same point still applies.

If there was even a 0.1% deviation in the amount of time (I think that's what that link said) it takes life to involve intelligence on two otherwise identical planets in the same solar system, they would never even meet each other as two pre/early trans-newtonian civilizations. to the more advanced civ they would find apes when they looked, and 10,000 years later (remember that life would have been evolving for about 4.5 billion years already, an extra 10k is nothing in the grand scheme of things) the less advance civs would find a highly advanced race. When you put this on a galactic scale, it's so unlikely that any 2 modern age civs would co-exist at the same time within reachable range.

I'm not sure how much clearer I can make myself. it's now up to you to ask questions you might have about what I'm saying if you don't understand where I'm coming from.