Posted on 12/29/2018 3:45:29 PM PST by BenLurkin
For the precocious hunter of off-Earth life, the Drake equation is the ever-ready, go-to toolkit for estimating just how (not) lonely humans are in the Milky Way galaxy. The equation was developed by astronomer Frank Drake in 1961 in a slight hurry so that attendees of an upcoming conference would have something to confer about, and it breaks down the daunting question "Are we alone?" into more manageable, bite-size chunks.
The equation starts with some straightforward concepts, such as the rate of star formation and the fraction of stars hosting planets. But it quickly moves into tricky terrain, asking for numbers like what fraction of those planets that could host life actually end up evolving intelligent species and what fraction of those planets blast out friendly signals into the cosmos, inviting us Earthlings to a nice little chat.
…
For the Drake equation, we simply have no idea about the uncertainties attached to any of the parameters. What fraction of planets where life could get started eventually develop life? Zero percent? 100 percent? Somewhere in between? Is it 50 percent plus or minus 5 percent? Or plus or minus 25 percent? Or plus 5 percent and minus 25 percent?
And it takes only one unknown uncertainty to sink the whole enterprise. You may chip away at the Drake equation over the course of decades, taking careful observation after careful observation, measuring star-formation rates, hunting for liquid water on planetary surfaces, the works. You may think you're making good progress on nailing down this prediction, but as long as a single parameter still has unknown uncertainty, you haven't made any progress.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
Been pointing this out for years, but am not an astrophysicist and do not play one on TV (and did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.)
Of possible interest
You are not alone.
Settling this question, once-and-for-all:
“We don’t know.”
But we have to flashy thing you anyway.
Then there is always the Fermi Paradox
The Fermi paradox:
the apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence and high probability estimates[1] for the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations.[2] The basic points of the argument, made by physicists Enrico Fermi (1901–1954) are:
There are billions of stars in the galaxy that are similar to the Sun,[3][4] and many of these stars are billions of years older than the Solar system.[5][6]
With high probability, some of these stars have Earth-like planets,[7][8] and if the Earth is typical, some may have developed intelligent life.
Some of these civilizations may have developed interstellar travel, a step the Earth is investigating now.
Even at the slow pace of currently envisioned interstellar travel, the Milky Way galaxy could be completely traversed in a few million years.[9]
According to this line of reasoning, the Earth should have already been visited by extraterrestrial aliens. In an informal conversation, Fermi noted no convincing evidence of this, leading him to ask, “Where is everybody?”[10][11] There have been many attempts to explain the Fermi paradox,[12][13] primarily either suggesting that intelligent extraterrestrial life is extremely rare or proposing reasons that such civilizations have not contacted or visited Earth.
In a country where people actually believe the Globull worming stuff, though, it's no wonder people accept it.
How the Hell people who claim to be all about what science can prove swallow any crap spoon fed to them by the media never ceases to amaze me.
The answer is simple - the universe is too young and dangerous for any civilization to survive long enough and close enough to be even detected.
E.g., say we are the first. Not only is it a question of how long would it take to achieve interstellar travel, but how long until we are obliterated by either volcanism or meteor strikes.
The speed of light problem is real. If we survive 10000 more years, that’s only a spherical radius of 10000 light years for us to be detected.
Someone else would have to be that close and able to detect us. Signals we generate would be weak anyway, which’d reduce the distance. Even if that were the case, by the time they’d get here, we’d already be gone...
More like the “Keep Me Employed” equation.
Then there is the Dark Forest theory - the not-friendly aliens, the predators: the lions, the tigers, the crocodiles, the bears. waiting to pounce on prey, on potential threats, on the helpless, om the week, on the naive ...
“Where is everybody?”
—
Hiding
“Skuld, are you saying that no space aliens ever said ‘Hello’ to us? Not once?”
“Sorry, Keiichi. Sad to say, they never did. The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence [SETI] had been ongoing for decades by your time. Near the end, they crowed-sourced the signal analysis out to over a million home-based computers, each as powerful as a Cray supercomputer of 30 years prior. They searched practically the whole spectrum for a modulated signal across both hemispheres of the sky. They found nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Oh, there were a couple odd one-shot signals, like the famous ‘Wow’ signal in 1977, but never anything definite.”
“So what’s the explanation then? Why is the universe so silent?”
“The answer is simple.”
“Well?”
“Everybody is hiding.”
“Hiding from what?” Keiichi chuckled, “The Borg or something?”
Skuld wasn’t laughing. “Basically, yes.”
“You’re serious.”
“I am. Look, it only takes one [bleep]-hole alien race to ruin the whole neighborhood.”
“Wait, the Borg are real?”
“No. It’s much more primitive than that. It only takes one jerk race to decide that they have to be the only ones to exist in the galaxy. Some time long ago, nobody knows when exactly, some long dead and unnamed alien race built and launched a set of self-replicating probes called Von Neumann probes, named after the famous computer scientist who first postulated them.”
“Self-replicating probes.”
“Yeah. It is actually not all that particularly hard for an advanced civilization to create them. The unmanned probes were automated and operated on fairly simple software. They travelled at sublight speed. They searched for coherent signals and home it on them. When they get a lock they then shove an asteroid to set it on a collision course with the signal source. Then they make more probes from raw material in the ejecta and go out again.”
“But that’s awful!”
“I know. We call them Berserkers, named after the SF author Fred Saberhagen who first wrote several stories about them. Berserkers are just another type of predator, one that preys on intelligent life. Remember what I showed you earlier - that predators will always be found anywhere life exists? It is a universal constant.”
“So is that what happened to the Earth?”
“No. But it would have. Sooner or later.”
“Really?”
“Keiichi, the TV signals transmitted from I Love Lucy in the 1950’s were dozens of light-years out in space by your time. Eventually a Berserker would have locked on and it would have all been over. So even if the KBO didn’t hit, Earth was going to be doomed anyway. I’m sorry.”
“But if Earth’s technology had gotten advanced enough, quickly enough, before they got there then perhaps a defense..”
“No. Then Earth would have just succumbed to gray goo or something else.”
“You think so? Why?”
“Because it’s a simple fact that most sentient races don’t reach the level of spaceflight, or if they do, it is not for very long. Such civilizations typically self-destruct. Or they turn inward. Or they turn murderous.”
“You mean like the Scorpio galaxy, the Empire fighting the Rebel Alliance and all that.”
“Yes. It was remarkable how long their space-faring era lasted given how unstable and violent it was. All that destruction. But all that occurred a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.”
“What happened to them?”
“Some moved on, but most destroyed themselves. The typical pattern.”
“The typical pattern?”
“Eventually these civilizations self-destruct. They reach a critical turning point. Technology progresses faster, then faster, then even faster still, until the line goes almost straight up. Vernon Vinge called it the ‘singularity’. When this happens every individual possesses incredible power. They become demigods, or they think they are. It’s not unlike how Asgard was.”
“And it takes just one bad apple to wreck the whole barrel. Like Sena.”
“Yes. When every person has the power and technology to destroy the world, sooner or later one of them will. Life is delicate. It takes only one deflected asteroid or one vial of grey goo to wipe out all life overnight. It could even be accidental, a science experiment that goes out of control.”
“It’s unstable.”
“The problem is that Earth’s technology would have rapidly progressed to the point where any idiot could build a world-ending weapon, be it biosphere-eating nanites or whatever, even by mistake.”
“So Earth never got to see a cool Star Trek future.”
“Sadly, no. Life is just too fragile. The Star Trek film Into Darkness showed how just one person could mess up even as advanced a civilization as that one. It’s just too easy to drop stuff from orbit.”
Keiichi’s shoulders slumped. “Great. Now you are just bumming me out.”
“Sorry about that. Didn’t mean to. I’m just trying to explain why God had to cut short the story’s ending in Revelation and rescue the survivors. Otherwise nobody would have survived.”
What are the chances that the first aliens to find us are Episcopalians? Military? Fugitives from justice? Space Vikings? Pirates? Missionaries? Psychopaths? Good guys? Bad guys?
Like the first natives seeing the Spanish galleons approaching over the horizon. Might be good news. Might not.
So is it the mystery how the ancients did boob jobs or is it a myth that the did boob jobs?
If there are societies out there they were planted by the same God as we. But you might expect a similar mix of virtue and character flaws among its citizens. The history of our relations with the less-technically-advanced on this earth are any guide, first contact could lead to a rocky relationship.
the apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence and high probability estimates
= = =
Isn’t that the reasoning Tom Foley used with Bush and Iran-Contra, that there is no evidence, which proves how well Bush, et.al. hid it.
As my aging memory recalls, Senator.
HeeHeeeHee !
Good one!
Megan may be full of fake Hollywood ideals but her boobies are 100% Home grown Tennessee Milk Jugs!
So what’s that from?
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