The aliens are silent because they are dead

[wolram]

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/01/160121110932.htm

Date:
January 21, 2016
Source:
Australian National University
Summary:
The universe is probably filled with habitable planets, so many scientists think it should be teeming with aliens. But life on other planets would likely be brief and become extinct very quickly, say astrobiologists. In research aiming to understand how life might develop, the scientists realized new life would commonly die out due to runaway heating or cooling on their fledgling planets.

So is SETI a waste of time or is there life amidst the thousands of Earth like planets.

 

[Charles Kottler]

It seems improbable to me that ours is the only planet to have evolved complex life forms. However you work the maths, the number of planets capable of supporting some form of life is staggering. Take a look at the variety of 'extremophile' life forms on Earth: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremophile

Once life gains a foothold it spreads. Rapid climate change may kill the majority of life but surely not all? Once a new stable point is reached the remaining organisms would thrive, mutate and spread again...

Long live SETI!

 

[rootone]

It's possible that SETI or something similar could find evidence of intelligent life.
However we wouldn't be able to have any kind of conversation with them.
Even if they are fairly close in cosmic scale of things it's still going to take decades, more likely centuries to get any reply to 'hi there'.

 

[Garth]

May it be that the aliens are silent because they are sensible? - That is the ones that are sensible enough to manage to survive the technology crisis and not wipe themselves off the face of their planets.

These would be sensible enough to have sustainable technologies, sustainable over millions or even billions of years.

They also would therefore not waste energy by leaking it through broadcasting into space but have narrow band and narrow beam communication systems or fibre-optic type systems.

Perhaps one day we too may become 'sensible', but so far it doesn't look too good...

Garth

 

[Rubidium_71]

Rapid climate change may kill the majority of life but surely not all?

Quite right, the Great Dying (aka the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event) on Earth would seem to back that up to an extent. It took around 10 million years, but the biosphere eventually bounced back from that. Theoretical life surviving in subsurface ocean worlds would also seem to be in a better position to survive when it comes to climate change as well.
As far as SETI goes, the general idea is to listen for radio transmissions. The absence of such transmissions is taken by some as evidence there is not other intelligent life except for humans. A life form doesn't necessarily have to use technology to be intelligent. Humans got along perfectly fine on Earth for a long time without the benefit of radio, but we would still consider a human from, say, the 16th century to be an intelligent life form. It seems (from our own star system) that sub surface ocean planets might also be abundant in addition to Earth like worlds. Silence doesn't mean they're not out there, maybe they're just not listening or broadcasting. Maybe they evolved in an environment like a sub surface ocean world and aren't even concerned with what's possibly going on beyond the icy shell of their world. There are other methods apart from SETI that can be employed to search for alien life, it's possible a future breakthrough won't depend on radio transmissions at all.

 

[Chronos]

It's just not in our nature to resist the opportunity to eavesdrop on our celestial nature. I'm confident there are people listening for messages from other planets in our own solar system. SETI may be a long shot for any number of reasons, but, what other means are available? You never know what may be out there unless you look for it. There is no reason to believe an alien civilization would not use radio even if it is a primitive and pathetically feeble technology. We don't yet have technology of the type a highly advanced civilization might use, but, I'm confident we will try as that technology is developed.

 

[CalcNerd]

What if the planet, oh, let's say Earth, were a little more even/smooth with less tectonic activity and a LOT more water. Without land to crawl up onto, all of our life would be water borne. Probably wouldn't even have dolphins, but let's ignore that. Dolphins are highly intelligent, yet, they would NEVER develop any type of radio technology EVER! Why can I make this claim, because it is obvious, they could never develop even the simplest metallurgy. Without access to air, they could never advance any further than they currently are. Yeah, they might evolve hands of some sort and even make shift tools of a sort, but their own ocean would prevent them from developing any further. They might, might ascertain they lived on a giant ball, covered with water. but that would be the extent of it. Fire would be a foreign concept. Their experience with electricity would be from lightning strikes. They would have NO way to replicate and learn from this. They would be a civilization to be discovered, but they wouldn't be transmitting any radio signals, much less venturing out into the cosmos themselves.

 

[Charles Kottler]

Their experience with electricity would be from lightning strikes. They would have NO way to replicate and learn from this.

Several aqueous animals here have evolved methods of giving powerful electric shocks. Sharks have evolved electroreceptors to sense electromagnetic fields. Flying fish have evolved methods of staying above water for short periods of time.What's to say an intelligent subsea race would be incapable of replicating and improving upon these developments? To constrain technological advance to the narrow path that it has taken so far here is probably short sighted.

 

[Jeff Corkern]

The aliens are silent because they are in Happiness Boxes. Computer-generated "artificial" realities. It's the smart thing to do. All sentient races do this. In fact, what has made this clear is the human race has started to go down the same path.

Here is a more detailed explanation. It shows why this MUST happen. It's actually a really easy thing to see, given the appearance of video games. https://omni.media/all-advanced-aliens-are-in-happiness-boxes

 

[rootone]

.. they are in Happiness Boxes..

So what would be supplying and maintaining electricity and other necessary physical infrastructure for said happiness boxes?

 

[Chronos]

Humans tend to gravitate toward 'games' with enduring risk-reward consequences virtual games are incapable of offering.

 

[Rubidium_71]

I agree with @Charles Kottler, we shouldn't underestimate aquatic life...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolphin#Vocalizations
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus#Tool_use
A subsurface ocean world could produce some interesting species, especially if extinction events were less frequent than they have been on Earth. Who knows what they could come up with given time?

 

[Gary Motta]

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/01/160121110932.htm

Date:
January 21, 2016
Source:
Australian National University
Summary:
The universe is probably filled with habitable planets, so many scientists think it should be teeming with aliens. But life on other planets would likely be brief and become extinct very quickly, say astrobiologists. In research aiming to understand how life might develop, the scientists realized new life would commonly die out due to runaway heating or cooling on their fledgling planets.

So is SETI a waste of time or is there life amidst the thousands of Earth like planets.

It's possible that some civilizations may have cooperated and used that cooperation to engineer their planets to control the climate and avoid extinction.

 

[Larry Kennedy]

I believe SETI is indeed a long shot, but like a major impact in any given century, the consequences are enormous.

 

[Collin237]

However you work the maths, the number of planets capable of supporting some form of life is staggering.

However you work the maths, it's still a fabrication. It is unscientific to assign a probability to an event known only ever to have occurred once.

 

[Promytius]

If it happened once, it will most likely, using probability, happen again, and again, and again... every very long line of anything starts with a one; I like the idea of being the first, known sentient beings, and hate the idea of being the only ones. Oh it's not thousands of planets, it's thousands of billions of planets to pick from.
I state categorically there are numerous civilizations, thousands and thousands, and have been and will be for billions and billions of years.

In human terms life, endlessly abundant, forever and forever. In human terms, the universe is eternal, life is eternal.

 

[rootone]

No, a sample of one means it has definitely happened once.
That offers no implication or predication at all for the likelihood (or unlikelihood) of how often it might occur elsewhere.
We don't even have much of a clue how life got started here on Earth though there are numerous interesting ideas.

 

[Charles Kottler]

However you work the maths, it's still a fabrication. It is unscientific to assign a probability to an event known only ever to have occurred once.

On the contrary, a key aspect of science is to propose a hypothesis and establish a means of testing it against observable data. In 2013 Sarah Seager published an attempt to put some actual figures on the probability of us detecting an inhabited planet within ten years:

https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/events/2013/postkepler/Exoplanets_in_the_Post_Kepler_Era/Program_files/Seager.pdf

The component F_L in her equation, the fraction of planets with life, is as she says purely speculative until we find one. My point was concerning the number of planets which we would consider capable of supporting life.

 

[jwolynski]

If they are genuinely intelligent they will avoid us, as well, they will not communicate with us... even go as far as to hide the best they can from beings like us. Seriously. We mass murder each other. Think about how that looks to people from other systems.

 

[Collin237]

We are genuinely intelligent. If they are too, maybe they also mass murder each other. That would certainly fit into the OP's theory!

 

[Gitirana]

I think that we need to consider the following:
Is there any possibility to have a close planet with a kind life in the same technology level than us?
In the distance the we have such planet is it possible with our technology level detect any radio signal?
If the technology level is below us in the same habitat probably they don't know radio signal.
If the the life evolved in a completely different habitat probably technology used will very different even having the same phisical laws.
They think like us? For example we are looking for a contact but a different specie that followed a different evolution way may disagree any kind of contact.

Let's assume that we find an intelligent form of life that evolved from reptile in your planet and Main dish are beings of humanoid forms that evolved from something like apes. How would we feel, we would seek a contact?

Or if there is a specie that followed a completely different evolution way and they don't eat meat for example or they evolved from a vegetable form of life that consider the forest as a sacred place how they will see us? They will try to do any contact with us?

The possibility to have life in the other places space is very big mainly if we consider that our planet is already spreading seeds of life since of 3.5 Billions of years ago via comets that collided with us and spreading the Earth's life in the universe.

The probability to have life in other places is big.
The probability to have life similar to life that exist or already existed in the Earth is not so big only if planet have an habitat like our.

The probability de have a form of life similar to mammal evolved from something ape like, is very very very low.

Because the planet habitat must be like our and must be submit to the same geological history.

If moreover we consider that the form of life should be in the same technological level and think or have the same goals than us, this is very unlikely.

We must start to think that we are the exception. Because our star is not the standard of Universe. The standard are the small red stars or red dwarf.

Probably there are more moons in giant planets with inhabitable conditions than inhabitable planets in the Universe.

If there are more advanced beings than we probably are in contact with us, but because our intellectual level low and technological we do not even realize.

Only scientific research and future discoveries will give us an idea of our place in the universe.

 

[Gitirana]

I think that we need to consider the following:
Is there any possibility to have a close planet with a kind life in the same technology level than us?
In the distance that we have such planet is it possible with our technology level detect any radio signal?
If the technology level is below us in the same habitat probably they don't know radio signal.
If the the life evolved in a completely different habitat probably technology used will very different even having the same phisical laws.
They think like us? For example we are looking for a contact but a different specie that followed a different evolution way may disagree any kind of contact.
Let's assume that we find an intelligent form of life that evolved from reptile in your planet and the main food are beings of humanoid forms that evolved from something like apes. How would we feel, we would seek a contact?
Or if there is a specie that followed a completely different evolution way and they don't eat meat for example or they evolved from a vegetable form of life that consider the forest as a sacred place how they will see us? They will try to do any kind of contact with us?
The possibility to have life in the other places space is very big mainly if we consider that our planet is already spreading seeds of life since of 3.5 Billions of years ago via comets that collided with us and spreading the Earth's life in the universe.
The probability to have life in other places is big.
The probability to have life similar to life that exist or already existed in the Earth is not so big only if planet have an habitat like our.
The probability de have a form of life similar to mammal evolved from something ape like, is very very very low.
Because the planet habitat must be like Earth and must be submited to the same gelogical history.
If moreover we consider that the form of life should be in the same technological level and think or have the same goals than us, this is very unlikely.
We must start to think that we are the exception. Because our star is not the standard of Universe. The standard are the small red stars or red dwarf.
Probably there are more moons in giant planets with inhabitable conditions than inhabitable planets in the Universe.

If there are beings more advanced than us probably they are in contact with us, but because our intellectual and technological level low we can´t understand.

There are so many questions and only scientific research and future discoveries will give us an idea of our place in the universe.

 

[rootone]

I think that we need to consider the following ...

Much of what you are considering is included in the 'Drake equation', not really a hypothesis as such but something worth chewing on.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation
You might like to look at the 'Fermi paradox' too.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox

 

[bluecap]

Is it not the universe expanded in the Big Bang with some portions faster than the speed of light. Things can't go faster than light inside spacetime, but spacetime itself can travel faster than light.

Maybe only primitive civilization use electromagnetic wave for interstellar radio.. maybe if SETI would have sensors that could detect the faster than light spacetime wave (is this also called gravitational wave), then they could get tons of positive signal

 

[anorlunda]

Maybe only primitive civilization use electromagnetic wave for interstellar radio.. maybe if SETI would have sensors that could detect the faster than light spacetime wave (is this also called gravitational wave), then they could get tons of positive signal

Gravitational waves do not travel faster than light.

 

[Gitirana]

The usage of radio waves to communications is not the best option in a solar system due to pollution in the same spectrum of waves. Advanced communications probably will use something like quantum tunneling. How far we are to use it?

I think that our planet is a incredible evolutionary laboratory. How many times the life was almost extinguished giving opportunities to new species?
What will happen if in other planets such changes never happen or happened partially? Can we imagine the diversity of Earth life in the past 700.000 years?
How many especies there were here? If carbonific period has been many times longer there will be form of lifes from vegetables evolved from carnivorous plants?
If our planet is completely covered by water there will be an form of life evolved from jellyfish? May an jellyfish evolve until become technologicaly advanced? Probably it is only a time question.
If we meet an alien life evolved from a jellyfish there will be any possibility of communications? We have a centralized brain but probably a form of life evolved from a jellyfish will have another arrange of brain probably distributed by all body. Some jellyfish never die. How an form of life that never die will see and understand us?
There is a new career in the universities called by exo biology that I think will grow a lot with evolution of exoplanets observations.

Let's suppose that in many exoplanets. Probably one of millions and millions of species from Earth become the dominant specie.
Currently here the monkey hominid become the dominant. If we consider another habitats different of Earth probably there will be species that never existed here.
Like the spider in how many planets the life use copper instead of iron in its blood?
We may have a lot and a lot of suppositions and we can imagine many possibilities and as the Universe is vast with almost endless possibilities in some place in this vast Universe one of such suppositions probably will exist.

The main question is: How many of them are close with conditions to reach us? Is safe to announce our existence to those species without know them? Probably the other species are thinking like mentioned and for this reason we don't have a contact?

 

[Chronos]

Finding another civilization just like 'ours' would be a nightmare. We would eventually be forced to join efforts to defend against our alien rivals and so would they. A horrid situation. It would be a disaster of legendary proportions. It's not who we are nor how we operate - it could very well subvert an alien culture.

 

[Fervent Freyja]

Is there an established probability for finding life elsewhere in the universe? If so, then, also determine a probably for intelligent life existing in those places. On earth, humans are a rare species, more than 99% of the species so far have not been any kind of intelligent life, even if we consider a slug intelligent. I still don't see intelligent life being a common occurrence at all.

 

[bluecap]

The Problem is.. scientists expect aliens to be like buck rogers with spaceships that use rockets... scientists expect the aliens use the Standard Model physics or if beyond the standard model... Supersymmetry or things that don't have lower energy consequence. Therefore if there are really aliens who used unconventional technology and even unconventional reason for coming, then they can completely go past the mainstream monitoring.

For example. If our emotions and sentience occurs as a result of physics beyond the standard model... giving us the most advanced being and development. Then only aliens who wanted to contact us are androids or those with problems (like space penal colony).

The above is logical is it not? And when we heard reports of abductions (like those from David Jacobs). We laughed out so loud and raise our heads high because it doesn't conform to the Standard Model. Haven't anyone here thought that any aliens should use beyond the standard model technology and physics?

 

[Chronos]

We know nothing about alien life because none has been confirmed. So speculating about their level of intelligence is kind of an inverse fermi paradox.

 

[anorlunda]

We know nothing about alien life because none has been confirmed. So speculating about their level of intelligence is kind of an inverse fermi paradox.

The mainstay of science fiction has always been that most speculations about aliens are really commentaries about ourselves in disguise. Such is the case here. I remember discussions about the Drake Equation in the 60s and 70s. Back then, almost all speculations about alien extinctions centered on nuclear war. Today's speculations have shifted their center point.

 

[jedishrfu]

I'd like to thank everyone for contributing to this thread and since the OP's original question has now been thoroughly answered, its a good time to close it before we devolve into more speculative areas.

Jedi