Hey guys, what are your thoughts on the existence of extraterrestrial life and the potential involvement of governments in concealing or studying such entities.

  • possibly a cat@lemmy.ml
    0·
    8 months ago

    I expect that many other planets have life. I suspect that interstellar travel is not the only means of traveling between planets.

    I am not at all convinced that foreign intelligences do visit, but I do consider it a very real possibility. If I were to somehow know they were here and nothing more, then I would feel confident that their visitation is being concealed.

    It’s a wonderful topic, but I’m not particularly interested in beliefs related to it. I am much more interested in the possibilities.

    • michaelrose@lemmy.ml
      0·
      8 months ago

      I’m dubious of faster than life travel being for reasons beyond our understanding of physics. If there were a reasonable way to do so 1 race anywhere in the galaxy could have colonized the entire galaxy or at least a substantial portion thereof in only a few million years. If it is possible it seems to suggest that life is so rare that there are very few forms of higher intelligent life in the galaxy at any given time and probably relatively few ever.

      • possibly a cat@lemmy.ml
        0·
        8 months ago

        There are plenty of alternative explanations.

        For a few examples:

        • In such a huge universe, even if FTL travel is possible, why should we expect Earth to be a common destination?
        • It is possible that only species who do not wish to colonize the galaxy will avoid the Great Filter and acquire the technology needed to colonize it.
        • Not all space-faring races must be highly populous, while less populous species will encounter less of the issues that would cause a population to collapse before becoming space-faring.
        • We could be colonized without recognizing it.
        • Colonization itself could be inherently unsustainable.

        There is also no reason to limit the discussion to a galaxy. If we assume that an FTL civilization will colonize (in a way that we would recognize), then they could come from any galaxy. Given the expanse of the universe, if such a behavior is common enough that it would stand a chance of succeeding, then it should probably exist already. And yet we do not appear to be colonized. Which is more likely: That FTL intelligences must colonize, or that we are all alone in the universe? Axiomatic reasoning reveals that the latter is statistically much less likely than the former. So it is less likely to successfully explain why we appear to be uncolonized.