It took 4.5 billion years for intelligence to arise

Our Sun is 4.57 billion years old, so if the big bang brought Suns 13
billion years ago, there may
be species 8.5 billion years old. And yet no signs of any intelligent
radio signals from any star.
One thing I realized, we are not the oldest, newest, firstest
necessarily.

Dear gb:

On Jan 7, 2:20*am, gb wrote:
Our Sun is 4.57 billion years old, so if the big bang
brought Suns 13 billion years ago, there may
be species 8.5 billion years old.

Small issue, not too much "biological order" is going to arise if the
CMBR has not yet redshifted to below 350 K or so. So maybe 8 billion
years..

And yet no signs of any intelligent radio signals from
any star.

What if they use cable, to prevent waste of energy?

What if they use digital, with very high data compression, and
hyperbolic antennas? What we would get would be entirely random noise
(if no carrier was used).

How long can you talk to a one-second old child without growing
bored? To follow your analogy of 8 billion years to ~1 million years.

One thing I realized, we are not the oldest, newest,
firstest necessarily.

I hope we are not the wisest yet.

David A. Smith

gb wrote:
Our Sun is 4.57 billion years old, so if the big bang brought Suns 13
billion years ago, there may
be species 8.5 billion years old.

Unlikely, unless they are not carbon or silicon-based lifeforms. The
process of creating heavier atoms such as carbon, iron, oxygen and
nuclear fissionable materials practically requires the life cycle of
stars going supernova and "seeding the field", a process that in itself
could take many billions of years. Under the Rare Earth hypothesis
(which granted only covers "life as we know it" - but still have
ultimately valid points) many of the features that make life possible
require heavier elements which help provide life with defense from
cosmic radiation, stellar radiation, and provide the basic building
blocks of carbon- or silicon-based life.

And yet no signs of any intelligent
radio signals from any star.

This, of course, assumes that intelligent life elsewhere uses radio
based communications, and ones strong enough to reach us without
significant decay to boot. Furthermore, I have yet to hear many good,
rational definitions for what "intelligent life" actually is, many
groups just define it as "capable of communicating with us" which I
think has nothing to do with intelligence. We are very likely alone in
our galaxy, though the odds of intelligent life in other galaxies is
quite probable, and while they may even be ahead of us technologically
in other galaxies (possibly colonizing their galaxy), bridging the void
between is a larger challenge.

One thing I realized, we are not the oldest, newest, firstest
necessarily.

Not necessarily, no. But we have a long ways to go before we can
verify that, it would seem.

- Timothy Partee