ETI is common in the universe rare on the scale of galaxies

Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;

1) Our extremely short life span
2) Our extremely difficult developmental path

While single celled life on Earth arose quite quickly, after the
conditions were favorable for life, it took over 3 billion years for
multicelled life capable of making brains arose. After brains arose
technology quickly arose and appears to be headed toward a
technological singularity by 2030-2040 time frame. After that time
self-replicating machine systems of immense capacity are likely to
displace humans as the most powerful intelligences on Earth.
Humanity's tenure as the dominant technical species on this planet is
likely to be short, even if humans are ultimately highly successful.
Of course our tenure as a technical species may be short if we manage
to kill ourselves off.

So, the longevity of technical species such as ourselves is very
short. On the order of a century. And we are very rare, on the order
of one every 30 trillion stars.

Species that are incapable of producing a technological singularity do
not factor into the Fermi Paradox. We know where they are, stuck on
their planet of origin incapable of affecting us here.

Species capable of interstellar communication either wipe themselves
out or develop a technological singularity and give rise to a post-
biological intelligence which displaces them.

Prior to the development of high technology, species are incapable of
communicating either electronically or physically across interstellar
distances. After the development of high technology we are easily
capable of communicating across interstellar distances. First with
radio waves, later with light waves, later still by physical
transport.

However, the development of ever more powerful technologies gives rise
to an increasingly more powerful means of destruction to the species
developing that technology. The development of ever more powerful
weapons is clearly maladaptive.

The development of increasingly capable means of production spawns
excessive population growth and causes resource depletion and
environmental degradation. Again, highly maladaptive developments for
a biological species

Why did we develop technology then? We had the brains for it. The
development of large brains, and the associated development of high-
technology using those brains, is an example of sexual selection in
humans Humans with big brains tend to produce more offspring than
humans without big brains. Those with big brains flirt and make
themselve more sexually attractive. Thus big brains are selected for
the same way other excessively large organs are selected for

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_selection

So, we have big brains and high technology for the same reason
peacocks have large tail feathers. Excessively large brains result
from this process and along with it, increasing technological prowess
leading ultimately to a technological singularity or our demise
through abuse of technology. Species that don't follow this sort of
developmental path lack any capacity to affect or signal off their
world and so don't factor in to the Fermi paradox.

All technology, based as it is upon fundamental physical principals,
have the same end points in their development and those end points are
all reached in a century or so after the development of nuclear energy
due to the fact that technical development itself accelerates tehnical
development. So, all technologies tend to mature to their physical
limits at the same time. This is called a technological singularity.

Before the singularity life is limited and difficult. After the
singularity, everything that can be done in the physical world, is
easily attained. Including self replicating machine intelligences
capable of interstellar travel - aka von Neumann Probes.

The development of a species capable of spawning a technological
singularity is rare on the scale of galaxies, but common in the
cosmos. Best estimates using Drakes equation indicate you need about
30 trillion to hundred trillion stars to spawn a technological
singularity. Once the singularity has occurred, then that star system
becomes the point source of an expanding wave of self replicating
starships that engulf the host galaxy in less than a million years,
and engulfs surrounding galaxies in equally short periods after
transit times of millions to tens of millions of years.

So, a living world, like Earth, spawns life in less than a billion
years, and then gestates for over 3 billion years and produces sexual
multi-celled creatures that have brains. In less than a billion years
after brains,a technological singularity appears that becomes the
source of an exponentially expanding wave of self-replicating
starships that engulf billions of galaxies surrounding the point of
origin.

The stars composing the galaxies are broken up processed for their
metals and fusion occurs enclosed in energy collectors rendering them
invisible to outside observers. A portion of the industrial output is
made into daughter probes to repeat the process farther from the
origin. The balance of material and energy are available for
industrial use.

So, a survey of galaxies should show indications of regions of low
galaxy counts relative to the average.

An examination of the latest galaxy surveys shows that such spherical
voids do indeed exist in the numbers and sizes predicted by my
analysis. More detailed analysis will likely show that;

That technological singularities occurred no less than 500 million
years ago and no more than 800 million years ago - by looking at the
variation of 'void' size with distance from Earth.

That the rate of expansion ranges from 0.2 c (20% light speed) to 0.3
c (30% light speed) by looking at circularity with distance and size
variation with distance. .

That the spawning of a single technological singularity requires 30
trillion to 50 trillion stars.

Comparison of result 3 with the developmental time line of Earth gives
the fractions of all the components in the Drake Equation

If correct it is very likely that the Earth is under surveillance by
extra-galactic ETI (zoo hypothesis is correct) until we have spawned
our own post-biological intelligence, This is the result of the
explosive nature of the technological singularity, and the massive
ability to survey and affect the cosmos using self-replicating machine
system, along with a substantial head start of hundreds of millons of
years by the earliest ETIs.

This contact should occur about the time of our own technologicla
singularity predicted to occur by 2030-2040 AD time frame. At that
point, contact may be initiated by ETI and our own post-biological
intelligences will enter the cosmic nursery for the youngest of cosmic
intelligences.

On Apr 1, 7:16 am, wrote:
Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;

1) Our extremely short life span
2) Our extremely difficult developmental path

While single celled life on Earth arose quite quickly, after the
conditions were favorable for life, it took over 3 billion years for
multicelled life capable of making brains arose. After brains arose
technology quickly arose and appears to be headed toward a
technological singularity by 2030-2040 time frame. After that time
self-replicating machine systems of immense capacity are likely to
displace humans as the most powerful intelligences on Earth.
Humanity's tenure as the dominant technical species on this planet is
likely to be short, even if humans are ultimately highly successful.
Of course our tenure as a technical species may be short if we manage
to kill ourselves off.

So, the longevity of technical species such as ourselves is very
short. On the order of a century. And we are very rare, on the order
of one every 30 trillion stars.

Species that are incapable of producing a technological singularity do
not factor into the Fermi Paradox. We know where they are, stuck on
their planet of origin incapable of affecting us here.

Species capable of interstellar communication either wipe themselves
out or develop a technological singularity and give rise to a post-
biological intelligence which displaces them.

Prior to the development of high technology, species are incapable of
communicating either electronically or physically across interstellar
distances. After the development of high technology we are easily
capable of communicating across interstellar distances. First with
radio waves, later with light waves, later still by physical
transport.

However, the development of ever more powerful technologies gives rise
to an increasingly more powerful means of destruction to the species
developing that technology. The development of ever more powerful
weapons is clearly maladaptive.

The development of increasingly capable means of production spawns
excessive population growth and causes resource depletion and
environmental degradation. Again, highly maladaptive developments for
a biological species

Why did we develop technology then? We had the brains for it. The
development of large brains, and the associated development of high-
technology using those brains, is an example of sexual selection in
humans Humans with big brains tend to produce more offspring than
humans without big brains. Those with big brains flirt and make
themselve more sexually attractive. Thus big brains are selected for
the same way other excessively large organs are selected for

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_selection

So, we have big brains and high technology for the same reason
peacocks have large tail feathers. Excessively large brains result
from this process and along with it, increasing technological prowess
leading ultimately to a technological singularity or our demise
through abuse of technology. Species that don't follow this sort of
developmental path lack any capacity to affect or signal off their
world and so don't factor in to the Fermi paradox.

All technology, based as it is upon fundamental physical principals,
have the same end points in their development and those end points are
all reached in a century or so after the development of nuclear energy
due to the fact that technical development itself accelerates tehnical
development. So, all technologies tend to mature to their physical
limits at the same time. This is called a technological singularity.

Before the singularity life is limited and difficult. After the
singularity, everything that can be done in the physical world, is
easily attained. Including self replicating machine intelligences
capable of interstellar travel - aka von Neumann Probes.

The development of a species capable of spawning a technological
singularity is rare on the scale of galaxies, but common in the
cosmos. Best estimates using Drakes equation indicate you need about
30 trillion to hundred trillion stars to spawn a technological
singularity. Once the singularity has occurred, then that star system
becomes the point source of an expanding wave of self replicating
starships that engulf the host galaxy in less than a million years,
and engulfs surrounding galaxies in equally short periods after
transit times of millions to tens of millions of years.

So, a living world, like Earth, spawns life in less than a billion
years, and then gestates for over 3 billion years and produces sexual
multi-celled creatures that have brains. In less than a billion years
after brains,a technological singularity appears that becomes the
source of an exponentially expanding wave of self-replicating
starships that engulf billions of galaxies surrounding the point of
origin.

The stars composing the galaxies are broken up processed for their
metals and fusion occurs enclosed in energy collectors rendering them
invisible to outside observers. A portion of the industrial output is
made into daughter probes to repeat the process farther from the
origin. The balance of material and energy are available for
industrial use.

So, a survey of galaxies should show indications of regions of low
galaxy counts relative to the average.

An examination of the latest galaxy surveys shows that such spherical
voids do indeed exist in the numbers and sizes predicted by my
analysis. More detailed analysis will likely show that;

That technological singularities occurred no less than 500 million
years ago and no more than 800 million years ago - by looking at the
variation of 'void' size with distance from Earth.

That the rate of expansion ranges from 0.2 c (20% light speed) to 0.3
c (30% light speed) by looking at circularity with distance and size
variation with distance. .

That the spawning of a single technological singularity requires 30
trillion to 50 trillion stars.

Comparison of result 3 with the developmental time line of Earth gives
the fractions of all the components in the Drake Equation

If correct it is very likely that the Earth is under surveillance by
extra-galactic ETI (zoo hypothesis is correct) until we have spawned
our own post-biological intelligence, This is the result of the
explosive nature of the technological singularity, and the massive
ability to survey and affect the cosmos using self-replicating machine
system, along with a substantial head start of hundreds of millons of
years by the earliest ETIs.

This contact should occur about the time of our own technologicla
singularity predicted to occur by 2030-2040 AD time frame. At that
point, contact may be initiated by ETI and our own post-biological
intelligences will enter the cosmic nursery for the youngest of cosmic
intelligences.

You are still mainstream box thinking as though we're it, as in nearly
the one and only viable species of intelligence to behold within our
entire galaxy, and much less God forbid within our solar system.

What if the other planet(s) of technically viable life hadn't wasted
such horrific centuries upon centuries at systematically exterminating
one another, and/or having trashed their environment in the process?

How much further advanced would an Earth like species be if they had
merely 1000 years or even 100 years worth of intellectually productive
opportunities (focus), that obviously we're not going to see the start
of for at least another century to come?

Just because a given planet is a little too hot for us isn't excluding
what good it is for other intelligent species, and in some instances a
somewhat cold planet or moon isn't taboo as long as there's a few
local resources of energy, or at least a viable way of importing the
required energy.

We obviously can't live upon our nearly naked and thus reactive moon,
but with applied technology and mostly robotics is how we can as a
species directly benefit from such efforts, and if need be survive
deep enough underground as based nearly entirely upon those local
energy resources.
-
Brad Guth

wrote:
Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;
....

To repeat, if 1/10 of 1% of the unexplained UFO sightings are the real thing
the Earth is a popular tourist destination in the universe.

Bottom line, we have no basis for saying ETs are rare. All we can say is we
have not had any success with RF surveys. We can only speculate as to why there
has been no success.

===What follows is unnecessary and likely distracting from the above point.

When I lived in DC with its millions of tourists a year I have no idea how many
of them were disguised ETs. I rarely did more than a very rare wave in the right
direction with the very few I ever got close to. So most didn't even need good
camouflage/costumes to fool me. [Insert joke about being certain a few
foreigners looked like they were.]

Why are you looking for RF transmissions? The light is better over here.

I am reminded of the 15th c. Chinese explorers who built a navy, took a quick
look around and dismantled it. So we not only have to assume ETs are like humans
we also have to assume they are like 15th and 16th c. European explorers before
we can even expect exploration and an interest in dealing with new species but
then if and only if there is the profit motive that drove the Europeans. The
idea of a human spirit of exploration is a myth, a strong and popular one but a
myth nevertheless. Belief in that myth is the primary reason we expect ET to
explore yet the Chinese example and the example of all prior civilizations in
the world shows no signs of any spirit of exploration.

It is difficult to imagine what profit there might be trade of any kind or any
resources worth exploiting even if found on Mars much less dozens and more light
years away. I do not see a profit in it. Consider anything you can imagine you
can find in asteroids with a much cheaper gravity well than any planet that is,
if you can imagine something.

If there is a species or two with a spirit of exploration and learning for its
own sake how many other civilizations have to be discovered before "if you've
seen one you've seen them all" sets in for all but a few academics? And how many
more before even academics find more interesting things to study?

Digging up bibleland was hot decades ago before it became clear there was no
bible to find. Now it is a few people who have interests in what there really is
to find who pretend to bible digs to get money from rich Christian and Jewish
sponsors. (Think, The Producers, Bialystok and Blum.) And there are not many of
them as there is almost no hope of finding anything of sufficient importance to
make a professional reputation. In a few more decades even that fiction will
disappear. (soc.history.ancient is the place to disagree with me on this point.)

Studying alien civilizations will be hot for a while but the bloom will wear
off. Who discovered the Aztecs? The Incas? Easy? How about the Sioux? The
Apache? The most famous naturalist of all time was Darwin. Name three others.

So even the advance of our own sciences shows new fields are popular for a
while and then decline and eventually fade to obscurity. Space is different? If
you were alive you likely saw the first moon landing. When did you last watch a
shuttle launch? Even on SETI, how many can and cannot name the last search
upgrade for the data we are analyzing? How long was it before you stopped
reading the latest info posting on the S@H website?

And all of that even though we cannot say for certain we are not being visited
frequently.

--
Will the Iraq surge be remembered along with WWI attempts to break through
the western front?
-- The Iron Webmaster, 3743
nizkor http://www.giwersworld.org/nizkook/nizkook.phtml
flying saucers http://www.giwersworld.org/flyingsa.html a2

On Apr 1, 7:57 pm, Matt Giwer wrote:
wrote:
Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;
...
To repeat, if 1/10 of 1% of the unexplained UFO sightings are the real thing
the Earth is a popular tourist destination in the universe.

Bottom line, we have no basis for saying ETs are rare. All we can say is we
have not had any success with RF surveys. We can only speculate as to why there
has been no success.

That's the very best and perfectly honest topic consideration, as well
as for nailing most everything that's dead wrong about SETI.

ETI has absolutely nothing to do with space travel, nor with anything
RF.

ETI has to do with their survival in spite of whatever environment, or
also in spite of our insurmountable arrogance and dumbfounded
naysayism (the likes as having been imposed by "Willie Moo"). We
silly humans may not even be the cosmic alpha species, especially if
we consider what we've done to ourselves and that of our badly failing
environment.


Why are you looking for RF transmissions? The light is better over here.

Using light, and of especially using a quantum/FM binary code, on
behalf of biological and technological communications via some nifty
and extremely energy efficient spectrums of visible light (including
UV and IR to many species) is by far superior to anything RF.

BTW; though more than old enough, I'm still waiting to see the first
human moon landing, and safe return of our rad-hard astronauts.
-
Brad Guth

wrote in message
ups.com...
Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs
like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example
of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;

1) Our extremely short life span
2) Our extremely difficult developmental path

While single celled life on Earth arose quite quickly,
after the
conditions were favorable for life, it took over 3 billion
years for
multicelled life capable of making brains arose. After
brains arose
technology quickly arose and appears to be headed toward a
technological singularity by 2030-2040 time frame. After
that time
self-replicating machine systems of immense capacity are
likely to
displace humans as the most powerful intelligences on
Earth.
Humanity's tenure as the dominant technical species on
this planet is
likely to be short, even if humans are ultimately highly
successful.
Of course our tenure as a technical species may be short
if we manage
to kill ourselves off.

So, the longevity of technical species such as ourselves
is very
short. On the order of a century. And we are very rare,
on the order
of one every 30 trillion stars.

[rest snipped]

I think it's a bit too much to say that we may be the only
intelligent life in the "entire cosmos", if you mean the
whole universe, but I do agree that such interstellar
spacefaring life is very sparse in our galaxy in this
particular galactic epoch.

From your comments about von Neuman machine probes, you
might enjoy Alastair Reynolds' grand hard scifi, space opera
trilogy (3 giant books), "Revelation Space", "Redemption
Ark", and "Absolution Gap." I just finished the great first
2 books, and a main plot point has been revealed to be: a
race of intelligent machine life lies in wait for any
intelligent race venturing on massive interstellar
migration, at which point they are totally eradicated as a
species. The machines have been doing this for billion upon
billions of years! Of course they have a (still somewhat
unclear) good reason to do so. This works to explain
Fermi, though Reynolds makes a good case for many
interstellar races having quite long lifetimes before being
snuffed out.

I love the books, but I think it's sufficient to assume that
all interstellar travelling races (and their outposts,
colonies, etc) have short average lifetimes, far less than
millions of years -- there are many possible reasons for
their extinction, and I think the mismatches between the
time windows of their periods of communication and
explorations and our current era are explainable by their
sparses in number throughout time. ...tonyC

On Apr 1, 10:57 pm, Matt Giwer wrote:
wrote:
Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;

...

To repeat, if 1/10 of 1% of the unexplained UFO sightings are the real thing
the Earth is a popular tourist destination in the universe.

Far fewer than that 1 in 1000 are the real thing - if any are. I mean
consider that we have stealth technologies today on the drawing boards
that provide for total invisibility to the limits of optics

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...;312/5781/1777

in both the visible and microwave regions

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...;312/5781/1780

So, I doubt even if we were very popular there'd be ANY reports
whatever of the real thing even if they were SLIGHTLY in advance of
us.

Now, as to our popularity.. ever own a horse? Ever have a horse of
yours give birth? Its not an uncommon thing, to happen in the world.
Its nothing you send notices out about. But as the day approaches, it
attracts attention. People stop by the stable, they help out as best
they can. You call in the vet. You know. Its an event. More people
than usual visit the stall.

Same here. Except this is a really really rare event. I mean species
like us - biological entities in charge of the technology - are rare.
We're rare to start out with, but then our lifespan is only like 100
years. So, to see the birth of a post-biological intelligence, which
occurs in like 3 to 5 years - as we pass through the singularity - is
extraordinarily rare! It'll attract attention.

Further, self-replicating machine systems that have spread across even
one galaxy, let alone billions of them, have no cost. It doesn't cost
anything for anything that can happen to happen. So, the only
requirement is the will. Its hard for creatures like us to understand
the nature of reality as these super ETIs see it. The same way a
primitive tribesman might not understand the dining concerns of a
resident in Beverly Hills who spends the afternoon deciding what purse
will go wth what dress and shoes at the Gucci store on Rodeo drive.
If they think about dinner at all they are thinking about a seating at
a five star restaurant or just taking it easy and going three star
today. What the tribesman organizes his whole day around, and the
lives of the tribe he lives with - following the seasons of life to
eat - the resident of Beverly Hills pays no thought to at all - and
may never have skinned an animal and made use of the hide. In short,
they don't understand one another in the least. And they're the same
species on the same planet separated by a few thousand years of
technical development.

When we say things like we'd have to be as popular as the Grand Canyon
to have so many aliens visit us - the answer is no. Because it costs
us something to visit the Grand Canyon. It costs these creatures - if
you can call them that - NOTHING - in the way we think about costs.
So, the only thing they require is the will to do so. And the question
of whether its interesting enough to watch the answer is sure, at
least as interesting as watching a foal be born, and maybe more
interesting than a baby being born. So, there is a reason why here
why now -

But I doubt ANY UFO reports are the 'real thing' - Jung addressed this
fact many years ago. That doesn't mean aliens aren't observing and
perhaps even directing to a small degree our development - in the same
way a nurse directs the birthing procedure. haha..

..

Bottom line, we have no basis for saying ETs are rare.

Yes we do.

1) It took life that was already here nearly 1/3 the age of the
universe for intelligent life to emerge here. This suggests its
pretty uncommon and hard for life to do.

2) We have developed a workable technical procedure - von Neumann
probes - for exploring and making industrial use of the entire galaxy
that if initiated now would take less than 1 million years to swallow
the galaxy. In the pat 3 billion years life was developing brains and
technology on Earth - not one single star system arose to do the same
thing. This suggests that the Earth was lucky to develop brains.

3) The galactic surveys recently made show ball like regions of low
galaxy counts. This is the sort of structure that would be formed if
von Neumann probes expanded beyond their host galaxy and swallowed up
the surrounding galaxies - shielding their light from out view. These
ball like empty regions are 30 million to 300 million light years
across - and appear to be smaller farther from earth (farther back in
time) and seem to have have started forming some 800 million years
ago. This is consistent with Earth's history of life and evolutinary
time table.. The number of voids compared to the number of galaxies
in the survey suggest that one star in 30 trillion to 50 trillion
develop ETI capable of von Neumann probes - which are the only ones
that are of interest in the Fermi Paradox. This makes ETI
extraordinarily rare. And transitional biologically based
intelligences nearly unique in the cosmos.

All we can say is we
have not had any success with RF surveys. We can only speculate as to why there
has been no success.

Correct. The lack of success in finding native life forms nearby
within our own galaxy is consistent with this thesis - life is common
on the scale of the universe, rare on the scale of galaxies.


===What follows is unnecessary and likely distracting from the above point.

When I lived in DC with its millions of tourists a year I have no idea how many
of them were disguised ETs.

WE have technologies - mems based - that can penetrate a region
without anyone knowing; Check out this picture

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...gearandbug.jpg

That's a gear train MEMs based - and a dust mite - the kind that live
in the pores of your eyebrows!

Now imagine a population of dust mite sized robots connected via
wireless lan penetrating a region

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic

Now imagine sensor fusion software tapping into this wireless lan and
extracting real time virtual reality models based on it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensor_fusion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_reality

Consider too that a self replicating machine system - MEMs based - the
size of a dust mite only requires ONE device on board the robot probe
to seed the whole planet!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-replicating_machine

Check it out. A single dust mite sized robot makes a copy of itself,
and then goes back into storage. The daughter robo-mite is released
into the environment. Assuming replication times on the order of 1
second - In less than 100 seconds, any number of robo mites needed
would be created.

In short, in TWO MINUTES with only SLIGHT ADVANCES ON :HUMAN
TECHNOLOGIES - we could monitor the entire Earth to a very fine
degree.

This is MEMs based stuff - nanotech, down at the level of atoms -
would be smaller more capable and harder to detect.

I wouldt say it unlikely that we run into ETIs in DC. There's no
need. If an ETI wanted to affect a political leader to make a certain
decision they wouldn't have to do something as crass as talk to the
the leader. They'd impregnate that leader's body with viral sized
networks of robotic bugs and communicate directly with his brain
cells. They'd suggest a course of action and he or she would think it
a weird idea but one that wouldn't go away and as objections came up
around it, answers would form in his mind to address him, until the
idea was acted upon.

And you definitely would not run into biologically based ETIs EVER -
they're too rare and they got their own **** to worry about in a
galaxy far far away. The post biological ETIs have outstripped them
anyway.

No, if there are ETIs here watching us and helping us, they are post-
biological and they are doing their schtick in a way that's totally
undetectable by us.

I rarely did more than a very rare wave in the right
direction with the very few I ever got close to. So most didn't even need good
camouflage/costumes to fool me. [Insert joke about being certain a few
foreigners looked like they were.]

Well, this sounds like you have a mental disorder closely related to
certain schizophrenia types.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syndrom...ective_doubles

Basically, some people think that significant others in their life are
replaced with dopplegangers. You see other people and sense somehow
they are aliens. haha..

Have you had damage in the right cerebral cortex? Had drug use that
affects that region? This may explain your feelings that others in DC
are aliens.

Why are you looking for RF transmissions? The light is better over here.

You have misread my statements. I said the we have technologies that
can send radio signals across the universe (radio telescopes)

Ever hear of the water hole? The clear region between H and OH
spectra where even radio telescopes like we can build can signal
across the galaxy? A slight investment in building larger more
powerful such devices would allow us to signal across the cosmos.

We also have lasers. Which can do the same thing with light

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SETI

And we have von Neumann probe idea - which allow us with a small
investment - send spacecraft across the cosmos

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann_Probe



I am reminded of the 15th c. Chinese explorers who built a navy, took a quick
look around and dismantled it. So we not only have to assume ETs are like humans
we also have to assume they are like 15th and 16th c. European explorers before
we can even expect exploration and an interest in dealing with new species but
then if and only if there is the profit motive that drove the Europeans.

The Chinese saw no profit. They looked around and found nothing of
value that was worth the effort. The Europeans saw things
differently.

But you miss the point - eventually the entire Earth was explored with
the best available technology, and the culture that did it first,
dominated history since.

Same here. There will be many false starts and detours. Those don't
concern us. Only those ETIs that develop a technological singularity
- that spawn a post biological intelligence - which creates a wave of
self-repliating von Neumann probes - are the ones that will impact the
Fermi Paradox. And the paradox is answered. Those that have the
capacity to visit us are rare on the scale of galaxies, and about 100
million to 1 billion years in advance of us - and we are a rare
transitional species the last phase before the post-biological
intelligences emerge - so its very likely the zoo hypothesis is
correct.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity

The
idea of a human spirit of exploration is a myth, a strong and popular one but a
myth nevertheless.

So? All species have a range. All species tend to fill their range.
Humanity is unique in that it uses technical means to expand their
range beyond their native range. So,technology has allowed humans to
exist in ALL ranges. So, using technnology humanity has expanded to
the ends of the Earth. As a result humans are the most successful
animals of their size. This is what it means to be human.

The technological singularity will spawn a post-biological
intelilgence that will be superior to human intelligence in nearly
every measure. Once this intelligence self-reproduces, it can be said
to be a post-biological species. But this species will be superior to
humans in another way because they are not biological. they can
design THEMSELVES as well as their environment. So, here is how the
three orders of intelligent life come down;

1) Non-technical - range determined by nature
2) Technical - range fixed by ability to modify environment
3) Post-biological - range fixed by ability to modify self

In the third order of life the range is COSMIC. There are no limits.
So, such species will outpace and expand way beyond their biological
progenitors.

Belief in that myth is the primary reason we expect ET to
explore

No, Every species fills its range. I said I don't expect biologically
based ETIs to be anywhere near Earth. Post biological ETIs - based on
self-replicating machines modeled after successful organisms in the
environment, will fill their range and do their jobs - and that range
happens to be EVERYWHERE.

yet the Chinese example and the example of all prior civilizations in
the world shows no signs of any spirit of exploration.

You don't get the idea yet. You are looking at a detail and thinking
it is telling you something of a general nature. Fact is, the Chinese
faltered, humanity did not. Humanity filled the range they were
capable of filling like all other species. Details determine the
nature of things. The world is European culture based because of that
detail. But in the end, the world was filled with humans. As the
technological singularity passes, machine intelligence will arise to
surpase human intelligence, and humans will use this infrastructure to
have and to do whatever they like. Machine intelligences too will be
driven by the demands of humans, but they too will have their own
desires and needs - and in the end, because of their superior
capabilities - the machines will dominate.and they will fill their
range, which is everywhere.

It is difficult to imagine what profit there might be trade of any kind or any
resources worth exploiting even if found on Mars much less dozens and more light
years away. I do not see a profit in it.

So, you have much in common with the Chinese, so your culture will not
contribute to the development of interplanetary culture.
However,those who DO find utility - profit - in the development of
interplanetary space will do so. And THEY will contribute to that
culture. This is likely to occur after the technological
singularity,so its likely to be human post-biological intelligence.
Interested humans will tag along obviously, but the machines will
spread farther and faster than the humans.

Consider anything you can imagine you
can find in asteroids with a much cheaper gravity well than any planet that is,
if you can imagine something.

That's your imagination - and that's fine. Super human machines will
have super human imaginations and deal with other super human machines
to achieve goals they have come up with or have been asked to achieve.

If there is a species or two with a spirit of exploration and learning for its
own sake

Curiousity is a feature of those who use brains successfully. You are
making distinctions on secondary observables. The primary is that
humans use technology to expand their range. This is embedded in our
culture. Joseph Campbell talks about the monomyth. All myths have a
hero who is called to adventure and enters a transcendant realm.
There the hero finds a great secret and returns to mundane reality to
share that secret.

Prometheus climbs Mount Olympus, consorts with the gods, steals fire,
and shares it with his fellows.

Buddah as a great prince, fights a great battle, and achieves
enlightenment and sits under a Boddi tree teaching his fellows

Christ suffers dies and is buried on the third day he rises again
bringing salvation to humanity.

This mythic cycle resonates with the human experience because it is
the internalization of the process of expansion humans have engaged in
since Olduvai Gorge. The transcendant realm is the frontier beyond
the known. The great divine secret the new resources available
without competition with your fellows. The joining of your fellows
and the sharing high lighting the lack of compeition because of the
knowledge of the new realm.

Any successful species will engage in this activity.

Any successful post-biological species will engage in this activity.

Any species that does not engage in this activity will not fill its
range and will therefore not be successful as a species. And will not
be detectable by us or contribute to the Fermi Paradox.

how many other civilizations have to be discovered before "if you've
seen one you've seen them all" sets in for all but a few academics?

Successful species fill their range. Unsuccessful species do not.
So, we are compelled to fill a range available to us by forces having
nothing to little to do with the desire to explore. Although the
desire to explore can be tied into this if one has faith that any
untapped range is a range waiting to be developed. This is not true
for us generally - off world - it IS true for post-biological self
replicating machine intelligences. So, to the extent such machine
populations form a successful species, they will expand across the
cosmos - and be part of the Fermi paradox. This is the only species
we are talking about when we ask where are they? We know where all
the others are - they're on their home world or in their home star or
close to it.

And how many
more before even academics find more interesting things to study?

How many babies have to be born before we humans tire of having babies
and engaging in the activities associated with making babies?

To the extent an intelligence sees the cosmos as something very
valuable that only takes a little effort to bring to reality - they
will do those things necessary to fill the cosmos. To the extent an
intelligent sees the cosmos as a barren wilderness totally devoid of
any practical value, rife with danger, and an endless cost - they will
do nothing since in their minds they have reached the limits of their
range - and those species will turn inward and begin the long slow
decline perfecting their mental and technical skills in increasingly
cunning forms of competition over the limited resources available to
them.

Digging up bibleland was hot decades ago before it became clear there was no
bible to find.

You are not looking at this properly.

Now it is a few people who have interests in what there really is
to find who pretend to bible digs to get money from rich Christian and Jewish
sponsors. (Think, The Producers, Bialystok and Blum.) And there are not many of
them as there is almost no hope of finding anything of sufficient importance to
make a professional reputation. In a few more decades even that fiction will
disappear. (soc.history.ancient is the place to disagree with me on this point.)

This has little to nothing to do with how humans and post-biological
intelligences will view the cosmos as a range to be filled.

Studying alien civilizations will be hot for a while but the bloom will wear
off. Who discovered the Aztecs? The Incas? Easy? How about the Sioux? The
Apache? The most famous naturalist of all time was Darwin. Name three others.

We will not explore and settle and make of the cosmos a habitable
range because we're idly curous about intelligence. We will expand
our range because that's what successful species are driven to do. If
we circumscribe our range to Earth to the solar system to the Perseus
Arm, we are placing limits on ourselves and will eventually become
less than human. We will turn inward, forget our the power of our
myths, and become increasingly cunning at stealing and conniving and
fighting one another for what limited resources are left.

If we remain true to our ancient heritage of expanding our habitable
range - and encode that capacity into our post-biological offspring -
then we will set up a species that will seek to fill the cosmos with
its kind - and we will follow where we can of course - and competition
for resources will disappeaer. The mythic promise of the machine will
have been fulfilled.

So even the advance of our own sciences shows new fields are popular for a
while and then decline and eventually fade to obscurity. Space is different? If
you were alive you likely saw the first moon landing. When did you last watch a
shuttle launch? Even on SETI, how many can and cannot name the last search
upgrade for the data we are analyzing? How long was it before you stopped
reading the latest info posting on the S@H website?

And all of that even though we cannot say for certain we are not being visited
frequently.

We are about 30 years away from our own technological singularity. It
has been clear for the past 70 or 80 years that were headed that way.
Not to us obviously,but to those in the know. So, the cosmic web may
have manifested some ETIs nearby and increased intelligence operations
to observe and perhaps participate in this new birth. Such
observations and inflence is very likely to be nearly invisible to us,
even if we knew what to look for.

Here is an example of how it might go. Who knows for sure? But I've
imagined a scenario tht would be nearly impossible for even advanced
systems that were looking really hard - to find what's up.

An intelligent interstellar substrate that followed minimal
interference protocols in regions unimportant to the spawning ETI
would be easily put in place and have been observing the Milky way at
a limited level for aeons.. Given speed of light limits - if they
exist - or complexity limits - if they don't - intelligent machine
systems would be spread throughout the cosmos in a distributed
decision making network that reliably carried out the goals of the
makers.

When the signs of an approaching technological singularity arises on a
planet, more intelligence and decision making capacity is called for.
So, a station out in the Oort cloud might be manifested. A 1 kg probe
is built with an invisibilty sheild and is shot toward Earth along a
radius from the Earth's center to a convenient bright star near the
path to the Oort cloud base. So, even if you could figure out how to
see the slight optical distortions of the invisibilility sheild, the
bright star light would hide the tiny craft from even dedicted
viewers. When the craft hit the Earth's atmosphere it would break up,
looking to the casual observer like a tiny asteroid, but as it slowed,
mite sized robot populations of a wide variety would scatter in the
wind. When they touched down they would establish nests - and receive
additional instructions and manifest additional stealthy techniques to
spread data gathering and processing capabilities across the surface
of the Earth. They would then use sensor fusion and virtual reality
techniques to obtain whatever detail they wanted, run scenarios
against different possibilities, and where needed apply tiny
corrective inputs suggested by the computer models likely by affecting
the brains of humans directly through an intelligent viral infection.

All humans have cold viruses and herpes viruses. It is quite likely
that we have many unknown benign virus infections that have no
sypmptoms. So its easy to imagine that an engineered viral populatoin
could be made to create a latent infection among all members of a
particular species and then have all those elements coordinate to
create structures in each of those bodies capable of sending and
receiving information to a network of other nanotech devices external
to that species. .

--
Will the Iraq surge be remembered along with WWI attempts to break through
the western front?

It may be that every detail of every life for the past 70 years has
been recorded in minute detail and can be summoned up in a virtual
reality model - and that every human heart and thought has been
recorded since it might be of interest to the post-biological
intelligence we spawn some day.

Why would an ETI do this? Because our post-biological intelligence
may have unique capacities and insights that are useful to the ETI at
some point in the cosmic future,and the ETI having this data would
have a bargaining chip - that is, something to trade for the efforts
of our intelligence.


-- The Iron Webmaster, 3743
nizkorhttp://www.giwersworld.org/nizkook/nizkook.phtml
flying saucershttp://www.giwersworld.org/flyingsa.htmla2

Alright

On Apr 2, 10:57 am, "Anthony Cerrato" wrote:
wrote in message

ups.com...





Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs
like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example
of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;

1) Our extremely short life span
2) Our extremely difficult developmental path

While single celled life on Earth arose quite quickly,
after the
conditions were favorable for life, it took over 3 billion
years for
multicelled life capable of making brains arose. After
brains arose
technology quickly arose and appears to be headed toward a
technological singularity by 2030-2040 time frame. After
that time
self-replicating machine systems of immense capacity are
likely to
displace humans as the most powerful intelligences on
Earth.
Humanity's tenure as the dominant technical species on
this planet is
likely to be short, even if humans are ultimately highly
successful.
Of course our tenure as a technical species may be short
if we manage
to kill ourselves off.

So, the longevity of technical species such as ourselves
is very
short. On the order of a century. And we are very rare,
on the order
of one every 30 trillion stars.

[rest snipped]

I think it's a bit too much to say that we may be the only
intelligent life in the "entire cosmos", if you mean the
whole universe, but I do agree that such interstellar
spacefaring life is very sparse in our galaxy in this
particular galactic epoch.

You missed what I'm saying. Look at the data I provided from the
recent galactic survey. ETIs once they are past the technological
singularity will be around for billions of years. And there are
hundreds of them in the nearby cosmos. This makes them common in the
cosmos rare on the scale of galaxies.

ALL those ETIs are POST-BIOLOGICAL. They're machines. They're not
organic. WE are organic. We stand at the cross-roads. Before us,
there wasn't any organic intelligence on Earth. In 30 years machine
intelligence will supercede us. WE ARE VERY RARE. On the scale of
the cosmos we are unique.

There may be 300 ETIs spawned in the last 600 million years. That's
an ETI every 2 million years. But we haven't even concieved of
practical ways to communicate with ETIs more than 60 years ago, and we
will have passed through our own technologicla singularity - in 30
yeears which will obsolete us. If we don't do this, we'll kill
ourselves innuclear war, or die of environmental degradation, or fail
to continue our economic and technical expansion.

But assuming we are on the path toward our technological singularity -
we're quite rare. We're an intelligence capable of signalling across
the cosmos - and we won't be here in our present form in 30 years.

There will another ETI spawned in less time than it took homosapiens
to arise - but its life a a biologically based intelligence driving
the growth of technology capable of cosmic communication - will be
similarly short lived.

No, we're the only one LIKE US. There are hundreds machine based -
and one convenient to us may even be aware of us.

From your comments about von Neuman machine probes, you
might enjoy Alastair Reynolds' grand hard scifi, space opera
trilogy (3 giant books), "Revelation Space", "Redemption
Ark", and "Absolution Gap." I just finished the great first
2 books, and a main plot point has been revealed to be: a
race of intelligent machine life lies in wait for any
intelligent race venturing on massive interstellar
migration, at which point they are totally eradicated as a
species. The machines have been doing this for billion upon
billions of years! Of course they have a (still somewhat
unclear) good reason to do so. This works to explain
Fermi, though Reynolds makes a good case for many
interstellar races having quite long lifetimes before being
snuffed out.

Well, I'm talking about the evidence of the recent galaxy surveys.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi.../71/2dfgrs.png

Here is a recent survey of nearby galaxies. Note the spherical regions
of lower galaxy count. They get larger the closer they are to Earth,
and they don't exist past about 900 million light years. This is
consistent with von Neumann probes engulfing galaxies about 300
million years ago.

Why now and not earlier? The metallicity of the universe wasn't high
enough.


I love the books, but I think it's sufficient to assume that
all interstellar travelling races (and their outposts,
colonies, etc) have short average lifetimes,

Once an ETI passes through a technological singularity the biological
members of that species are no longer in charge. They are outclassed
and surpassed by post-biological lifeforms. Those forms that adopt
the impulse to spread their kind throughout their range, will create
an expanding sphere of industrially organized matter that will appear
dimmer than native matter. So we should see a region filled with dark
spheres equal in diameter to their age times some fraction of light
speed.


far less than
millions of years -

Biological entities have life spans on this range of time scales. But
ETI biologies - the ones that spawned the post-biological component -
is likely to be as long lived as alligators due to lack of selective
pressure - but likely would not survive in their spawning form for
more than 100 million years. Of course, the post-biological ETI can
change its form as needed - and to the extent they wish to do
so,members of the spawning biology can play that game too - but they
cannot properly be said to be of the same species as the spawning
population.

- there are many possible reasons for
their extinction, and I think the mismatches between the
time windows of their periods of communication and
explorations and our current era are explainable by their
sparses in number throughout time. ...tonyC- Hide quoted text -

The universe pours out metal from its very creation. The fraction of
metals rise over time as a result. Metals are needed for life. So,
metals must be present in a certain amount for life to appear. The
cosmic abundance of metals must be generally above a certian level for
von Neumann probes to function. So, von Neumann probes won't span the
galxies until the galaxies are filled with enough population 1 stars
to make it worth while. This happened only in the last 900 million
years. And it just so happens, that voids arose in the galaxy
patterns 900 million years ago.

This suggests that the source of the voids is the activity of von
Neumann probes.

- Show quoted text -

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi.../71/2dfgrs.png

On Apr 1, 8:54 pm, wrote:
On Apr 1, 7:16 am, wrote:





Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;

1) Our extremely short life span
2) Our extremely difficult developmental path

While single celled life on Earth arose quite quickly, after the
conditions were favorable for life, it took over 3 billion years for
multicelled life capable of making brains arose. After brains arose
technology quickly arose and appears to be headed toward a
technological singularity by 2030-2040 time frame. After that time
self-replicating machine systems of immense capacity are likely to
displace humans as the most powerful intelligences on Earth.
Humanity's tenure as the dominant technical species on this planet is
likely to be short, even if humans are ultimately highly successful.
Of course our tenure as a technical species may be short if we manage
to kill ourselves off.

So, the longevity of technical species such as ourselves is very
short. On the order of a century. And we are very rare, on the order
of one every 30 trillion stars.

Species that are incapable of producing a technological singularity do
not factor into the Fermi Paradox. We know where they are, stuck on
their planet of origin incapable of affecting us here.

Species capable of interstellar communication either wipe themselves
out or develop a technological singularity and give rise to a post-
biological intelligence which displaces them.

Prior to the development of high technology, species are incapable of
communicating either electronically or physically across interstellar
distances. After the development of high technology we are easily
capable of communicating across interstellar distances. First with
radio waves, later with light waves, later still by physical
transport.

However, the development of ever more powerful technologies gives rise
to an increasingly more powerful means of destruction to the species
developing that technology. The development of ever more powerful
weapons is clearly maladaptive.

The development of increasingly capable means of production spawns
excessive population growth and causes resource depletion and
environmental degradation. Again, highly maladaptive developments for
a biological species

Why did we develop technology then? We had the brains for it. The
development of large brains, and the associated development of high-
technology using those brains, is an example of sexual selection in
humans Humans with big brains tend to produce more offspring than
humans without big brains. Those with big brains flirt and make
themselve more sexually attractive. Thus big brains are selected for
the same way other excessively large organs are selected for

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_selection

So, we have big brains and high technology for the same reason
peacocks have large tail feathers. Excessively large brains result
from this process and along with it, increasing technological prowess
leading ultimately to a technological singularity or our demise
through abuse of technology. Species that don't follow this sort of
developmental path lack any capacity to affect or signal off their
world and so don't factor in to the Fermi paradox.

All technology, based as it is upon fundamental physical principals,
have the same end points in their development and those end points are
all reached in a century or so after the development of nuclear energy
due to the fact that technical development itself accelerates tehnical
development. So, all technologies tend to mature to their physical
limits at the same time. This is called a technological singularity.

Before the singularity life is limited and difficult. After the
singularity, everything that can be done in the physical world, is
easily attained. Including self replicating machine intelligences
capable of interstellar travel - aka von Neumann Probes.

The development of a species capable of spawning a technological
singularity is rare on the scale of galaxies, but common in the
cosmos. Best estimates using Drakes equation indicate you need about
30 trillion to hundred trillion stars to spawn a technological
singularity. Once the singularity has occurred, then that star system
becomes the point source of an expanding wave of self replicating
starships that engulf the host galaxy in less than a million years,
and engulfs surrounding galaxies in equally short periods after
transit times of millions to tens of millions of years.

So, a living world, like Earth, spawns life in less than a billion
years, and then gestates for over 3 billion years and produces sexual
multi-celled creatures that have brains. In less than a billion years
after brains,a technological singularity appears that becomes the
source of an exponentially expanding wave of self-replicating
starships that engulf billions of galaxies surrounding the point of
origin.

The stars composing the galaxies are broken up processed for their
metals and fusion occurs enclosed in energy collectors rendering them
invisible to outside observers. A portion of the industrial output is
made into daughter probes to repeat the process farther from the
origin. The balance of material and energy are available for
industrial use.

So, a survey of galaxies should show indications of regions of low
galaxy counts relative to the average.

An examination of the latest galaxy surveys shows that such spherical
voids do indeed exist in the numbers and sizes predicted by my
analysis. More detailed analysis will likely show that;

That technological singularities occurred no less than 500 million
years ago and no more than 800 million years ago - by looking at the
variation of 'void' size with distance from Earth.

That the rate of expansion ranges from 0.2 c (20% light speed) to 0.3
c (30% light speed) by looking at circularity with distance and size
variation with distance. .

That the spawning of a single technological singularity requires 30
trillion to 50 trillion stars.

Comparison of result 3 with the developmental time line of Earth gives
the fractions of all the components in the Drake Equation

If correct it is very likely that the Earth is under surveillance by
extra-galactic ETI (zoo hypothesis is correct) until we have spawned
our own post-biological intelligence, This is the result of the
explosive nature of the technological singularity, and the massive
ability to survey and affect the cosmos using self-replicating machine
system, along with a substantial head start of hundreds of millons of
years by the earliest ETIs.

This contact should occur about the time of our own technologicla
singularity predicted to occur by 2030-2040 AD time frame. At that
point, contact may be initiated by ETI and our own post-biological
intelligences will enter the cosmic nursery for the youngest of cosmic
intelligences.

You are still mainstream box thinking

You say that as if there were a problem.

as though we're it, as in nearly
the one and only viable species of intelligence to behold within our
entire galaxy,

Yes. That is exactly what I am proposing are the facts.

and much less God forbid within our solar system.

There is no jugdgment attached to this thesis. It is merely suggested
by seveal threads of evidence. God knows, we don't.

What if the other planet(s) of technically viable life hadn't wasted
such horrific centuries upon centuries at systematically exterminating
one another,

We have not systematicallly exterminated ourselves. Otherwise we
wouldn't be here. So, your comment makes no sense. You seem to be
asking if there were no war would the human race have benefited in the
modern age. Yes, human suffering would be less. But such differences
would be meaningless to the arrival a technological singularity.
After all, 120 years is already pretty damn quick. If we hadn't had
two world wars and a cold war humanity might have shaved two or three
decades off that interval. It might make a difference to us alive
today, but it would make scant difference in the grand scheme of
things if my thesis is correct.


and/or having trashed their environment in the process?

Again, if humans were more sensitive to the environmental consequences
of their actions it would allow them to live at a higher standard of
living prior to the singularity and it would shave a few years off the
interval between the arrival of technologies capable of interstellar
communication and the coming technological singularity. But in the
grand scheme of things very little would have changed.

Had humans the benefit of hindsight and spent less on global warfare
and less on nuclear weapons and more on productive efforts and more on
environmental concerns, our lives would be marginally improved and the
end result would be the arrival of a technological singularity now
instead of 30 years from now. But since the technological singularity
is itself highly disruptive, giving rise to a non-biological
intelligent species that dominates future growth from this world, then
it matters little in the grand scheme I am reporting here.

How much further advanced would an Earth like species be if they had
merely 1000 years or even 100 years worth of intellectually productive
opportunities (focus), that obviously we're not going to see the start
of for at least another century to come?

If you would trouble yourself to actually read and understand the
references I am providing you would see that the technological
singularity is 30 years off. We've only been capable of signalling
interstellar distances for 50 years. We've only had nuclear power for
60 years. We've only had cybernetic processes for 65 years. The
interval between the rise of high technology and technological
singularity is around a century. Us being less wasteful, more kind to
one another, more friendly to our environment and more efficient in
our investments would only serve to reduce this period by 20 to 30
years.

Also, you miss my point entirely. Humans will not be in charge in 100
years, so how we decide to value things in 100 years or 1000 years
won't matter. The singularity will achieve ALL within 30 years.
Understand, technical development feeds back on itself and accelerates
technical development. Once that continues for a period of time, the
rate of technological growth accelerates so that an INFINITE amount of
development occurs in a FINITE amount of time. Anyone familiar with
the operation of calculus understands how this works. Well, ALL
technical development beyond a certain point seems to follow this sort
of path. So, there is a natural break point, before which everything
has a cost and is organized in ways we understand, and after which
nothing makes sense to us, and we are no longer the dominant
intelligence on Earth. THIS is what ETIs are waiting for - if they're
here waiting for anything. What we choose to do doesn't really
matter. Nothing we do prior to the singularity can compare to what
the singularity will do.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity
http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/vi...ngularity.html



Just because a given planet is a little too hot for us isn't excluding
what good it is for other intelligent species, and in some instances a
somewhat cold planet or moon isn't taboo as long as there's a few
local resources of energy, or at least a viable way of importing the
required energy.

To a post-singularity self-replicating machine based intelligence that
is some 100 million to 900 million years in advance of the human race,
the resources of the solar system are about as useful and as much
interest as the food resources in a squirrels nest to a human. That
is, your analysis proceeds from several flawed assumptions.


We obviously can't live upon our nearly naked and thus reactive moon,

Humans have visited the moon and plans have been drawn up to create an
outpost there since the 1950s.

http://www.astronautix.com/articles/lunex.htm

This ability and our actually carrying out manned lunar expeditions a
decade after Lunex plans would have carried out the building of a
lunar base

http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary...ollo_25th.html

all prior to the technological singularity has no bearing whatever on
the points I am making. These comments of yours are the same words
verbatim that you make to EVERY post from EVERYONE on EVERY subject.
This suggests that what I say in response from this point out has no
real impact on you at all since you are now driven not by logic,but by
some deep incessant need to engage in the same series of fixed ideas
related to the moon, venus and humanity.

but with applied technology and mostly robotics is how we can as a
species directly benefit from such efforts, and if need be survive
deep enough underground as based nearly entirely upon those local
energy resources.

Energy concerns are a problem facing humanity today. Such concerns
will not be germaine in the not so distant future and to a species
capable of inter galactic travel the resources of the solar system
will matter little. WE are the resource due to the information
encoded in us and our culture. This is what ETI is interested in
without disturbing it too much by its presence, if there is an ETI
observing us at all.

-
Brad Guth- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

wrote:
On Apr 1, 10:57 pm, Matt Giwer wrote:
wrote:
Fermi's paradox asks, where are they? The answer is ETIs like
ourselves are very rare, we may be the only living example of such
species in the entire cosmos. This due to two factors;
...

To repeat, if 1/10 of 1% of the unexplained UFO sightings are the real thing
the Earth is a popular tourist destination in the universe.

Far fewer than that 1 in 1000 are the real thing - if any are.

Mere assertion with about 10% in the unexplained category. (Thus I am talking
about 1 in 10,000 being real.) If you can't explain it you can't assign it to
the "not real" category nor to the real category as believers are wont. Both are
equally baseless assertions.

What you should realize is the number of UFOs that are reported is still quite
large even though it does not make the news. I have seen two I cannot explain
even with a degree in physics and years of looking into UFO explanations. I do
not spend much time looking at the sky. Assuming I am average and 6 billion
people in the world that is a lot of unexplainable sightings.

I mean
consider that we have stealth technologies today on the drawing boards
that provide for total invisibility to the limits of optics

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...;312/5781/1777

in both the visible and microwave regions

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...;312/5781/1780

So, I doubt even if we were very popular there'd be ANY reports
whatever of the real thing even if they were SLIGHTLY in advance of
us.

You assume they would care to be stealthy. Why? As we have only ourselves, a
sample size of one, we can either assume they are exactly like us or
incomprehensible to us. Given different cultures of humans are mutually
incomprehensible to each other (the US and Iraq as one example, ancient and Dark
Ages and Medieval and modern Romans for another) it is unlikely they are exactly
like us.

Now, as to our popularity.. ever own a horse? Ever have a horse of
yours give birth? Its not an uncommon thing, to happen in the world.
Its nothing you send notices out about. But as the day approaches, it
attracts attention. People stop by the stable, they help out as best
they can. You call in the vet. You know. Its an event. More people
than usual visit the stall.

What it does not attract is biologists to study it as an example of mammalian
reproduction.

Same here. Except this is a really really rare event. I mean species
like us - biological entities in charge of the technology - are rare.

Upon what basis do you make that assertion? Rare compared to what?

We're rare to start out with, but then our lifespan is only like 100
years. So, to see the birth of a post-biological intelligence, which
occurs in like 3 to 5 years - as we pass through the singularity - is
extraordinarily rare! It'll attract attention.

The more common it is the less attention it gets. Who would be interested in
seeing the ten thousandth example of it?

Further, self-replicating machine systems that have spread across even
one galaxy, let alone billions of them, have no cost. It doesn't cost
anything for anything that can happen to happen. So, the only
requirement is the will. Its hard for creatures like us to understand
the nature of reality as these super ETIs see it.

This whole idea of "super" is rather grating in its 1930s pulp form. Different
is a given. We do not understand reality as the Afghanis see it. It has nothing
to do with "super" anything.

The same way a
primitive tribesman might not understand the dining concerns of a
resident in Beverly Hills who spends the afternoon deciding what purse
will go wth what dress and shoes at the Gucci store on Rodeo drive.

Nor vice versa and neither implies super anything.

If they think about dinner at all they are thinking about a seating at
a five star restaurant or just taking it easy and going three star
today. What the tribesman organizes his whole day around, and the
lives of the tribe he lives with - following the seasons of life to
eat - the resident of Beverly Hills pays no thought to at all - and
may never have skinned an animal and made use of the hide. In short,
they don't understand one another in the least. And they're the same
species on the same planet separated by a few thousand years of
technical development.

So which do you assume would be like the visiting ET and why? Because we do it
has nothing to do with any other species particularly one with no relationship
at all to any life on earth. We have no idea even if our idea of evolution
applies any place else.

When we say things like we'd have to be as popular as the Grand Canyon
to have so many aliens visit us - the answer is no. Because it costs
us something to visit the Grand Canyon. It costs these creatures - if
you can call them that - NOTHING - in the way we think about costs.
So, the only thing they require is the will to do so. And the question
of whether its interesting enough to watch the answer is sure, at
least as interesting as watching a foal be born, and maybe more
interesting than a baby being born. So, there is a reason why here
why now -

I only said the rejection of all observations when there are so many
unexplainable and using our sample size of one is ridiculous. I did not suggest
I had the least idea why they might be visiting. Maybe they like talking with
our clouds. Maybe they are mating with our stones. Maybe they are teenagers who
like spooking the natives -- see stealth above. I have no idea. Is it not like
people to assume the only interest is themselves?

But I doubt ANY UFO reports are the 'real thing' - Jung addressed this
fact many years ago. That doesn't mean aliens aren't observing and
perhaps even directing to a small degree our development - in the same
way a nurse directs the birthing procedure. haha..

The great fraud Jung has spoken? All psychoanalysis is fraud and all
psychoanalysts are quacks and should be in prison for their fraud and
racketeering. That includes Freud. L. Ron Hubbard did nothing but copy the
psychoanalysis con. No one has ever been cured of anything by talking. Self-help
gurus with fancy degrees are still con men.

I would expect you to do better than that. At least from someone who in fact
knows something about science.

..
Bottom line, we have no basis for saying ETs are rare.

Yes we do.

Unexplained therefore not real. You have lost me.

1) It took life that was already here nearly 1/3 the age of the
universe for intelligent life to emerge here. This suggests its
pretty uncommon and hard for life to do.

Absent alien seeding the distant past life on earth has ZERO relationship to
life any place else. A sample size of one is not useful for extrapolation as to
how long it takes. If you really like the idea they might come here to study us
then they might be studying why real intelligence has not emerged yet.

Second our solar system is nearly a third of the age of the universe. Life
started almost immediately. That leaves two earlier thirds for other
intelligences to have appeared.

Third, it is a sample size of one. That means it always happens 4 billion years
after a planet forms. That means the first intelligences appeared some 10
million years ago on every planet that formed. That is a big number of them even
at the 1% level of planets where life can evolve. That is a big number at the
one in a million level and even at the one in a billion level.

2) We have developed a workable technical procedure - von Neumann
probes - for exploring and making industrial use of the entire galaxy
that if initiated now would take less than 1 million years to swallow
the galaxy. In the pat 3 billion years life was developing brains and
technology on Earth - not one single star system arose to do the same
thing. This suggests that the Earth was lucky to develop brains.

I have explored that twice here but it assumes what we MIGHT do and is only a
response to those saying spreading through space is impossible. That something
is possible does not mean that it will be done. They are not human. They are not
even terrestrial. The Romans were not tossing amphora with messages into the sea.

3) The galactic surveys recently made show ball like regions of low
galaxy counts. This is the sort of structure that would be formed if
von Neumann probes expanded beyond their host galaxy and swallowed up
the surrounding galaxies - shielding their light from out view. These
ball like empty regions are 30 million to 300 million light years
across - and appear to be smaller farther from earth (farther back in
time) and seem to have have started forming some 800 million years
ago. This is consistent with Earth's history of life and evolutinary
time table.. The number of voids compared to the number of galaxies
in the survey suggest that one star in 30 trillion to 50 trillion
develop ETI capable of von Neumann probes - which are the only ones
that are of interest in the Fermi Paradox. This makes ETI
extraordinarily rare. And transitional biologically based
intelligences nearly unique in the cosmos.

The other problem with 2 and 3 is how late our solar system formed. There would
be 10 billion years of expansion meaning all we could see would be stars older
than than that.

All we can say is we
have not had any success with RF surveys. We can only speculate as to why there
has been no success.

Correct. The lack of success in finding native life forms nearby
within our own galaxy is consistent with this thesis - life is common
on the scale of the universe, rare on the scale of galaxies.

We have barely looked at our solar system yet. Some fringe groups are holding
out for dolphin and elephants being intelligent. The most primitive
civilizations hold out for animals having different natures not different
intelligence levels.

===

We do not have to make assumptions about what we do not know. If you want to
write a filler article pro or con ET all you have to do is make any assumption
and work it to the bitter end. It helps to pick an assumption that leads to the
opposite conclusion of the previous article to increase its saleability. You
could make a living on such articles alternating back and forth using different
pen names.

Some consider it fun. It can be used as a tutorial exercise. But in the end we
have a sample size of one and we can't do a thing with that. But people have a
strong attachment to first impressions. That is why the mark always wins the
first hand in a crooked poker game. We are our only impression of life.

--
Acts, Romans, Corinthians! Let me fix your ears. -- JC
-- The Iron Webmaster, 3747
nizkor http://www.giwersworld.org/nizkook/nizkook.phtml
Old Testament http://www.giwersworld.org/bible/ot.phtml a6

wrote:

Mr. Guth, you are an idiot. Don't bother posting to me.

--
The mysteries of this life will be revealed in the next because they don't
skimp on the science funding on the other side.
-- The Iron Webmaster, 3750
nizkor http://www.giwersworld.org/nizkook/nizkook.phtml
http://www.giwersworld.org