This ends badly for the Precursors, we become corrupted after creating our 2 potential replacements for holding the Mantle. Our own children, the Forerunners, nearly wipe us out and we have to flee the galaxy. We come back with a vengeance and manifest as the Flood and get our revenge in the end.
We would’ve gotten away with it too, if it wasn’t for those pesky Halo rings
According to the drake equation we’re looking at at least a few million planets with at least ordinary carbon-and-water-based life in this galaxy alone- and in such an unimaginably huge place as even the galaxy (never mind UNIVERSE) there’s bound to be at least 2 of everything, including sentient species.
Yet we see nothing. Even if FTL is impossible, we should be seeing signs of more advanced civilizations (starts shifting due to Dyson swarms etc). Something in our understanding is very wrong, and most of the options are horrifying, in their own ways.
Nah. The distances are too vast. Even if you could touch 1/4 of light speed then that means to get anywhere you take light years and x4 and you start to see the issue.
Then there’s the time dilation thing. Suppose you do see some evidence…so u fly towards it. Only in the time it takes u to get there the civ is gone.
There are a few unexplained phenomena in the universe that physicists do little more than shrug their shoulders at. Any of them could be evidence of other life, and there are proposed theories suggesting as much. We can’t prove anything definitively because we’re too limited in how far we can go towards explaining the unexplained, but I’d say there’s an asterisk on “nothing”.
Why is not being alone in the universe a bad thing though?
I actually get a great deal of comfort from the thought that us and our silly little squabbles are so inconsequential to the universe at large. That some alien species we can’t even begin to imagine is just doing the same shit we are 800 billion light years away. Makes me feel like maybe getting up for work in the morning ain’t so bad when you consider the scale
Why is not being alone in the universe a bad thing though?
There are possible concerns relating to the Fermi paradox. Perhaps there aren’t many space faring civilizations because the most advance civilization exterminates others that they see as a potential threat.
But yeah, I also find it comforting to know our existence really isn’t that big a deal lol. It just makes me feel like we should do what we can to get the most joy out of our lives while we’re here
Maybe they’re also bickering and arguing about who killed who in the Guejenjdjja-Otoenenjda conflict, taking place in the desert of purple sand, with very geographically-literate Ghdisixoosbdbjzoakan college students obnoxiously cosplaying it in the quads
The arguments some people make is that if it’s likely there’s so many other civilizations out there, then why haven’t we found any evidence of any of them? You have Great Filter and Dark Forest theories that try to explain it, both of which would likely be very bad for humanity.
But it all forgets that we really haven’t searched much of even our own solar system in incredible detail, so it’s very possible we either haven’t looked in the right places, or don’t have the tech in place to see civilizations
Given how curious we are, I think being scared of aliens is odd. I would assume that a civilization capable of interstellar travel is fairly chill.
And a sufficiently advanced alien civilization could sterilise earth from the comfort of their home star system, so if advanced aliens wanted us dead, it would not be hard, we wouldn’t even see it coming.
I think the scary part stems from looking at ourselves. We’re well on our way “out there” but still kill each other in the cruellest ways. Our sadistic qualities only limited by our means to perpetrate them.
Hawkins shared his thoughts on this subject and, although less morbid, still quite scary.
A civilization capable of interstellar travel would be a lot more advanced then we are. If we but this in perspective, we as humans don’t really care about other species that much. Imagine a species that is more advanced tham we are compared to chimps. Some people respect chimps, but we keep them in zoos and destroy their living spaces. An interstellar civilization could see us even lower than that, just some primates living on a rock. They might not even think us intelligent, we only just have ‘understood’ quantum theory.
I think that is an overly bleak view. An interstellar civilization is likely on a similar evolutionary ladder spot as us and I would imagine that they would recognize this. I don’t think that there is much difference between us and them in that scenario, except how far we have developed our idea space. Supposedly with the help of such a civilization we would be able to accomplish the same feats as them in a fairly short time. No monkey is going to engineer rockets, no matter how long you try to teach them.
Ye, the civilization might see us as potential rivals even and to be exterminated before we reach their level. It would be very naive to think that any interaction with a more advanced species is gonna be positive for us
The difference between us and a mouse is only 50 million years. The difference between us and a smart ape is maybe only 200k years. Now imagine a civilisation that has been around for 1 billion years. And then apply the same exponential growth curve that life and technology have on earth. The distance between us and them could be absurdly huge.
There’s a Sci Fi trilogy about that. All aliens are omnicidal.
The main rule is “don’t ever get spotted by another civilization”. If another nearby civilization wants to conquer you, you could stop them by threatening to broadcast both our and their locations more broadly, a kind of mutually assured distruction.
They may have stupid politics like us and need us as a common enemy to unite their factions/be racist at. So even if theyre not naturally genocidal, they might choose to “for the greater good”. Plus our sweet sweet natural resources/scrap.
The best estimates of how many intelligent civilizations there should be suggest that the galaxy should be teeming with them. If any of them evolved mere millions of years before we did, given our pace of technological improvement they should have figured out interstellar travel by now, and they should be broadcasting communication across the galaxy like we’re doing. Yet we’ve detected nothing. Why?
A possible explanation is that an advanced civilization is exterminating all other civilizations, perhaps to avoid competition. It seems like a sensible approach to lie low until we can figure this out, just in case.
That is a solution, there are multiple other solutions all equally or more likely that don’t involve murderous aliens.
One just as out there would be a sort of galactic zoo - there is simply an agreement not to interact with intelligent life before they reach a certain step, say establish global unity or develop a certain tech.
It could be that we are in fact a statistical outlier or are simply wrong in our probability calculations.
It could be that intelligence develops but spacefaring is rare. It could be that intelligent life simply has a tendency to collapse before it gets there. It is certainly still possible for us and it is not like we are making super meaningful progress towards space colonisation.
It could be that there are not great viable interstellar travel options, almost every option we have thought of that makes sense time wise has big ifs attached to it assuming we have a good idea of physics. Of those probably relativistic travel is the most likely and even then it would take quite a decent chunk of time to span the galaxy, going to war on those timescales is basically non-sensical.
I expect that any civilisation capable of cooperating at scale to achieve meaningful interstellar travel would also be developed enough in ethics to most likely not pose a danger to us.
A civilisation capable of waging war like that is probably around a K2 civ and the idea that a single planet somehow threatens them is also silly. Even a fully K1 civ to them would be close to a stadium packed full on earth in terms of relative size.
Absolutely, there’s lots of possibilities. But I don’t think that negates the point that the most sensible approach to any unknown situation is to be cautious and lie low until you fully understand the situation.
Of course, flawed as we are, we’re not doing that, as we aren’t responding to other potential existential threats.
To be fair, the droplet wasn’t exactly a bumper car. It could ram and destroy several ships before your human reaction time could tell which way it went. It went so fast it could pass through a ship leaving a hole behind and white hot metal and it could turn on a dime at full speed.
It was definitely badass, an excellent ‘inscrutable monster’ type of foe.
I’ll say though, the droplet was so far ahead of humanity that it didn’t matter what they were prepared for. The droplet could’ve just as easily been a guided projectile (which it was) and it wouldn’t have made a difference.
Tangential, this is also the best explanation why in Mass Effect the Asari, Batarians and Quarians look so human-like and many other species are sharing similarities with humans: A few cycles ago, a species adept at bio-engineering took special interest in those primates from E-arth and just asked themselves: “What would happen, if we mix their DNA with every other species in the galaxy?”
This belief that Asari use their psychic powers to manipulate people is based solely on a scene of three drunk dudes sitting around a table and watching an Asari stripper. I’d hardly call that conclusive evidence.
Also, if that theory were true, it’d have knock-on effects that quickly spiral out of control. If Asari would use psychic powers to make everyone believe they look like the viewers’ race, then what happens to recorded media? What happens if anyone ever decides to draw how Asari look to them, only to then find out that others see Asari completely different? What happens if you try to touch an Asari? Do Elcor see Asari as Elcor-like? And Hanar see Asari as floating squids? How would that work with the statue on Thessia? And what range would those psychic powers have? And if those psychic powers had a lasting effect on the brain of those affected, how come no doctor or medical computer ever noticed that? And what do people see that watch media of Asari, but had never met Asari in real life?
No, I think the scene in question just shows three drunk guys seeing what they want to see.
I’ve come to the conclusion…. That if there are species out there able to travel interstellar distances in a reasonable time, then they have the ability to know humans are fucking nuts- because they can detect the radioactive isotopes in the atmosphere.
Which means the only ones coming are even more nuts than we are.
This, leads me to assume that either, they’re genocidal maniacs out to destroy everything that’s not them, (a la the bad guys in Ian Douglas’ Semper Mars series,)
I suppose i should have mentioned the third possibility of “both”- they’re Space Mormons; but we rejected the good news so now they’re on a genocidal killing spree. (And they think were primitive, as you say,)
I dunno. would space rednecks really survive getting their own M/AM torps? you really wouldn’t want redneck engineering anywhere near antimatter in enough concentration to blow up.
(there is that theory. Life is common. But usually kills itself off or dies off before leaving it’s home system.)
Would depend on how old anti matter tech is for them. Rednecks work best with older tech. So if the tech is a couple centuries old and anti matter reactors are as common as internal combustion engines are for us then id trust it about as much as a redneck tank, meaning let me see it in action atleast a couple times before I get near it.
Okay redneck tank was probably a bad example, but the redneck IED is still nothing to laugh at. Worst case scenario we use it a base for study, perhaps chuck it at anyone dumb enough to get near earth. Just give Ireland veto power it should be fine.
If we arent then we must embrace our oldest tendency and become alone. They will either become one with mankind much like the Neanderthals or they must simply perish.
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