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The Fermi Paradox II — Solutions and Ideas – Where Are All The Aliens?

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    There are probably 10,000 stars for every grain of sand on Earth, in the observable universe.
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    We know that there are maybe trillions of planets.
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    So where are all the aliens?
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    This is the Fermi Paradox
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    If you want to know more about it, watch part one.
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    Here we look to the possible solutions to the Fermi Paradox.
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    So will we be destroyed or does a glorious future await us?
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    Space travel is hard. Although possible, it's an enormous challenge to travel to other stars.
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    Massive amounts of materials have to be put into orbit and assembled.
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    A journey of maybe thousands of years needs to be survived by population big enough to start from a scratch.
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    And the planet might be not as hospitable as it seems from afar.
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    It was already extremely hard to set up a spaceship that could survive the trip.
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    And interstellar invasion might be impossible to pull off.
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    Also consider time, the universe is very old.
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    On Earth there's been life for at least 3.6 billion years.
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    Intelligent human life for about 250,000 years.
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    But only for about a century have we had the technology to communicate over great distances.
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    There might have been grand alien empires that stretched across thousands of systems and existed for millions of years,
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    and we might just have missed them.
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    There might be grandiose ruins washing away on distant worlds.
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    99% of all species on Earth have died out.
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    It's easy to argue that this will be our fate sooner or later.
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    Intelligent life may develop, spread over a few systems and die off over and over again.
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    But galactic civilizations might never meet.
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    So maybe it's a unifying experience for life in the universe to look at the stars and wonder "Where is everyone?"
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    But there is no reason to assume aliens are like us
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    or that our logic applies to them
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    It might just be that our means of communications are extremely primitive and outdated.
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    Imagine sitting in a house with a Morse code transmitter, you keep sending messages but no people answer
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    and you would feel pretty lonely, maybe we're still undetectable for intelligent species
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    and we'll remain so until we learn to communicate properly.
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    And even if we met aliens we might be too different to be able to communicate with them in a meaningful way.
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    Imagine the smartest squirrel you can,
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    no matter how hard you try, you won't be able to explain our society to it
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    After all from the squirrel's perspective a tree is all that sophisticated intelligence like itself needs to survive.
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    So she learns cutting down whole forest is madness but we don't destroy forest because we hate squirrels.
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    We just want the resources
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    The squirrel's wishes and the squirrel's survival are no concern to us.
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    A type three civilization in need of resources might threat us in a similar way.
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    They might just evaporate our oceans to make collecting whatever they need easier.
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    One of the aliens might think for second "Ughh tiny little aches, they built really cute concrete structures, oh well now they're dead."
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    before activating warp speed.
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    But if there is a civilization out there that wants to eliminate other species,
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    it far more likely that it will be motivated by culture rather than by economics.
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    And anyway it will be more effective to automate the process by constructing the perfect weapon,
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    a self replicating space probes made from nano-machines.
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    They operate on molecular level incredibly fast and deadly,
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    with the power to attack and dismantle anything in an instant.
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    You only need to give them four instructions.
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    One, find planet with life.
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    Two, disassemble everything on this planet into its component parts.
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    Three, use the resources to build new space probes.
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    Four, repeat.
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    A doomsday machine like this could render a galaxy sterile in a few million years,
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    but why would you flight light years to get the resources or commit genocide.
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    The speed of light is actually not very fast.
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    If someone could travel at the speed of light, it will still take 100,000 years to cross the milky way once
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    and you'll probably travel way slower.
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    There might be way more enjoyable things than destroying civilizations and building empires.
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    An interesting concept is the Matrioshka Brain.
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    A mega-structure surrounding a star,
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    a computer of such computing power that an entire species could upload their consciousness and exist in a simulated universe.
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    Potentially, one could experience an eternity of pure ecstasies without ever being bored or sad, a perfect life.
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    If built around the red dwarfs, this computer could be powered for about ten trillions years.
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    Who would want to conquer the galaxy or make contact with other life forms if this were an option.
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    All these solutions to the Fermi Paradox have one problem.
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    We don't know where the borders of technology are.
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    We could be close to the limit or nowhere near it.
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    And super technology awaits us,
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    granting us immortality, transporting us to other galaxies, elevating us to the level of gods.
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    One thing we do have to acknowledge is that we really don't know anything.
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    Humans have spent more than ninety percent of their existence as hunters-gatherers.
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    500 years ago we thought we were the center of the universe.
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    200 years ago we stopped using human labors as the main source of the energy.
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    30 years ago we had apocalyptic weapons pointed at each other because of political disagreement.
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    In the galactic time scale we are embryos,
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    we've come far but still have a long way to go.
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    The mindset that we really are the center of the universe is still strong in humans,
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    so it's easy to make arrogant assumptions about life in the universe.
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    But in the end, there's only one way to find out right?
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Title:
The Fermi Paradox II — Solutions and Ideas – Where Are All The Aliens?
Description:

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Video Language:
English
Duration:
06:17

English subtitles

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