Welcome to I Am Your Target Demographic and today we’re discussing the Fermi Paradox,
which ultimately asks the big question “Where are the aliens?”
It’s named after physicist Enrico Fermi in the early 1900s, who came to believe in
this paradox by looking at two facts.
1.) We’ve never encountered alien life and
2.) there is a high probability of alien life existing.
So why is it that we’ve never encountered it?
Fermi started the argument, backed up more recently by another physicist named Michael
Hart, who actually researched and published based on the original concept.
Here’s the breakdown of the argument.
In our galaxy, there are billions of stars.
Some of these stars, maybe not many, likely have Earth-like planets with the ability to
host life of some sort.
Some of these would have likely advanced to intelligence and discovered interstellar travel,
just like we’re working on.
Either out of curiosity or necessity, it’s likely that some of these planets would begin
seeking out other hospitable planets like ours.
So now that we have a core understanding of the paradox, let’s try to figure out why this is...
What could explain the lack of alien contact?
In this video, we’re going to cover 20 reasons why we haven’t seen alien life, let’s
roll through them quickly.
The first reason is the most obvious.
Alien life is rare or non-existent.
This is called the Rare Earth hypothesis, that Earth is not quote unquote typical but
in fact one of a kind.
There are thousands of factors that all contribute to our planet being hospitable and that life
could even advance to this level.
Maybe we’re the only one.
Maybe no other intelligent life has evolved yet.
This assumes that yes, maybe other planets could host life, but maybe that life never
evolved, remaining forever in its simple state, like algae or bacteria.
Maybe this life did evolve but they haven’t achieved technology able to communicate or travel.
Maybe they’re just a few hundred years behind us in advancement, unable to send or receive
communications and unable to leave their planets.
We’re all living in isolated bubbles.
Up next we have a theory that’s a little grim.
It’s the nature of intelligent life to destroy itself.
This theory proposes that with technology comes inevitable destruction, through factors
like climate change, resource depletion, or faulty artificial intelligence, like a Terminator-like future.
This theory also connects to what’s called the Great Filter, the line at which civilizations
are filtered out.
The bigger question is whether we’ve already passed it and are somehow the greatest example,
or if we’ve yet to hit that filter point and are just awaiting the inevitable downfall.
Connected to this theory, what if it’s the nature of intelligent life to destroy others.
A technologically advanced civilization might understand the threats and concerns of competing
races, so might be destroying advanced civilizations as they arise.
This could be out of paranoia and fear for themselves or it could be out of aggression
and the simple fact that they can wipe out these civilizations.
Back to more natural reasons, such as Extinction events are common.
The Earth has endured several extinction-level events, so it’s likely that other planets
face these same things, constantly destroying or setting back advanced civilizations.
Now let’s assume that a civilization gets to the point of advanced technology.
What if these civilizations are too far apart in space or time.
What if millions of years ago, a civilization reached this stage and was out there seeking
life, while we were just evolving?
They went extinct before we had the chance to respond.
What if they exist so far away in space that we’ll never hear or see them?
We might become extinct while waiting for signals to reach that far.
Because these civilizations might be so far apart, it leads to the theory that Civilizations
might lack resources to travel the galaxy.
Even if they could travel, to travel across the galaxy might be so cost-prohibitive that
it’s essentially impossible.
The energy to propel ships or keep travelers alive or navigate obstacles…
It’s why many science fiction iterations feature ships bound for far away lands and
tragedy almost always strikes them.
It would cost too much and risk too much to travel.
A more simpler reason for not ever experiencing alien life might be...
That humans have not existed long enough to be noticed.
In the timeline of everything we know, the human race is still an infant, a barely noticeable speck.
The time that we’ve been able to send and receive communications is even smaller than that.
So the chances of us being encountered or finding communications is just very slim and improbable.
Even if we are listening for communication, maybe we are not listening properly.
We are looking for communication that looks like ours, in frequencies and metrics we understand.
Maybe we’re listening to certain areas of space and neglecting the areas where we might
actually find life.
We’re also assuming that they’re sending communication to our general area and in our
certain frequencies.
Signals might appear to us as background noise and be missed completely.
Based on our evolution, we can say that radio signals are only viable for a short time.
Advanced civilizations will likely outgrow the radio, or never use the radio, so might
not be listening for those messages or might be sending messages in another medium, such
as somewhere else on the electromagnetic spectrum.
We’re in such a small window of technology that we might be looking for and sending the
wrong type of message.
Now again, time for a simpler reason.
Advanced civilizations might become isolated.
At a certain point of evolution, what if aliens didn’t see a reason for communication?
Science fiction often showcases artificial environments and it might be totally realistic
for a population to exist in this entirely fictional world, an isolated existence.
If all of their needs are met and they’re no longer curious of the galaxy, why continue looking?
Even if they were interested, maybe these aliens are actually too alien.
In terms of physiology, they might be so different from us that the way they exist and function
is incomprehensible.
What if their language is something impossible for us to achieve?
All of our messages to space might be undetectable.
Higher life forms might use telepathy and not be even thinking or looking for outside communication.
There are a lot of reasons that we might be unable to communicate at all.
What if there are a lot of civilizations that are advanced but no one is transmitting but everyone is listening.
Most of our efforts on Earth focus on listening, trying to catch these signals in space.
Maybe everyone is doing the same.
Earth sends out very little communications, as every communication is a controversy and
must be vetted by worldwide councils and approved by international consultants.
This red tape means that very little ever gets sent at all.
If other civilizations are similar, everyone’s listening but no one is sending.
Now, what if other advanced civilizations knew about us but for some reason Earth is
deliberately not contacted.
This is based around what’s called the “zoo hypothesis” that Earth is known and maybe
even watched but for some reason not engaged with.
It could be for entertainment or it could be to allow our evolution to occur without incident.
Maybe this whole time we’ve been looking and other advanced civilizations have, for
some reason, chosen not to engage.
Related to the zoo hypothesis, is that maybe we’re purposely isolated.
Maybe the stars around us are fake, a simulated image that makes us think the vastness of
space goes on forever and maybe hides who is really watching us.
In this case, someone would have needed to create this quote unquote planetarium, which
is kind of a cool and yet terrifying thought.
We’ve talked about the obstacles of communication a few times but what if civilizations were
able to but it was dangerous to communicate.
For some reason, it’d either be dangerous for them, like exposing themselves to an enemy
or because they’re weak against our diseases, who knows.
Or maybe it’d be dangerous for us, like all of a sudden we’d be on the radar and
these advanced civilizations don’t want us in danger.
That’s nice of them right?
Now we get to a strange one.
What if this world, not just the stars, was all a simulation.
Our reality is designed, maybe as a game or an experiment or entertainment.
The ones who created this simulation might be other humans more technologically advanced,
so if this were true, it may still mean no contact has been made with alien life.
The last two theories acknowledge that aliens are somehow here.
Firstly, what if they’re here undetected.
They’ve managed to infiltrate or live among us, unbeknown to us.
They could be out in the open and confident or they could exist in a form that we wouldn’t
notice, such as a gas or an animal life form that we wouldn’t ever guess was an alien.
Or their technology allows them to stealthily live in our world without being noticed.
Or we noticed them, but for some reason they are not acknowledged.
A lot of people believe that aliens have been here, or crashed here, or abducted people from here.
There are theories of government coverups and conspiracies.
Maybe our methods of communication do work, maybe we have made contact, but it’s for
some reason not spoken of.
So those are the twenty reasons that explain the Fermi Paradox, how so many planets across
the vastness of reality can result in zero interactions with intelligent life.
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