{"id":685,"date":"2011-10-04T16:32:13","date_gmt":"2011-10-04T16:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/?p=685"},"modified":"2011-10-04T16:32:13","modified_gmt":"2011-10-04T16:32:13","slug":"what-if-we-are-number-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/?p=685","title":{"rendered":"What If We Are Number Two?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recently, a paper was published which suggested one-third of all stars likely have an Earth-like planet in the “Goldilocks” zone<\/a> around their sun, the distance from their sun best suited for life to be able to arise.\u00a0 This, quite simply changes everything.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Okay, not everything<\/em>.\u00a0 But a lot.\u00a0 There are estimated to be at least two-hundred billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy alone, so that’s an estimated sixty-eight billion Earth-like planets in the right place.\u00a0 Let’s suppose that only one percent of those actually have life arise.\u00a0 That’s six-hundred-eighty million planets with life.\u00a0 Taking the next step–and being even more conservative–if a tenth of a percent of those planets with life have intelligent life (a civilization) evolve, that’s six-hundred-eighty thousand civilizations out there in our galaxy alone.\u00a0 Honestly, though, it seems to me that if life shows up, it is likely to evolve to a high enough intelligence for some sort of civilization.\u00a0 We think of dinosaurs as being pretty dumb, but some have suggested that some dinos were pretty bright and, given time, would have become the dominant, civilized species on the planet if it hadn’t been for the asteroid which wiped them all out.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So, conservatively, there’s a few hundred thousand civilizations out there.\u00a0 Or will be.\u00a0 It’s impossible at this point to say how fast life would arise and evolve on a planet on average as we only have one example.\u00a0 We do know it’s not an easy process, and requires a lot of conditions to be just right.\u00a0 This brings us to a possible answer to the Fermi Paradox<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I’ve mentioned this concept before.\u00a0 In short, the Fermi Paradox asks, “If advanced life is common in the galaxy, where are they?”\u00a0 Mathematically, it certainly seems probable there’s lots of civilizations out there, but thus far no solid evidence has been presented to the general public concerning the actual existence of extraterrestrials.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I said “presented to the general public” as one of the most prominent conspiracy theories is that extraterrestrials visit us regularly (and have been for some time) but various governments cover up their visits.\u00a0 Assuming the conspiracy theorists are right, there’s still a problem:\u00a0 The appearance of the aliens reported by the folks who have reported encounters is pretty consistent.\u00a0 This consistency bolsters the likelihood of the conspiracy-believers are right because different people are reporting the same thing, but at the same time it begs the question of why there’s only one basic form for aliens.\u00a0 If there’s thousands of civilizations out there, it’s astronomically unlikely the members of any two would look that much alike.\u00a0 According to Wikipedia, however, there are only eleven different kinds of aliens reported, several of which could, quite frankly, simply be humans mistaken for something else.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This leaves two possibilities.\u00a0 The first is that the aliens witnesses have seen are of some civilization “assigned” by some higher galactic authority to keep an eye on us.\u00a0 Other civilizations aren’t allowed to come here; it’s the observational territory of just the “little green \/ gray men” we are familiar with.\u00a0 This makes some sense, but it is also likely somebody<\/em> would screw this up and show up anyway and be seen.\u00a0 The aliens aren’t perfect.\u00a0 If the Roswell incident (or any similar incident) has any truth to it, they even occasionally crash into Earth from time to time.\u00a0 So at some point it seems more alien types would be reported.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The other possibility is simply that we are among the first civilizations to reach the technological level we have.\u00a0 Scientists have conceived of vessels capable of traveling to the stars.\u00a0 Each concepts has had a problem–usually more power needed than we currently know how to generate–but it’s reasonable to think, given our current rate of technological advance, we’ll soon overcome these problems and find a way to other solar systems.\u00a0 If the conspiracy theorists are right, we won’t be the first civilization traveling around the galaxy, but perhaps we’re number two.\u00a0 Or number twelve.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Mathematically, this is a hard concept to swallow.\u00a0 It is highly unlikely, given the probably number of life-bearing planets out there, we would be so high up on the chain.\u00a0 But it is certainly not impossible.\u00a0 Our own civilization was held back from advancement during the middle ages largely due to religious influence.\u00a0 Suppose that influence continued and kept science from doing anything?\u00a0 The odds are that since we developed a science-repressing religion, it’s likely other worlds have, too, and some of them will be even more oppressive than our own religions have been.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This is not a dig on religion, by the way.\u00a0 There are plenty of options for negative influences on scientific advances from non-religious sources.\u00a0 Religion has gotten the most press, but one way tyrants stay in power is by keeping the masses ignorant.\u00a0 Some have used religion for this, others have simply refused to allow good educational processes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Anyway, what if we are, in fact, number two?\u00a0 What an amazing thing that would be.\u00a0 It would be like winning the lottery, but with a lot more responsibility than figuring out what to do with a few millions dollars.\u00a0 It’s an important question, and one we should address soon.\u00a0 I honestly think interstellar travel–or possibly open extraterrestrial contact–isn’t too far off.\u00a0 I look forward to it, even if I am not sure how to answer the question of how to react.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently, a paper was published which suggested one-third of all stars likely have an Earth-like planet in the “Goldilocks” zone around their sun, the distance from their sun best suited for life to be able to arise.\u00a0 This, quite simply changes everything.   Okay, not everything.\u00a0 But a lot.\u00a0 There are estimated to be at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=685"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":686,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685\/revisions\/686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}