Is There Life Out There?

“Everyone feels something when they’re in a really good starry place on a really good starry night and they look up.” Italian physicist Enrico Fermi, in particular, felt the persistent pondering of, “Where is everybody?”  Online publication site Wait But Why and writer Tim Urban provide a fascinating article summarizing some of Fermi’s work and the out-there explanations to the age-old question “Is there other intelligent life out there in the universe?” in an article titled The Fermi Paradox.

First, the article tries to put some numbers to the question of intelligence out in the universe.  In EAS 1601, the Drake equation, the equation of N = R* • fp • ne • fl • fi • fc • L, has been used to examine this question.  While no mention of the Drake equation appears in the article, a similar set of parameters are used to determine an estimate for intelligent life. 

The article does a great job of putting the outrageously colossal numbers presented into perspective to the reader.  It posits that there are between 1022 and 1024 total stars in the universe.  For perspective, this means that there are roughly 10,000 stars for every single grain of sand on every beach on Earth.  The article also makes it a point to use the lower end of every estimated range that is mentioned.  In doing so, the article gives numbers at the highest end of plausibility, a minimum for intelligent systems in the universe.  Next the article states that, for the 1022 stars, roughly 5% of those are sun-like and that an Earth-like planet capable of sustaining life may orbit 22% of those sun-like stars.  This gives us an estimated 100 billion billion Earth-like planets (no that is not a typo).  Imagining that only 1% of those planets developed intelligence, and take the scale down to our galaxy alone.  Now we’re looking at numbers around 1 billion Earth-like planets with at least 100,000 intelligent civilizations.

On Earth, there are countless organizations, dedicated to extraterrestrial communication, a well-known example being SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Communication), who spend hours listening for signals from other intelligent life.  In the decades that it has been set up, however, SETI has never encountered a single signal.  Again the question is raised, “Where is everybody?”

The next factor that the article raises is time and how it effects what we call a “civilization”.   Our planet is estimated to be roughly 4.54 billion years old, while the universe is known to have planets that formed much earlier, say 8 billion years ago as the article uses for example.  “The technology and knowledge of a civilization only 1,000 years ahead of us could be as shocking to us as our world would be to a medieval person. A civilization 1 million years ahead of us might be as incomprehensible to us as human culture is to chimpanzees.”  That is hard to imagine, but now try to envision a planet 3.46 billion years older than us…

This brings us to the idea of Type I, Type II and Type III civilizations.  A Type I civilization is said to be able to harness all of the energy of their planet, which puts Earth at an estimated 0.7 civilization.  A Type II civilization has the capabilities to use all of the energy of their host star.  A Type III civilization, on the other hand, would theoretically be able to gather energy comparable to that of the entire galaxy.  Now, further speculation regarding planets say billions of years older than us, would conservatively give us the ability to estimate that 1% of intelligent life reached Type III, giving us 1000 Type III civilizations in our galaxy alone.  So, “Where is everybody?”  Finally, the article reaches into the Fermi Paradox.

The Fermi Paradox has led us to several “possible explanations”, yet no firm answers, as to why humans have not made contact with other intelligent life in the universe.  The first Group of explanations rests on the idea that there are no higher signs of Type II and Type III civilizations because there are no higher civilizations in existence.  Our math has led us to an estimate of thousands of civilizations, and yet the first group of explanations postulates that there are none, explained by the Great Filter theory.  “The Great Filter theory says that at some point from pre-life to Type III intelligence, there’s a wall that all or nearly all attempts at life hit. There’s some stage in that long evolutionary process that is extremely unlikely or impossible for life to get beyond.”  Assuming this theory to be true, the question arises, “Where in the timeline does the great filter occur?”  Leading off this question, the article gives us our three possible explanations: “We’re rare, we’re first, or we’re fucked.”

Perhaps we as a civilization are rare, and we have managed to pass the Great Filter.  This would mean it is almost impossible for a civilization to reach the level of sophistication that we have.  Perhaps the Great Filter occurs so early that it is nearly impossible for life to occur at all, or maybe the Great Filter lies in the large jump from single celled prokaryote to complex eukaryotic cells.  The Rare Earth Hypothesis suggests that, while there are many Earth-like planets out there, we may have just had the right combination to produce life.  Personally, I find this hypothesis hard to believe or even imagine, really.  This would mean that the unimaginable expanses of space are devoid of life.  The idea is almost hard to swallow: We may actually be alone after all…

The second idea is that “we’re first,” a conclusion resting on the fact that it took billions of years for life to even form on Earth, and so we may just be at the time in evolutionary progression that we are on our way to reaching Type II and Type III status along with few other early civilizations. It is interesting to think that we could be on our way to reaching that higher level of civilization, and that there may be countless other forms of life working towards the same thing.  This explanation, to me, seems slightly more reasonable than the last.

The last of the three Group 1 explanations, as the article states, is that “We’re fucked.”  Perhaps the Great Filter is ahead of us, and when we reach it, our civilization will cease to exist.  Maybe the reason that there are no Type III civilizations is that there is a guaranteed barrier that has stopped earlier life, and maybe we’re next.  This theory gives many post-apocalyptic visions like a societal downfall, or cataclysmic natural disasters, or really anything that could bring out end…

Those three possible explanations consider that there are no higher civilizations, but what if there are?  Why haven’t we made contact?  Now, perhaps that is more interesting to consider, and the ten possible explanations granted in the article certainly pique one’s interest.

The first possibility is that super intelligent life has already visited Earth, but before we were here.  There is certainly a lot of plausible evidence to suggest that “aliens” have visited the Earth before.  I know, from other reading I have done in the past, that ancient Sumerians, believed to be humanity’s first civilization, had sculptures and paintings that resemble rocket ships and non-human entities. This is not an unbelievable explanation.

Next, the article gives the idea that the galaxy is colonized, but we simply live in some rural, backwoods area.  Similar to isolated tribes in South America and Africa, very little contact if any may be made because we are in a less populated or less sophisticated area.  This one, I find hard to buy.

Perhaps the entire concept of physical colonization seems backwards to an extremely advanced society.  A Type II civilization, having harnessed the entire energy of their host star, could plausibly transcend the physical world altogether without the need for other resources.  This concept I think is one of the most interesting and idealistic ones.  It is an idea I love to imagine.

Possibility 4 states that there are scary predator civilizations out there, and most intelligent life knows better than to broadcast any outgoing signals and advertise their location.  But perhaps we don’t.  It is scary to think that Earth would be foolishly advertising its location in a dangerous situation.  After all, no one on Earth has been known to make stupid decisions…

The next possibility, in my opinion, could have some ground because it reminds me of scenario I am familiar with.  There’s only one instance of higher-intelligent life—a “superpredator” civilization (like humans are here on Earth)—who is far more advanced than everyone else and keeps it that way by exterminating any intelligent civilization once they get past a certain level.  This explanation reminds of the video game Mass Effect in which a group of hyper intelligent “life” forms called Reapers exterminate every civilization once they have become too advanced.

It could also be that civilizations are sending signals but our technology is too primitive to pick it up, or we’re looking for the wrong things.  The article gives the funny example that it could take some civilization sending signals 12 years to say “hello”.

The age-old explanation that has varying degrees of plausibility is the idea that we are receiving signals but the government is hiding them from us.  This one is interesting to consider, but still unlikely in my opinion.

The “Zoo Hypothesis” relies on the idea that higher intelligences are actually watching and observing us much like we do with animals in a zoo.  To me, this explanation has some possibility.  Some “alien” media culture I have come across over the years suggests similar ideas.

The ninth possible explanation is one that gives some interesting perspective: Perhaps higher civilizations are all around us but we are too primitive to perceive them.  The article quotes Michio Kaku saying: “Lets say we have an ant hill in the middle of the forest. And right next to the ant hill, they’re building a ten-lane super-highway. And the question is Would the ants be able to understand what a ten-lane super-highway is? Would the ants be able to understand the technology and the intentions of the beings building the highway next to them?” Here is an explanation that could really mess with your head, and one that is indeed very plausible.

The last of the ten explanations flips all the cards and suggests perhaps we are just wrong about our reality, a classically entertained situation that makes me think of the Matrix.  Maybe what we perceive is completely off; maybe we are nothing more than a computer simulation and other forms of life weren’t programmed yet.  But then the spiraling philosophical questions arise, “Who made that program? Who made our reality? What is reality?”  And so on and so forth until you can hardly be sure of anything…

This article was something I read in my spare time simply because I found it absolutely fascinating.  Fortunately it applied so well to the EAS 1601 course.  It is a piece of material that truly makes you think about existence and as the author puts it, “leaves me with a deep humbling. Not just the normal ‘Oh yeah, I’m microscopic and my existence lasts for three seconds’ humbling that the universe always triggers. The Fermi Paradox brings out a sharper, more personal humbling.”

Works Cited

·      Urban, Tim. "The Fermi Paradox - Wait But Why." Wait But Why. Wait But Why. Web. 20 Oct. 2015. http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html