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This is an older article but I share it whenever this topic comes up because it's a good summary of the various outcomes of the Great Filter: https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html I'm personally a fan of the "we're first" outcome. There's another article (I don't remember enough details to find it and I might be getting some of these details wrong) where someone graphed the "complexity" of life on Earth and worked backwards to find that the origin "should" be before the universe formed, another point in favor of "we're first".
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Nov 29, 2018 17:34
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axeil posted:I'd be interested in reading that 2nd bit you talk about as it sounds interesting and lines up with the theory that you need a star of at least the 3rd generation to generate life because you need heavier elements. Found it after more searching! Here's the summary: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/513781/moores-law-and-the-origin-of-life/ and the original: https://arxiv.org/abs/1304.3381. I did have some of the details wrong, it wasn't before the universe formed, it was before the Earth formed:  quote:Sharov and Gordon say that the evidence by this measure is clear. “Linear regression of genetic complexity (on a log scale) extrapolated back to just one base pair suggests the time of the origin of life = 9.7 ± 2.5 billion years ago,” they say.
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Nov 29, 2018 17:45
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VH4Ever posted:The sheer odds of our short existence overlapping with some other spacefaring species' are long indeed. This is why I think the "we're [among the] first" is the most likely explanation to the Fermi paradox. Prokaryotes were on their own for two billion years before eukaryotes came about, then another two billion to get to us. The universe is only around 14 billion years old and the early universe didn't contain any heavy elements as axiel pointed out. I don't think enough time has passed for intelligent life to bridge the vast distances of the universe, if that's even possible under the current physical laws governing the universe.
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Nov 29, 2018 18:34
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qkkl posted:Eventually civilization bounces back, only to rediscover nuclear weapons and go right back to the stone age with another nuclear war. This is one of my Earth-related anxieties, I don't think industrial civilization would bounce back, at least on Earth. We've used up all the oil that's easy to access and I'm skeptical that we could make the leap to a second industrial revolution if we had to start from scratch.
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Nov 29, 2018 19:03
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