4/10/2010 – Seriously: are we turning into a science blog? It could certainly look that way, after we published a story on April 1st on the Large Hadron Collider, and then a week later a follow-up with a proposed solution to the Fermi paradox by GM Yasser Seirawan. This in turn has generated a spate of new letters and messages from our readers. We share with you the most interesting speculations.
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Feedback to Seirawan on Fermi paradox
GM Yasser Seirawan's answer
to the Fermi paradox was the simple and obvious one: advanced extraterrestrial
societies became virtual. They built expansive virtual worlds of astonishing
beauty and complexity. They have learned to put their bodies in solar-powered
machines of cryonic states so that they could extend their life cycle and avoid
injuries or death. They have created complex avatars of themselves in their
virtual worlds that were far more resilient than their own bodies.
Seirawan's speculations have led to another spate of letters and messages.
One that was particularly welcome was a Skype discussion with IM Almira
Skripchenko, Paris:
"The probable answer to the Fermi paradox is that we may be the avatars
of another intelligent civilisation and their virtual world," Almira told
us. She has been reading Hawking, Einstein and Le Monde the French newspaper
has recently been carrying multiple articles on the Large Hadron Collider and
black holes. Also after years of "Friends" she now watches "Big
Bang Theory", a comedy show that increases her expertise on the subject.
Feedback by other readers – with our comments indented and in italics:
Nicolas Doyon, Quebec, Canada
I work as a researcher in biology and think that the Fermi paradox rest upon
a false assumption which is: planets similar to the earth have good chances
to develop intelligent life mastering advanced technology. This is only guessing
since we have absolutely no clue to which conditions are necessary for the evolution
of intelligent animals. Furthermore, intelligence may very rarely lead to technological
advances. Judging by brain comparison, dolphins are smarter than yet unlikely
candidates for space travel.
True, intelligence may very rarely lead to technological advances. Or
it might very often do so. But even if it is a seldom case the time scale
for colonizing the galaxy is so small – fifty million years –
that even rare occurrences of technical civilsations should leat to aliens
being in our system.
Alex Gorbounov, Cary, NC, USA
Thanks for publishing the article on LHC and spurring such a lively debate about
the Fermi paradox, black holes, etc. I love the humour of your articles and
your general "outside the box" approach to journalism. That's why
chessbase.com is one of my favorite places to visit.
We must, however, make an effort to prevent this site from turning into
a science blog.
I want to give my two cents on this paradox, if you don't mind. First of all,
interstellar travel. In the admission of many scientists, celestial distances
and the cosmic debris would be two very big obstacles to overcome for any civilization,
no matter how advanced, the debris being the bigger one perhaps. If you try
to reduce the travel time by increasing speed, than the impact of tiniest particles
on the ship would be magnified exponentially and would lead to a statistically
unavoidable destruction. OK, but that premise, however likely correct, may not
necessarily be the reason for the stated absence of evidence of alien visitation,
because we don't really know what future technologies will be capable of achieving,
it may as well turn out that space debris and distances will be a piece of cake
in a couple of hundred years.
Or a couple of thousand, or a couple of million. The Bussard
ramjet, ´which can solve the problem of interstellar debris, has
already been concieved in our time.
Next, let's examine the other postulate of this paradox, which is the alleged
fact that we haven't been visited. I think a lot of people will disagree with
that statement. Just that it's not a proven scientific fact, since science requires
this "reproducibility" criterion for acceptance of anything as a fact
(but how can you ask for a reproducibility of something that is absolutely outside
of anybody's control), does not rule out the possibility that we have been visited.
Look at all the documented, eye-witnessed encounters with flying objects of
unexplained origin (better known as UFOs) and a lot of other things that may
qualify as alien evidence of alien visits.
We have
written about the probability of "UFOs" being proof of visitation
by alien species. There are many reasons to doubt this: (1) It is not easy
to imagine why interstellar travellers would cross gigantic distances, which
is very, very hard, and then try, more or less unsuccessfully, to hide themselves
from the native species. What is the point? (2) It is difficult to believe
that alien spaceships, which have apparently been sighted in many millions
of instances, and have indeed conducted countless abductions with the infamous
body probes, have never left the equivalent of a Hershey Bar wrapper for us
to find and analyse. (3) It is puzzling why the creatures described in cases
of abduction tend to have great similarity with the comic book and movie aliens
of the corresponding countries and for relevant eras: tall, slender aliens
visit Europe and Scandinavia, reptilian beings land in Japan and the Far East.
Over the last fifty years or so the aliens have mutated in synch with science
fiction movies.
But the key problem is the following: if we assume there have been alien
landings, the people who would best know about this are the military, scientists
and politicians. Each would have a tremendous motivation to bring the information
to public attention. Scientists have trouble keeping anything a secret –
they are dying to announce discoveries and publish papers. The military knows
that the moment they can confirm the visit of some reclusive alien beings
with space ships and, in all likelihood, powerful weapons, the defence budget
would be doubled and tripled. And finally politicians know that this type
of "crisis" inevitably leads to the widest possible support for
those currently in power – people need their leaders to steer them out
of danger. It is difficult to believe that all three groups would join forces,
as never before in history, to suppress the vital information of alien presence,
and would do so for the one reason that is usually cited: "to avoid world
panic".Sorry, we just don't buy it.
One more assumption in the paradox can also be challenged. A bunch of other
civilizations may exist, but what makes anybody think that they are at the advanced
technological state that makes the interstellar travel possible? In all likelihood,
the majority of them are at about the same technological level as we are. Because
if you assume that a certain chronology of astronomic events with similar timeframes
needs to be followed for intelligent life to develop, then other alien worlds
will be practically confined to a similar developmental stage as us.
The chances that any alien civilisation is at about the same technological
level as we are is infinitely remote. Our current technology is a few thousand
years old – a couple of hundred, actually, if you look at the bulk of
scientific and engineering discoveries. With the age of the universe being
13.7 billion years we would expect the average galactic civilisation to be,
statistically, millions if not hundreds of millions of years ahead of us.
Enough time to discover forms of interstellar travel which our fledgling civilisation
has not yet dreamed of.
Samir, Portugal
My solution to the Fermi Paradox: the aliens are here but they are undetectable
because of advanced invisibility and cloaking technology. Their craft are undetectable
with human technology. This seems to me a simple and effective solution to the
Fermi Paradox.
Pal G., Avondale, AZ, USA
Please, please let us know if GM Yasser Seirawan's write-up regarding the Fermi
paradox was written on April 1st. His commentary is so unbelievable that I am
confident it is composed in jest. If not, I recommend he seeks professional
help, and spends less time in the theatre.
Andrew Greet, Glasgow, UK
I would like to propose a simpler and, dare I say, more rational answer to Fermi's
so-called Paradox. Your article states that the paradox is based on the assumption
of "overwhelming statistical odds for intelligent civilisations in our
galaxy". With all due respect, this is nonsense. The truth of the matter
is that – leaving aside any tales of alien abductions, conspiracy theories
etc – we have had no contact with any form of extraterrestrial life, intelligent
or otherwise. Therefore we are in no position to estimate the probability of
life occurring elsewhere. We can try to make intelligent guesses based on the
chemical composition of distant planets, but it is still guesswork. We still
do not know exactly how life got started on this planet, and the likelihood
of a similar process occurring elsewhere. We also have no idea about the probability
of microscopic organisms evolving into complex ones (bearing in mind that life
on this planet consisted of not much more than bacteria for billions of years).
So, the bottom line is: we have no idea how likely it is that intelligent extraterrestrial
life exists, which as far as I can see, renders the Fermi Paradox redundant.
We would like to address this directly, but the next reader has done
is for us.
Dr. Ray Bagley, St Cloud, Minnesota
I read with interest the different views about LHC and also off-world life.
It is true that after many years SETI has not found messages from off world
life. As a first thought one might read Peter Ward and Jon Brownlee's book "Rare
Earth" as why they think we have no visitors. The real and true answers
to the questions are of course unknown, we can guess and try ideas. One of the
main problems is that we may not know enough to ask relevant questions. Sort
of like trying to explain the Santa Claus method of fast world travel to a small
child and hope that the child has any idea at all what you are talking about,
or even know what you are trying to answer. There are many possibilities. Some
very clear potential ideas never seem to be even mentioned among the many viewpoints
I have heard, or read about. I find that just as odd as Fermi's Paradox. I am
a scientist and mathematician. In progress I am writing a book that will explore
these ideas of other life so we can understand better why the situation is not
at all strange. In science we have to be very careful to limit our speculations
for it is easy to create pure fantasy rather than good science. In mathematics
I like to prove theorems or create mathematical structures. The process can
be slow and even perfectly valid lines of logic and reasoning can suddenly reach
a dead end. So you start again on another path. It all becomes worth it if you
discover a good set of proofs and begin to understand what the problem or structure
really is. Then you can make the ideas and concepts beautiful and clear for
others to appreciate.
The LHC is a wonderful project and I hope we will learn many exciting things
from this effort. For those people that have less knowledge and are willing
to read in order to understand what we are trying to learn I recommend a good
place to start is reading Lisa Randall's book "Warped
Passages". Lisa is not just a good writer she is a great physicist
who has gained tenure from three of the best universities in America (Harvard,
MIT, and Princeton).
James, Canberra, Australia
Although the visible universe is monstrously large, the passage of light from
all the regions of space means we can actually see the evolution of the universe
unfolding from the present to 14 billion years into the past. There is no recognisable
or physical signature of anyone being out there, in this galaxy or elsewhere,
or indeed any evidence that there ever has been. To suggest that this is because
all the trillions of possible sapient species in the universe would develop
the same technology as us, or follow even a vaguely similar technological trajectory,
and then engage in exactly similar end use of information technology to create
avatars while their "real" bodies are in cryogenic suspension seems
even less likely than there being no-one out there. The truth is out there:
it's just that we have no idea what it is.
It is conceivable that a survey of the galaxy would reveal that life
almost always forms on temperate planets with water and carbon; that it starts
out with single-cell forms that inhabit the planet for a few billion years;
that at some stage mulit-cellular organisms develop, always in water; that
the process of evolution then kicks in to develop more and more complex species;
that at some stage one of these species is able to construct digital electronic
machines; and that, in all systems surveyed, the biological systems inevitably
migrate into the electronic ones. It is conceivable.
Luvin C., Philippines
My answer to the Fermi Paradox, (perhaps this is just additional paradox –
I am just wondering if ants really know humans exist): Is it not possible that
other life forms not similar to humans can exist, that makes it the reason why
we cannot detect their existence. We keep assuming that human life is the standard,
that if there are other life forms they should be something similar to humans.
The truth is, different environments creates different life forms with differing
communication or perhaps no communication. Perhaps other life forms exist in
solitude, and other in more advance form. Our existence may just be like the
pawns and other pieces on the chess board. I don't know if the pawns are aware
that we ever existed. But we know they do.
Very few scientists assume that alien life forms will be similar to humans.
That is the crime of movie producers, who in most cases depict aliens in pure
bipedal human forms, down to limbs, joints, muscles, digits, organs and skin
(in Star Treck they usually have some slight abnormality of the forehead).
Aliens don't even have the diversity we find within the phylum Chordata. There
are, of course, exceptions, where realistic alien lifeforms are portrayed.
One of our earliest encounters with exotic aliens was ages ago, when
our chief science advisor John Nunn gave us a book by Robert Forward called
"Dragon's Egg",
which describes life on the surface of a neutron star. The most intelligent
species there are called cheela and have about the same mass as a adult human.
However, the extreme gravity of the neutron star compresses the cheela to
the volume of a sesame seed. They live and develop at a much faster rate than
humans: a "day" on Dragon's Egg is about 0.2 seconds, and a typical
cheela's lifetime is about 40 minutes. The entire history of cheela civilization
spans from 22 May 2050 to 21 June 2050. Fascinating, with surprisingly plausible
ideas.
Julian Wan, Ann Arbor, USA
Yasser Seirawan's "solution" to the Fermi Paradox falls into the category
of an "inward looking solution." Roughly there are these possible
answers to the paradox:
1. Outward solutions: there are stellar civilizations but hide or ignore us
because we are either not ready for contact or are so different that we are
like insects to them and we aren't yet recognized as being sufficiently advanced.
These solutions argue that there are stellar civilizations but they don't want
to see us or don't consider us ready.
2. Catastrophic solutions: Stephen Hawking is quoted in the article discussing
the possibility that the length of time it takes to become a stellar civilization
puts a planet at risk for a catastrophic asteroid collision. Other variants
include global nuclear war, ecological disaster or inability to create a global
government. Catastrophe overtakes civilizations before they can become starbound.
3. Inward Solutions: travel between the stars is very difficult due to the
vast distances, time involved and the barriers imposed by the light speed limit.
Civilizations which develop stellar level powers therefore turn inward and explore
other options. Seirawan argues for a virtual universe. Others like Freeman Dyson
have proposed that these worlds create massive artificial worlds (radius of
the world is the orbital radius of the earth) surrounding their suns to full
capture the light for energy, and living surface area (so-called Dyson
Sphere). Very interesting article by Seirawan and the ChessBase team!
Aniket Basu, Hyderabad, India
May I suggest that a proof that extra-terrestrial civilizations of superior
intelligence exist is that none of these civilizations has bothered to try and
make contact with us? (Tongue firmly in cheek)
Rune Friborg, Copenhagen, Denmark
While your story and different views on the 'Fermi-paradox' was entertaining,
my formal philosophical education obliges me to protest. The most obvious and
likely solution to the 'problem' was unfairly neglected in your article and
so I must bring it to your attention. The answer that I'm speaking of is this
simple one: It is all a bunch of rubbish. The information on which the 'paradox'
is based (number of stars, probability of life evolving, etc.) is so uncertain
and inaccessible that it simply renders the whole idea of speculating on a 'solution'
to the problem utterly and completely useless. What I read was entertaining,
sci-fi speculation – not anything that could (even remotely) resemble
serious science, and as a news-channel, I feel that you should have pointed
this out for your young readers, who might not be able to judge the validity
of what they read.
Why is scientific speculation "utterly and completely useless"?
The speculation on alien intelligence has spawned SETI
– the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence – on which hundreds
of millions have been spent, with much more to come. Incidentally, one of
the conclusions already being drawn by SETI scientists is that earlier speculations
about the distribution of intelligent life in our galaxy may have been too
euphoric or optimistic. "In light of new findings and insights,"
writes Peter Schenkel, "it seems appropriate to take a more down-to-earth
view ... We should quietly admit that the early estimates – that there
may be a million, a hundred thousand, or ten thousand advanced extraterrestrial
civilizations in our galaxy – may no longer be tenable."
Karsten Balogh, Budapest, Hungary
After reading the article "Seirawan on physics, Feynman on chess"
I can't but add my own thoughts. The whole avatar idea is obviously not new,
but to believe that our very future is going to be a virtual reality based on
the fact that we haven't been visited by extraterrestrial intelligent life-forms
so far (and as far as we know) is grotesque! Concerning human nature, this whole
virtual reality thing is a disease. Technology should not 'serve' us, but rather
be the mean to achieve a goal; the exploration of the universe for example.
If we do no more than shape a world of ignorance to hide in, than we have forgotten
the original purpose, the source of our drive to push technology into new dimensions.
For all I know mankind is not better off now than it was in the Stone Age. When
I read about the LHC and the hugely debated possibility of the annihilation
of mankind, I must say that we lightly took our chances. Out of unstillable
curiosity or rather because our current way of life isn't worth enough to be
handled more cautiously? I have tons of other unorganized thoughts on this,
but will spare you from further outpourings.
"For all I know mankind is not better off now than it was in the
Stone Age." That is correct. Except for the teeth, which we retain beyond
the age of twenty-five. And the lifespan, which is longer than thirty years.
And the 60,000 diseases for which we now have known treatement. And sanitation,
and shelter, and the increase of our travel radius from dozens of miles to
all over the globe. And writing, and communication, and TV, and computers,
the Internet, the iPad. But apart from these things we are probably no better
off than our ancestors. Sounds a bit Pythonesque, doesn't it?
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