Big silence: we are alone until the alien answers.

Intelligent lifeforms do not always develop interstellar technology. 

Fermi's paradox: all lifeforms are not intelligent. Intelligent lifeforms do not always develop interstellar technology. And we are alone until the alien answers. 

Drake's equation and Fermi's paradox are interesting questions. And at this point, I must say that everything. That is written about aliens is purely hypothetical. Somebody says there are 20,000 intelligent lifeforms in our galaxy. And that is far too much. The new suggestion is that there are four alien civilizations per 10,000 galaxies. That means the intelligent life would be rarer than we even imagine. And we are alone until aliens contact us. 

All lifeforms are not intelligent. 

And all intelligent lifeforms are not forming civilizations. 

And all intelligent civilizations are not developing interstellar technology. 

The birth of life is a complicated thing. The birth of intelligent life is more complicated. There must be something, that makes evolution favor intelligence. Intelligent lifeforms require time to create technology. And then it needs the willingness to create technology. There is the possibility that intelligent life turns into something like Erewhon. 

The novel "Erewhon: or, Over the Range" described the hypothetical state, where technology was prohibited. And in that case, the intelligent lifeform will not create technology. Then civilization requires resources to develop space- and interstellar technology. And it needs time to develop those things. It's possible that some intelligent life form forms on a planet that orbits a red giant or blue star. The remaining lifetime of those stars is so short, that the lifeform has no time to advance. 

So the ability to create radio telescopes requires that culture will accept that thing. And it requires technology, that is high enough to complete the project. The intelligent lifeform requires motivation to create megaprojects that interstellar transportation requires. The civilization that chooses a model that will not create space technology will be destroyed in a cosmic catastrophe. That civilization cannot defend itself against comets or asteroids. 

Maybe we are the only civilization in the universe. That is one really sad thing because if that is true. We are in deep trouble. The answer to the Big Silence is this: there are no other intelligent lifeforms. And we should do some other things than just search some alien civilizations. That might not answer anyway. An easy answer to the question of why we don't get answers from alien civilizations is that they do not exist. 

But then we can say that we are alone in the universe. We are in great trouble. We face the dominating lion's problem with billions of times more powerful weapons than some lions ever can have. The problem is that if we are alone in the universe, we will destroy ourselves because there are people who want more than they can reach. And in that case, we face our fate in four ways. 

1) We can poison our entire planet and cause extinction. 

2) We can destroy our planet in a nuclear war. 

3) We can let some asteroid hit on Earth. And that destroys our planet. 

4) We can just wait too long. And in the distant future, the sun expands into a red giant. So, if we do not develop interstellar technology. We would perish in flames. 

The asteroids are a big natural threat. Sometimes, researchers say that they can just push asteroids from their tracks. Sometimes asteroids spin. And that case requires a nuclear blast. That pushes the asteroid into another track. The other version is to use an antimatter or laser system. But when a big asteroid approaches. There must be something that people can use against it. If the large, kilometer-size asteroid approaches. 

It's possible to cut in pieces using nuclear detonators. And that means there will be lots of smaller particles. However, a large-scale fusion system can turn the asteroid into vapor. But the problem is that if we start to argue in that case about things like who gets glory for saving Earth, we might forget to send that system to that asteroid. And then we must have that fusion system. 

The fact is that. we are alone in the universe before aliens give us an answer or make contact with us.  When we think about loneliness in the universe, we can say that we can be alone even if we are surrounded by aliens. If aliens don't want to answer to us, we are alone even if those aliens are in our neighborhood. Their existence means that the creatures communicate with each other or we can even see them. 

But the conclusion that we are alone in the universe, and we should stop the SETI program seems too easy. Of course, we can say that there can be 4 civilizations per 10,000 galaxies. Then we can imagine the possibility, that those 4 civilizations are in the same galaxy, and then we can ask are dwarf galaxies involved in those calculations. 

Or how is the galaxy determined anyway? Easy answers are not good answers. They oversimplify complex questions. But we can determine the big silence, that we are alone until we see aliens. Or, we can prove that things that we see are extraterrestrial aliens. 

https://www.space.com/plate-tectonics-intelligent-alien-life-rare

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erewhon

https://setiandfermiparadox.wordpress.com/2024/07/16/big-silence-we-are-alone-until-the-alien-answers/