Posted by Bob on 7/27/2007, 10:45 am The famous physicist, Enrico Fermi, once posed the question, "Where are they?" to a select small group of eminent colleagues. The context of that statement is somewhat unclear many years later, but subsequent interviews strongly suggest that Fermi was saying that there cannot be extra-terrrestrial civilizations capable of inter-stellar space travel. Because if there were such technologies, the math shows that we should already have been colonized by them. Given the age of the galaxy, probability theory indicates that even if intelligent life is very unlikely in any given solar system, the sheer numbers of stars in the galaxy, combined with billions of years of time, make it highly likely that earth should have attracted the attention of, and the exploitation by, at least one advanced technological civilization, and long ago. To our knowledge, this has not happened. One might speculate that alien spacecraft have indeed visited our planet, but that for whatever motive they had, left no clear proof of their visits. Might they have adopted a "non-interference" policy? If so, then we might reasonably conclude that we are under constant and pervasive surveillance by extraterrestrials. Certainly, any technological creatures capable of instellar space travel would be able to completely conceal their presence, while keeping us under meticulously detailed observation. That, if it is a fact, would discredit any and all reports of "alien flying saucer" sightings, since any flying saucers, if they exist, should be undetectable. Even our present, primitive stealth technology suggests that in the near future, virtually invisible, even undetectable, aircraft can be built. If we (primitives) are able to achieve only a fraction of that ability, then certainly, alien spacecraft must be utterly undetectable to us. So then, we are left with two distinct possibilities to consider: 1) We are already laboratory rats, completely at the mercy of invincible powers. 2) There are no such powers, and we are alone in the universe.
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Is it scientifically probable that no other intelligent life exists in all the universe, except for us? The thought is sobering, but there is a modicum of support for just that idea.
