Does The "Dark Forest Theory" Explain The Fermi Paradox Concerning Advanced Alien Civilizations?

The Drake Equation was conceived by Dr. Frank Drake, in 1961. It was an equation designed to estimate the number of advanced technological civilizations that exist in our galaxy.

The Drake Equation is an attempt to encapsulate all the variables that would be relevant to establishing the number of intelligent civilizations that existed in the Milky Way galaxy and which were broadcasting radio signals at this particular point in time. The Drake Equation is composed of seven terms. The first six are used to compute the rate at which intelligent civilizations are being created and the final term identifies how long each lasts on average as a broadcasting civilization. It is worth stressing that the Drake Equation applies only to intelligent civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy. It does not apply to civilizations in other galaxies because they are too distant to be able to detect their radio signals.

www.astrodigital.org...

In 1950, Enrico Fermi, physicist and the creator of the world's first nuclear reactor, made a lunchtime remark concerning the possibility of advanced civilizations existing throughout the universe. He asked, "where is everybody?"

Fermi realized that any civilization with a modest amount of rocket technology and an immodest amount of imperial incentive could rapidly colonize the entire Galaxy. Within ten million years, every star system could be brought under the wing of empire. Ten million years may sound long, but in fact it's quite short compared with the age of the Galaxy, which is roughly ten thousand million years. Colonization of the Milky Way should be a quick exercise.

www.seti.org...

The Dark Forest Theory is explained in the science fiction novel, "The Dark Forest" by Liu Cixin. The universe is The Dark Forest and advanced extraterrestrials are silent hunters, looking for planets to colonize. It's a kill, or be killed mentality, where starfaring ET's wipe out existing civilizations, before they develop the technologies that could threaten and destroy them. Cixin's novel questions how to interact with an alien race, if they are potentially a hostile race. In the novel, all advance civilizations view contact as dangerous and purposely hide in radio silence.

Since all other lifeforms in the novel are risk-averse and willing to do anything to save themselves, contact of any kind is dangerous, as it almost assuredly would lead to the contacted race wiping out whoever was foolish enough to give away their location. This leads to all civilizations attempting to hide in radio silence.

In the novel, the argument is laid out like this: All life desires to stay alive. There is no way to know if other lifeforms can or will destroy you if given a chance. Lacking assurances, the safest option for any species is to annihilate other life forms before they have a chance to do the same.

bigthink.com...

The Dark Forest Theory seems to expound on the warnings that Stephen Hawking and Michio Kaku made regarding alien contact. Obviously, we haven't discovered advanced civilizations yet, even though there's talk about the possibility of ET craft visiting earth. We also have been making our existence known to the cosmos for many decades, thanks to our leaky TV and radio transmissions. Maybe Hawking, Kaku and the author of "The Dark Forest" are correct. Perhaps the unexplained aerial phenomena, that many people see flying in our skies, are nothing more than alien drones. Could these drones be scouting for civilizations to conquer and wipe out? Could they be the precursor of a potential alien invasion? Is this even plausible? Time to write my sci-fi novel.

a reply to: shawmanfromny

The Drake Equation was conceived by Dr. Frank Drake, in 1961. It was an equation designed to estimate the number of advanced technological civilizations that exist in our galaxy.

No it was not. The Drake equation was an example of how the laws of probability could be used in Astronomy. A humorous one at that.

a reply to: shawmanfromny

Thought I would drop this off seeing it speaks to the subject matter

a reply to: shawmanfromny

I don't think it's totally the answer but certainly could be part of it , if they follow a similar path to our own they will at some point emit radio on their way to better technologies.

I agree with Hawking and Kaku , silence is golden and a good way of ensuring the survival of our species.
There will be other civilizations like our own out there advertising their presence to all who care to listen so at some point we may hear from them.

originally posted by: gortex
a reply to: shawmanfromny

I don't think it's totally the answer but certainly could be part of it , if they follow a similar path to our own they will at some point emit radio on their way to better technologies.

I agree with Hawking and Kaku , silence is golden and a good way of ensuring the survival of our species.
There will be other civilizations like our own out there advertising their presence to all who care to listen so at some point we may hear from them.

It's the same with job hunting. People are getting to fed up with aggressive headhunter recruitment agents trying to push them into unsuitable positions, that they are taking their details offline and only applying to companies directly. Silence is golden indeed.

a reply to: shawmanfromny

Some things to keep in mind:

The Drake Equation:

N = R * fp * ne * fl * fi * fc * L

N = The number of broadcasting civilizations.
R = Average rate of formation of suitable stars (stars/year) in the Milky Way galaxy
fp = Fraction of stars that form planets
ne = Average number of habitable planets per star
fl = Fraction of habitable planets (ne) where life emerges
fi = Fraction of habitable planets with life where intelligent evolves
fc = Fraction of planets with intelligent life capable of interstellar communication
L = Years a civilization remains detectable

"R" we have a good understanding of from observations of star formation in our galaxy and other galaxies.

"Fp" several decades ago, we had NO idea at all, but today we've gotten a much better idea of what this number might be.

"Ne" Again, several decades ago, pure speculation. Now we're getting better data, and it keeps getting better, but this number is still up for debate.

"Fl" We have NO idea what this number is. We've not discovered life anywhere else yet, so the number is pure speculation. We can make some good guesses, but guesses is all it is.

"Fi" Again, we have NO idea what this number is. We can only guess as Earth is our only example right now.

"Fc" Yep, once again, absolutely NO idea what this number is either. Only pure speculation.

"L" We are not 100 percent sure what this number would be, but while we speculated, we can base it upon the technology we have now, and what we know we'll be able to do in the short term future.

So "N" is a purely speculative number for us.



Us broadcasting:

They would have to be less than 100 light years from us, as our RF transmissions can only travel at the speed of light.

Those transmissions are WEAK. Very, very, very, VERY weak. Some of them would be so weak, it would be hard to see them above the CBR.

They would certainly have to be actively looking for us.

Even without the existence of modern mankind...our blue planet stands out as a calling card for any wayfaring civilization that has the ability to traverse major portions of our galaxy.

a reply to: shawmanfromny

Judging by the amount of war, sucicide, murder, theft, and other criminal and morally abject activities that take place here, let alone the amount of confusion and opposing opinions on the very possibility of life out there and life visiiting here, id say they are already here and their plan to control, dominate, and destroy us is already showing its ugly head, or they came by just to watch us, and are stunned at how many times we have almost annhaillated ourselves just in the last 100 years.

Chances are we are akin to the annoying little sibling that gets the red carpet treatment, even though we are a pain in everyones ass until we finally grow the hell up.m (and join adulthood aka the greater community).

We be babies crying in the woods, with the possibility that we could be crying in the middle of a blood fued or something between space lions, tigers and bears.

It would be like sniping but in space.

a reply to: shawmanfromny

It could also be possible that ET Civilizations have deep cover operatives in our planet in all levels of society (politics, academia, economy, military etc.)

Is this Dark Forest Theory not a great argument for putting weapons into space?




thanks.

a reply to: CreationBro

I doubt aliens are giving us the "kid glove treatment." Did you ever consider that human's barbaric behavior is tame, compared to extraterrestrial civilizations more advanced than ours? That point is expressed by at least two brilliant men, Stephen Hawking and Michio Kaku.

a reply to: Nivek555

Perhaps, but I think they would be more likely used on humans, due to a war on earth, instead of a hostile alien invader.

a reply to: starwarsisreal

I sometimes wondered about this, but why toy with us and go through all that trouble, when they probably have the capabilities to wipe us out quickly? An alien virus spreading around the globe, would efficiently eliminate humans and allow them to take control of this planet for their own needs.

The Drake equation has never taken the stealth
abilities of an advanced civilization into account.
If we want to surveil someone in a less advanced
country they don’t even know it happened. We used high flying aircraft
drones and or satellites. An advanced alien agenda to study
us would be much the same, we’d never know it was happening.

a reply to: shawmanfromny

Thanks, man! I really appreciate your content contribution in this forum. Props

Could these drones be scouting for civilizations to conquer and wipe out? Could they be the precursor of a potential alien invasion? Is this even plausible?

Say they are scout ships/drones, where’s the calvary? How would the scout ships/drones communicate with — for lack of a better term — the mothership, and do so, with the limitations of known physics (e.g. overcoming speed of light communication)??

Thanks in advance

Another form of xenophobia…

We’ve done so many horrible things to each other (through entire human history) that it will alone easily render us afraid of anything “from known to unknown” genetically.

Any occupational forces out there (thru kidnaping/abducting) can easily study us deeply both genetically/psychologically; gets access to our brain wavelengths thus telepathically controlling us then, forcing us to kill each other with our own hands without even sweating or even present themselves among us.

Or makes us slave for some other experiments they are up to.

Nothing scares me when I know that we are so weak and can be manipulated easily…!

a reply to: BeefNoMeat

Well, I've always believed that a super advanced, alien civilization would be able to manipulate time and space, allowing them to travel anywhere in the universe. Maybe they have a method to fabricate wormholes anywhere they want and use them like doorways, to enter any part of the universe. If they can do this, perhaps it's also feasible, that any drone they launched, would use these "doorways" to travel around also. I think many of us seem to forget how far we've evolved, technologically speaking, as a race in the past 100 years. Our human minds couldn't comprehend, what an advanced civilization, that's hundreds of thousands, or perhaps, millions of years more advance than us, would be capable of achieving. It would be akin to sitting a chimpanzee in front of the world's fastest computer and having it figure out what it is and how it was constructed. Here's something to ponder...if they can manipulate time and space, could they also change the outcome of future events?

a reply to: shawmanfromny

As for operatives, I think its mostly for intelligence gathering.

As for why they don't send an alien virus, its possible Earth is some sort of sacred ground. With all the paranormal activities and strange happenings in our world, I wonder if Earth has some sort of connection with spirit world and thus, held spiritual importance to ET Civilizations.

a reply to: starwarsisreal

Could be! I'm hoping that there are peaceful alien creatures out there that can enlighten us...not destroy us.