An exchange between Astrophysicist Charles Lineweaver and myself: In their 2019 paper “The Timing of Evolutionary Transitions Suggests Intelligent Life is Rare”, Snyder-Beattie, Sandberg, Drexler, and Bonsall argue that the expected time for “intelligent life” to appear on Earth “likely exceed the lifetime of Earth, perhaps by many orders of magnitude” which “corroborate[s] the original argument suggested by Brandon Carter that intelligent life in the Universe is exceptionally rare.”
Well almost by definition a civilization needs technological intelligence, but what are the chances of a life form spreading from star system to star system and having big visible effects, something like a space born bacteria.
The Snyder-Beattie et al. result depends on the assumption that … the major transitions that characterize our evolution happen elsewhere. There is little evidence in the history of life on earth to support this assumption
Under the materialist framework, even if evolutionary steps 3,4,5 etc vary wildly planet to planet, step 1 wouldn't. Material abiogenesis has no choice but to go through the same card-shuffling action (of molecules found in proteins) that it did on Earth. And the success of this action is just too rare, so it will need to be attempted on so many planets that the average life-bearing planet per universe is less than 1.
What's funny is that because Earth seems to have accomplished this step 1 so early in the age of the universe that it implies either/and three things: some UDASSA-type anthropic theory, the population of Sun-like stars is decreasing already (it is), or that we live in a rare universe where other planets will also get the correct card-shuffle soon (similar to Hanson's idea but where a typical universe is utterly devoid of civs entirely).
Easy. One, a biological von neumann probe (no int needed, just biological mechanisms and an ant-like society). Two, spiritual civilization (only will and desire needed).
Expanding is what lots of species do, which is why the New World already had megafauna before we arrived (for us to hunt to extinction). If a niche can be exploited, the Darwinian logic says to expect that to happen.
First, intelligence obviously is not inevitable. Life on Earth got by for a very long time without it. I wouldn't say that contemporary mammals are any "higher" or "more advanced" than the fauna of the Cretaceous, and none of them built radiotelescopes. The more we learn about human intelligence, especially technological intelligence, the more it seems the result of a very unlikely set of circumstances: hands from arboreal ancestors, followed by a switch to upright locomotion, all with a social group structure encouraging language and communication . . . very implausible, really.
The second draws on that: the filters may not be the same for every species. In other words there may be a kind of "meta-filter" -- is your species going to face challenges it's well-suited to overcome, or not? More and more I think that both life on Earth and human intelligence are not Copernican average outcomes but extremely unlikely outliers, possibly the first to occur in the universe we can observe.
You say that "In contrast, Earth today seems to plausibly have a much higher rate for creating BVC. I’d say we have at least a one in a million chance of doing so within the next ten million years." I presume most people reading that assume you are talking about humans, or whatever we humans may evolve/grow into (EMs, for example), as being the creators of this future BVC. I'm curious what odds you would assign to the following: Suppose all humans on Earth went extinct, but all (more or less) other advanced animals remained alive and healthy. By this, I mean to include such clever creatures as apes, elephants, dolphins, etc. Now, what is your estimate of the odds that these non-human inheritors of the Earth would eventually create (or evolve, so as to be able to create) a BVC in a million years? How about in a 100 million years? And how about in a billion? Thx.
That's not Dr. Hanson's point, though, is it? (Correct me if I'm wrong, Doctor.) After all, even if only 1 in 10,000 alien intelligences with the capability to expand actually wants to, that intelligence is simply going to wipe out, or at least be much more visible, than all the others.
And really, 1 in 10,000 isn't all that many orders of magnitude when considering the age and size of the universe.
My background in psychology makes me think that the assumptions based on science are human-centric. We are blinded by our own evolutionary biases.
One obvious idea is that we must keep expanding, rather than the alternative of maintaining an equilibrium, because the simplest solution is that space is big, and colonizing the galaxy is a pipe dream.
I wonder if we are the equivalent of the Australian brown beetles that try to mate with discarded beer bottles. If so, how can we know we are looking for the right indicators of alien intelligence's in the universe.
Re: "Morris … argues that strong selection pressure leads to convergent evolution which then produces human-like intelligence. Hanson and most physicists subscribe to this view, but most biologists and I don’t." I think it is only Morris. My impression is that most others write his views on the topic off as those of a misguided christian. That is certainly a rational assessment, in any case.
If you take panspermia seriously (you do, I don't), then a biological von neumann probe isn't much of a leap.
Edit: some good ideas here https://worldbuilding.stack...
And how exactly do you imagine such a probe arising?
Well almost by definition a civilization needs technological intelligence, but what are the chances of a life form spreading from star system to star system and having big visible effects, something like a space born bacteria.
The Snyder-Beattie et al. result depends on the assumption that … the major transitions that characterize our evolution happen elsewhere. There is little evidence in the history of life on earth to support this assumption
Under the materialist framework, even if evolutionary steps 3,4,5 etc vary wildly planet to planet, step 1 wouldn't. Material abiogenesis has no choice but to go through the same card-shuffling action (of molecules found in proteins) that it did on Earth. And the success of this action is just too rare, so it will need to be attempted on so many planets that the average life-bearing planet per universe is less than 1.
What's funny is that because Earth seems to have accomplished this step 1 so early in the age of the universe that it implies either/and three things: some UDASSA-type anthropic theory, the population of Sun-like stars is decreasing already (it is), or that we live in a rare universe where other planets will also get the correct card-shuffle soon (similar to Hanson's idea but where a typical universe is utterly devoid of civs entirely).
Easy. One, a biological von neumann probe (no int needed, just biological mechanisms and an ant-like society). Two, spiritual civilization (only will and desire needed).
Expanding is what lots of species do, which is why the New World already had megafauna before we arrived (for us to hunt to extinction). If a niche can be exploited, the Darwinian logic says to expect that to happen.
If UFOs are actually piloted by dinosaurs from deep within the hollow-earth, the chances are good.
The question is: how easy is it to imagine a BVC that resulted from anything other than technological intelligence?
Thanks for pointing this out; fixed.
Two points, one minor and obvious, one maybe not.
First, intelligence obviously is not inevitable. Life on Earth got by for a very long time without it. I wouldn't say that contemporary mammals are any "higher" or "more advanced" than the fauna of the Cretaceous, and none of them built radiotelescopes. The more we learn about human intelligence, especially technological intelligence, the more it seems the result of a very unlikely set of circumstances: hands from arboreal ancestors, followed by a switch to upright locomotion, all with a social group structure encouraging language and communication . . . very implausible, really.
The second draws on that: the filters may not be the same for every species. In other words there may be a kind of "meta-filter" -- is your species going to face challenges it's well-suited to overcome, or not? More and more I think that both life on Earth and human intelligence are not Copernican average outcomes but extremely unlikely outliers, possibly the first to occur in the universe we can observe.
Is your reply link broken? It points to the same lonely universe article.
You say that "In contrast, Earth today seems to plausibly have a much higher rate for creating BVC. I’d say we have at least a one in a million chance of doing so within the next ten million years." I presume most people reading that assume you are talking about humans, or whatever we humans may evolve/grow into (EMs, for example), as being the creators of this future BVC. I'm curious what odds you would assign to the following: Suppose all humans on Earth went extinct, but all (more or less) other advanced animals remained alive and healthy. By this, I mean to include such clever creatures as apes, elephants, dolphins, etc. Now, what is your estimate of the odds that these non-human inheritors of the Earth would eventually create (or evolve, so as to be able to create) a BVC in a million years? How about in a 100 million years? And how about in a billion? Thx.
That's not Dr. Hanson's point, though, is it? (Correct me if I'm wrong, Doctor.) After all, even if only 1 in 10,000 alien intelligences with the capability to expand actually wants to, that intelligence is simply going to wipe out, or at least be much more visible, than all the others.
And really, 1 in 10,000 isn't all that many orders of magnitude when considering the age and size of the universe.
My background in psychology makes me think that the assumptions based on science are human-centric. We are blinded by our own evolutionary biases.
One obvious idea is that we must keep expanding, rather than the alternative of maintaining an equilibrium, because the simplest solution is that space is big, and colonizing the galaxy is a pipe dream.
I wonder if we are the equivalent of the Australian brown beetles that try to mate with discarded beer bottles. If so, how can we know we are looking for the right indicators of alien intelligence's in the universe.
Re: "Morris … argues that strong selection pressure leads to convergent evolution which then produces human-like intelligence. Hanson and most physicists subscribe to this view, but most biologists and I don’t." I think it is only Morris. My impression is that most others write his views on the topic off as those of a misguided christian. That is certainly a rational assessment, in any case.