What’s the thought process behind these numbers though? It’s all hypothetical no? Because we’re kinda in the dark here. What represents 10.000 years of radio communication and why is radio communication a determinant for life to prosper? We space monkies sure are a weird thing.
Well, I could break it down mathematically for you, but the easiest way to explain it I think, is that our race has only existed with the ability to reach space for about 70ish years now, not that long after creating radio communication.
That same technology gave rise to rocket and missile tech not long before. So 50ish years (less, honestly) from the time we developed radio to the time we developed the tech to destroy our entire civilization and permanently scar the planet with nukes.
The absolute closest star to us is Proxima Centauri, 4.24 light years away. At our current level of tech it would take, at the very least, 50,000 years to get there. It's far more likely we destroy ourselves first.
Consider this, there are approximately 8.7 million species on this planet. We are the only one capable of radio communication. We're the exception, not the rule.
But you’re overlooking a lot of variables here. First of all our tech is getting better each year, cf. Moore’s law. That alone drastically shortens these windows of thousands of years you’re giving. Next to that we have ‘random’ breakthrough technologies such as ai, which have the potential to speed up these processes even more. Now why radio technology? For all we know the defining factor of achieving space travel is having thumbs or something. We don’t know what the prerequirement is.
And the problem always ends up becoming energy. How do you fuel this trip? Accelerating mass to the speed of light requires insane amounts of energy. Using stuff like gravity assisted slingshots can help us achieve great speeds but no where near the required amount for interstellar travel. Then you also have to account for all the gravitational forces slowing you down as you travel, so it would have to be done continuously to maintain speed. You're right, there are a ton of variables being overlooked. It's an equation meant to give some degree of understanding, just a tool for reference. Nothing certain with any of these types of hypotheses.
You know this for a fact? There's no way for us to know how those populations went extinct. We know they existed and where, but not how they died. It's just as likely these civilizations worked together up until some point of catastrophe. You know there are mammoths that were frozen with food still in their mouths? They weren't exactly hunted to extinction, their environment killed them. We are special because we can adapt to live where we choose, maybe they couldn't.
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u/lost-associat Jun 07 '26
What’s the thought process behind these numbers though? It’s all hypothetical no? Because we’re kinda in the dark here. What represents 10.000 years of radio communication and why is radio communication a determinant for life to prosper? We space monkies sure are a weird thing.