[extropy-chat] The Drake Equation and Spatial Proximity.

[John K Clark]

Robert Bradbury Wrote:

>  Nor would one expect "predictions" when one is running around with an
> anthropocentric perspective that "they" are like "us".

You keep using the word "anthropocentric" like it's the worst insult in the
world but its not, it's a valuable tool evolution has provided us to help us
figure out what out fellow creature are going to do next, even though our
fellow creatures are not just like us. ET or a Jupiter brain would be
proudly different from a human, but if you insist that no idea they have
ever had has the slightest similarity to any idea we have ever had then
there is nothing more that can be said about them.

I maintain any intelligence would have a will to power; or at least any
intelligence you would want to spend time or use valuable brain cells
talking to.

> if you can propose that quantum, entangled states of matter can process
> information faster than the speed of light

Quantum, entangled states can NOT process information faster than light. It
can change things at a great distance faster than light but that is not
sending information, you are just changing one apparently random sequence to
another apparently random sequence. It's not really random but you can only
see that when you check what's been sent and what's been received, and you
can only do that at the speed of light or less.

If you want to propose faster than light information transfer you are
proposing radical new physics. And you still haven't explain what it has to
do with dark matter. My "there are no ET's" theory needs no new physics and
does not need to explain dark matter.

> The *reason* the Galaxy has *not* been engineered is that light speed and
> energy costs limit how rapidly you can move X quantity of photons

You can't have it both ways; can you transmit information faster than light
or can you not?

> I would argue "weakly interacting dark matter" clearly requires "new
> physics".

Well sure it does, but you haven't given me the slightest reason to think
dark matter has anything to do with ET's or their lack. Your reasoning is
that ET's are mysterious and dark matter is mysterious so they must be
related. You need a hell of a lot more than that in my book.

> I am perfectly comfortable with ETs are intelligent and believe that they
> do not go where going is pointless and this would in turn dictate why they
> are not "here"

To send one Von Neumann probe to the nearest star would cost the poorest ET
or smallest Jupiter Brain about what it costs us to buy a candy bar. To
maintain that out of the billions of civilizations and trillions of
individuals not one of them has bothered to do so is simply not credible my
friend.

> I want to see you present a case before an informed body that would say
> "Yes, we know civilization XYZZY will be at a state to receive *and* make
> use of our information stream from Y20XX to 20YY."

Jupiter Brain A: Hey dude I've got the munchies, let's buy a bag of potato
chips.

Jupiter Brain B: Nah, let's send a Von Neumann Probe to star X20YY instead.

Jupiter Brain A: Ok Dude, that would be gnarly.

   John K Clark