[ExI] Where are they? was Re: 2^57885161-1

[BillK]

On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 10:33 AM, Eugen Leitl wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 10:13:15AM +0000, BillK wrote:
>> On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 12:35 AM, Keith Henson  wrote:
>> > That leads to uploading and speeding up to where the rest of the
>> > universe recedes out of reach.
>
> Yeah, just as we all live in one big city. Wait, we don't.
> It seems that we're fine with local communication asynchrony.

Communication with home is not the point. Travel to the nearest star
would take thousands of years subjective time. Very boring. Yes, the
whole civilisation could decide to move and take their internal
communication system along with them. Indeed, moving to deep space
could be a safety consideration for advanced civilisations (assuming
they still have an energy source there).


>> A large enough speedup effectively 'freezes' the physical universe.
>
> Of course.
>
>> This implies that thinking and action will all take place in a virtual
>> universe created by the high speed intelligences. (As they cannot
>
> No, because you ignore the physical layer something will eat you.

Advanced intelligences are pretty good at fixing threats, especially
very slow threats. Automatic systems could deal with most of them.

>>
>> If this intelligence speedup is the future of all intelligent life,
>> then there could be billions of virtual civilisations floating around
>> in the vastness of space.
>
> And the universe would be full of very peculiar stellar-output FIR
> sources. There aren't, so you're wrong.
>


Well, we are faced with a lack of evidence of *any* intelligent
civilisations out there. To the ends of the universe everything looks
natural. The evidence says that we are alone. Or all intelligence
remains at a low level with undetectable effects.

However, we don't know the form an advanced civilisation would take or
what source of energy it would use. We can only see normal matter,
about 17%. Dark matter makes up 83%, and it is heavy, because we can
detect the gravitational effects. Then there is dark energy as well.
It seems presumptuous to claim that an advanced civilisation would be
unable to make use of either.

Taking the enormous size and age of the universe into account, it
seems to indicate that (if they exist!) -

1) we are unable to detect advanced civilisations, and
2) they have no interest in large scale manipulation of the natural universe.

But your guess is as good as mine, or any of the many other people
constructing theories.
Every theory has to be based on absolutely no evidence that we can detect.


BillK