[ExI] Bad News for Fermi Paradox?

[spike]

>… On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace
Subject: Re: [ExI] Bad News for Fermi Paradox?

 

The implication is that once species become
technological, they flame out and take the biosphere with them.

billk

 

There is actually a short story by Isaac Asimov in which an intergalactic organization goes around testing civilizations.  As soon as the technology gets nuclear the planet is invited to join the galactic group.  Just when Earth was about to get the invitation they discovered that we were using nuclear power to bomb each other.

 

And so we were the only ones ever to have done this.  

 

bill w

 

 

Thanks BillW; it’s one of Asimov’s shortest short stories, called Silly Asses:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silly_Asses

 

In Asimov’s writings, always be aware of his subtle skill in writing allegory.  Sagan was a like-minded writer who had skills in popularizing science, but he had not a fraction of Asimov’s skill in weaving subtle messages into compelling fiction.  With that in mind, think of a work many of us read in our misspent youth, the Foundation trilogy.  If viewed as well-written allegory with subtle references to so many of western civilization’s memetic notions (all the way down to the term “foundation”) we see Asimov’s brilliant fiction in a whole new light.

 

spike

 

(WOWsers, someone triggered an Asimov discussion!  We haven’t had one of those in a long time, ja?)

 

 

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