[ExI] Are Dyson swarms a good idea?

[Jason Resch]

On Thu, Jan 29, 2026, 1:19 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> On 29/01/2026 17:17, Jason Resch wrote:
> >
> >     > We see the aliens from the movie independence day as evil for
> trying to wipe out life on Earth. Is it not an equivalent evil to build a
> Dyson swarm around an alien star and preclude any chance of life from
> emerging on any planet in that system?
> >
> >
> >
> >     That is the argument I was refuting. Talking about hegemonising  the
> whole galaxy, and supplanting any existing lifeforms with another, is
> another argument altogether.
> >
> >
> > You are right. There is a missing factor in the calculation which is the
> probability that the solar system will develop conscious life.
> >
> > It is an equivalent evil only when that factor is 1. And for systems
> with no chance of developing life the factor is 0.
>
>
> A probability of 1 is a certainty. I don't know how you could determine
> that.
>

It is conceivable that an elder civilization might gain enough experience
with comparative exobiology and have sufficiently powerful simulation
capabilities to be able to make accurate predictions about a system's
prospects for life.



> I did, many posts ago, mention that it would probably be a good idea to
> have some protocol for deciding if any life already exists in the system,
> before building anything that might destroy the life, on the assumption
> that any intelligent minds wouldn't want to destroy information without
> good cause.
>


I agree on that. But would also suggest they might go a little further:
they may not discount the value of "a future potential for life" as
unworthy of consideration.


> I'm talking about existing life, though, not some hypothetical ability to
> develop it. As 'life' doesn't have a hard definition, some decision would
> have to be made, if, for example, amino acids, etc., were detected on a
> planet with an environment that might encourage the formation of living
> cells if things turn out just right. Or if something analogous to
> cyanobacteria were the only inhabitants of a planet.
>
> We can't second-guess a superintelligence, but I'd say that it was
> certainly a good idea to leave alone any systems (or at least any planets)
> with existing multicellular life, and only colonise barren systems. I'm
> sure there are a great many of them, and that most of them can be detected
> at a distance, before you even send your probes out.
>

There's plenty of mass out there in oort clouds, frozen gas giants, etc.
available for fusion or more exotic mass to energy conversions. If an
intelligent civilization wanted to be minimally disruptive it could wait
for the main sequence stars to die out all intelligent life that could
arise, will have arisen, and then there's the 99.3% of mass-energy
remaining in the stellar remnants that have fused all their hydrogen, still
available for productive use.

Or an intelligent civilization could be greedy and impatient, harvest that
0.7% now with Dyson swarms, and wipe out other life from the cosmos.

The reason I mention here isn't to say this is the obvious course that they
will take, only to show there are other possibilities that can raise doubts
as to the certainty that ETI inevitably builds Dyson swarms all across the
galaxy.

Jason
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