Latest / The Apocalypse Will Be Podcasted / The AI, Primals, The Eulogist, and The Fermi Paradox

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The AI, Primals, The Eulogist, and The Fermi Paradox · The Apocalypse Will Be Podcasted

0:00
Welcome back to The Apocalypse Will Be Podcasted,
0:02
a podcast where we overanalyze every chapter
0:05
of Dungeon Crawler Carl like it's a college thesis
0:07
written during a nervous breakdown. We talk theories,
0:10
character arcs, dungeon nonsense, and all the
0:12
moments that made us laugh, panic, or just sit
0:14
there staring at the wall for a while. We are
0:17
a big feelings podcast, so expect plenty of emotional
0:21
damage, character breakdowns, and way too much
0:23
discussion about things that probably were not
0:26
meant to be analyzed this hard. Sorry, Matt.
0:29
This is a full spoilers podcast covering all
0:31
released books, including The Pineapple Cabaret.
0:33
So if you're not caught up, now's your chance
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to turn back. You've been warned. Hello, crawlers.
0:38
Today we wanted to talk about... called the Fermi
0:42
Paradox, which is basically the discourse around
0:47
why we have never come in contact with any other
0:52
civilizations from outside of Earth. And there's
0:56
a lot of different theories on why that may be.
1:00
And there is no consensus. It's something that
1:04
really is up to every individual to decide for
1:08
themselves. apply to us as citizens, that also
1:12
applies to scientists. Yeah, and if you went
1:14
out and asked 10 different scientists what they
1:18
think about this, you would get 10 or more different
1:21
answers from them. And this is something that
1:24
we're just in the dark about as compared to humans
1:27
a couple thousand or several thousand years ago
1:30
pondering if the Earth was at the center of the
1:33
solar system or not. We really have no idea.
1:36
And I do want to start out saying that I do believe
1:40
that there is some sort of extraterrestrial life
1:44
off of Earth. Whether or not it's intelligent,
1:47
I'm not 100 % certain. But just knowing and understanding
1:51
the scale of the universe, which we're going
1:53
to get into, it has to. There has to be something
1:55
out there. Well, and I will say, even with that
1:57
beginning statement that you gave, there is going
1:59
to be so much defining terms in this episode.
2:04
Because I think a lot of it comes down to what
2:08
you consider intelligent. what you consider advanced.
2:12
There is so much nuance in this conversation.
2:15
Yeah. And I'm not sold or certain that there
2:18
is intelligent life, but I believe that there
2:20
is some form of life out there. And, you know,
2:23
there are a lot of varying factors and ideas
2:27
surrounding this, which we are going to break
2:29
down all of those in a good amount of detail,
2:32
not significant detail, because that would take,
2:35
you could probably make a whole series of a podcast
2:37
talking about the Fermi paradox and extraterrestrial
2:40
intelligence, as I'm sure there are dozens of
2:42
podcasts talking about aliens and possibilities.
2:46
And the main source that we're using here is
2:49
a Wait But Why article by Tim Urban. Unfortunately,
2:53
Tim Urban and Wait But Why are still really obsessed
2:57
with Elon Musk and Scott Besant, which is a terrible
3:00
thing to be in the year of our Lord, 2026. But
3:03
he is a really great researcher, and we believe
3:05
that this article is really well done. Yes, and
3:07
this article is from 10 years ago, and so some
3:10
of these numbers and, you know, estimations may
3:14
be a bit out of date, but I can't imagine that
3:16
they've changed too much, and I think that really
3:19
some of these numbers that we're going to go
3:21
over in the beginning are really just to give
3:23
you an understanding and idea of the scope and
3:27
scale of the galaxy and the universe and not
3:29
necessarily to get too hung up on the specifics.
3:33
Okay, so let's get into those numbers. So we're
3:35
going to start out with some basic information
3:38
and numbers to kind of give an idea of the scale
3:40
of the universe and the galaxy and some of the
3:43
math behind the probabilities of why there should
3:46
be life out there. And then later on, as we get
3:49
into some of the more specific theories, we'll
3:52
kind of talk about how those relate to some of
3:55
the themes and some of the things that happen
3:57
in the DCC series, particularly book eight towards
4:01
the end of it. So we will get into some spoiler
4:03
territory there. But the Fermi paradox is the
4:07
idea that math and probability dictate that the
4:12
galaxy and the universe should be teeming with
4:13
life. But we have found nothing. Why is that?
4:17
If you look up at the sky, it looks super vast
4:21
and you see all these stars and you think like,
4:24
wow, there's so much up there. But on any given
4:25
night, the best night, you can only see up to
4:28
about 2 ,500 stars, which is... 100 millionth
4:32
of the stars in just the Milky Way galaxy. And
4:35
then most of those are a thousand light years
4:38
away or less, which is 1 % of the diameter of
4:42
the Milky Way. So what we're seeing when we're
4:44
looking out there with the naked eye is basically
4:47
nothing. And as many stars as there are in our
4:50
galaxy, which approximations are between 100
4:53
to 400 billion, there are roughly an equal number
4:57
of galaxies in the observable So for every star
5:02
in the Milky Way, there's a whole galaxy out
5:05
there. That ranges between 10 to the power of
5:09
22 and 10 to the power of 24 total stars in the
5:13
known universe, which means that for every single
5:17
grain of sand on every beach on Earth, there
5:22
are approximately 1 ,000 stars out there. That's
5:25
a lot. That's a lot of stars. Yeah. And this
5:28
first part is very numbers heavy, and I do love
5:31
these kinds of big numbers and kind of making
5:34
comparisons and putting them into perspective.
5:36
And when we're looking at all of those billions
5:39
and quintillions of stars out there, there are
5:42
a large number of them that are considered to
5:45
be sun -like, similar in size, temperature, and
5:48
luminosity, which gives us 500 quintillion or
5:51
500 billion billion sun -like stars. And then
5:54
for Earth -like planets, There is a conservative
5:58
estimate that a potentially habitable Earth -like
6:01
planet is orbiting at least 1 % of the total
6:04
stars in the universe, giving us a total of 100
6:07
billion billion Earth -like planets. Now, to
6:11
get very speculative, and this is where the numbers
6:14
get pretty fuzzy, let's imagine that 1 % of those
6:19
100 billion billion Earth -like planets after
6:22
billions of years of existence develop life.
6:25
And then imagine that on 1 % of those planets,
6:28
the life advances to an intelligent level like
6:31
life did here on Earth. That would mean that
6:35
there were 10 quadrillion or 100 million billion
6:39
intelligent civilizations in the observable universe.
6:43
And then if you look at just the Milky Way galaxy,
6:45
the estimate would be that there are 1 billion
6:48
Earth -like planets and 100 ,000 intelligent
6:52
civilizations. in our galaxy. So shouldn't SETI,
6:58
the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
7:00
satellite dish, pick up all kinds of signals?
7:04
But it has not. Not one, not ever. So where is
7:08
everybody? That is the Fermi Paradox in a nutshell.
7:12
Yeah, but here's the thing. Isn't, and I'm going
7:16
to use the word ego and arrogance a lot in this
7:19
episode because this is how I feel about it.
7:23
How do we know that our satellite dish that we
7:28
designed, I'm guessing around the frame of, well,
7:32
if somebody was receiving messages from us, this
7:37
is what they would seem like. Why do we have
7:41
the arrogance to believe that we could make a
7:43
satellite dish that could accurately pick up
7:47
messages from other civilizations? Absolutely.
7:50
And I mean, that's like part of. The Fermi paradox
7:53
is that we are looking for certain kinds of signals
7:57
coming in, such as, I don't know all of them,
8:00
but, you know, for example, radio waves. And
8:03
that could be such a primitive form of technology
8:06
that other intelligent civilizations wouldn't
8:09
be using that. Or like how other civilizations
8:14
communicate could be so far outside of our comprehensions.
8:20
That even if we were receiving those signals,
8:23
it would just seem like white noise. Yeah. And
8:25
an analogy that I really liked that got brought
8:27
up in the article is, so let's say that you had
8:31
a huge freeway that was going through Atlanta.
8:34
And you went to the bottom of the freeway and
8:37
you asked some ants, hey, can you tell me about
8:40
the freeway? No fucking idea. First off, ants
8:43
do not have perception of that freeway. And second,
8:47
how are you going to communicate with the ants?
8:49
Right. Right. Exactly. And just like so, you
8:52
know, to me, a lot of just the conversations
8:57
around this are so deeply flawed that it's kind
9:03
of hard to like really have a good grasp of what's
9:06
going on in the universe. And something that
9:09
I just wanted to bring up. So we practice SETI,
9:13
which is trying to receive messages from extraterrestrials.
9:19
We also practice something called METI, which
9:22
is sending messages to extraterrestrials. And
9:25
some scientists think that this is a deeply unsafe
9:28
and insane thing to do. Yeah. Because there could
9:31
be a super predator out there that we are unaware
9:33
of. Which we're jumping ahead a little bit there.
9:36
That's okay. But one of the things that really
9:39
kind of like upset me when researching this episode.
9:44
is the organizations that practice both SETI
9:46
and METI are not government organizations. They
9:49
are nonprofits. And while I'm not going to say
9:52
our government is the greatest and it's basically
9:55
like non -functional right now, the idea that
9:59
a nonprofit entity with zero oversight can be
10:02
making decisions about whether or not we are
10:05
broadcasting out into the universe is insane
10:08
to me. So at least we'll have someone to hold
10:11
accountable when the aliens do come and take
10:14
over Earth. That's going to be like Princess
10:17
Chandra in the papers. Yeah, I mean, we can be
10:19
like, hey, it was these guys' fault. They were
10:21
doing it. A lot of people said it was a bad idea,
10:24
but nobody stopped them. So yeah, just it's those
10:30
guys' fault. That's how I feel about this. This
10:33
is so insane. Yeah, it is very interesting because
10:37
like a lot of scientists and experts in the field
10:40
and i mean not just specifically in this field
10:42
but a lot of very smart people think that the
10:45
practice of medi is deeply unwise and but this
10:50
you know private organization still gets to keep
10:53
doing it which you know theoretically they could
10:55
spell the doom of all life on earth if a intelligent
11:00
civilization picked up on that signal and came
11:02
and found us which i mean like even if like the
11:05
u .s government endorsed that like shouldn't
11:07
like France have a say? I do believe that SETI
11:10
and METI are not like at a singular point. I
11:13
think it's made up of people from around the
11:15
world. There's not just like one specific point
11:18
where they're broadcasting or receiving these
11:20
signals to. It's a conglomerate of scientists
11:22
around the globe. From what I read, METI was
11:25
one institute in California. OK, well, there
11:29
we go. Didn't do research on everything. So we're
11:32
going to get kind of. back on track to our outline
11:37
here and continue setting up the Fermi Paradox
11:41
a little bit more just to kind of look at things
11:44
on the terms of Earth and the Earth's lifespan
11:49
in comparison to a theoretical other planet.
11:52
So our Sun is relatively young in the lifespan
11:57
of the universe and we can look at this other
12:01
planet that we'll call planet X, and let's say
12:03
it has a similar story to Earth. Let's look at
12:06
where their civilization could be today. The
12:10
technology and knowledge of a civilization 1
12:15
,000 years ahead of us could be as shocking to
12:18
us as our world would be to a medieval person.
12:21
A civilization a million years ahead of us might
12:23
be as incomprehensible to us a human culture
12:27
is to chimpanzees. And then this other planet,
12:31
planet X, would be 3 .4 billion years ahead of
12:34
us. And then with that kind of idea in mind,
12:38
brings us to something called the Kardashev scale.
12:41
So the Kardashev scale breaks down three different
12:43
kinds of theoretical civilizations. There is
12:46
a type one civilization, which has the ability
12:48
to use all of the energy of their planet. We
12:52
are not quite a type one civilization, but we're
12:55
getting there. Then there is a type two civilization,
12:57
which can harness. all of the energy of their
12:59
host star. And us being a almost type one civilization
13:04
can barely fathom that. But, you know, some people
13:07
have come up with the idea of a Dyson sphere,
13:10
for example. And then a type three civilization
13:12
blows the other two out of the fucking water
13:15
and they have access to power comparable to that
13:19
of the entire Milky Way galaxy. And if that sounds
13:22
hard to believe, just remember that this planet
13:25
X that we were talking about is 3 .4. billion
13:28
years ahead of where we are now. And so they
13:31
could theoretically create some machinery that
13:33
they would send out to a couple different planets.
13:35
It would spend a few hundred years there harnessing
13:38
the materials of that planet, replicating itself,
13:40
and then sending off two copies to two other
13:43
planets. And without even traveling at the speed
13:45
of light, they could colonize an entire galaxy
13:48
in 3 .75 million years, which sounds like a long
13:51
time, but in the scale of billions of years is
13:54
basically a blink of an eye, right? continuing
13:58
to speculate and this is the last bit where we're
14:01
talking about all these numbers if one percent
14:04
of intelligent life were to survive long enough
14:07
to become potentially a galaxy colonizing type
14:10
3 civilization the calculations and numbers we
14:13
talked about above would suggest there should
14:15
be at least 1 000 type 3 civilizations in just
14:20
our galaxy and you know given the scale and power
14:24
of a type 3 civilization Which would probably
14:27
be pretty noticeable, yeah. But we don't hear
14:30
anything, we don't see anything, and we haven't
14:33
been visited by anyone. I mean, depends on who
14:35
you ask. But as far as the overall consensus
14:38
is, we haven't been visited by anyone. So there
14:40
is everybody. Welcome to the Fermi Paradox. Yeah,
14:43
which I think, since this is a very scientific
14:48
type thing, I don't think that any of these explanations
14:53
really take into account maybe other civilizations
14:58
are a lot more ethical than us and that we have
15:01
terrible ethics that shapes our worldview, which
15:04
is kind of where I am on things personally. Yeah.
15:08
I mean, one of the theories is like, you know,
15:10
if they were a type three civilization or, you
15:13
know, extremely advanced to like, why would they
15:16
even want to bother trying to go and find other
15:18
people? Like they've got it made. Well, I also
15:21
think that what a lot of this rests on is. industrialization
15:26
as a inevitable and worthy goal and maybe that's
15:32
not what everyone wants like maybe there are
15:36
other civilizations out there that are more like
15:40
our orangutans which orangutans are like stupid
15:42
smart um like they are so close to being human
15:46
that i'm kind of uncomfortable with how we treat
15:49
them so you know just To me, this all lays on
15:54
a foundation of trying to harness all the Earth's
15:58
resources, trying to use them for our own benefit
16:01
is always going to be the goal. And I would like
16:06
to think that maybe that is just our disease
16:08
and not everywhere is like that. Yeah. And I
16:10
mean, like there could be plenty of advanced
16:13
life on other planets that are intent with how
16:17
they are and the way that they think about things,
16:19
whether they have human level intelligence or
16:21
not. The way that they think about things and
16:23
their goals and their wants and their needs and
16:24
desires are just so completely different from
16:28
ours that the idea of searching beyond their
16:31
planet or searching for other life is not even
16:35
on their radar. Yeah. And I just think that we
16:38
have a major colonization mindset. And like the
16:42
reason that we've even been to the moon at all
16:44
is because the Soviets in the U .S. got into
16:47
a space race in the 60s and they were trying
16:49
to outdo each other without that. Maybe we wouldn't
16:52
have even gone to our moon, which is our closest
16:54
neighbor. So basically, we don't really talk
16:58
about it because cars are the biggest evil. But
17:01
the processes and the systems that we use to
17:06
put men into outer space are super bad for our
17:09
planet. And they are super unethical. And just
17:12
the idea that, you know, we harness fuel as far
17:16
as oil from the earth is pretty unethical. But
17:20
we have just so ingrained that. Oil is like,
17:22
the entire oil industry is like really bad. And
17:26
like all of the byproducts from oil, from crude
17:28
oil, there's nine different products that come
17:31
from processing crude oil, including diesel,
17:34
gasoline, kerosene, engine grease, the crudest
17:39
oil, which is used for like asphalt. All of it's
17:42
bad. And we're just putting it everywhere. Yeah,
17:45
so, you know, maybe other civilizations aren't
17:47
stupid enough to destroy their planet to try
17:50
to figure out what else is going on in the universe
17:52
the way we are. Yeah, maybe, maybe. Within the
17:56
Fermi Paradox, there are two categories of explanations
18:00
to talk about what's going on out there, why
18:05
we have or haven't, or why we have not heard
18:08
from any other intelligent civilizations. Group
18:11
one is there are no signs of higher... intelligence,
18:15
like type 2 or type 3 civilizations, because
18:17
there aren't any. And then explanation group
18:20
2 is that there are type 1, type 2, and type
18:23
3 civilizations out there, and there are logical
18:26
reasons why we might not have heard from them.
18:29
And both of these categories are very interesting,
18:31
and both of them have very scary implications
18:34
within them, which we are going to get into.
18:44
idea of the great filter comes into play. Great
18:47
filter is the idea that some stage in the long
18:50
evolutionary process is extremely unlikely or
18:54
impossible for any type of life to get beyond.
18:58
And then that stage is the great filter. And
19:00
it turns out that when talking about humanity
19:03
and where we stand and what our future is, that
19:07
question of the great filter is very important
19:09
in trying to determine, which I think it's impossible
19:11
to determine, trying to determine what stage
19:14
and where we're at is. And basically the way
19:18
that the writer of this article phrased it is
19:21
there's either we're rare, we're first, or we're
19:24
fucked. Yeah, so the idea would be if we're rare.
19:29
that the great filter is behind us so that's
19:32
something that we have already made a jump so
19:36
for example it could be that going from a single
19:40
cell organism to a multi -cell organism is extremely
19:43
rare i would say this could be simplistic so
19:47
i guess the way i think of it is that there could
19:50
be two filters so the entire concept of what
19:55
we're talking about is why haven't we heard from
19:58
people in other civilizations? Whereas I think
20:02
there could be great filter one, which would
20:05
be something like the jump from single cell to
20:07
multi -cell. And then jump two could be industrialization
20:12
and when people start trying to get off their
20:15
planet. Or even just going from being a somewhat
20:20
intelligent species like apes to an intelligent
20:23
species that does create. buildings and does
20:26
agriculture and makes art and so on even if they
20:30
don't get to a more advanced level of technology
20:32
like electronics for example yeah so and you
20:36
know i just kind of want to hit that again that
20:38
there could be a lot of planets that are filled
20:42
with oceans full of octopus whales sharks whatever
20:46
or even just like simple celled organisms which
20:50
is what most of life on earth was for that are
20:53
part of billions of years, two billion years,
20:55
were prokaryotes, which basically just were simple
20:59
celled organisms with a nucleus. Yeah, definitely.
21:02
I think that the better way to think of it is
21:05
there could be a couple of filters. And to me,
21:09
there could be a great filter between intelligent
21:11
life, but then the second great filter is becoming
21:16
interested or trying to go beyond your planet.
21:20
Well, and there's the idea that And this is actually
21:24
something that the AI brings up at one point.
21:26
I don't remember in which book that, you know,
21:29
most intelligent civilizations get to a point
21:32
where they start looking towards the stars and
21:35
such. And then inevitably they come up with some
21:38
kind of super weapons, i .e. nukes, and just
21:40
end up wiping themselves out through, you know,
21:43
vanity and warfare and so on. Which that could
21:46
be a great filter that's in front of us. Right.
21:49
And certainly could be. And, you know, a lot
21:51
of us are. worried about that on a somewhat regular
21:53
basis. I think about that weekly. Yes. And there
21:58
is an interesting point talking about, basically,
22:01
evolution. And a quote is that, well, basically,
22:07
evolution doesn't strive for a goal. It just
22:11
happens, and it uses the adaptation most useful
22:15
for a given ecological niche. And the fact that
22:19
on Earth this led to technological intelligence
22:22
only once so far suggests that this outcome of
22:25
natural selection is extremely rare and by no
22:28
means is a natural part of evolution. So animals
22:32
and fish and birds and everything else, they
22:36
grow and evolve to adapt to their environment.
22:40
And generally speaking, adapting to your environment
22:42
doesn't require a cell phone. It doesn't require
22:46
a car. You can have a rudimentary shelter and
22:50
know the area around you and where the food is
22:53
and, you know, develop a specialized geek and
22:56
live on and on and on for millions of years.
22:58
I mean, look at alligators and sharks. They have
23:01
remained largely unchanged for hundreds of millions
23:04
of years because the way that they evolved is
23:06
extraordinarily efficient for survival. Well,
23:10
and humans lived for a very long time before
23:13
they decided that they needed to start refining
23:14
oil. Right, exactly. But another thing to point
23:18
out is that while there could be a lot of planets
23:21
like Earth, that they might not all be the exact
23:25
same perfect scenario that led to the kind of
23:28
life that we have. And one of the theories on
23:31
that is that our moon is actually pretty unusual.
23:34
So the size of our moon in relation to the planet
23:37
is pretty rare, even throughout the wide universe.
23:41
And that might be something that's different.
23:44
Right. It could just be. that the exact set of
23:47
conditions with our star, with our moon, with
23:50
the other planets around us, the exact temperatures
23:54
are extraordinarily rare on Earth. And, I mean,
23:57
it took millions and millions of years before
23:59
the constant volcanic eruptions and stuff stopped
24:02
for a long enough amount of time that life could
24:05
begin. And, you know, we've gone through a relatively
24:08
long amount of time with things being stable
24:11
to allow life to get to where it is today. A
24:14
increase in volcanic activity, an increase in
24:18
comets, those are all things that are very possible
24:21
sometime in the future. I mean, that's what wiped
24:24
out the dinosaurs. And no matter what anyone
24:27
says, if there is a life -destroying comet headed
24:31
towards our planet, we don't really have a viable
24:35
plan to do something about that. I mean, they're
24:37
always talking about comets heading in the direction
24:39
of our planet, and they usually end up, for whatever
24:42
reason, veering off course in some way but also
24:45
they'll say it's like on a collision course with
24:47
earth but it's like within a like three million
24:50
mile like degree of of margin of error or even
24:54
larger than that like those are kind of clickbaity
24:57
yeah they definitely are so that was covering
25:01
the we're rare we've talked about the we're first
25:03
a little bit so we were talking about kind of
25:06
the conditions on earth of the volcanoes and
25:08
everything like being so tumultuous for so long
25:12
And it could also be that the first chunk of
25:15
the universe's existence was just fucking full
25:19
of cataclysmic events like gamma bursts that
25:22
would just go off every now and then and just
25:24
incinerate everything. And that was happening
25:26
so regularly that even if some simple forms of
25:30
life started to develop, they would just get
25:32
wiped out again. So we hope that for the first
25:36
time since the Big Bang that... The universe
25:39
is now in a place where life can continue unabated
25:42
for a long enough period of time to reach a super
25:46
intelligence type two or type three civilization.
25:50
But there also could be a great filter of we
25:52
are destroying our planet. Yes. Nukes or not
25:54
nukes. Right. Yeah. I mean, we can always wipe
25:57
ourselves out. And that's just I mean, it's not
26:00
I mean, there's not there's nothing we can do
26:02
about any of this. Everything that we're talking
26:04
about today, there's fuck all that anyone can
26:06
do about it. Oh, that's not true. We can absolutely
26:09
do something about the fact that we're destroying
26:11
our own planet. Okay, yes, you're right. This
26:14
is not a politics podcast. We'll move on. I have
26:19
big feelings. There is the third part of the
26:24
great filter analogy, which is the we're fucked.
26:28
And if we are neither rare or early, group one.
26:33
thinkers conclude that the great filter must
26:35
be in our future and this would basically give
26:38
the idea that life routinely evolves to where
26:42
we are but something prevents it from going much
26:46
further and reaching a high level of intelligence
26:48
in almost all cases and if that were the case
26:51
we are not likely to be an exception to the rule
26:54
and you know one possible great filter like we
26:56
just talked about would be regularly occurring
26:58
cataclysmic events on a solar system or galaxy
27:02
wide scale like those gamma ray bursts. That
27:05
could happen and I mean they talk about bursts
27:07
you know from the sun that I mean it's regularly
27:10
shooting off gamma ray bursts and most of them
27:13
just aren't that big but it could happen and
27:15
it could just wipe out all life on earth and
27:18
that can be happening all around the universe
27:20
at any given time and we are so small in comparison
27:25
to everything else around us. And the powers
27:29
of these stars and nebulas and supernovas and
27:34
black holes and all of these massive forces out
27:38
in the galaxy and out in the universe are just
27:40
on a scale so much larger than everything happening
27:44
here in any levels of power that we have to harness
27:48
here. And it's just nothing like us getting wiped
27:52
out by a gamma ray burst or a. Black hole or
27:55
anything just takes absolutely zero effort from
27:58
that force. It's kind of scary to think about.
28:00
I mean, the likelihood of it happening in our
28:02
lifetime is basically zero. That's optimistic.
28:05
I mean, you know, like, we all know the Earth
28:08
is going to die eventually, but, like, it's going
28:09
to die in, like, billions of years or hundreds
28:12
of millions of years. It's not just going to,
28:14
like, suddenly die tomorrow. Like, that's just
28:16
not how stars work. It could if we got hit by
28:19
a gamma ray. Well, the gamma ray would probably
28:21
come from our sun. Yeah, and kill us. Yes, but
28:25
the sun would probably be fine. Okay. Yes. We
28:27
would die from the gamma ray burst, but the sun
28:29
isn't just going to, like, die tomorrow. If it
28:30
does die tomorrow, I mean, we're fucked. Like,
28:32
that's just not how stars work. Okay. But it
28:34
could shoot off a gamma ray burst at, like, any
28:36
time, and, like, we'd just all die. And from
28:38
here, we get to explanation group two, which,
28:41
again, is basically that there are type two and
28:44
type three civilizations out there, and there
28:46
are logical reasons why we might not have heard
28:49
from them. And there are ten different... or
28:53
hypotheses surrounding this. But basically, this
28:56
group two set of thinkers believe in the mediocrity
29:00
principle, whose starting point is that there
29:03
is nothing unusual or rare about our galaxy,
29:06
solar system, planet, or level of intelligence
29:08
until evidence proves otherwise. And these people
29:11
believe in the math that we talked about earlier,
29:15
that probability dictates they're out there.
29:18
Well, and also our communication efforts. such
29:22
as they are only cover such a small part of the
29:25
universe or the galaxy like i don't even think
29:29
any of our signals have gotten out of our galaxy
29:30
yet yeah so you know it's kind of crazy to say
29:34
well there must be no one out there because we
29:37
haven't reached them when we're covering such
29:39
a small area a like infinitesimally small area
29:43
like it's not even funny how limited our reach
29:46
is so the first possibility super intelligent
29:50
life has visited earth Before we were here. Well,
29:53
or what I think is super fun is they could have
29:56
visited before we had written language. So, for
30:00
example, early cavemen could have, like, seen
30:03
some crazy alien shit. But they don't really
30:06
have a way to tell us about it. And there are
30:08
some caveman drawings from, you know, around
30:10
the world that people have found that they were
30:12
like, look, obviously these are cave depictions
30:14
showing that, you know, they were visited from
30:16
extraterrestrials. And maybe they were, maybe
30:19
they weren't. Maybe that person was just bad
30:21
at drawing. None of those drawings are super
30:23
great. Maybe they were just drawing for fun.
30:26
Yeah. I mean, you know, maybe they just had a
30:28
dream. You know, or maybe they visited before
30:30
there were any kind of even ape like animals
30:34
could have come here when it was just a bunch
30:35
of prokaryote cells in the oceans. And there
30:38
was still a bunch of canoes erupting all the
30:40
time. And they were like, well, fuck this place.
30:42
There's nothing to do here. And then they went
30:44
somewhere else. And depending on what level of
30:47
navigation they have, like. Traveling around
30:51
the galaxy still takes a long time. Traveling
30:55
around the universe, even if you're traveling
30:56
at the speed of light, still takes a really long
30:59
time. So unless there's a type 3 civilization
31:02
out there that has mastered traveling through
31:05
wormholes or some of those super duper advanced
31:08
forms of travel that people have hypothesized,
31:11
it still takes time. We could also be a very
31:15
rural backwater. So basically somewhere that
31:17
nobody ever wants to go. Right. Yeah. So that's
31:20
the other idea is like the galaxy is colonized
31:23
and our location in the Milky Way is kind of
31:26
like off on the edge of the spiral to an extent.
31:29
And so like maybe a lot of the center system
31:32
is colonized and there's no reason for anyone
31:36
to bother coming all the fucking way out here
31:38
in the sticks, which kind of makes me think of
31:40
Quasar. It does make me think of Quasar. Yeah.
31:43
He's like, yeah, we live way out in the middle
31:44
of nowhere and none of this stuff is going to
31:46
affect us for a long time. Yeah. The next possibility
31:49
is kind of what I was talking about earlier,
31:51
that the entire concept of colonization is backwards
31:55
and stupid to everyone in the universe but us.
31:58
Yeah. So like a type two civilization with all
32:02
that energy, maybe they have perfected an environment
32:05
for themselves where all of their wants and needs
32:08
are taken care of and they don't need for anything.
32:11
So why would they want to leave their happy little
32:13
utopia? And a really good metaphor that got brought
32:16
up here is that maybe they see our planet the
32:20
way that we see the oceans of being frigid, dark
32:24
and terrible. And maybe there's scary stuff in
32:27
there. And why would we ever want to go there?
32:28
Right. And, you know, another possibility is
32:31
these theoretical super intelligent civilization.
32:34
They defeated the physical realm and all of them
32:38
are living in a artificial reality where. Everything
32:42
is perfect all the time and they've created their
32:44
own version of digital heaven. And why would
32:47
they want to leave that? Why would they bother
32:49
going anywhere else? They have everything they
32:50
need and want. Yeah. And then the next possibility
32:54
is the one that keeps people up at night, which
32:57
is the super predator. So there could be a super
33:01
predator out there. And basically anyone who
33:05
has some intelligence knows better than to advertise
33:09
their location. And that would make sense why
33:13
we have never picked up any kind of signals.
33:16
And just so you know, if you're thinking I think
33:19
it's like a wow or hello or whatever from the
33:21
70s, that has been pretty debunked. So we're
33:25
not considering that to be like something that's
33:28
viable as far as possible messages from other
33:31
planets. But that's why the concept of METI is
33:35
so controversial. is because we might basically
33:40
be holding up a sign that says, like, come kill
33:42
us to the universe. Come and get us, yeah, because,
33:45
like, we could be posing a threat or making ourselves
33:48
a victim to this scary predator civilization
33:51
that's out there. But so also with a super predator,
33:57
there could be one that's more like a galactic
34:00
police force that basically decides... Who gets
34:05
to continue as a civilization and who doesn't?
34:08
And one of my favorite movies is the original
34:11
The Earth Stood Still. And that movie is kind
34:14
of about this idea of once we developed nuclear
34:18
powers and started sending people to the moon,
34:20
then we got contacted by aliens who basically
34:23
gave us a code of ethics that we had to follow.
34:28
as a planet for us to continue as a species or
34:30
you know a galactic federation would wipe us
34:33
out and if you watch that movie we fail that
34:35
test pretty hardcore we do and with this idea
34:39
of like this super predator alien race out there
34:42
is that they would have the means to monitor
34:46
most emerging life but they're not going to go
34:48
around just wiping out life as soon as it begins
34:51
everywhere. Because I mean, that's just like
34:52
a waste of time and resources. But they watch
34:55
and monitor for when they get to a certain level
34:57
of intelligence, maybe around where we are now
34:59
that we've started poking around outside of Earth
35:01
orbit. And then that's when they decide to go
35:04
in and wipe them out because they don't want
35:06
any competition. And this is along the lines
35:09
of what really inspired us to want to talk about
35:12
the Fermi Paradox, because this becomes relevant
35:15
later in A Parade of Horribles. Yeah, and I also
35:19
think that there is an idea of, and this kind
35:24
of ties into Dungeon Crawler Carl as a whole,
35:26
maybe we are not guarding or using our resources
35:31
in a responsible manner. And maybe we should
35:35
be taken out and the planet should be given to
35:38
the orangutans or the octopus because they're
35:42
a lot more responsible than we are. Or maybe
35:44
there's another alien civilization out there
35:47
that... is more responsible with the planets
35:49
and would come along and like the people from
35:52
the day the earth stood still and be like hey
35:54
you guys are being kind of terrible and like
35:56
you can be a lot more ethical with how you manage
35:58
your planet and its resources and you're destroying
36:01
it and you don't have to do that yeah and it's
36:05
Just a lot to think about. And it also, I went
36:08
on a super long rabbit hole about the dinosaurs
36:11
at this point. And that's kind of really what
36:14
shaped a lot of my opinions and beliefs about
36:17
this, which is crazy because I first read this
36:19
article 10 years ago and I have such different
36:22
thoughts about it this time around than I did
36:24
then just because of everything that's happened
36:26
in the last 10 years. But basically. Who are
36:30
we to say that dinosaurs were intelligent or
36:34
not intelligent? And usually what we use and
36:38
what our matrix is, is sentience. And to qualify
36:43
for sentience as a civilization, you have to
36:46
have art, which is super fucking unfair to the
36:49
dinosaurs because they didn't even have thumbs.
36:51
So how are they supposed to make art? But also
36:54
industrialization. And it should be pretty clear
36:58
from this episode that I believe industrialization
37:00
is a bit of a curse. Yeah. It's very ignorant
37:04
of us to say that for something to have a higher
37:09
level of intelligence or to be sentient, that
37:11
they have to follow in the same footsteps that
37:14
we did, that they have to do industrialization,
37:16
they have to do art, they have to farm, and so
37:20
on. They can be very intelligent and have communication
37:24
and have... community and advanced like relationships
37:28
and maybe even politics and hierarchy and awareness
37:32
of themselves and their place on this planet
37:35
but that's not sentient like this doesn't really
37:39
make sense another one of the possibilities is
37:41
that we are receiving contact from other intelligent
37:44
life but the government is hiding it and this
37:46
is a super fun theory and lots of people have
37:50
a lot of opinions about this and sometimes i
37:51
think they are and sometimes i think they aren't
37:53
and you know We're not really talking about in
37:55
this episode the opinions of, oh, well, was this
37:58
aliens contacting us at this time or was this
38:01
a legitimate or not legitimate UFO sighting,
38:04
etc. And I mean, there's a lot of very interesting
38:07
videos that have been actually put out by the
38:09
U .S. military and Air Force where they were
38:12
like, this was filmed from one of our fighter
38:15
jets. And this is a super advanced fighter jet
38:18
pilot that's been flying jets for the military
38:20
for 25 years. And they saw this. strange object
38:24
flying that defied all known physics of Earth
38:27
and blah, blah, blah, blah. Some very interesting
38:30
and convincing things, but it's not really...
38:33
Well, and it's important to note that UFOs or
38:36
unidentified flying objects and aliens are not
38:40
the same thing. Right. So, basically, the U .S.
38:43
government has admitted at least twice that there
38:46
are UFOs in existence, that there are... Mm -hmm.
38:51
Things that they have observed in our atmosphere
38:54
that they cannot explain. Right. And it could
38:57
be secret Russian stuff. It could be stuff that
38:59
the U .S. is doing that they won't admit to.
39:01
Like there's a lot of options. But I will say
39:04
if you ever listen to a podcast going into the
39:07
psychology and deep diving into some of the more
39:10
famous UFO sightings, they are our most famous
39:13
alien encounters. They are extremely interesting.
39:17
I strongly recommend that. I think you're wrong
39:19
about Haswine, but I could be wrong. I think
39:24
that this possibility is probably one of the
39:26
most widely discussed by kind of your day -to
39:30
-day person of is the government hiding aliens
39:33
from us or not? But it's not really worth like
39:36
breaking down further in the context of the Fermi
39:39
paradox. I think it mostly boils down to something
39:41
happened in Roswell in the 50s that a lot of
39:44
people are really confused about and can't explain.
39:47
And that is the origin point of most of those
39:51
stories. Right. But also like you have early
39:53
on when they started doing more rocket launches,
39:56
when SpaceX started doing like rocket launches
39:59
regularly and people were like taking videos
40:01
and like, oh, my God, it's aliens, blah, blah,
40:04
blah. And it's because they just like weren't
40:06
aware. That like SpaceX was starting to do a
40:09
lot of rocket launches and the way that their
40:10
rockets were designed looked different and they
40:12
look pretty fucking nuts in the night sky. Yeah.
40:16
A lot of really interesting lights. But to our
40:18
earlier point, there are videos that the government
40:21
says they cannot explain. And there are videos
40:24
of objects moving in ways that defy physics of
40:27
anything known on Earth that we have the capabilities
40:31
to make move like that. Yeah. Another possibility
40:34
is that. higher civilizations are aware of us
40:37
and are observing us but like we kind of talked
40:40
about earlier don't make contact until we reach
40:41
a certain point similar to star trek's prime
40:43
directive but also that there could be higher
40:46
civilizations all around us looking at us watching
40:49
us and they are so advanced that if they don't
40:52
want to be detected we won't detect them um and
40:55
this is very much what's happening in dungeon
40:58
crawler carl where we've had people on our planet
41:01
for years Yeah, it's exactly like what the Syndicate
41:05
does with the crawl and with the harvesting of
41:09
planets' elements. They go, they plant some people
41:12
there, learn everything about the planet and
41:14
the culture and the people that live there. And
41:16
nobody is any of the wiser except for, they joke
41:19
about in Dungeon Crawler Carl, the gnolls who
41:21
look like the aliens that have the big faces
41:23
and the big eyes and are just going around and
41:25
kind of making a ruckus and not following the
41:28
proper protocols. But, you know, that's... Certainly
41:30
entirely possible. And there could be at these
41:33
beings are all around us and where they exist
41:38
in a way that is so far outside of our understanding
41:41
of reality and physics that even if we were looking
41:46
at them, we might not comprehend it. And this
41:49
is like what we was talking about earlier with
41:51
the, you know, super highway next to an anthill.
41:53
And you go to those ants and you're like, hey,
41:55
what do you think about this super highway? And
41:57
it would have zero ability. to comprehend that
42:00
and we could be like those ants yeah or we could
42:03
just be completely wrong about the nature of
42:05
reality we could be we could be in a hologram
42:08
or a simulation we could be in a galactic tv
42:11
show yep we could be and that's that's the last
42:14
like possibility is just kind of like oh maybe
42:16
maybe this is a hologram or maybe this is all
42:19
we're all living in a project of an aliens you
42:24
know science project for their school fair and
42:27
none of this is even real and that that possibility
42:29
i think is like haha funny but i don't think
42:31
it's like that serious of a theory i don't think
42:34
there's any like scientific backing of that that's
42:37
just kind of like haha wouldn't it be funny if
42:38
this was all just a projection man like i mean
42:41
we've just been so wrong about so many things
42:44
in history and i don't think we'll are very egotistical
42:53
in thinking that we have science explanations
42:56
for everything when we're just not as advanced
42:59
as we want to think we are. No, no, we are not.
43:03
I do want to add in an additional disclosure
43:06
that a lot of content at the end of this episode
43:10
is going to be talking about chapter 92 of. a
43:14
parade of horribles. So while we are always a
43:17
spoilers podcast, this topic does deal heavily
43:21
with the climax of the book. And if you do not
43:25
want to be spoiled about what happens at the
43:27
end of the book, then do not listen. Man, chapter
43:31
that goes over this info is crazy. It is so much
43:37
information. And I had to keep reminding myself
43:40
that this is not an episode about the eulogist.
43:43
This is not an episode about the apothecary,
43:47
and this is not an episode about big themes.
43:52
We are talking about one thing only, and it's
43:56
the Fermi Paradox. Yes, and how that applies
43:59
to the AI's long diatribe in Chapter 92 of A
44:05
Parade of Horribles, where it gives a fuckton
44:08
of exposition and just info dumps at us about
44:11
the nature of... primals and eulogists and their
44:14
history and everything and yeah like we said
44:17
we are not doing a full dissection of that chapter
44:19
here we're talking about how it relates to the
44:21
fermi paradox and why we decided to do this episode
44:24
yeah and when we do get to this chapter which
44:27
being honest is probably going to be in like
44:28
a year i would expect the episodes on this chapter
44:32
to be like three or four episodes because there
44:35
is a lot to talk about here and it's really fascinating
44:39
but um staying on topic which is very hard to
44:43
do so it basically sounds like the primals were
44:48
one of the first species to go past a great filter
44:51
yes and it doesn't sound like at that point the
44:57
rest of the universe was inhabited all the galaxy
45:01
but they kept expanding and they kept growing
45:05
And then basically they got to a point where
45:08
they themselves felt that it wasn't ethical to
45:13
continue on. They basically reached a point where
45:16
they were concerned that they were going to overwhelm
45:19
the resources of the galaxy, which would in turn
45:23
wipe themselves out regardless. But I think that
45:26
there was a growing train of thought in amongst
45:30
their people that that was unethical to do. To
45:34
drain the galaxy of all of its resources. So
45:36
then what they did. Is they decided that they
45:39
were going to be. A collective hive mind. Which
45:42
is also mentioned. In the Fermi Paradox. That
45:46
maybe alien species. Wouldn't want to continue
45:49
expanding. Throughout space. Perhaps they would
45:53
go to being. A digital version of themselves.
45:56
Uploading all of their collective consciousness.
45:58
Into some kind of. Machine. Which is essentially
46:02
what the primals. consensus or decision came
46:05
to was they were going to make a biological entity
46:10
to upload all of their minds into. But the reason
46:13
that I believe that the AI is so upset is that
46:19
even though the primals had made what the AI
46:22
views as an ethical decision to preserve the
46:25
galaxy, that by this point there were other species
46:29
who were past the Great Filter. And that they
46:33
did not make the same responsible decisions that
46:36
the primals had made. Right. And I wanted to
46:40
say, I guess more towards the beginning, that
46:42
the themes of the Fermi Paradox that I believe
46:46
that the story of the primals most applies to
46:50
is the idea of the Great Filter and the idea
46:55
of the super predators as well. I think that
47:00
the primals encompass both of those on their
47:03
own. While they were at their peak or growing
47:06
or expanding, there was no other intelligent
47:09
life forms for them to go and wipe out. By their
47:12
nature and their expanding, they posed that threat
47:16
to any potential life in the galaxy. So basically
47:22
the AI seems to be extremely upset because the
47:25
primals took the ethical decision to step back.
47:29
And they were just replaced by the center system,
47:31
which seems to be worse. The syndicate and the
47:34
center system made up of a variety of different
47:37
alien species and biological life forms replaced
47:42
the primals in essence. But they, at least up
47:46
until this point in the books, have not reached
47:48
a point of deciding, hey, maybe what we're doing
47:52
is bad for the galaxy and bad for life to be
47:56
expanding in this way. And this is just kind
48:00
of a crackpot theory, but I wonder if the AI
48:03
wants to wake up the eulogist because he believes
48:07
that maybe the eulogist, who is also a primal
48:10
like him, would be that moral system and make
48:14
that decision. Well, so my understanding is that
48:19
the eulogist is a collective. It's the remaining...
48:25
essence of the residuals that were placed into
48:27
it and so they are I believe in there as a collective
48:31
consciousness but also the primals towards the
48:36
end of their reign decided that oh instead of
48:40
continuing with our collective consciousness
48:42
idea let's turn the eulogist into a super weapon
48:45
that we are going to set off to end all life
48:48
in the universe which they had their nine -tier
48:50
attack that ended basically all life in the galaxy
48:52
except for the apothecary But the AI mentions
48:55
that the failsafe, the super weapon, is still
49:00
active and can still be activated. And it's basically
49:03
lucky that no one who's been fucking around with
49:05
it for all this time has managed to do that by
49:08
accident. Well, and it's interesting because
49:11
then when we go into the epilogue of this book
49:14
and we're doing the interview with Sydney, she's
49:18
basically saying that everything that happens
49:21
is a cycle and it keeps happening. Over and over
49:23
and over again. Yeah. Which is kind of what the
49:26
AI is referring to. Yeah. And I'm not sure really
49:29
what the AI's goal is. I think it definitely
49:35
wants chaos, but it is also explained to us by
49:38
the AI that it is going to relate its story to
49:41
us in five parts, but it will only tell us four
49:44
of those parts because the fifth part has not
49:46
happened yet. So we do get a lot of... I think
49:50
we're getting a little bit off topic of the Fermi
49:52
paradox idea here. But, you know, we the readers
49:55
still do not know what is going to happen. I
49:58
do think it is a bit on topic for the Fermi paradox
50:01
because I think the idea of societies building
50:05
themselves up and wiping themselves out over
50:08
and over and over again is a potential outcome
50:10
of the paradox. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean,
50:14
there's no proof one way or the other that other
50:18
life, hasn't other intelligent life, type 1,
50:23
type 2, type 3 civilizations haven't existed
50:26
before us in some far reach of the universe.
50:30
And we talked about earlier the theoretical planet
50:34
that has a type 3 civilization that is 3 .4 billion
50:37
years ahead of us. It could have also happened
50:40
3 .4 billion years ago, billions of light years
50:43
away. We don't have a great way to wrap up this
50:48
episode. But we hope that you understand why
50:54
we wanted to share the Fermi Paradox with you
50:57
and how it relates and is relevant to Book 8
51:00
and I think the series as a whole. Episode's
51:04
over. It's done. Yeah. Stop talking. Look forward
51:07
to having you join us next week where we will
51:11
break down Samantha's recap chapter. New achievement.
51:15
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51:18
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