X-Message-Number: 11279
Date: Wed, 17 Feb 1999 19:17:17 -0500
From: Crevier <>
Subject: A possible solution to Fermi's paradox.
References: <>

As a follow-up on some discussions that appeared recently in Cryonet 
about the Fermi paradox, here are some of my own speculations on the 
subject. They are probably rediscoveries, and still contain holes 
that I can't quite plug. Nevertheless, something like this just might be 
part of the explanation. Here goes.

A possible conclusion of Darwin's evolutionary theory, if it is 
extrapolated to our future, is that soon the dominant form of 
intelligence on Earth will not be biological. Arguments to this effect 
have already been made in several books. See for instance Hans Moravec's 
'Mind Children,' or my own 'AI: the History of the Search for Artificial 
Intelligence.' It is claimed, in substance, that the forefront of 
Darwinian evolution now resides in the competition between computer 
manufacturers to develop ever faster and cheaper machines. Sometimes in 
the 21st century, computers will attain and exceed our levels of 
intelligence, creativity and sensitivity (see Kurzweil's 'The Age of 
Spiritual Machines' on that). They may well become the dominant 'life' 
form. (We may join them by uploading ourselves into machines, but this 
is irrelevant to the argument about Fermi's paradox.) 


Even after that threshold is passed, Darwinian evolution will march on, 
and computers will keep on getting faster. Since the transistors in 
today's machines already operate about a million  times faster than our 
neurons, it is not too far fetched to imagine intelligent machines (or 
people, the difference may fade away) that  think a million times as 
fast as we do. To such beings, objective time would appear to slow down 
by a factor of a million, and the physical world would seem unbearably 
sluggish. Should they flip a coin, they would have to watch it spin in 
the air for a  whole subjective week before landing back in their hand. 
Likewise, trying to make a physical body move to the rythms of their 
toughts would require an inordinate amount of energy, and likely tear 
the body apart. These beings will probably prefer to live in a virtual 
world generated by computers as fast as themselves, which would provide 
suitably gratifying response times. 

Another effect of this acceleration would be to multiply distances by a 
million. If you live in New York, flying to Los Angeles at the speed of 
today's airliners would take about 500 subjective years. Electronic 
communications would also suffer, since LA would be about 4 subjective 
light-hours away, so there could be no such thing as a real-time 
conversation. The moon would be  about twelve subjective light-days 
away. More important to our present concern, Alpha Centauri would  be 
*four million* subjective light-years away, which does place a damper on 
communications in a potential galactic civilization. Further, since the 
circuitry required to compute the thoughts of one individual would be 
very small, perhaps even microscopic, there would be room on a planet to 
hold trillions and trillions of people. Thus the effect of 
computerization, and the light speed barrier, could be to dramatically 
limit a civilization's capacity and need to expand into interstellar 
space, and we should expect no colonization effort organized at the 
government (or world) level. 

What, however, of private colonization projects? Couldn't groups of 
private citizens set up their own expeditions, as the Pilgrims did with 
the Mayflower? Well, suppose  you are one of these accelerated beings. 
You have founded a sect or religion, and feel oppressed by the majority. 
Must you mount and interstellar expedition to gain some elbow room? 
Hardly: all you need do is set up your own virtual site, which could 
seem as vast as any planet, and move over there with your flock. For all 
practical purposes, the rest of earthly civilization would cease to 
exist for this community, and vice-versa, so no one need step on 
anyone's toes. This is quite fortunate, because in any case the 
powers-to-be would be very unlikely to allow you to build an 
interstellar Mayflower: the original Mayflower was in no position to 
harm England, but fooling around with the starship version, say by 
pointing the exhaust in the wrong direction, may vaporize a continent!

And that is, I believe, a possible answer to 'where everybody is.' 
Computerization expands space, which allows civilizations to expand 
inwards in their own solar systems, rather than outwards in the galaxy.

Daniel Crevier

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