An Economic Answer to the Fermi Paradox?
Those who ponder the Fermi Paradox might want to consider Myrhaf's solution, one based on economics. If advanced technolgical civilizations really are out there, maybe they simply can't afford to build interstellar spacecraft. Myrhaf assumes that the only realistic way to travel between the stars is via a slow generation ship, what Isaac Asimov once called a 'spome' or 'space home.' And he doubts anyone would attempt it.
SETI sympathizers are big on this one. I don't buy it. The very notion of "economics" might be foreign to an ET civilization. And, in any case, the feasibility of building interstellar craft is ultimately one of priority. Considering that we may very well be inhabiting the last century of human dominance on Earth (at least, until we get around to rebuilding), one wonders how our attitudes toward space colonization might change if we viewed our predicament as sufficiently dire to necessitate an interstellar mission.
Put simply, a civilization committed to interstellar exploration isn't going to give a rat's ass about cost. When survival is at stake, "cost" evaporates; saddling hypothetical ETs with all-too-human economic principles is inexcusable anthropomorphism.
7 comments:
I really get tired of the "earth-centric" view. I think people are constantly bombarded with the idea that any alien life form would hold the same values that they do, and that's simply ridiculous, in my opinion. The definition of "alien" includes the idea of something so different from yourself as to make it, at the very least, difficult to understand. When the people on this planet have such a hard time understanding each other, why in the world would we sit back and think that we can place our own motives and ideas on an alien race?
There are a host of other reasons, as well. This author sees the universe from not only a very human perspective, but also from a very western "white-person" perspective. Holding as a given that any technologically advanced species must somehow be operating within the economic parameters of Earthly capitalism strikes me as rather arrogant and quite unimaginative.
It is economics and capitalism that continues to hold us woefully back, in this the year of 2006 CE. Following the predictions of last century's many science fiction writers and thinkers, it is shameful that we have not sent many many manned missions not only to Mars but to Jupiter and beyond. We can't even have discussions without binding them around the precepts of what is good for the earth-based business' bottom-line.
Money is fake anyway. Where are all the trillions that are pissed away every year in bogus business deals and silly absurdity. Money means something to US, the people, because it is a scarcity which we are painfully aware of at all times. But there are other worlds going on as well. Consider the $25 billion which was "written off" back in the days of the AOL-Time Warner merger. $25 billion. Consider this number. How many years would it take a man to collect $25 billion, earning a respectable $100,000 per year? 250,000 years.
But it isn't even real, this number. It is just information. It was a "write-off". There was never a collection of money bags filled with $25 billion in cash that changed hands in any of this. Merely bits of data transmitted across the network.
It is things like this which demonstrate the laughability at any talk of 'economics'. Economics is merely a myth which a lot of us are forced to buy into if we want to participate in all the perks of this modern age.
It is suggestive of perhaps the reasoning that those who are among us already still shy away from formal "first contact". If this is the limit of our so-called intellectuals.. Embarassing, I think.
There are a host of other reasons, as well. This author sees the universe from not only a very human perspective, but also from a very western "white-person" perspective. Holding as a given that any technologically advanced species must somehow be operating within the economic parameters of Earthly capitalism strikes me as rather arrogant and quite unimaginative.
It is economics and capitalism that continues to hold us woefully back, in this the year of 2006 CE. Following the predictions of last century's many science fiction writers and thinkers, it is shameful that we have not sent many many manned missions not only to Mars but to Jupiter and beyond. We can't even have discussions without binding them around the precepts of what is good for the earth-based business' bottom-line.
Money is fake anyway. Where are all the trillions that are pissed away every year in bogus business deals and silly absurdity. Money means something to US, the people, because it is a scarcity which we are painfully aware of at all times. But there are other worlds going on as well. Consider the $25 billion which was "written off" back in the days of the AOL-Time Warner merger. $25 billion. Consider this number. How many years would it take a man to collect $25 billion, earning a respectable $100,000 per year? 250,000 years.
But it isn't even real, this number. It is just information. It was a "write-off". There was never a collection of money bags filled with $25 billion in cash that changed hands in any of this. Merely bits of data transmitted across the network.
It is things like this which demonstrate the laughability at any talk of 'economics'. Economics is merely a myth which a lot of us are forced to buy into if we want to participate in all the perks of this modern age.
It is suggestive of perhaps the reasoning that those who are among us already still shy away from formal "first contact". If this is the limit of our so-called intellectuals.. Embarassing, I think.
sorry for the double-post.. blogger is acting weird
Reuben--
When *isn't* Blogger acting weird?
"There are a host of other reasons, as well. This author sees the universe from not only a very human perspective, but also from a very western "white-person" perspective. Holding as a given that any technologically advanced species must somehow be operating within the economic parameters of Earthly capitalism strikes me as rather arrogant and quite unimaginative."
I concur.
"It is economics and capitalism that continues to hold us woefully back, in this the year of 2006 CE. Following the predictions of last century's many science fiction writers and thinkers, it is shameful that we have not sent many many manned missions not only to Mars but to Jupiter and beyond. We can't even have discussions without binding them around the precepts of what is good for the earth-based business' bottom-line."
Here I disagree. I think that the pace of technological progress under capitalism is the best that we can expect as a species. Capitalist economies produce more and produce faster than any other economic system we humans have tried. It'd be nice if we could come up with an economic system that works even better than capitalism, but I don't think that's gonna happen.
I think that the pace of technological progress under capitalism is the best that we can expect as a species.
But there's a catch: The pace of progress under capitalism threatens to destroy the very means of production and -- although I don't know if Marx was aware of it -- a sustainable future for human civilization.
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