Fermi's Paradox and the UB

Is there other Intelligent Life "out there"? If not, why not? If so, where are they?

Originally published as comments on Ace of Spades blog here and here. some folks were discussing Fermi's Paradox and related topics, and I chimed in with this:

Been decades since I read Asimov, but IIRC, in his fictional universe, humanity never found any other intelligent life anywhere Out There. Proto-life, nothing as advanced as animals. I suppose something like that could be because, once an ecological niche is filled (e.g. self-aware humans arise), they, or nature, suppress anyone else rising to that level, or something like that.

Mars AttacksSome say that other material beings might be so "alien" that we might not even recognize them as such, nor they us. Like the sand intelligence on that Trek:NextGen episode.

[Star Trek: Next Generation episode "Home Soil"]

EwokI prefer to think that, just as evolution followed patterns of development on our world for physical reasons, life on other worlds would have similar forms, minds, morals, and faith. Because that's how the universe is constructed, by God.

Capt Kirk vs the GornI usually joke, the main clue that there's intelligent life in abundance Out There is that we haven't heard from them yet. We're still in the cradle, the anthropological let-them-develop-some-more stage. And, would you want to associate with primitives like us? Eww.

UFO

My Favorite MartianIn The Urantia Book universe (what, that again?) the time-space universe is created by the eternal God to be filled with mortal children. They even say there is a world of mortal beings "near" us, although without specifying whether within the solar system or around some "nearby" star, nor what level of evolution they've reached, e.g. radio chatter we could pick up.

In their telling, the cosmos is all overseen by the children of God, and mortal world civilizations are usually guided from the earliest days, and so we should know that we are part of universal civilization.

The Day the Earth Stood StillOn our world, indeed our whole section of space, "all the foundations of the earth are out of course" (Psalm 82:5). A similar idea was given in L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time - the universe is light, but with dark patches. Looks all dark when you're inside the bad parts.

In the Urantia story, ever since the "Lucifer rebellion" hundreds of thousands of years ago, we are isolated from the spiritual circuits and won't be reinstated until his trial is completed, no projection on that date given. Whether the "spiritual circuits" being reinstated would be noticed by mortals is not specified. (Lucifer's disciple, the "prince of this world" was "cast down" is no longer in power, but is still free to cause trouble, for those who ask him in.)

I was interested to read last week about CS Lewis (wasn't it?) writing about something similar, worlds under leadership of divine authority - want to look that up.

So, here on Urantia (name of our world, it sez), thanks to that old rebel, we lost our intended planetary guides twice over, and so are largely on our own, revelations from occasional teachers and the Son of God incarnate notwithstanding. Makes us a hot tourist spot for unseen cosmic visitors, though, seeing how we are a planet with so many "who have not seen but have believed."

Interesting note that one of Lucifer's big arguments was that too much time and energy was spent on administering mortal worlds and resurrecting us. A$$hole. [spit]

However, we do have the Urantia revelation to assure us that we are not alone, not abandoned, and are indeed loved and assured of eternal life, if we do not reject this gift of God. In case you didn't already get that memo from the Gospels.

UFO from 1350 painting