←back to thread

What do we do if SETI is successful?

(www.universetoday.com)
174 points leephillips | 5 comments | 20 Oct 25 17:13 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
Show context
gmuslera ◴[21 Oct 25 19:54 UTC] No.45660850[source]▶
Time is a factor here. How close in time and space would be them?

If we get something coming from more than 100 light years away we might not have the technology to respond, and if we do it may not matter anyway if we are at risk of not having a technological civilization anymore 100-200 years forward. So the meaningful actions on those cases may not include answering back.

Then it will be the actual use of that message. Lets assume that we will decide that is a signal from a civilization that is out there. It will be a signal meant for us and for any other civilization that doesn't have the knowledge/culture level as them, meant for giving us a common ground for communicating back, or it will be something that just will tell us that someone intelligent is out there, but no mean to understand it?

So the options are that we find apparently benevolent aliens willing to contact us, or that we find out that someone is out there but no way to communicate/reach them. I think the second scenario is the most probable one, and how our civilization will react if widely enough will change with time, novelty at first and indifference a few years later.

replies(2): >>45660980 #>>45661992 #
kulahan ◴[21 Oct 25 20:04 UTC] No.45660980[source]▶
I cannot imagine any scenario where we're just 100-200 years away from "no more tech" that isn't purely total nuclear destruction. Even then, we'd probably be so close to getting back to a technological civilization that it'd be a blip in the radar at best if we're talking about a society that far away.

We lost 150 years of progress? That's okay, we had 800 more years to advance before the aliens showed up or whatever.

It's such a weird thing I see so many people assuming. We were down to like 16,000 humans on Earth at one point, and that was before we'd developed things that you could theoretically scavenge and jumpstart your tech.

People need to stop doomscrolling; I'm certain this is depression projected.

replies(4): >>45661134 #>>45661397 #>>45661444 #>>45662297 #
wat10000 ◴[21 Oct 25 20:18 UTC] No.45661134[source]▶
It was also before we'd burned all the easily accessible fossil fuels.
replies(3): >>45661298 #>>45661385 #>>45661475 #
1. smallmancontrov ◴[21 Oct 25 20:31 UTC] No.45661298{3}[source]▶
We mined all of the easily accessible drywall gypsum too, I guess we wouldn't be able to have houses either and would have to live outside in the cold and rain!
replies(2): >>45661476 #>>45662853 #
2. nradov ◴[21 Oct 25 20:45 UTC] No.45661476[source]▶
Perhaps the aliens will share advanced technology with us such as how to build a tent.
replies(1): >>45662332 #
3. datavirtue ◴[21 Oct 25 22:06 UTC] No.45662332[source]▶
I can't wait until everyone realizes how easy it is to rebuild Göbekli Tepe with hand tools.
4. wat10000 ◴[21 Oct 25 23:02 UTC] No.45662853[source]▶
There are lots of other building materials available. What other sources of energy are there which are suitable for driving a new industrial revolution if you’re starting over? Wind and solar aren’t worth too much without high tech to enable them. Biomass is insufficient. Nuclear needs high tech. Hydro could do, but it’s pretty limiting.
replies(1): >>45695529 #
5. smallmancontrov ◴[24 Oct 25 15:16 UTC] No.45695529[source]▶
Insufficient for a hydrocarbon sugar high, but hardly insufficient for bootstrapping a civilization. Yeah, bio and hydro are limiting. So we would deal with the limits for longer until we worked our way past them. It's wildly condescending to imagine that this would be a show-stopper, doubly so when you review the history of all the things that were historically not stopped by the lack of fossil fuels.