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From: milne@uci-icse
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: Meeting Advanced Aliens
Message-ID: <2953@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Sat, 27-Jul-85 00:23:57 EDT
Article-I.D.: topaz.2953
Posted: Sat Jul 27 00:23:57 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 28-Jul-85 06:13:41 EDT
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Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
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From: Alastair Milne <milne@uci-icse>


   I'm surprised nobody has mentioned what seems to me the most obvious
   reason: distances in space are !!!ENORMOUS!!!, far beyond human capacity to
   perceive.  Remember the definition of "infinite" given in the Hitchhikers' 
   Guide to the Galaxy?  "Big, multiplied by colossal, multiplied by 
   staggeringly huge ...".  An understatement, certainly, but aiming in the 
   right direction.  Isn't it more than likely that, in all that unthinkable 
   volume, our little planet just hasn't been noticed?  Consider:
 
       - All our radio and TV signals (and whatever other kinds we've been 
       generating) can't be more than 50 or 60 light-years out by now.  
       Furthermore, the ones at the front must be in pretty rotten shape: 
       besides the attenuation as they describe the surface of an expanding 
       sphere, the equipment that produced them wasn't very good to begin with. 

       - The only other way I've heard of to detect a planet is to examine 
       any eccentricity in its sun's motion; and I have no idea how well Earth 
       can be detected that way, since we have 8 competitors, including some 
       real heavyweights (though it is true that they are at much greater 
       distances).  

       - Even from a relatively low height above Earth, no signs of
       civilisation can be detected.  You have to be surprisingly low before
       you can see regularities in surface patterns around New York, for
       instance, or the wanderings of the Great Wall of China.  Though I grant
       that anybody scanning the EM bands at that distance should be bombarded
       with regular signals.

 
       How, then, is any non-Terran going to know that there is anything (like
       a planet) or anybody here to visit?  This seems to me the most likely
       reason.


       Alastair Milne