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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   3169 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 18, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

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I’m 95% on UFOs not being real.

We have thousands of telescopes and radio telescopes trained on deep space, including the JWST and Hubble. We’ve never found anything that’s unambiguously life, and certainly no evidence of technology, no ships, no stations, no artificial signals, no Dyson spheres, nothing of the sort. As such there’s no reason to think that there’s anything out there with the capacity to come here.

Most experts on the topic say that FTL travel isn’t just difficult, it’s impossible. And without it, interstellar travel isn’t feasible. The speed and distance are simply too great for beings with lifespans like ours to do much more than conquer their solar system.

What about Generation Ships?

Which run splat into the telescopes problem— we haven’t seen any anywhere. They’re certainly more feasible than the usual FTL because muh billions of years means that I can ignore known physics.

Seems to me that it may just be unlikely for us to spot any. Theoretically you only need to send one once to colonize a distant place, and they can presumably coast most of the way. Not exactly the stuff that highly visible traffic lanes are made of.

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