Last week I saw the latest sci-fi in cinema, Ad Astra (*SPOILER ALERT* just to give you a heads up). If you haven’t seen it, go and watch it. In a nutshell, the film charts a space exploration seeking to discover intelligent life. Despite reaching Neptune, and amassing 20 years of rich astrobiological research, their efforts prove fruitless. As Brad Pitt concedes in the denouement of the film, perhaps we are alone - ‘now we know, we’re all we’ve got’.
A sobering revelation, which plunges the audience into deep existential angst. What if we truly are alone? It seems liberating, yet renders us totally isolated. A paradox alluded to by
science writer Arthur Clarke (who, in fact, co-wrote the screenplay for Space Odyssey) - ‘‘either we are alone in the universe or we are not: both are equally terrifying’’.
The idea that we are alone runs contrary to the widespread assumption that extra-terrestrial intelligent life is written in the cards. But where is the evidence? There isn’t any. The Fermi Paradox - a familiar term in cosmological discourse - contrasts the immensely high probability of extra-terrestrial intelligent life with the stark lack of evidence.
The Big Bang occurred 14bn years ago. Earth was formed 4bn years ago. Homosapiens emerged around 100’000 years ago. If you were to extrapolate the life of the universe on an annual calendar (i.e January 1st = Big Bang and the 31st December = present day), then New Year’s Eve would mark the birth of mankind. That puts into perspective how much time has elapsed prior our existence.
Assuming 100’000 years is the yardstick for intelligence to evolve (given that’s all the data we have), then theoretically, thousands of super-intelligent beings should have evolved: beings that could traverse the universe in the blink of an eye; beings that could reach out, rehabilitate or even eradicate us at the push of a button. Assuming intelligence manifests itself in a similar fashion, with curiosity as the engine, these purported aliens would have surely touched base. Yet not an iota of evidence, throughout our existence, suggests aliens have ever set foot on Earth.
Evaluating all this information compelled me to dig a little deeper. Let’s strip it back. Rather than focusing on the product (intelligence), let’s focus on the process (evolution). The prevailing belief is that conscious intelligence is a favourable evolutionary quality - being intelligent, rational and conscious renders you a superior species - as I unconsciously mentioned earlier, ‘thousands of super-intelligent beings should have evolved’ which is evidence per se.
However, the apparent scarcity of super, conscious intelligent life suggests otherwise. What if conscious intelligence was a mistake... an evolutionary blunder. Look at humans, human nature is riddled with flaws that are often shielded by our ego. As Agent Smith illustrates in The Matrix:
“I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species (humans) and I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humansdo not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You're a plague”
The line I have emboldened encapsulates this idea - every other animal lives in harmony with their natural instincts and surroundings. We, however, do not. Look at the way we treat our planet: we pollute tirelessly; we torment animals remorselessly; we deplete resources voraciously and unsustainably. We disobey the laws of nature. As suggested by Agent Smith, we destabilise the natural equilibrium. It seems our pursuit of knowledge comes at the expense of our environment.
Why therefore would evolution create something that threatens to undermine its own creation? It would be like deliberately adding lemon juice (humans) to a sunday roast (Earth): a meal that is worth so much more than the sum of its parts, yet would be spoilt and soured by an overpowering addition like lemon. Or worse, it would be like intentionally adding a saxophonist (humans) to the Beatles (Earth): a band of brothers that developed such wonderful harmonies, that would have been diluted and disrupted by the cacophony of a saxophone. The only answer is that humans were a tragic misstep in the course of evolution, and perhaps explains why a 6th mass extinction looms large...nature is finally correcting itself.
Obviously this whole stance is pretty radical, and is built on some questionable assumptions, but maybe we’re not as great as think we are. Just some food for thought.
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