The Grabby Aliens Problem with Robin Hanson

[@EventHorizonShow]

Thanks for watching, be sure to hit like, and subscribe if you want more videos like this. Also, go watch David Kipping's new video on Cool Worlds, Do "Grabby Aliens" Solve The Fermi Paradox? kzbin.info/www/bejne/qoOUeYeEqciMrZIfeature=shared

[@glorymanheretosleep]

Well, Michael, where do you stand on aliens being among us or in our galaxy? Do you believe in life in other galaxies?

[@tienshan9819]

If I recall correctly, Kipping's argument isn't about low probabilities, but logical fallacies and philosophical biases in the Grabby Alien hypothesis. Also: Hanson is sort of arguing that globalization is the Great Filter. Globalization, and perhaps spiritual frameworks like the Baha'i Faith.

[@leonelmateus]

lol is he not just trying to jump on the popularity bandwagon of this novel yet perhaps overly simplistic idea/economic model and seems to dismiss Hanson out of hand for being an economist and not a "real astronomer".

[@christopherbrice5473]

@@leonelmateusHanson is an economist (barely a profession, rarely scientific). We know that at least.

[@andyhannon5926]

Maybe everyone is reading Dwell In These Demons which is available on Amazon! 👻

[@txorimorea3869]

When there is a world government that decides to not expand, depopulate the planet, and doing everything in their hands to nerf the population IQ, in that case you know for sure you got grabbed by aliens.

[@MrKoobuh]

It is an adequate and tidy explanation for what we are seeing today.

[@tomten2539]

Right! All that speculation are liberal economists fear of the creative minds expanding onto a interplanetary civilisation, or a hightech planetary one. They would rather see a "greenish" Mayan type of dictatorship without strange people and their strange ideas. Seems unlikely that the grabbies want our freedoms and highways. Also, they cant stand oxygen, or CO2, for that matter.

[@Movetheproduct]

My thoughts aswell

[@JediMentat]

Actually would explain the perplexing reason for corporations and governments systematically poisoning us and shortening our lives/quality of life

[@KorakBrosepf]

​@MrKoobuh only if you're a weirdo conspiracy theorist. Only a right wing gov would decide that this is God's decision to not explore the universe.

[@Stevie-J]

I love JMG's other channel with scripted content and it's so fun to hear more of his personality come out in the conversational format of this channel. Such a contrast

[@EventHorizonShow]

Glad you like both! Thanks, Stevie!

[@InoceramusGigas]

Eager to listen in light of kippings recent video! Thanks again John!

[@EventHorizonShow]

Enjoy!

[@EventHorizonShow]

And let us know what you think!

[@kevinsayes]

JMG/EH drop before my *wonderful* 1 hr Houston commute? Send it. Thanks JMG

[@EventHorizonShow]

Have a nice commute! Keep your eyes on the road, Kevin.

[@Kustan112]

YEAH, KEVIN... O.O

[@Kulumuli]

Aren't we the grabby aliens?

[@TheSouthernorycle]

Yes but likely not the only ones. There may be some more grabby than us!

[@EventHorizonShow]

You think we are?

[@evanmoyle]

@@Kulumuli hopefully one day

[@king_milkfart]

IIRC the real grabby aliens are the friends we made along the way

[@kayakMike1000]

In a few years, I hope we are among them. The universe becomes far more interesting with different life on different planets!

[@supremelebowski2712]

If you get grabbed by an alien, does that make the alien a predator?

[@marktwain368]

You answered your own question. What do they want??

[@trippyliquids]

yes!

[@robertpetty4427]

LMFAO

[@gammaraygem]

If you catch a fly in a glass jar, are you a predator?

[@iamatlantis1]

They are going to shove things up your butt. So yes.

[@BitcoinMeister]

Last line of the show was so great! This entire paradox discussion could all end on a dime if someone sees something! May it happen soon! Keep looking!

[@EventHorizonShow]

Do you think it’ll happen in our time?

[@BitcoinMeister]

​@@EventHorizonShow I think there will be some "ambiguous" bio-signatures found soon, probably by JWST. I HOPE Avi Loeb or someone like him will find some sort of techno-sig that will leave no doubt.

[@Frisson391]

If you’ve done or planning any videos of. UAPs that we have no clue, or have videos discussing THE WATCHERS, Shining, . VEDIC TEXTS, and so many many others APPARENTLY THEIR IS NO EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER OF ALIENS, ETS, … NOTHIN SO FAR… ACCORDING TO THIS TAKE HERE. NOTHING TO SEE HERE …

[@dreamfall77]

The solution to the Fermi Paradox is the Mandela Effect. But in science, such epoch-making discoveries are not a quick thing, and only recently did Chicago psychologists discover that the explanation of this phenomenon goes beyond the scope of psychology.

[@gammaraygem]

Cropcircles. . NOBODY has ever replicated a cropcircle like the Milk Hill one in 4 hours of night without leaving a trace of human activity. Many are fake, and many are authentic.Just do your research.

[@bobthelonghairedboi5425]

Ive been watching you guys for about 3-4 years (jmg's main channel too) this has helped me get back into space and planets/exo planets, now when i look up at the stars it always has me wondering who can be out there, what they all look like and what their home worlds look like (the flora especially) thank you once again for making lonely nights way better

[@EventHorizonShow]

Bob, this type of comment means the world to all of us at event horizon. Thank you. What are your favorite topics?

[@bobthelonghairedboi5425]

@EventHorizonShow definitely exoplanets (oceanic planets) and ice shell moons, it leaves alot of room for imagination with the data we currently have, cant help but imagine finding space whales and alien fish on europa and enceladus, it always feels like we are so tantalizingly to finding life on other worlds

[@bigcity2085]

@@EventHorizonShow If I could interject a topic, if that's okay Bob, my math has Voyager moving much faster than Scholtz's star. But which direction did Scholtz come from ? Did it pass us in the galactic plane ? Did we pass it ? Is Voyager heading to the center of the galaxy ..or where ? We know there are billions of rogue planets. Are there lots of "wandering red dwarfs ", like Scholtz ? Are we a wandering star ? (seeing as how we don't have a companion star, and losing your companion speeds you up.) Thanks.

[@baneverything5580]

I`ve had multiple encounters. Some have been nice and others very frightening but it seems they`re here to help us. But I wonder why? Is it for selfish reasons or do they genuinely care? And why would my life be saved and not someone else? I`ve never amounted to much of anything, at least from my point of view.

[@bigcity2085]

@@baneverything5580 As Robert Anton Wilson has said in one of his books, to paraphrase,"Things have been happening to people for thousands of years, from the little village girl all the way up to Nikolai Tesla and others. NEVER let yourself or anyone say "Why you ?"". That is not a relevant query. It happened. That helped me immensely with mine. Hope it helps you.

[@deemond5289]

I have fallen in, I always wonder about the universe in which we liiiiiiiiiiiive.

[@deemond5289]

This guy is deluded,we cant live in peace on earth why would we be in peace in other star systems?

[@7heHorror]

@@deemond5289 That seems the great filter we're succumbing to. If grabby aliens showed up tomorrow, people would race *to weaponize the aliens against other people.*

[@ostsan8598]

I think the simplest solution that fits all the evidence is that we're the first civilization in our area that is capable of detecting other civilizations and being detected by other civilizations. Somebody has to be first.

[@stewstube70]

There could easily have been others WAY before us but who aren't there now - even Mars may have had intelligent life on it millions of year ago. Advanced dinosaurs were walking Earth over 100 million years ago. If we hadn't had a mass extinction event there could have been a civilisation as advanced as us on Earth millions of years ago too.

[@anthonywood7420]

​@@stewstube70 the Silurian hypothesis. You've got the reptilian from 100,000,000 years ago, then insectoid from the carboniferous era 300,000,000 years ago. But as you say, no one's seen anything like them recently.

[@Ron.J23]

How does that explain UFOS?

[@flinxsl]

Going extinct is not the only thing that could prevent us from becoming grabby. Collapse of our technological society for whatever reason and then the lack of easy energy from fossil fuel to get back to where we were technologically and economically could be a great filter. I would have liked to hear your's and Hanson's thoughts on this.

[@kevincrady2831]

I was going to say the same thing. Another way fossil fuels could be a Great Filter is if massive accumulations of them like we have on Earth are rare. Nature abhors an accumulation as much as she abhors a vacuum, and for the same reason: it's an out-of-equilibrium state. Perhaps on most other worlds, some critter (microbe or otherwise) evolves to consume the dead plant material that would otherwise become fossil fuels before it has the chance to do so. Nature is generally very good at not leaving a bunch of bio-available energy laying around. That she did so in the case of fossil fuels--leaving so much untapped energy that the light from its fires can be easily seen from space--could well be an extreme rarity. If fossil fuels had been rare or nonexistent on Earth, we would not be talking about "grabbing" the Galaxy. Perhaps we'd have a bit of solar-steampunk technology, such as electricity generated by solar-thermal devices. Maybe it would be able to light up places like Buckingham Palace and power a few somewhat unreliable electric railroads, but it wouldn't provide the kind of energy surpluses needed for an extravagance like space travel.

[@Houshalter]

In the US coal didn't replace wood until really late into the industrial revolution. Wind and hydro were not uncommon sources of energy in that time either. And there was an increasing trend in technology, science, mathematics, etc starting in 1500 if not earlier. Well before the invention of steam engines. History might be slower and different without coal, but not by much. Today we have all kinds of replacements for coal. We only keep it around because of how cheap it is and how afraid of nuclear we are. We could have skipped it entirety if we had to.

[@kevincrady2831]

@@Houshalter I'm not sure if it applies to the US separately, but if you look at a graph of world energy consumption by source, humanity as a whole didn't really replace wood/biomass, we just layered the new energy sources on top of it in order to increase total consumption. Biomass is still there as a "bumpy-flat" percentage of total energy use at the bottom, not seriously decreasing in total use as the other energy sources were added. If that trend continues, new energy sources like renewables will just feed into energy-use growth instead of replacing fossil fuels. At least until we pass the peak of accessible fossil fuels and start onto the downward slope. Given the way that fossil fuels are built into virtually everything our industrial society does, it's an open question whether or not it can persist without them. If not, our ability to attempt space travel is going to be a brief blip in the total history of the species.

[@flinxsl]

@@Houshalter Yeah so we can do a little better than subsistence farming, but not good enough to power a global logistics system.

[@antonystringfellow5152]

There are many possibilites for a great filter in our near future. The most obvious and most likely being self-annihilation. Such an event needn't result in our complete extinction, merely the end of civilization, which doesn't take much at all (complex human civilizations have already been lost in various geographic locations, at various times in history, and for various reasons). Whatever the case, looking at the fermi paradox from a purely statistical viewpoint, things don't bode well for our long-term survival. All the relevant information we have to date is basically: 1. We see no signs of intelligent life anywhere outside our own planet. 2. Intelligent life has existed here only for a very short time (a tiny fraction of the existence of life on Earth). Two data points aren't much to go on but that's all we have and based on those alone, the most obvious conclusion to draw is that we are an anomaly, in time and space. That is, others may have existed before us but even if they have, they don't seem to be around anymore. The reason for that may be quite simple and one that's encountered by all technologically advancing civilizations; technological advancement. The more advanced technology becomes, the more powerful it becomes. The more powerful it becomes, the more potentially destructive it becomes. Eventually, it only takes one mistake or one bad actor and the whole civilization is gone. Sorry, I know that's not a very comforting thought but based on the very limited information we have, it seems to be the most logical conclusion.

[@ourcommonancestry6025]

I'm 1 min into the show and I'm so happy with this guest.tytytyty for the show!

[@TheAmericanAmerican]

When searching for Grabby Aliens/Galactic Empires, we have to remember that it is pretty much impossible to look at other galaxies and SEE if there are signs there and that in turn, it is really hard to look at our galaxy itself! We literally could be the North Sentinel Island or New Zealand of the Milky Way and not know it because we either lack the technology to SEE the other side of the galaxy where the thriving galactic civilization is or we are simply in the backwaters where no one wants to travel to!

[@la7era1u54]

Also, looking for radio signal to find aliens is like people in the 16th century seeing into the present, but they see no smoke signals so they think that people obviously must not exist in the future

[@effdiffeyeno171]

New Zealand?!? 😂 Is that place real?

[@bigcity2085]

To SEE ...yes; it's a relative term.

[@patrickkalin4437]

@@effdiffeyeno171 apparently I've been here in NZ for 40 years but I cannot prove that conclusively 😆

[@tjallingdalheuvel126]

It is. And the world is sort of spherical too. How's my kakapo friends doing?

[@Bibrius]

When I hear grabby aliens, I think of some portly alien movie director who has gotten backlash on his home planet for doing unnecessary things with abducted humans.

[@asahearts1]

"Events lately have been happening crazy fast compared to events a long time ago." To be honest I wasn't paying attention and at first I thought he meant the last couple of years. 😂

[@michaelstoliker971]

I'm already grabby. Give me an extended lifespan and get me out there and I want it all!

[@TheAmericanAmerican]

Same here! Give me 2 more centuries of life and a rocketship and I will happily get out *THERE* :)

[@zrebbesh]

Odds of alien invasion before sending out colonists to another star: Probably Zero. After (creating aliens by) sending out colonists to another star: Definitely Non Zero.

[@mandogundam5779]

Lets hope we are not the Krogans (mass effect) in this scenario.

[@matthewhue]

@@zrebbesh that’s not necessarily true. You speak of the “odds” of an alien invasion but you have no data to come up with any odds. Also what do you characterize as an invasion? From all the data we have now it seems some form of NHI is already on earth and has been visiting Earth for a long time. Just because they haven’t shown themselves doesn’t mean they are not in control of things.

[@manydirt2600]

Honestly might be my favorite guest ever. Some fantastic points with extremely solid logic

[@EventHorizonShow]

He will be back!

[@LadyBeyondTheWall]

@@EventHorizonShow I'm glad to hear that. There are some.. weird attitudes towards Robin in not just Dr Kipping's video, but the whole comment section of his video. There's a lot of "he's just an economist, it's hard for an astrophysicist to talk to him" stuff over there as if he has no scientific background whatsoever. Which to be fair, Dr Kipping didn't seem to bring up his scientific background much at all, just that he's "an economist", while including pictures of the ancient aliens dude, that I think a lot of his viewers came out of the whole thing believing Robin has no idea what he's talking about at all. Quite disappointing and a lot of it came off as elitist.

[@hibbs1712]

This was a very real conversation. Love the route this conversation took and I really enjoyed hearing Hanson's ideals about our society

[@JeffPopplewell]

Thanks for one of the most fascinating discussions I've had the pleasure of hearing!

[@manachromeYT]

if the aliens are grabby I better hope, they like our French fries.

[@rickb06]

No, if they come, according to highly credible science fiction, they will unequivocally become addicted to either maple syrup OR marshmallow fluff. This is the way.

[@EventHorizonShow]

What’s your favorite type of fries?

[@TimKRobb]

let's hope they're not some form of sentient potato then

[@shalomedome1614]

@@EventHorizonShowwaffle

[@MrPerfs]

@@EventHorizonShow hot jupiters

[@miketheburns]

I'm now a fan of Robin Hanson! really love his unique views and explanations.

[@Harbinger343]

I think that the “paradise” he’s talking about would only be considered to be so by a tiny percentage of the “elites” in our society. It would be a tyranny to everyone else. The draw of the frontier is a powerful one. And not everyone wants to be safe and comfortable inside of a gilded cage.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Depends if there’s a PlayStation in the gilded cage.

[@FreakyLynx]

@EventHorizonShow if there’s no competition you probably won’t get anything past Atari.

[@AtSafeDistance]

You must be over 50. I wouldn't expect to hear that kind of talk from a 20 year old.

[@stricknine6130]

Great conversation! Thanks for the episode1

[@EventHorizonShow]

Thanks Strick!

[@alexczajka5623]

Amazing. I was hoping there'd be a comment from Hanson, wasn't expecting it this soon though!

[@EventHorizonShow]

Surprised it’s here so soon?

[@alexczajka5623]

@@EventHorizonShow very! It made my morning!

[@Etain18]

It's clear that, compared to Hanson, Kipping doesn't have the social-science chops to properly evaluate the GA/QA model, though it's good to see engagement on it. Great discussion, thanks!

[@Blink_1984]

"Forevermore conflict and change" is probably the best definition of life in the universe (sitting here looking around at this insanely vibrant and beautiful planet). Diversity allows life to beat the odds, so to speak, by providing more tools for survival, more options, more configurations. If we decide to be a monoculture as a species we risk not surviving any kind of future filter. A future filter could also force us into a monoculture. I am tempted to think that any civilization we discover at this late stage in the universe is a breakaway from a breakaway, from a breakaway.

[@chrisdahler5557]

"Mystery" is why.

[@heavyj2134]

Big meta questions about the nature of civilizational development in the reality of our universe. I'm here for it. Great stuff!

[@cavetroll666]

thanks John salute from Ontario.

[@thecatnaper1]

I had something go down my throat months ago and now seeing things like you are showing and have pictures and videos

[@GannDolph]

Another great one JMG & Robin ! btw never change the event horizon music JMG! too many other channels changing up their music theme not realizing it's a key part of the experience!

[@EventHorizonShow]

It’s not going anywhere and thank you for the compliment. You can find links to all of the music used on event horizon in the description above.

[@GannDolph]

@@EventHorizonShow Right on 👍 Thanks again to all of Eryn, JMG, and Ross (and possum ?) for this great show !

[@anniealexander9911]

I love the music! I "air conduct" to the opening theme every time

[@galaxia4709]

Thanks, one of my favorite channels and shows!

[@EventHorizonShow]

Appreciate that. What’s your favorite topic?

[@joefresh3725]

I understand the arguments about how many civilizations may or may not be out there. But what makes us so sure we could see them? We aren't even sure how many planets are in our solar system, or if our closest neighbour star has any planets or not. There could be a civilization right next door to us. One with satellites and radio and nukes, just like us, and we have no instrument sensitive enough to see them. I can think of many ways an alien could be seen, but I can think of even more ways that they would be invisible to us at this point.

[@Ladyfloats]

True they could be in a regular planet and their people are flying around the universe in ufos.

[@haredr6511]

I suspect that life is the rule, not the exception, and that intelligent life although somewhat rare, is pretty wide-spread. The problem isn’t really, “where are the aliens,” but that we perceive too much Star Trek in the universe. The perceived lack of any aliens is simply that all technological civilizations run into the same physical constraints of the universe as we’ve experienced. There’s nothing they can do to make themselves, “apparent.” No Dyson spheres, no self replicating probes no moved stars. No altered galaxies. It’s just that simple.

[@joefresh3725]

@@haredr6511 While I agree, I also think that interstellar travel might never be easy, or affordable to even the most advanced technology. We humans haven't built cities on Antarctica, or the bottom of the sea. We can.... we have the technology. But it would be very expensive, with very little returns. A species that evolves into a grabby state, may just give up after a few expansions. I don't think there will be many planets out there that we would be comfortable on. Habitible and hospitable are very different ideas. We might live in a universe where warp drives and worm holes are just fantasy. And a technological super race may expand enough to avoid extinction, but not much more. That being said, if a starship the size of Manhattan, with a billion aliens on board is a light year away from us, and heading this way at relativistic speed, we have no hope of seeing them.

[@kskaiseraaron]

Listened last night while falling asleep. Listening now to enjoy

[@edibleapeman]

LOL What was that diatribe about outlawing weird people around 20:00? If you institute a society that prohibits people from "being weird" then goodbye theatre, goodbye film, goodbye books, goodbye explorers. I don't know what Robin's deal is here - maybe I misunderstood - but it felt really weird and that's about where I stopped paying attention.

[@Toxickys]

Dude sounds like delusional and living in an alternative reality lol, half of the planet is at war, people are killing each other because of religion and other thing, and this dude talking about stoping the innovators lol

[@garygenerous8982]

@@edibleapeman yeah it seemed like he was saying that a society that acts like that is a good thing… all I heard was “I want to be Big Brother and bring 1984 to life”… that sort of society is horrifying to me. Because the only way you are going to get that society is through literal giga-deaths.

[@joshuacollins9316]

@@edibleapeman I think he was speaking more on a macro-societal and philosophical level. Not individuals still pursuing the arts.

[@trippyliquids]

I SMELL COMMUNISM

[@hibbs1712]

​@@joshuacollins9316this was my inference as well. I kinda thought we were inferring people like Diddy, Drake, and Trumpies

[@celerystalk1521]

loved this crossover. i didn't know he did interviews, but he should do more! also this is one of the rare times the background music actually enhanced a conversation.

[@celerystalk1521]

by he i mean you, john michael godiear.

[@EventHorizonShow]

This show is hosted by John Michael Godier.

[@arthurwigglesby8590]

I think you're right about aquatic intelligent life and the hurdle of their developing industry as we know it, but it also brings in another variable. Let's say that life (intelligent or otherwise) develops in the ocean of an ice shelf moon 10,000 LY away. How would we ever pick up on that? They wouldn't be sending signals, and if they are under miles of ice, they likely wouldn't know that space exists. The surface itself would be their "what's at the edge of the universe" question. Imagine if they reached the surface and looked up. "What is all of this? And what's THAT up there?!" Distances and time scales are a beast here, too. If ET is 1,000 LY away but moved beyond radio communication 2,000 years ago to something that we cannot yet detect or make sense of, we wouldn't pick up on it, and their radio signals would have passed us by long ago. Maybe they nuked themselves, or their homeworld was swallowed up as their star became a red giant, so they went dark too long ago for us to detect them. I imagine that it's far more difficult to "leave your mark" than it is to fly under the radar.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Why is it more difficult to leave a mark?

[@rickb06]

If anything, aquatic life has it easier, all they'd have to do is move to colder water and borrow our millions of varieties of ice cube trays, boom, they just skipped injection moulding and the need for plastics.

[@arthurwigglesby8590]

@@EventHorizonShow I hear a lot of talk of modifying one's world in an unmistakable manner; if we see it with something like JWST, we know that what we're detecting is unnatural, and had to have been manipulated by life. But the universe is constantly reforming itself. Stars expand and go supernova, or collapse into black holes. Those worlds may not be there anymore by the time that we point the right equipment their direction. Unless a species cracks the code for interstellar travel, they're on a countdown. Just trying to think of scenarios that both allow for life to exist elsewhere, and not be standing out thus far.

[@Siluetae]

​@EventHorizonShow I think leaving a mark is easy if you know where to leave it. A pyramid on the moon would outlast those on earth. Of course detection is problematic, Voyager suffers from this, but even more limiting is an inability to reproduce or replicate. Perhaps microbots passionate about creating would evolve magnificently on a journey to the oort cloud and develop indelible structures capable of manifesting interstellar sceneries that perfectly mimic humanities interpretation. Ultimately sending probes back to earth and recreating the entire Universe in earths image as a gesture to humanity.

[@sveng9933]

The description of the "Paradise Solution" sounds like hell to me. I would definitely one of the first pioneers going out to the new frontier!

[@rickb06]

John, I love the alien content!!!! Yay!

[@EventHorizonShow]

Is it your number one topic?!

[@chlve]

art at the beginning is incredible nicely done to the author

[@iamthesilverlining]

I strongly disagree on his position of innovation. Innovation is directly tied to energy access, not population size. Mass production can be correlated with population size until machining and automation came along. Then large populations are not necessary. They are only necessary for certain economies. Once you reach a certain level of energy production, that styoe of economy is no longer necessary.

[@vr0na843]

I think Dr. Kipping's argument is far more convincing and likely imo, but still a great convo.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Why do you agree with his stance?

[@vr0na843]

@@EventHorizonShow I think we definitely should expect to see evidence of grabby aliens if they exist and I find it hard to believe that we would be the first intelligent species in our galaxy. My opinion is that a hyper advanced species capable of quickly occupying an entire galaxy would not actually go about things in the way grabby aliens theorizes. I am unconvinced that mass expansion is the end state for intelligent species. Sufficiently technological species could easily terraform "dead" worlds or create massive space habitats. They may even choose to inhabit a few star systems that are relatively close to each other and artificially extend those stars lives. Unless FTL travel is possible (I don't think it is) you cannot really have a galaxy wide civilization. There is no real utility to that level of expansion imo.

[@simonklein4687]

I think David Kipping misses the most important aspect of the grabby aliens. It's not as much what it says per se. It's the constraints it puts on Kardashev scale civilisations. We have been looking for them and not finding any, and the grabby aliens theory tells us how many can there be, how far away, what is the largest amount of space that can currently be colonised and when is the soonest we can expect to meet them. Sure, there can be fewer of them further away, expanding slower. Fair enough.

[@shangtsung88]

David Kipping just wants to be that one voice standing against the grain...

[@vr0na843]

@@shangtsung88 How so? Grabby aliens is far from a widely accepted theory. I mean let's be honest. There is zero empirical evidence for it.

[@SnowyBrighton]

Just watched David’s Cool Worlds video. Will follow up after.

[@castrot2701]

Awesome thumbnail mate 🤘

[@EventHorizonShow]

Thanks 😁

[@nc1901]

Why am I just now finding this channel from John. Welp. Time to binge.

[@SevenSixTwo2012]

Maybe all the advanced Aliens simply figured out that it's not worth expanding, because of some deeper truth about the universe that we are yet to discover?

[@Irishcream216]

Dark forest, perhaps. If there indeed exists a civilization out there greater than our own, it may want to keep itself from being discovered at all.

[@milohobo9186]

Take my love, take my land, take me where I cannot stand. I don't care, I'm still free, you can't take the sky from me

[@SirAntoniousBlock]

If Sol was the size of a white blood cell, the Milky Way would be the size of of the USA or Australia. That's why we haven't encountered extraterrestrial life yet.

[@roberthamilton4380]

Thanks for recapping the end of the original Dune series by Herbert

[@EventHorizonShow]

lisan al gaib?!?

[@michaelkavanagh5947]

The fact we can't create simple life is very worrying. And it hasn't happened again on it's own.

[@EventHorizonShow]

How do you know it hasn’t happened many, many times and it gets stopped by our form of life?

[@ixian_technocrat]

​@@EventHorizonShow If it were that easy, biologists would have managed to create some simple alternate lifeforms in a lab, but I am not aware of anything viable having been made. So what, you might say, nature is just better at creating than humans. However, humans did create swords that can cut any living being, bombs that can vaporize anything, buildings larger than hills, computers that imitate thinking .... So they can create a lot of things more impressive than nature.

[@lukehahn4489]

@@ixian_technocrat You don't start with full on life forms. Amino acids, etc

[@totalbliss1]

Throughout this whole discussion, my mind couldn't disengage from the thought that you both sound eerily similar to the Mythbusters stars Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman with John being Jamie and Robin mimicking Adam.😂

[@EventHorizonShow]

What myth should they bust next?!?

[@totalbliss1]

​@@EventHorizonShow Lol. Perhaps the news about the three military veterans who testified in Congress' including a former Air Force intelligence officer who revealed that the U.S. government has operated a secret "multi-decade" reverse engineering program of recovered vessels. He also said the U.S. has recovered non-human "biologics" from alleged crash sites. Myth or fact discussion from respected members of the scientific community??

[@urbanshadow777]

Great filters dont have to be destructive, they can also be obstructive. Life on this planet lived for millions of years without ever knowing about coal, oil or gas. So it would stand to reason that on other planets life could happily go on without such products. However coal oil and gas are the things that kick-started the industrial revolution which lead to nuclear which lead to wind and solar. All of these things are what technological civilization runs on. Without the carboniferous period and the Palezoic era on our planet creating oil and coal, it may have significantly slowed technological progress if not stopping it altogether, thus we never developed into a space fairing civilization or even a technological one. On other planets there may never be a carboniferous period meaning whatever life on that planet will never have their own industrial revolution and the live a feudal lifestyle for all of their existance.

[@Siluetae]

Civilizations void of petroleum hydrocarbons will accelerate toward interstellar more effectively than us. Petroleum is itself a significant filter, hindering humanities potential.

[@Meilk27]

instantly liked and saved to watch later

[@copperdragon9041]

Great chat 🎉

[@EventHorizonShow]

What do you think of it?

[@copperdragon9041]

​@EventHorizonShow I really enjoy the free-flowing thread of ideas related to our progress as a species.

[@duran9664]

Time is the answer 🤷‍♀️ We NEVER saw the present. All what we have been seeing so far was the far past🤏 So no one can claim that the universe is empty right now 🤏

[@justin.channels]

Magnetosphere flip is a filter that will occur well before we can prevent it. At present, the prognosis is survivors will emerge from bunkers some years later, hoping to rebuild civilization before their applicable knowledge is lost.

[@lowtech_1]

We could lose civilization, after a nuclear war, and prolonged environmental problems. Things needed to building the next tech civilization, like copper would be far less easy to acess.

[@kelvincasing5265]

Yes, but he's thinking on cosmological time. It wouldn't take more than a million years to rebuild.

[@vantongerent]

I wish they would’ve discussed the ideas in the 3 body problem, in which as soon as an alien civilization reveals itself, it is casually destroyed by a more advanced civilization.

[@thegutlessleadingthecluele7810]

I think the total striving for more and more power, in connection with the coming technological development, is one of the great filters facing humanity. It is already possible to influence people's thoughts on a physical, technological level. This is guaranteed to be further perfected. Sooner or later, this will completely eliminate people's free minds. The world is controlled by criminal dynasties. Should a real world government ever come into existence under these conditions, it would be the end of humanity, in my opinion.

[@christopherbrice5473]

Then we become a hive mind collective and conquer the stars with maximum efficiency

[@robotaholic]

You had such a wonderful guest so interesting

[@TheVigilante2000]

Why would anyone want to leave Sol? For a riskey trip talking 1000s of years to be alone with the few people you left Sol with. Seems to me nobody would ever leave a paradise (I'm assuming we have solved nearby problems before tackling interstellar colonization) just to be on another planet.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Why do people climb mountains? Why did we go to the moon? Why not?

[@TheVigilante2000]

@@EventHorizonShow Well from those places, you can come home and share the experience with your friends/community/world.

[@TysonJensen]

@@EventHorizonShow Climbing a mountain doesn't cost thousands of trillions of dollars with a zero chance of ever seeing anyone not on the mountain ever again. And, the Moon was a good argument in favor of grabby aliens in the 1950s / 60s, but at this point it's a more of a counter argument. We went. Got some rocks. Never bothered to build a base. Forgot (literally forgot) how to build big rockets. We haven't even colonized Antarctica. I think the unfortunate answer is that technology to actually be a grabby alien is very unlikely and is the "filter." They're there, but they just aren't coming. And we aren't going.

[@MCsCreations]

​@TheVigilante2000 you're forgetting something: Earth isn't going to be habitable for ever. And the Sun is going to die as well.

[@TheVigilante2000]

@@MCsCreations Totally true, but we have about 1 billion years to figure out how to 'move' our civilization. We may even move to a few different places. Though I don't think that rate of expansion qualifies as 'grabby'.

[@raufsat8261]

One thing to consider re: ~17:30 and other timestamps: We are observing the past when looking at space. Which means that even if an advanced civilization would have done anything observable a million years ago (even radio signals) it wouldn't have reached us if they are at a distance of more than 1 million lightyears. Considering no invention which would bypass speed of light travel in any way or form. I was slightly distracted whilst listening so it may have been mentioned.

[@deanevans5346]

Nothing gets done without thumbs.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Claws!

[@DeimosSaturn]

Whether or not metalurgy is possible under a liquid water salty ocean would be an interesting research paper to see. Or if its possible in a gaseous environment with no solid surface. Unless something makes heavy metals be suspended in the air naturally it might be impossible for gasbag-type life that evolves on a gas giant or venus-like world to ever develop metal tools.

[@rlstine4982]

It is also likely that in a not so far future our AI will actually be our pioneers for space colonization. Not only would that be easier, due to AI not relying on biological needs like we do, but it is possibly more resilient to natural adversity, allowing our consciousness to expand with less challenges accross the galaxy.

[@EventHorizonShow]

What do you do about time dilation? How do you trust what the AI is telling you?

[@rlstine4982]

@@EventHorizonShow I am not sure that AI will have to communicate with "us" in the future in a way that would be meaningful. Should we survive as conscious biological human beings, as explained in the podcast, divergent exploratory pioneers of the universe would be so remote and distant one from the other that, even at light speed, communications could take decades to be performed. Hence, it would not matter what our AI tells us, it would be in such a distant communication mode that sending status reports would be the best we could meaningfully get. The same way we send postal cards to our families from foreign countries we traveled - never expecting a useful or actionable reply from them, and yet, them trusting that we are true to our words.

[@galaxia4709]

@@rlstine4982 responding is useless, the question, especially the 2nd one, was just asked to evoke an extra comment. Read them all and you'll see how silly or ingenuine or irrelevant some are

[@rlstine4982]

@@galaxia4709 I was not sure, as indeed the question was weird and out of topic compared to my comment. That's a shame, because the podcasts are great otherwise.

[@galaxia4709]

@@rlstine4982 I'm disappointed too, somehow you don't expect it

[@nicholasbrunning]

Fuck this is an admirable conversation, it's polite but deep. I missed this; cheers jmg.

[@siz4sean]

If aliens grab you, does that mean you "scored"?.......asking for a friend.

[@TheDominionOfElites]

What if they’ve got 3 breasts?

[@SirAntoniousBlock]

Think anal probe.

[@Craft-oh7uv]

No that's touchy feely 😘

[@halfdayofthejackal9372]

This conversation is evidence of other-worldly intelligence 🙌

[@WillaLamour]

First statement. “We don’t see Aliens …” The “rare intelligence hypothesis" solves that issue instantly - but you can’t make more pod-casts with that one.

[@sagehawk12]

@@WillaLamour the real problem is testing that solution. Good luck with that.

[@johnc4957]

Mr Hanson, this bro is like a fresh breeze in a summer evening.

[@NataliaCh93]

What if aliens are just us from the future? Or why they're coming so often to the USA and not for example to Poland? And what civilization of Atlantians didn't die or drown and they just survived and what if they were an aliens? Hello from Poland 🇵🇱😊

[@floridaman4073]

The Soviet Bloc era had probably the equivalent amount of stories coming out as the US and UK had

[@EventHorizonShow]

Hello! We love Poland! How is the weather?

[@NataliaCh93]

@@EventHorizonShow Hi, weather is good, warm, summy, just summer😊 and how are You?

[@EventHorizonShow]

Quite the same! Thank you.

[@captain_crunk]

I've never understood the appeal of the 'aliens are us from the future' idea. Why would we come back to ourselves only to buzz around in such a weird manner? If they are waiting for something, why not skip the wait and just come back to the exact correct time they are ostensibly waiting for? The illogical plot holes are a deal breaker for me.

[@MCsCreations]

Fantastic interview, John! Thanks a bunch!!! 😃 But yeah, we definitely need models to have something, anything, to compare our observations to. Otherwise... Well, perhaps we already detected someone out there, but we don't know it. And we probably think it's some kind of natural phenomenon. Dyson spheres or swarms, for example, we wouldn't have candidates if we didn't know what to look for. Anyway, stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊

[@christianferloni2323]

Yeah, I'm going to have to side with Kipping on this one.

[@Kustan112]

John, please check out Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun Tetralogy. It deals directly with conflict between humans of different planets that share lineage with Urth.

[@kringle02]

I’m a 51 year old retired mechanic and me and 4 others seen a disk shaped saucer tree top high move across our property last 3 or 4 minutes.on august 17.2023 .august 27 2024 we so a orange orb the size of a basket ball fly over our heads may be 20 miles a hour tree top high. Start looking up between 830 and 10pm .it’s all real when you see it you will know. This happened in west Tn.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Did you take a photo?

[@TheAmericanAmerican]

lasts 3-4 min and no one took out their HD pocket video recorder AKA smart phone?

[@kringle02]

@@TheAmericanAmerican 1 person had there cell phone and tried to record it there screen just showed a black screen like it was in reboot mode.that was when the disc flew over. The orb flew over I did not have my phone on me. I’ve spent the last week watching the sky with my phone in hand. I wish it was all fake I get no thrills or money reporting it honestly every thing about it sucks.

[@kringle02]

@@EventHorizonShow no I didn’t have my phone when the orb flew over. When the 4 of us saw the disc 1 person did have there phone but it just showed a black screen. I’m a nobody and I have seen them twice others have to be seeing them. I grew up in California and lived right next McClellan Air Force Base and the elementary school I went to was bell ave we watched planes on a daily bases I’m not easily fooled. After we seen the disc I drew a picture of it and showed it to my wife and said is this what you seen she said yes so I’m not crazy.Another thing I have struggled with is there is nothing around the area I live that is important so why are they showing up unless these things are every were.I started keeping an eye on the sky when the pilots came forward. I tryed to convince my self it was Elon musk satellites, problem is we watched them during the same period fly right over head one by one clear as a bell and they look nothing like what we saw. We’re in the process of having cameras installed just to watch the sky.

[@gregbennett4769]

I saw an orange orb right around 830 in wv. Looked like a fireball. I did get pics and a video. I only had 19 seconds because of crap phone. If I would've had 3-5 more minutes I would've caught it take off at around a 45° angle and just dissappear. It was definitely around 3 or less miles from me and when it disappeared I couldn't tell you how far, but it definitely looked like it went outside our atmosphere.

[@hazonku]

Excellent discussion.

[@EventHorizonShow]

What’d you like most about it?

[@halilzelenka5813]

Interesting conversation. You can tell Hanson has an economics background when he theorizes that there is a fundamental connection between liberalism and innovation. Let’s recall that Germany was an industrial and scientific powerhouse in the 19th century, despite having an autocratic system. Same with the USSR in the 20th century and China today. It is a typical Western ideological position that is easily disproven by historical example

[@Quickshot0]

Fair, though Germany was actually a bit of a weird place. It actually had a parliament that some what mattered and local freedoms were much better then Russia or China. Still, that doesn't change the conclusion. Well as a second comment in the margins... I do have the feeling the Soviets at least in hindsight weren't broadly as innovative as was initially thought. Looking back at it, a lot of their industries were less good then one might have expected, they missed the boat on quite a few important technologies and basically throughout their existence were some what dependent on Western tech imports to be as good as they were. Still... that at most argues they're some what slower in innovation, then not innovating.

[@Toxickys]

Dude sounded delusional ngl

[@christopherbrice5473]

What's it with scientists and being terminal libs? It's nauseating. You'd think they'd read, idk, a founder of modern social science, Marx, for example. But no obviously just to the left of Reagan is far enough for these brilliant thinkers.

[@halilzelenka5813]

@@christopherbrice5473 exactly

[@Quickshot0]

@@christopherbrice5473 I find it interesting that your take for this conversation is that you try to guess where some one is on a political spectrum. I guess that shows what you are most curious about.

[@krispykleen3404]

I just listened to this whole thing. I have no idea what a "Grabby" alien is. Thats wild.

[@rossmcleod7983]

And yet..all this conjecture is utterly meaningless after you have experienced a truly anomalous event that was confirmed by sceptics.

[@EventHorizonShow]

Have you experienced something anomalous, Ross?

[@rossmcleod7983]

@@EventHorizonShowyes! I went from a non denominational materialist to what I am now (whatever that is) and to say science has lost its sheen would be an understatement. I won’t bother with the detail, but the data is in, confirmed in every respect. In short - after a bewildering run of synchronicities, a dream I related (in all it’s absurd, intense and very clear detail) that I related to my wife unfolded exactly, just two weeks later and there was no chance of coincidence here, it was far too measured and layered. Precognition is apparently a thing! That and vivid, lucid dreams that are worthy of their own movie franchise. My world view of late has been shattered, but strangely invigorated too. 😊

[@bobmoretti4893]

@@rossmcleod7983 That's a lot of words to say absolutely nothing.

[@rossmcleod7983]

@@bobmoretti4893perhaps I wasn’t clear. I had a complex dream that unfolded exactly, two weeks later. Confirmed by my now not so sceptical wife. There was no chance of it being a coincidence. Weird huh.

[@bobmoretti4893]

@@rossmcleod7983 Ah. Cool. : )

[@CH-vb5kr]

Technological advancement came about because we discovered how to make fire, and then how to use fire for other things: like cooking, smelting and brush clearance. Fire isn't of much use to aquatic lifeforms, PLUS, warm water can't hold as much O2.

[@WaaaaghBoss]

First?

[@EventHorizonShow]

You win.

[@rickb06]

​@@EventHorizonShowhehehe lol

[@alecjones7299]

🥇

[@Alexanderkowaliuk-s7i]

I believe that we will have explored the entire galaxies within the next 200 years. Alex kowaliuk. Lockheed Martin.

[@askani21]

This guy sounds like a conspiracy theorist, with his weird fear of "World Government"... And what's up with his obsession with competition? The best science is achieved in collegial environments, where cooperation thrives. NOT COMPETITION! Competition is generally bad for science. It sounds like typical pro-capitalist / anti-communist talk we hear all the time among US conapiracy theorists. He had a few interesting ideas, still. The rest was ok.

[@Humannondancer]

At 44 minutes he promoted autocracy just before that.

[@heysaekari]

without competition, there is little to no incentive for financial investment by the private sector. if there's no chance of gaining an edge over a competitor and therefore gaining a return on the investment, there will be no investment. this is why intellectual property results in investment by the private sector in things like vaccines or new datasets for autonomous classification of communications. where do you think the money comes from?

[@askani21]

@@Humannondancer Holy sssssht you're right, he called "conservative authoritarian" government "more stable"... I just realised he's not even a scientist. He's a right-wing conservative economist. That explains it.

[@Humannondancer]

@@askani21 Yeah, always taking note of their qualifications in the opening segment can give you an idea if they are legit or not.

[@vladtheimpaler7375]

They’re already here becuase we are them and have been the whole the time. This whole thing is much more profound than we can imagine.

[@belliott538]

I already want to leave… Sadly I’m too old and broken to be able to hang around long enough to see it happen. I got old and broken as I followed a path into the wilderness in order to get away from my fellow man… and I’ve fostered this desire in my children. Add to this desire of “go my own way” the tendency of the young to “get out from under our parents” and there will almost always be a desire to go out into the Universe. I wish I could go with them… our children… but then they would probably chose to go on their own ship. 😎

[@barbaradeininger9521]

The fighting WILL continue.

[@lemelou]

Awesome discussion, thanks!

[@odysseyorchids9507]

Even the music along with jmg’s voice gives me the feels. To think about the universe and its vastness is an absurd topic indeed

[@Dagmere-n7l]

Intelligent fish could evolve to use their fins as like fingers and grow long beaks to handle small instruments made from sea bed rocks.

[@odysseyorchids9507]

@@Dagmere-n7l I’m certain there is a planet on which this is a thing.

[@christiancorralejo8726]

A way humans can avoid becoming grabby is by developing stellar lifting. Extracting resources from our own sun would extend the life of our sun and give us abundant materials to build other mega structures with like a Dyson swarm.

[@nurgle333]

@@christiancorralejo8726 what is grabby, anyway?

[@inezjackson2244]

They’re all ready here

[@thechanginideas2600]

When you have ads every 5 minutes.That's when you know you've been grabbed by an alien

[@Hyzer_Sozay]

Great conversation fellaz. However i still think trying to align NHI motives and knowledge of technology and the universe with our own is a mistake.

[@fabioregis3885]

Hi John, great video, thanks. If I may, The music is too loud and distracting up to 15min (particularly around minute 8) . From 20min to 24min the soundtrack choice is absolutely perfect. Just my opinion.

[@duran9664]

Time is the barrier 🤏

[@steakeater4018]

@@duran9664 time is not real. Prove it exists without a human made device.

[@la7era1u54]

Looking for radio signal to find aliens is like people in the 16th century seeing into the present, but they see no smoke signals so they think that people obviously must not exist in the future

[@EventHorizonShow]

That’s a poor analogy. Especially when you look at what’s possible. arxiv.org/abs/2103.11483

[@blackshard641]

17:40 So you're saying there's a chance..... YESSSSS!!!

[@chuckystein3103]

We are early and that's it. We are just one measurement point. Not every data point has to be "normal", for heavens sake

[@gdr189]

What if (just for fun theory) the grabby-aliens were already here as we developed. The hard part then being the realising: the UV is a sun-lamp not a sun, the X is actually a Y etc.

[@Quickshot0]

An interesting discussion, was great to hear a bit more on the grabby alien hypothesis basic underpinnings. I'd seen the Cool Worlds video on this as well, though I wasn't all that convinced by their argument, because it didn't really resolve why there aren't any grabby aliens at all. Instead just suggesting that perhaps there was such a mechanism, which well it could be, but considering how life tends to go isn't really the first starting position I'd take for it. So it felt pretty unsatisfying as proposed. As an interesting aside, the upcoming projects for the Habitable World Telescopes and various optical interferometers on the Moon and Space will likely make it possible to get a more clear picture on how much life we can expect across the universe. Well once the results start coming in probably somewhere mid-century or so I guess, unless they do exceptionally well on their timelines for once. Still the idea is that once you can start scanning nearby stars for habitable worlds and studying if they have things like an altered atmosphere. Then you could start placing minimum limits on how many worlds there are with more advanced biospheres out there. So if you find a fair few, then that would imply there will be more advanced life out there... And well if you find nothing at all, that might start implying we could be alone with in the visible universe. Though I guess that would resolve the Fermi Paradox then...