It’s not a take that I’ve thought about deeply, but could the evidence be explained by a technological advancement: the ability to hop between diverging universes?
It would explain why we don’t see aliens; they discover the technology, and that empty parallel worlds are closer in terms of energy expenditure.
It could also explain why the interlopers don’t bother us much; they are scouting for uninhabited parallel earths with easily-accessible resources, and skipping those with a population. The only ones we see are the ones incompetent or unlucky enough to crash.
It would explain why aliens aren’t ridiculously outclassing us technologically. They don’t have to solve interstellar travel before they start hopping.
It would provide an alternate explanation for why aliens ‘look like us’; they are from timelines with varying amounts of divergence. (The default explanation of course being that we are primed to see humans everywhere, so our imagined monsters look human.)
I can easily think of a few arguments against this possibility.
If dimension hoppers aren’t far ahead of us technologically, trading with us has advantages. Why skip, instead of open trade?
Technology would probably continue to advance. Hyper-advanced dimension hoppers should be better capable of scouting dimensions, and of displacing populated worlds, and yet we don’t see them. (Perhaps they are better at hiding, but then, they don’t need to hide.)
Instead of ‘where is the alien AI’ we are now left with ‘where is the divergent timeline AI’.
That last one in particular makes me think this explanation isn’t likely. I’d expect rogue AI and self-replicating machines to be invading constantly.
‘Dimension hopping’ or ‘dimension manipulation’ could be a solution to the Fermi paradox. The universe could be full of intelligent life that remain silent and (mostly) invisible behind advanced spatial technology.
(the second type refers to more limited hypothetical dimension technology such as creating pocket dimensions, for example, rather than accessing other universes)
It’s not a take that I’ve thought about deeply, but could the evidence be explained by a technological advancement: the ability to hop between diverging universes?
It would explain why we don’t see aliens; they discover the technology, and that empty parallel worlds are closer in terms of energy expenditure.
It could also explain why the interlopers don’t bother us much; they are scouting for uninhabited parallel earths with easily-accessible resources, and skipping those with a population. The only ones we see are the ones incompetent or unlucky enough to crash.
It would explain why aliens aren’t ridiculously outclassing us technologically. They don’t have to solve interstellar travel before they start hopping.
It would provide an alternate explanation for why aliens ‘look like us’; they are from timelines with varying amounts of divergence. (The default explanation of course being that we are primed to see humans everywhere, so our imagined monsters look human.)
I can easily think of a few arguments against this possibility.
If dimension hoppers aren’t far ahead of us technologically, trading with us has advantages. Why skip, instead of open trade?
Technology would probably continue to advance. Hyper-advanced dimension hoppers should be better capable of scouting dimensions, and of displacing populated worlds, and yet we don’t see them. (Perhaps they are better at hiding, but then, they don’t need to hide.)
Instead of ‘where is the alien AI’ we are now left with ‘where is the divergent timeline AI’.
That last one in particular makes me think this explanation isn’t likely. I’d expect rogue AI and self-replicating machines to be invading constantly.
‘Dimension hopping’ or ‘dimension manipulation’ could be a solution to the Fermi paradox. The universe could be full of intelligent life that remain silent and (mostly) invisible behind advanced spatial technology.
(the second type refers to more limited hypothetical dimension technology such as creating pocket dimensions, for example, rather than accessing other universes)