On Wednesday, October 25, 2006 at 3:46:49 PM UTC-6, Jim Klein wrote:

> The one thing that all the ET science shows forget is that there may
> be other tool making creatures in the galaxy, but it does not take
> much to miss eachother in "time".

Arthur C. Clarke recognized this. The way he put it was:

"We may find apes or angels, but never men."

- we may miss civilizations because they destroyed themselves,
or died of some natural cause, but if we are late instead of too
early, then what we will find aren't Star Trek-style aliens, but
instead beings millions of years or more beyond us.

Of course, though, one thing he _didn't_ realize was that this
eliminates one of the favored arguments to debunk flying
saucers. If the transition moment between being just animals
and being an elderly civilization with godlike powers is so
brief on a cosmic scale... then a society _in_ that phase *would*
be immensely interesting for aliens to study.

Not that I believe in flying saucers, even so, but that _one_ argument
against them is at least partly fallacious means we should rely on
the others.

John Savard

On Wed, 1 Jun 2022 21:13:40 -0700 (PDT), Quadibloc <jsavard@ecn.ab.ca>
wrote:

>On Wednesday, October 25, 2006 at 3:46:49 PM UTC-6, Jim Klein wrote:
>
>> The one thing that all the ET science shows forget is that there may
>> be other tool making creatures in the galaxy, but it does not take
>> much to miss eachother in "time".
>
>Arthur C. Clarke recognized this. The way he put it was:
>
>"We may find apes or angels, but never men."
>
>- we may miss civilizations because they destroyed themselves,
>or died of some natural cause, but if we are late instead of too
>early, then what we will find aren't Star Trek-style aliens, but
>instead beings millions of years or more beyond us.
>
>Of course, though, one thing he _didn't_ realize was that this
>eliminates one of the favored arguments to debunk flying
>saucers. If the transition moment between being just animals
>and being an elderly civilization with godlike powers is so
>brief on a cosmic scale... then a society _in_ that phase *would*
>be immensely interesting for aliens to study.
>
>Not that I believe in flying saucers, even so, but that _one_ argument
>against them is at least partly fallacious means we should rely on
>the others.

I wonder if a species millions of years older than our own would be
much different in terms of technology. Obviously, it would be more
socially and ethically advanced. But I wonder how far technology can
go?