What, no Aliens!?

Elon Musk says we're all alone in a big Universe but he’s wrong

Last week Musk gave an update from SpaceX’s Starbase in Texas but first he waxed esoteric (his words) that there aren’t any Aliens - we’re it, so best get cracking onto Mars lest humanity perish. More on that later.

What do you think - Aliens or no?

It’s an odd question because who knows? It’s so far outside our reality that who besides the man building a fleet of rockets to Mars has time to ponder it?

Well lucky you, I have the time and I believe. At least I did until I heard Elon rag on the Aliens and then I had to do a think.

I first decided years ago - it’s just a numbers game. I internalized the Millions, Billions and Trillions from Carl Sagan and Cosmos. 100 Billion Stars like the sun in our galaxy. 100 Billion galaxies like the Milky Way in our universe. 100 Billion x 100 Billion is a really big number - the universe must be teeming with life!

The numbers get even bigger and harder to get your head around now that we’ve got telescopes in space like the James Webb Space Telescope. Now we think there are trillions of galaxies.

There is a more tangible advance. Now, in addition to stars we’re now able to count planets.

An exoplanet is a planet outside our solar system and NASA has a scoreboard. NASA estimates 1 planet for every star - so billions in our galaxy alone - and they are mapping every one they find. Here’s the latest score:

Elon’s not the first to look at the numbers and doubt. Back in Oppenheimer’s Los Alamos lab heyday a bunch of physicists were having lunch talking about physicist stuff like faster-than-light travel and UFOs and Alien math like we covered above. Enrico Fermi blurted out ‘But where is everybody?’

We should have seen some Aliens by now.

Turns out a lot more people care about this than I posited at the beginning of the article and there are a bunch of theories about where all the extraterrestrials are hiding or why there aren’t any.

Some of the more entertaining ones, along with with my © 5-Fermi Saucer 🛸 ranking of what I think of each:

• Rare Earth - we really are the special-est of snowflakes. No other planet in the universe has the characteristics necessary to develop intelligent life 🛸

• Zoo - the Aliens are watching while eating alien crackerjacks, checking us out from afar while we fling our poop at each other 🛸🛸

• Single Planet species (Elon’s fave) - extraterrestrial life does exist but hasn’t been able to successfully become interplanetary. Go Mars! 🛸🛸🛸

• Extinction - like the Dinosaurs run-in with the asteroid, extinction events are common and don’t give intelligent species the time needed to develop 🛸🛸🛸

• Self-Destruction - technologically advanced civilizations tend to destroy themselves as they advance. This is another one Elon likes to cite, talking about WW3 🫤 🛸🛸

• Dark Forest - the Aliens are out there in force, but they keep quiet for fear of being destroyed by another civilization. Lay low or they’ll come destroy you. Final book of The Three-Body Problem. 🛸

• Too Weird - Alien life is out there but it’s so different from us that we don’t recognize it or even know what to look for 🛸🛸🛸🛸

No 5 Fermi Saucer worthy entries on that list if you ask me.

And if there aren’t any Aliens then what are all the great Sci-Fi movies, TV and books on about?

Someday, our descendants, drinking a cold one at the local cosmic bar will look around and say “forget Fermi, George Lucas - now that that guy really nailed it!”

Seminal Sci-Fi categorized in 5-Fermi Saucers order:

1. Space Opera 🪐 Aliens are everywhere and they’re good and bad and mostly look like us but weirder and with superpowers. Also, we have amazing spaceships and tech to go visit and hang out with them.

   Star Wars, Dune, Guardians of the Galaxy, Star Trek, The Expanse, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy 🛸🛸🛸🛸🛸

2. Bad Aliens 👾 They are coming to get us.

   Alien, Starship Troopers, 10 Cloverfield Lane, The X Files, Three Body Problem, Hyperion 🛸🛸🛸🛸

3. Good Aliens 👽 Nicer and better than us.

   ET, Arrival, Mork & Mindy, Stranger in a Strange Land, Project Hail Mary 🛸🛸🛸

Sadly, most of space is empty. Like 99.999999999999% is nothingness. Our Alien neighbors are far away. The closest earth-like exoplanet is Proxima Centauri B over 4 light years away. If we left today, it would take us 250,000 years to visit 😭

We need Sci-Fi tricks like warp speed or wormholes or transporters to find our Alien friends so we can embark on our real Space Opera.

You can watch Musk’s take here.

What do you think?

Are you with him - there’s no one out there - or are you with me - there’s a future of extraterrestrial buddies and grand space operas? 🛸

best, Andrew

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Check out last week’s article!