The paper posits that there could be numerous Communicating Extraterrestrial Intelligent civilizations (CETIs) in the universe. However, their existence hinges on their ability to endure for millennia to facilitate contact with other civilizations. Various theories have been postulated to decipher Fermi's Paradox, suggesting that patience might be the key to unraveling this mystery.
A groundbreaking research published in The Astrophysical Journal by Wenjie Song and He Gao addresses this issue. They estimated the number of CETIs based on the probability of life emerging on Earth-like planets and the evolution stage of the host star where CETIs could potentially originate. They proposed nine scenarios ranging from rare to common CETI occurrences. In a scenario where CETIs are sparse (approximately 110 in the entire Milky Way), a civilization would need to persist for about 400,000 years to receive a signal from another civilization. Conversely, in the most optimistic scenario with around 43,000 CETIs, a civilization would have to last at least 2,000 years to receive its initial cosmic signal.
The absence of signals could be explained by the relatively short duration of human communication. The authors from Beijing Normal University put forth the idea of civilizations' duration being inherently self-limiting due to numerous potential threats such as population issues, nuclear destruction, abrupt climatic changes, rogue comets, ecological shifts, among others. If this theory holds, humans may not receive signals from other CETIs before facing extinction.
The probabilistic approach towards Fermi's Paradox implies that our current quest for other civilizations is still in its infancy. The researchers acknowledge the vast uncertainties in their estimates, yet, the possibility of future communication with extraterrestrial life cannot be dismissed. The proportion of Earth-like planets that could foster life and the likelihood of an extraterrestrial civilization developing the technology to send detectable signals into space remains unknown. Moreover, we are uncertain of the number of CETIs in the universe and whether they would wish to communicate with us.
The "Dark Forest" hypothesis, suggesting that civilizations might prefer to remain concealed for undisclosed reasons, adds another layer of intrigue to the cosmic mystery. As we continue to probe the depths of the universe, there's still much left to uncover about Fermi's Paradox and the elusive CETIs.
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