The Fermi Paradox With Neil deGrasse Tyson - Where Are All The Aliens?

Since the birth of philosophy, we've never stopped wondering about the answer to the question: Are we alone?
Neil deGrasse Tyson tackles the possibility of the prevalence of life in the cosmos by comparing our sole data-point we have, life on Earth. He points to the fact that life on Earth formed as soon as it had a chance after the late heavy bombardment period.

Neil deGrasse Tyson also extrapolates from the fossil record that Intelligence as we humans have defined it is not necessary for survival, therefore intelligent life in the cosmos might be extremely rare.

In the summer of 1950 Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi, while walking to lunch with his fellow physicists was having a casual conversation about recent UFO reports and the possibility of faster-than-light travel. Allegedly Fermi suddenly during lunch said, "But where is everybody?

This later became known as the Fermi problem or paradox. Which is the apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence for extraterrestrial life and the high estimate probability for their existence.

So what could possibly explain this semblant paradox?

Whatever is preventing non-living matter from undergoing "Abiogenesis" in time, to expanding lasting life as measured by the Kardashev scale, in the context of the Fermi paradox, is known as the "Great Filter".

As NASA has explored our solar system and beyond, it has developed increasingly sophisticated tools to address our endless curiosity for the possibility of life existing elsewhere in the cosmos. Within our solar system, NASA’s missions have searched for signs of both ancient and current life, especially on Mars and soon, Jupiter’s moon Europa. Beyond our solar system, missions, such as Kepler, are revealing thousands of planets orbiting other stars. Fueling our imaginations further with bewilderment, wondering if there are other civilizations out there, perhaps asking the same question. Are we alone?

A growing number of people believe we've already answered this question due to recent UFO reports over the last few years. However, eye-witness testimony and ambiguous video footage does not qualify as extraordinary evidence to definitively answer this age old question. But to be respectful to the people who believe we've been visited by extraterrestrial crafts, we will dedicate a whole video on the topic.

#fermiparadox #neiltyson #aliens

"Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson Visits JWST and NASA Goddard" by James Webb Space Telescope is licensed under CC BY 2.0

[thorstenziglasch]

Maybe it is just a very specific human trait to feel the need to shout out our existence to the universe. The majority of other species might just favor silence and hiding. Camouflage is very common among various species on our planet.

[BadBoyofScience]

It’s a haunting hypothesis to wonder whether millions of other civilisations might be thinking exactly the same thing - all locked in 🔒 by the laws of relativity and the speed of light.

[damage]

I REALLY don't want to leave this life before we find the answer

[robd]

I always liked the quote, "Somewhere, out there, there is probably a race of aliens that don't seriously believe in us"

[SuperSalim]

Intelligence is the right thing to have to render yourself extinct. A complete new insight. Never thought it this way.

[Whymedude]

“Intelligence is just the right thing to have to render yourself extinct” this hit hard

[joenunez]

What we consider intelligence can be equivalent to what an alien species would consider to be a sensory characteristic like sight. Their intelligence could be unfathomable to us.

[toxiflexx]

Honestly the proof we have for extraterrestrial life is our existence

[LandonAshworthDirects]

“With Neil tyson” proceeds to steal audio of Neil and not actually have him on the show

[tofu_golem]

"The surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that it has never tried to contact us."
--Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

[jimmckinney]

Just mathematically there has to be a lot of intelligent life in the Universe. The problem is that where ever they are, they are stuck where they are at just like us. The tremendous challenges of long duration space travel are too prohibitive to overcome. Biological life forms are too fragile for long duration space travel.

[elizabeth]

I often think about if we did find extraterrestrial life, how would we communicate with them. What if we have no possible way of translating our thoughts to them. Their way of life would probably be so unimaginably different compared to ours that we wouldn’t even be able to comprehend it.

[davidtaylor]

I think we're surrounded by intelligent life who are having the same conversation.
They know we're out there but realize they might not ever get to make contact much less visit.

[shania]

I saw this story of an alien who really wanted to visit earth so he traveled 3.7 billion light years just to get here. And when he finally arrived, he stepped out of his craft, and the earth was basically a dystopia with no life at all. The amount of time it would take to get here is genuinely that staggering that honestly if you think abt it, it’s pretty believable.

I mean, it takes about 9.5 years to get to Pluto. And we’ve obviously been observing(somehow)planets even farther away so it’s not hard to believe that if there was anyone out there, by the time they get here, no one reading this comment would be alive to see it.

Which means we’re basically alone. And if there is other life similar to us(not fantasy aliens with super high tech) they would feel the same, alone. Bc it’s seemingly impossible to get that contact before either one of us went extinct.

Now it Kinda sounds like multiverses to me so I’m gonna stop

[callsignblaze]

Either concept is terrifying and amazing in its own right. If the universe is infinite and we are alone then we would never have to worry about hostile alien species as well had have endless room for expansion. If we are not alone then statistically there would be both hostile and non hostile as well as inconceivably advanced and primitive species. The learning and advancement would be incredible.

[BluntApe]

It's funny how we want to find alien civilizations in the universe when at the same time we can't even get along with each other in our own civilization.

[narp]

I think the answer is that evolution of intelligent self-awareness is highly circumstantial. Prokaryotic life may exist everywhere you find liquid water. But here on Earth, three key random instances caused it to evolve further. First: The Great Oxidation event likely changed the chemical composition of Earths oceans, causing a microbial mass extinction allowing for the evolution of Eukaryotes. Second: The Cryogenian glaciation may have initiated the evolution of multicellularity. And thirdly and most notablly, the asteroid impact which wiped out the dumb Dinosaurs allowing for the proliferation of mammals that ultimately allowed us to evolve. Now consider that this random succession of important occurrences never happened on other goldilocks worlds and you have your explanation of the Fermi paradox. Earth may be an example of a relatively unique and rare phenomenon where the evolutionary dominos fell in just the right order to allow for the emergence of technological intelligence.

[vitamind]

I’m off to see Tyson in person tonight. It’s a lecture about the possibility of life in our universe. So pumped!!!

[houseofstone]

The fact that we haven’t yet discovered life speaks to how small and isolated we are and how big our universe and space is. Surely other life exists but the sheer size of the “playing field “ is incomprehensible.

[nesh_san]

I always like to imagine that there is a civilization that is looking into the vast space just counting the amount of stars, planets, galaxies, exoplanets and so on, just wondering "Where is everybody", just like us and that one of the exoplanets, Earth, could have life on them. Even if they would be "just" a few light years away from us, colonizing their solar system and still not encountering anyone else just deepens the thought that they might be alone in the universe and just as special as we think we are.