The likely evolutionary path of the human race:
The Letter:
The most likely answer to Ian Crawford's question "where are they?" in the article by the same name (Scientific American, July 2000) is that extra-terrestrial civilizations are all in the same stage of development as we are. This would explain why the SETI data cannot rule out the possibility that "a hundred or more type 1 civilizations could share the galaxy with us" and also the fact that an advanced civilization could have rapidly colonized the galaxy long ago but apparently has not. After having read "Complexity" by M. Mitchell Waldrop, I think that this relatively new science can shed some light on this situation. First of all, physicists agree that the universe is an expanding structure of energy that is completely interconnected on the quantum level. Because of the many seemingly unrelated phenomena that the science of Complexity can link together, I think it likely that the total universe should be seen as it's own vast dynamic system that exhibits this half order, half chaos relationship (constant through time) that Complexity outlines. I think that the emergence of life in the universe must be seen from this total system perspective in order to begin to be understood, and that looking at it in this way implies a point at which the total system reaches the critical level of complexity necessary to produce life. In other words, life would start all at once throughout the universe where all of the requirements are present. To my mind, this same half order, half chaos property of our universe also implies a constant equal rate for the development of life: too fast, too much chaos, too slow, too much order. Of course, the question at this point would be: are WE on this critical point or did we arrive later? I would say that it is most likely that the evolution of life on our planet started at this critical point of complexity reached by the whole universe. This could be the reason why we can't detect any extra-terrestrials yet by radio signals and there is no evidence of colonization in our galaxy so far. Facts such as heavy element stars being much older than our sun and our own evolution being dependant on chance meteor hits make much more sense from this 'total system in terms of Complexity' perspective as well. Of course, this view is surely impossible to prove at this point, but it can be a beautiful mental image. Picture, if you will, a vast expanding sphere of energy reaching a critical point and then slowly flowering with life positioned equally throughout it, all of it struggling slowly towards more and more levels of complexity, hence consciousness.
D.M. Petersen
philosophy.dmpetersen.net
From: "George Musser" <gmusser@sciam.com> Save Address - Block Sender
To: d_m_petersen@hotmail.com Save Address
Subject: Re: Letter to the editor of Scientific American
Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 15:20:43 -0400
>The most likely answer to Ian Crawford's question "where are they?" in the
>article by the same name is that extra-terrestrial civilizations are all in
>the same stage of development as we are.
Quite possibly, though that raises its own problems, such as what holds civilizations back from greater advancement. It is hard to imagine that the complexity principle you describe would be truly universal and completely synchronized; there should be some range to the technological level of civilizations.
With best wishes,
George Musser
The likely evolutionary path of the human race:
Your right, they wouldn't be completely synchronized, they would be sort of 'chaotically synchronized'. Some would be slightly more advanced than others, but with none being capable of interstellar travel just yet. As far as the complexity principle we are discussing being truly universal, in light of the fact that the science of Complexity draws distinct parallels between virtually all complex systems observed by man, from biology to the stock market to stellar evolution, and the fact that the universe is agreed to be an exactly balanced energy system that is completely interconnected at the quantum level (Bell's Interconnectedness Theorem), it is actually harder to imagine this complexity principle NOT being universal. Lastly, as far as "what holds civilizations back from greater advancement", - nothing. They would all be advancing (if they survive) at the built in, somewhat chaotic rate.
If I revise my letter in light of these points will you print it?
Regards,
D.M. Petersen
philosophy.dmpetersen.net
From: "George Musser" <gmusser@sciam.com> Save Address - Block Sender
To: "D.M. Petersen" <d_m_petersen@hotmail.com> Save Address
Subject: Re: Letter to the editor of Scientific American
Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2000 14:59:14 -0400
I can't guarantee that we'd print it -- we've received probably 400 letters in response to the SETI articles -- but I can certainly submit it for our short list.
George
--
George Musser tel: 1-212-451-8809
Scientific American fax: 1-212-755-1976
415 Madison Ave. work: gmusser@sciam.com
New York, NY 10017-1111 home: (removed)
USA - EEUU
George,
Here is my revised letter based on our discussion. Thank you very much for your help. I would be glad to revise it further if you see any more problems.
D.M. Petersen
The most likely answer to Ian Crawford's question "where are they?" in the article by the same name (Scientific American, July 2000) is that extra-terrestrial civilizations are all in roughly the same stage of development as we are. This would explain why the SETI data cannot rule out the possibility that "a hundred or more type 1 civilizations could share the galaxy with us" and also the fact that an advanced civilization could have rapidly colonized the galaxy long ago but apparently has not. After having read "Complexity" by M. Mitchell Waldrop, I think that this relatively new science can shed some light on this situation. First of all, physicists agree that the universe is an expanding structure of exactly balanced energy that is completely interconnected on the quantum level, and so must be seen as an integrated entity. In light of this fact and because the science of Complexity draws distinct parallels between virtually all complex systems observed by man, from biology to the stock market to stellar evolution, I think it likely that the total universe should be seen as it's own vast dynamic system that exhibits this half order, half chaos relationship (constant through time) that Complexity outlines. I think that the emergence of life in the universe must be seen from this total system perspective in order to begin to be understood, and that looking at it in this way implies a point at which the total system reaches the critical level of complexity necessary to produce life. In other words, life would start all at once throughout the universe where all of the requirements are present. To my mind, this same half order, half chaos property of our universe also implies a somewhat equal rate for the advancement of life: too fast, too much chaos, too slow, too much order. By equal rate, I don't mean perfectly synchronized; some would be slightly more or less advanced than others but all would be fluctuating fairly closely around an average rate, thus all would be in more or less the same stage of development as we are. Of course, the question at this point would be: are WE on this critical point or did we arrive later? I would say that it is most likely that the evolution of life on our planet started at this critical point of complexity reached by the whole universe. This could be the reason why we can't detect any extra-terrestrials yet by radio signals and there is no evidence of colonization in our galaxy so far. Facts such as heavy element stars being much older than our sun and our own evolution being dependant on chance meteor hits make much more sense from this 'total system in terms of Complexity' perspective as well. Of course, this view is surely impossible to prove at this point, but it can be a beautiful mental image. Picture, if you will, a vast expanding sphere of energy reaching a critical point and then slowly flowering with life positioned equally throughout it, all of it struggling slowly towards more and more levels of complexity, hence consciousness.
D.M. Petersen
philosophy.dmpetersen.net
From: "George Musser" <gmusser@sciam.com> Save Address - Block Sender
To: "D.M. Petersen" <d_m_petersen@hotmail.com> Save Address
Subject: Re: letter
Date: Mon, 07 Aug 2000 12:33:03 -0500
Many thanks for your revised letter. I believe I did receive it earlier, but a second time can't hurt.
George
--
George Musser tel: 1-212-451-8809
Scientific American fax: 1-212-755-1976
415 Madison Ave. work: gmusser@sciam.com
New York, NY 10017-1111 home: (removed)
USA - EEUU
The likely evolutionary path of the human race:
The 21st century needs its own philosophy; here it is:
My entire body of work is archived Here forever, (http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/
http://philosophy.dmpetersen.net) except for some documents in my storage space.
LINKS
Extraterrestrial life - Scientific American