**Where Is Everybody? Exploring the Great Fermi Paradox**

The great physicist Enrico Fermi first posed a challenging question over half a century ago: *Where is everybody?* He wondered why, despite the vastness of the universe, we appear to be alone.

Perhaps the most straightforward answer is that, while alien life and even civilizations may be abundant throughout the galaxy, the vast gulfs of time and space that separate us might make us effectively alone.

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### The Gist of Fermi’s Paradox

We know for sure that life—and intelligent species capable of great technological achievements—has appeared at least once in the universe. The proof? *We’re it.* But the universe rarely does anything just once. There isn’t one star, or one galaxy, or one hydrogen atom in the cosmos. When conditions allow something to happen, it usually happens *a lot* because there’s so much universe to make it possible.

So, if life happened here once, it means life probably isn’t rare. In other words, as Fermi’s argument goes, there’s nothing special about us. Therefore, there should be multitudes of lifeforms and intelligent civilizations scattered across every galaxy.

Given that the universe has been around for nearly 14 billion years, there has been more than enough time for life to arise, civilizations to develop, and for aliens to create technology powerful enough to colonize an entire galaxy.

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### The Paradox: Yet We See No One

Even if these civilizations lasted a relatively short time—say, a million years—their technological remnants or ruins *should* still be detectable somewhere.

And yet, we don’t see anybody.

– No signals from the depths of space.
– No signs of alien technology orbiting distant stars.
– No ruins or remnants to speak of.

As far as our observations suggest, we are completely alone. So what gives? Where *is* everybody?

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### A NASA Astrophysicist Offers a “Less Terrifying” Explanation

Recently, an astrophysicist at NASA may have provided an answer to why aliens have been radio silent—literally.

In his paper *“A Less Terrifying Universe,”* published on the preprint server arXiv, Dr. Robin Corbet proposes that extraterrestrial technology might not be as advanced as we often imagine.

Corbet’s *mundane approach* suggests that other civilizations exist—possibly even more advanced than our own—but their technology isn’t “super-science” enough to be noticeable from galaxies away.

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### Revisiting Our Assumptions About Alien Technology

Hollywood tends to depict aliens as flying saucers capable of beaming humans (and sometimes cows) into the sky—a technology far beyond our current capabilities.

By Corbet’s logic, if we can’t achieve such feats, it’s unlikely extraterrestrial civilizations would either.

If our assumptions about alien technology are wrong, what else could we have misunderstood about the universe?

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### Proposed Solutions to Fermi’s Paradox

Since Fermi formulated his paradox, scientists have put forward many possible explanations:

– Life might actually be exceedingly rare, and we are a solitary example.
– Life could be common, but some sort of “Great Filter” wipes out intelligent species before they develop galactic dominance (e.g., nuclear war or catastrophic climate change).
– Aliens might exist but choose (or be forced) to remain silent, hiding in the vast darkness of space.
– The universe—and even our galaxy—might be far larger and more complex than we can comprehend.

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### Understanding Cosmic Distances

For example, the nearest star to the Sun is **Proxima Centauri**, an unremarkable red dwarf about 4.25 light-years away.

While that distance might sound small, the jargon term “light-year” hides the unimaginably vast distances between stars.

Our farthest spacecraft, *Voyager 1*, currently over 15 billion miles away, is traveling at 38,000 miles per hour—fast enough to circle the Earth in about 45 minutes.

Yet, even at this speed, if Voyager 1 were aimed toward Proxima Centauri (and it’s not), it would still need about **75,000 years** to arrive.

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### Why Isn’t Alien Technology Faster or More Advanced?

Humanity developed writing only about 5,000 years ago—a tiny fraction of the time needed to reach our nearest star with existing technology.

So, to Corbet’s point, why would alien spacecraft be able to travel incredibly fast and far if our own technology can’t?

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### What About Radio Signals?

Radio signals travel at the speed of light, so Earth broadcasts could reach Proxima Centauri in just over four years.

Unfortunately, interstellar communication isn’t that simple.

Radio waves weaken as they travel, spreading over a larger area. Additionally, the galaxy is noisy, filled with radio signals from exploding stars, charged particles, and dust clouds.

By the time our most powerful broadcasts reach even Proxima Centauri, the signals are too weak to stand out from the galactic background hum.

So even if aliens had radio technology, their messages might be drowned out and effectively “dead on arrival.”

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### The Scale and Complexity of the Universe

While Corbet’s argument is convincing, the universe remains chaotic and unpredictable.

Perhaps inconceivable technology does exist somewhere, but we haven’t detected it yet because of the universe’s vastness.

Proxima Centauri is our nearest star neighbor at just over four light-years away, but the Milky Way galaxy spans more than **100,000 light-years** across and contains hundreds of billions of stars.

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### Even Advanced Civilizations Might Be Lost in the Crowd

Imagine an alien civilization so advanced that it colonizes a million star systems.

Sounds impressive, but a million stars represent less than 0.001% of all stars in the Milky Way.

An alien empire spanning a million worlds, each with thousands of cities, still wouldn’t even register as a rounding error in the vast galactic scale.

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### Cosmic Time and Our Perspective

The universe is about 14 billion years old, and the Milky Way formed at least 9 billion years ago.

Civilizations lasting hundreds of thousands or millions of years still occupy only a blink of cosmic time.

Humankind built its first cities a few thousand years ago—tiny compared to the cosmic timeline.

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### The Frustrating yet Simple Answer

The cosmos is unimaginably vast and far older than we can grasp.

This might be why Fermi’s paradox remains unresolved: there could be many intelligent alien civilizations out there, possibly even more advanced than us.

We simply won’t ever see them, hear them, or meet them.

The distances are too great, the stars too numerous, and the galaxy too old.

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### Conclusion: We Are Likely Not Alone, But Effectively Isolated

Fermi was probably right: we are likely *not* alone in the universe.

But he missed a crucial point — the universe is *gigantic*, making us effectively alone.

This cosmic isolation brings both bad news and good news.

– **Bad news:** We will likely never encounter another intelligent species, except maybe a fleeting radio transmission from afar someday.
– **Good news:** Every star we see in the night sky is unclaimed, empty, and waiting for humanity to reach out and explore it.

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The universe is vast, mysterious, and filled with possibilities. Our journey to understand it has only just begun.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a69138612/where-are-the-aliens-hiding/