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Comment by amasad | Hacker News Reader

> There is practically zero chance of ever detecting a signal from the one or two other intelligent species that might be in our galaxy.

What are you basing this on? I'd like to see your Drake equation variables.

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Let's say 200 billion (suitable) stars. Let's say 20% of them have planets around them. If our own system is in any way typical, we can say that about 2 of those planets can sustain life. Let's say life develops maybe 30% of the time and 'intelligence' 5% of that (I think this is extremely generous). Then let's say technology (meaning they can broadcast radio signals) develops out of 10% of those. The last part is pretty crucial, the "lifetime" of these civilizations. What it means for this discussion is the amount of time they are broadcasting unencrypted radio signals. Let's give them 500 years (again, I think this is really generous). That should give us 6 civilizations in the galaxy at any given time. Sorry but you're just not going to find them.

What if one of these civilizations is an outlier that manages to hang around longer and spread out around the galaxy. Or are you saying that is simply not possible?

What if monkeys fly out of my butt? Anything is possible. I'm saying it's not likely.

It's not likely that any civilization will reach such a technological level. If one does, it's not likely that spreading around the galaxy colonizing planets will be a priority. If one does that anyway, it's not likely that they will use unencrypted radio signals for communications.

But, no, not impossible.

How about chances that there is another intelligent being in another planet is 10^-1000 ?

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