NASA Scientists Present Theory About Why We Haven't Met Other Intelligent Life. It's Crushing. - Yahoo! Voices

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NASA scientists person explained successful a new insubstantial why they judge it’s apt we haven’t ever encountered intelligent extraterrestrial beingness — and it’s heartbreaking.

All intelligent life, they argue, has apt destroyed itself earlier reaching a blase capable constituent successful improvement to enactment specified an encounter. And the aforesaid destiny apt awaits humans unless we instrumentality action, they believe.

The “Great Filter” mentation — arsenic successful “filtering out” assorted forms of beingness — argues that different civilizations, perchance several, person existed during the beingness of the universe. But they each destroyed themselves earlier they could marque interaction with Earth, noted the paper, “Avoiding the ‘Great Filter’: Extraterrestrial Life and Humanity’s Future successful the Universe.”

The scientists fearfulness that each intelligent life, specified arsenic humans, person profoundly ingrained dysfunctions that whitethorn “snowball rapidly into the Great Filter,” they wrote.

But there’s inactive a spot of anticipation for humans — provided we tin larn and instrumentality steps to debar our ain extinction, noted the insubstantial by a squad of researchers based astatine NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory successful confederate California.

“The cardinal to humanity successfully traversing specified a cosmopolitan filter is… identifying [destructive] attributes successful ourselves and neutralizing them successful advance,” astrophysicist Jonathan Jiang and his coauthors wrote successful the insubstantial that appeared online connected Oct. 23.

The insubstantial has not yet been peer-reviewed.

Whatever seems apt to hitch retired humans would conceivably alsothreaten intelligent beingness connected different planets, the authors argue. The apt culprits — which could beryllium impacted by humans oregon different intelligent beingness forms — see atomic war, pandemic, clime change, and uncontrolled artificial intelligence, the authors note.

The trick, the biggest situation of all, volition beryllium to enactment unneurotic to survive, the researchers said.

“History has shown that intraspecies contention and, much importantly, collaboration, has led america towards the highest peaks of invention. And yet, we prolong notions that look to beryllium the antithesis of semipermanent sustainable growth: Racism, genocide, inequity, sabotage,” the writers warn.

Check retired the full insubstantial here.

This nonfiction primitively appeared connected HuffPost and has been updated.