In a message dated 12/15/97 11:43:10 PM, jamesr@best.com wrote:
>In short, we need to know the probable universal density of sub-c Von
>Neuman cultures as a function of time before we can accurately guess
>whether or not we should have been found by such a culture yet. If the
>slope of the density function is small enough, we could reasonably assume
>we haven't seen a Von Neuman culture because they have not had the
>opportunity to reach us, or in the extreme, don't exist.
We know, from our own existence, that if any VN culture could have
reached us it's chosen not to, for whatever reason.
We know, from the fact that not only our galaxy but every other we've
looked at looks convicingly like it lacks Von Neuman colonizers, that
the density function of non-hiding VN cultures is very low. A VN
culture will chew up a galaxy in a hurry. If relativistic intergalactic
colonization is a no-go, then VN cultures may be effectively confined
to a galaxy, but that's the smallest pen you can keep them in.
When I said "out there" I wasn't referring to the entire universe, just
that near enough for us to examine. If there were a sub-relativistic VN
culture 1 billion ly away of course we wouldn't know.
Received on Tue Dec 16 07:03:16 1997
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