The Crowded Galaxy

A different resolution to the Fermi Paradox

Introduction

This essay will attempt to justify the idea that many species, intelligent and not-intelligent, inhabit many planets throughout the galaxy, that some legal framework governs the galaxy's spacefaring inhabitants, and that we're not particularly welcome but tolerated as long as we stick to our planet. This ET approach radically differs from how humanity interacts with newly discovered land. Imagine if Pizarro and his 177 men had not easily conquered the Inca empire but instead just galloped through occasionally and expressed little interest in trading or talking to the inhabitants. In this essay, I will explain why I believe the ETs restrain themselves so significantly. I call this "The Crowded Galaxy" theory. I've based my conclusions on the recent testimony of David Grusch in the U.S. Congress.

Basic Assumptions

E.T.s Are Here

There have been hundreds of UFO sightings over the years to prove that some advanced beings, or at least technology created by advanced beings, are visiting Earth. Recent congressional and NASA testimony further confirms that extraterrestrials visit Earth regularly. They are likely sending drones with bio-engineered androids since they know that such surveillance is dangerous.

E.T.s Have Faster Than Light Travel

There is plenty of evidence that no nearby bodies in the solar system can harbor intelligent life. That means that the extraterrestrials must have come from outside the solar system. The distances between solar systems are so large that unless they started the trip an extremely long time ago, they would have been unable to reach the Earth. Traveling near light speed would be highly dangerous as small micro-meteoroids would quickly destroy spacecraft traveling at those speeds. Likely they travel faster than light in some extra-dimensional medium.

E.T.s Don't Want to Exterminate Us

Suppose E.T.s visit Earth regularly and can travel between star systems. In that case, they have access to enormous energy and, with their technological development, could quickly develop perfect energy weapons or bioweapons to wipe us out.  

E.T.s Have Access to All Resources They Could Need In Deep Space

Deep space contains all the mineral resources an E.T. civilization could need. There aren't any materials on Earth that E.T.s would need that are special to Earth, except for the evolved life here.

The Evolution of Species for the Particular Circumstances of A Planet Would be Difficult to Replicate.

Earth has a particular gravity, temperature range, atmospheric makeup, and chemical makeup that organisms on Earth have developed over billions of years to operate without any outside technology or life support. Each of the millions of organisms on Earth is adapted to its environment and can work within that environment without technology. This adaptation is not an easy feat.

It's Unlikely that Humans Have Any Technological or Intellectual Knowledge That Could Benefit E.T.s.

Being vastly more advanced technologically by evidence of their ability to travel faster than light and with access to a considerably more advanced understanding of physics than Humans, it would be unlikely that we could provide them with any information they couldn't gather merely by observation. This reality is why they have not initiated broad contact. Perhaps the only thing they could want from us would be our permission to do certain things under some code of ethics or understanding among various E.T. races on what is considered acceptable behavior on inhabited planets, that being planets with perhaps any life intelligent or otherwise.

The Crowded Galaxy Theory

The Galaxy is Crowded

If faster-than-light travel is possible, spreading around the galaxy is straightforward. Even a millennium's head start to achieving faster-than-light travel would have allowed the species achieving it to spread throughout the galaxy to all habitable areas. The fact that these E.T.s haven't conquered Earth is evidence, though, that the alien race has some code that governs their conduct and interaction with less advanced life, as well as a general agreement among advanced races as to what this relationship would be, as there are likely more advanced races that have developed if advanced life is ethical and not bent on exterminating all other life, as appears to be the case as evidenced by Earth's relatively undisturbed circumstances.

Advanced Species That Have Come Into Contact with Each Other Have Avoided Wars of Extermination through some Agreed Upon Framework.

An advanced civilization that has visited us and not destroyed us has likely visited other advanced races. If there are at least two races in the galaxy, one being vastly more advanced than the other, then there are probably more, and the shared agreements have prevented a war of extermination among them.

Species That Evolved on A Particular Planet Have the Right to Live There

The only argument I can think of for extraterrestrials not treating us as disposable is that the only thing they would find hard to duplicate, our and other Earth species' adaptation to the Earth's conditions, is considered valuable for its own sake. This determination probably applies to other planets as well.

Habitable Planets are Somewhat Rare and are Considered Special, and the Use Of Such Planets is Highly Regulated

That E.T.s have not destroyed us is evidence that their legal system regulations their interaction with habitable planets. Thus, with the E.T.s ability to spread out over the galaxy, they are unlikely to take kindly to Humans' expectation of a vast, open, uninhabited frontier.

Our Fundamental Economic Relationship with Our Natural Environment is Incompatible with this Galatic Legal Framework

If the E.T.s were to give us unlimited energy technology and faster-than-light space travel the way we have treated the Earth, we would likely spread out to all corners of the galaxy and fill it with our species in 10,000 years. This tendency would probably put us in conflict with all other species in the galaxy and trample on the rights other E.T.s believe primitive organisms have to their habitable planets.

The Destruction of Our Natural Environment is Highly Concerning to E.T.s.

As Steven Greer has noted in his research, the destruction of our natural environment is highly concerning because the E.T.s believe that the evolution of species capable of operating and continuing indefinitely on the planet without technology is valuable. Thus, they will endeavor to prevent us from causing planet-killing catastrophes like nuclear war.

Conclusion - The Bad News

E.T.s view us Fundamentally as an Invasive Species.

E.T.s likely believe that humans have the right to live on our planet but must be closely monitored and contained. We have an expansion and colonization model that would spread war and ecological destruction throughout the galaxy. E.T.s consider us much like we consider invasive species. An invasive species is acceptable in its native habitat, where the environment is carefully balanced to keep its proliferation under control, but a disaster elsewhere. This understanding also means that we will not benefit from any technology transfer from the extraterrestrials except what we can pick up from crashed vehicles from their monitoring networks.

Through a Process of Learning to Live in Perpetual Balance with Our Environment, we may become Mature Enough to have Restrictions Lifted.

The extraterrestrials are likely aware that we are running out of resources such as fossil fuels and that we will have to revert to a sustainability-focused program to continue to exist as a technological society on this planet. Over the next century, we will likely have to convert our system to something perpetually sustainable such as the free-market ecology system I have developed. Alternatively, we could use reverse-engineered designs from extraterrestrials, which might compound the problem by depleting Earth's non-energy resources faster. It's unlikely that the E.T.s will let us use faster-than-light travel if developed to leave our solar system.