Contact with extraterrestrial intelligence likely in 1,500 years

According to new research, we would have heard from extraterrestrial intelligence in over 1000 years from now. Image Credit: ESO

If you’re expecting to hear from aliens from across the universe, it could be a while.

Deconstructing the Fermi Paradox and pairing it with the Mediocrity Principle into a fresh equation, Cornell astronomers say extraterrestrials likely won’t phone home – or Earth – for 1,500 years.

“We haven’t heard from aliens yet, as space is a big place – but that doesn’t mean no one is out there,” says Cornell astronomer Evan Solomonides.

“It’s possible to hear any time at all, but it becomes likely we will have heard around 1,500 years from now,” says Solomonides. “Until then, it is possible that we appear to be alone — even if we are not. But if we stop listening or looking, we may miss the signals. So we should keep looking.”

The Fermi Paradox says billions of Earth-like planets exist in our galaxy, yet no aliens have contacted or visited us. Thus the paradox: the cosmos teems with possibility. The Mediocrity Principle – originated by 16th-century mathematician Copernicus – says Earth’s physical attributes are not unique, as natural processes are likely common throughout the cosmos, and therefore aliens won’t discover us for a while.

Hunting for extraterrestrials means sending out signals like television broadcasts, for example. As Earth’s electronic ambassador, TV and radio signals are sent into space as a byproduct of broadcasting. These signals have been traveling from Earth for 80 years at the speed of light. For aliens receiving these transmissions, they would likely be indecipherable, explains Solomonides, as the extraterrestrials would need to decode light waves into sounds, then parse 3,000 human languages to grasp the message.

The Fermi Paradox says billions of Earth-planets exist in our galaxy. Image Credit: NASA

Nonetheless, Earth’s broadcast signals have reached every star within about 80 light-years from the Sun – about 8,531 stars and 3,555 Earth-like planets, as our Milky Way galaxy alone contains 200 billion stars.

“Even our mundane, typical spiral galaxy – not exceptionally large compared to other galaxies – is vast beyond imagination,” says Solomonides. “Those numbers are what make the Fermi Paradox so counterintuitive. We have reached so many stars and planets, surely we should have reached somebody by now, and in turn been reached – this demonstrates why we appear to be alone.”

Combining the equations for the Fermi Paradox and the Mediocrity Principle, the researchers suggests Earth might hear from an alien civilisation when approximately half of the Milky Way Galaxy has been signalled in about 1,500 years. “This is not to say that we must be reached by then or else we are, in fact, alone. We simply claim that it is somewhat unlikely that we will not hear anything before that time,” Solomonides says.

For Solomonides, this research was inspired by an assignment in the astronomy course, “The Search for Life in the Universe,” taught by Terzian. As an aficionado of the late Cornell astronomy professor Carl Sagan, who contemplated this very problem, Solomonides explained in a Sagan-esque way: “We are on the third planet around a tediously boring star surrounded by other completely normal stars about two-thirds of the way along one of several arms of a remarkably average spiral galaxy. The Mediocrity Principle is the idea that because we are not in any special location in the universe, we should not be anything special in the universe.”

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