# Why haven’t we been contacted by extraterrestrials? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 17, 2017, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410 "2017-01-17T19:42:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2017, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/121 "2017-01-20T22:02:45Z")
> [@Vinum\_Lupum](#): > > Cite for what? That everything necessarily _must_ hit a limit? I would have thought that that was obvious. Why would knowledge, and by extension, technology, necessarily have a bounded limit as a logistic function? ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2017, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/122 "2017-01-20T22:47:17Z")
> [@Fuji](#): > > Why would knowledge, and by extension, technology, necessarily have a bounded limit as a logistic function? If knowledge is stored in physical entities and physical entities have a limit wouldn’t knowledge have a limit? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2017, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/123 "2017-01-20T23:26:37Z")
> [@Vinum\_Lupum](#): > > . . . Your belief in future magic is touching, but it ain’t gonna actually happen. Because it _can’t_. Future technological advances must stop…but you don’t have enough information to tell us where it must stop. Isaac Newton could not have known about nuclear energy. What is it, perhaps, that we don’t know about? Future technology will not be magic, but, per Clarke’s Law, it might seem awfully like it! ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2017, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/124 "2017-01-21T03:01:54Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > If knowledge is stored in physical entities and physical entities have a limit wouldn’t knowledge have a limit? Well, the universe we can actually observe and attempt to understand is finite in extent, so perhaps a sufficiently large, bounded “archive” would encompass the totality of all possibly attainable knowledge. However, I really don’t think that having a big enough HDD is going to be the obstacle preventing us from attaining galactic expansion as some derivative of _H. sapiens_. ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2017, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/125 "2017-01-21T03:04:38Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Future technological advances must stop…but you don’t have enough information to tell us where it must stop. > > Isaac Newton could not have known about nuclear energy. What is it, perhaps, that we don’t know about? > > Future technology will not be magic, but, per Clarke’s Law, it might seem awfully like it! Well said. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2017, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/126 "2017-01-21T03:19:58Z")
Boy, the OP was right. These discussions can get emotional. > [@Tibby or Not Tibby](#): > > I agree, leaving something for some alien intelligence to find could be a good thing (or, it could be an incredibly bad thing). But, what would you leave that would be identifiable and likely to be found lets say thousands or millions of years into the future? Yeah, good question. I suppose things we leave in orbit will still be around, but they’d have to actually enter the solar system to find them. Something large and twinkly in orbit around the sun? Tabby’s Star (KIC 8462852) has got our attention with its brightness dips. Maybe something large enough with gaps in it, to regularly blink a “hello” signal. ---
**Author:** ![Vicsage](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/e68b1a/32.png) [@Vicsage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vicsage)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2017, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410/127 "2017-01-21T06:42:27Z")
I think we’re ignored because we’re boring. Have you seen 95% of the crap on TV? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-haven-t-we-been-contacted-by-extraterrestrials/777410.md?page=6)