You are not reading enough science fiction. ;)

I would suggest Peter Watts' "Blindsight" or Liu Cixin's "Three Body Problem" trilogy.

I enjoyed Blindsight, but it may not be very reassuring to someone concerned about the possibility of aliens arriving with the intention of using us as a food source.

And I really, really tried hard with The Three Body Problem. I get that the English version is a translation, but in the end the flowery language and slow plot just wore me down. Did anyone else have the same experience?

(Off topic, but I find that the problem with fiction based on SETI / first contact is that the subject often ends up being used as a metaphor for the human condition and the difficulty of really communicating with other people. Which is fine, but doesn't make for satisfying SF in my experience.)

Yeah I couldn't stand Three Body Problem - far too slow and uninteresting - and don't get the popularity of it at all.

You should really give "Three Body Problem" another chance. There are a lot of diversions and off shoots but the main story really comes together 1/3 of the way through the first book and really picks up in "Dark Forest".

Having read summaries of the books, I thought the complexity of the overall storyline was excessive for what is a fairly straightforward take on the Fermi paradox and game theory [1]. Maybe I'm being unfair, but having slogged through Seveneves a few months ago I'm kind of grumpy and lacking patience with long, complicated SF epics right now.

(Possible mild spoiler ahead)

[1] Basically: "the forest is full of hunters of unknown strength, so either stay quiet or kill all the hunters." I thought that Greg Bear's Forge of God and Anvil of Stars did a much better job on this aspect of Fermi.

I just finished the trilogy. I enjoyed the first book well enough. The other two have some interesting world-building but I found the plot too slow moving. They're also depressing in a way I can't get into, not just the Dark Forest theory but the prevalence of the "if I can't survive, no one should" attitude. I wonder if the latter actually is more prevalent in Chinese culture or if it's just coming from the author. I did like how things wrapped up at the end of Death's End.

Much of Seveneves was depressing too but it all seemed very plausible. It was in what came next that seemed off.

I rather liked The Three Body Problem - but I listened to the unabridged audio-books rather than reading them which definitely makes many books easier to consume.

Or The Killing Star.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Killing_Star

"Or"? They're all excellent and I highly recommend all of them, especially the 3 body problem series.

And honestly the killing star has aged.. weirdly. Amazing concept, seemingly written by an author with multiple personalities, one of whom just cannot shut up about the Titanic

I thought about that when I read the book. How weird to write about such grandiose ideas as interstellar travel and then go on and describe the wreck of Titanic as something marvelous and mysterious.

Has he written about Titanic in his other books too?

"They're not just going to be smart... they're going to be mean."

> Our signals decay so fast that you need moon sized antennas to receive them beyond a few light years.

This is true for relatively low power omni-directional broadcast signals such as terrestrial TV and radio. The signals proposed by the METI community (and those that have already been sent - e.g. from Arecibo) are broadcast at much higher power using a concentrated beam, and would be detectable over interstellar distances using technology similar to that which we have now.

> The signals proposed by the METI community

Yeah but they would need interstellar-type of timescale to reach us anyway even if they moved at a fraction of speed of light, so the risk is close to nil. We are way, way more likely to be hit by an asteroid or to destroy our planet than to be destroyed by a very remote alien civilization.

The signals propagate at the exact speed of light, but you're on point on the risk being minimal. Space is big.

I'm not the grandparent poster, but I think that "even if they moved at a fraction of speed of light" refers to the responding civilisation's space vessels, not their return signal.

Let's say you receive an EM signal from a sentient specie.

If you pinpoint its origin to light years away, you know they already had a lot of time to progress past this technology. A good response if you plan on eliminating them would not be a fleet: you'd better setup and direct a huge gamma-ray burst in their general direction.

So the destructive response could come at the speed of light with a little delay at first.

At a time where there is energy scarcity due to increased consumption, I question the economic viability of such an impractical endeavour being carried out under such government support. (Wow I just used so many new words!!!!)

Still this is not a movie where the aliens are on next moon so even if they picked up the signals it would long after the next few generations die off (Light years away - Man they are damn far off). (living in a developing country would give you a whole new perspective on energy scarcity)

It's not being done because anyone thinks its economically viable. And anyway it's being paid for by private donors, not the US government.

If some action is a waste of resources, then who provides the resources doesn't change whether it's a waste or not.

In this case, if sending a signal into space takes a lot of energy and if energy is scarce, then it's a waste of energy regardless of if the government provides it or a private donor.

EDIT: I'm not saying this is true in this particular case (I'm also not saying that its not true), I'm merely stating that whether something is a waste doesn't matter on who is doing the wasting. I would gladly listen to a counter argument and maybe a discussion can be had, but I guess its easier to click a down arrow. Oh well. (Yes, yes, I know it'll happen even more due to my mentioning it)

The Arecibo message had a broadcast power about a 1 megawatt and lasted 3 minutes [1] - in other words 0.05MWh. 1MWh can power 330 homes for one hour [2], so the broadcast "wasted" enough power to supply those homes for three minutes. Given that interstellar broadcasts aren't exactly frequent events, and assuming similar broadcast power/length today, then on a global scale it doesn't seem like a significant waste of power to me.

[1] http://io9.gizmodo.com/5784658/so-you-want-to-send-a-message...

[2] http://www.cleanenergyauthority.com/solar-energy-resources/w...

I never claimed that this particular thing wasteful. I was only pointing out that "And anyway it's being paid for by private donors, not the US government." isn't a good counter argument.

I wasn't taking any sides on this issue, so its not really relevant how much energy it took. I said "if" it is and it was a hypothetical to give a concrete example, not a statement that I thought it was wasteful.

I'll paraphrase:

If <something> is hypothetically wasteful, then <something> is still wasteful regardless of who did it.

>a miniature rock that has nothing to offer to a space faring race?

I'd think a truly space faring race would probably have very different goals to us and the currency of culture would be much more valuable than natural resources which surely are abundant if space travel is trivial to you. Looking at it that way we'd have a hell of a lot to offer.

I agree. If a culture makes the effort to become space faring then it seems likely that either they had a preexisting motivation/goal, or the experience would change them.

> you need moon sized antennas to receive them beyond a few light years.

I guess that this comment is based on our technologies that we have _now_....

If we had the resources wouldn't we visit another planet with intelligent life? Wouldn't that become a primary focus for the human race?

I don't want to sound negative, but considering we have so many problems with racism already, think of the problems we'd face when there would be another intelligent species around! There's probably a reason why there is only one intelligent species on Earth, and it isn't pretty.

Finally, by the time we'd be able to visit another planet, we'd probably prefer sitting in our Holodecks all day.

Maybe, maybe not. It would more depend on circumstances - friendly encounter might not go so badly. Just because we haven't solved some things doesn't mean we shouldn't try others or open other doors. Even if we do it despite the fact that racism is still a problem.

> only one intelligent species on Earth

Dolphins are pretty smart! Mean like us, too. If we and they didn't inhabit incompatible environments, I suspect we'd have had some complicated history with them, and probably now speak of them in the past tense - or they'd speak so of us.

Ravens as well.

They are! I recently had to make peace with a family of them, one of whose fledglings I had inadvertently upset by getting too close with a camera.

Fortunately, ravens are smart enough to recognize the combination of repeated food offerings, and a demurral to repeat the initial rudeness, as earnest of good intent - walking out the door with my camera no longer provokes alarm calls and surveillance overflights. Catbirds, not so much - I pissed off one of those back when there was snow on the ground, and I suspect he'd still quite happily rip my lungs out if he could.

> There's probably a reason why there is only one intelligent species on Earth, and it isn't pretty.

ONe intelligent species on Earth? So you are assuming most animals are moving objects without any thought or emotion?

Why would anyone spend an enormous amount of energy and time to reach us, a miniature rock that has nothing to offer to a space faring race?

Folks spend lifetimes thinking of philosophy or working on a single science problem. In addition, we are still exploring oceans, depths of volcanos, and we explore space as much as we can without actually travelling to the places ourselves. We research animals and our own bodies. Some folks spend a lifetime making music. Not all of these has a payback outside of satisfying curiosity or enjoyment, at least not upfront.

Considering this, why would it seem odd that a race would explore what there is to explore?