Before flipping off the site rules and implying that I didn’t read the article, you could think about what I actually said and the comment I responded to. Nothing about a civilization dying off in millions rather than billions of years implies the Great Filter, Dark Forest, or any other exotic explanation. All it requires is for the speed of light to be what it is, and hyper-optimistic “Von Neumann probe the galaxy” hypotheses to be wrong. If we’re technological for longer than many species exist, it would still be an eyeblink out of reach for the vast majority of any other hypothetical life in the universe.

If life is constrained to a reasonable fraction of the speed of light when moving mass, and light when communicating then the universe could be teeming with life out of temporal spatial sync with each other. We might not be alone, but we’d be effectively isolated, and still see ourselves as being alone. It’s only under the assumptions of unlimited growth and expansion that the Fermi Paradox is a paradox.

Mind you, the idea that life which is likely evolve, adapt, and develop significant technology being ultimately self-destructive a la The Filter also seems very likely. The article offers squat in rebuttal to that.

How is a von Neumann probe hyper optimistic when you yourself are an example of one?

I’m notable for a few talents and abilities. But self-replication and spaceworthiness aren’t among them. I appreciate the baffling non-sequitur though.