60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation?

Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation? by the8472 on Tuesday May 18, 2021 @04:46PM (#27200835)

Dissolving the Fermi Paradox[0] is a great and easy to read paper to disabuse anyone of the idea of multiplying point estimates when you could convolve probability distributions instead.

[0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1806.02404

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Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation? by robocat on Tuesday May 18, 2021 @07:12PM (#27202509)

I was confused by the line in the original article “by multiplying uncertain variables, the level of uncertainty grows exponentially, to the point where no firm conclusions are possible.”

Because when I looked for an explanation, it wasn’t exponential: https://foothill.edu/psme/daley/tutorials_files/10.%20Error%...

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Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation? by floxy on Tuesday May 18, 2021 @06:47PM (#27202259)

I think this paper should be a top level HN discussion thread.

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Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation? by the8472 on Tuesday May 18, 2021 @06:51PM (#27202294)

has been https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17560462

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Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation? by AceJohnny2 on Tuesday May 18, 2021 @07:05PM (#27202437)

Almost 3 years old, it's a candidate for repost.

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