Quoted from Frax:I have an open mind... I just don't believe this planet is worth anyone's time looking at. I kinda feel sorry for anyone that wasted their time and energy to get here, only to find....humanity? Joke's on you guys. We're too busy killing each other to give a crap.
Plus, that whole inability thus far to explain how FTL travel might be possible. I'm certain there's other life out there. The whole concept that this planet is some special playground that warranted divine attention (and subsequently mysterious noninterference for thousands of years hrm....) is ridiculous, and the universe is too big to not have replicated similar conditions SOMEWHERE. That said, without provable FTL speeds, the range in which humanity could ever reach out to is extremely limited overall, as would be the case for anyone else that hasn't figured out how to break the laws of physics as we understand them. It's very unlikely that unless that is figured out, any contact with anything even remotely intelligent is infinitesimal.
600 million stars within 5000 light years. 1 light year at the speed Voyager 1 is going, would take 17,000 years....to go 1 light year. I don't think people really understand the distances involved. As we currently stand, interstellar travel is nothing more than a figment of our imaginations. We'll be lucky to have a basic colony on Mars before we all kill each other.
I'm a realist.
THIS. Times 5.9 Trillion (number of miles in a light year).
Scorecard thus far:
1: Yes, there's aliens, because the universe is REALLY big and to think that it was made just for us (regardless of some book you read) is moronic.
2: No, they're not coming here, because everywhere else is just too damn far away. Correspondingly, we're not worth visiting. Think of it this way: Imagine if you really liked Thai food, and I told you that there's a really great Thai restaurant and we should go there for lunch. Now imagine that the restaurant is in...Thailand. And we have to walk there. From Kansas. On our knees. Through all terrain, and then row across the ocean in a dinghy. Is it possible? I suppose so, in a strictly theoretical sense. The trick is, it simply isn't worth it. It's way too damn far to go for lunch (or for any other reason given the method of transportation).
In simple math:
Earth = Thai joint
Knee walking, dinghy rowing = conventional non-FTL travel
You and me discussing where to have lunch = Little green men
They're not coming here, unless.......
3: IF (and its a big if), said little green men CAN fold the fabric of space and time AND, they decide to grace us with their presence, they are going to OBLITERATE US. They will have far superior technology and will wipe us out with great zeal. Why else would they bother to show in the first place? "Oh hi, we're aliens from a far advanced civilization that can bend the very fabric of space and time, but we're shopping around for the best recipe for mince meat pie."
NOPE. We get reduced to ash, and they take our stuff (stuff = planet).
4: Humanity technology scorecard, from a PRACTICAL every-day usage standpoint:
We cannot not cure the common cold.
Still can't a cell phone to work everywhere.
Wireless anything? Iffy at best.
Interstellar travel? NOT HAPPENING.