Can two civilizations from two different areas of space knowingly co-exist? In other words are we alone?

Question

I came up with this idea and I am curious to see what you all think.
We exist on Earth and in our solar system yet when we look at another star we are actually looking into the past. Say for example we see a civilization on another planet some 500 light years away looking back at us with a telescope we are seeing them 500 yrs ago and they are seeing us 500yrs ago from their time for a total of 1000yrs difference.
See Example:
Earth(year 2007)---500 L.Y.---> Alien planet(year 1507)

Earth(year 1007) <---500 L.Y.--- Alien Planet(year 1507)

We would see them as they looked at us, but they would be seeing us during the year 1007 A.D. So our two civilizations could never knowingly exist or communicate with one another at any given point during the same exact time. So are we alone then?

Answer 1

Two civilizations have exactly the same technological development, but are separated by 500 light years.

In our case, radio emissions from earth (assuming they would be detectable) are only a century old. So they would still have 400 years to go before reaching the other civilization.

Our communication technology has changed radically in that time. We no longer beam "out" we beam "at" other Earth destinations. So modern communications technology wastes less energy--especially once radio and tv broad casts cave in to satellite and cable.

In any case, in the example you give, the main factor is whether technological civilization will last the thousands of years necessary to develop a "routine" for communication. We can't know the answer to that because the technology is still very new. My grandparents were born in the era before radio.

It may also be that at some point some sort of quantum communications technology will develop and that this is what "everyone who is anyone" in the universe is using. All this radio stuff is strictly for kids (perhaps). So once we figure that out we'll know who our neighbors are....perhaps even faster than light communication, but not faster than light travel.

The more relevant issue is that the time factor is way off. As civilized beings go we have logged about 10,000 years--1% of one million years. So let's say we last one million years as a species. One million years is one tenth of one percent of a billion years. There is probably a 2 billion year window in which our solar system will support life on Earth. Remember that the world was perfectly habitable back in the dinosaur age.

So, the real issue is, what if an advanced technological civilization that lasted a million years has already come and gone on your hypothetical star. Or supposing it hasn't happened there yet, and won't happen, till long after we are dust. So we can be neighbors and still not know each other.

But the real issue in your question is whether technological civilizations like ours can last for tens of thousands of years....long enough to detect a neighbor, and be detected by them, if they have technology. If they do, the probability of eventually making contact with some other civilization goes up. If we fizzle out in the next 100 or 200 years then we're never going to know what's out there. But the issue of technical obsolescence is pretty big. One thousand years ago standing on a mountain and putting up smoke signals or using semaphore flags was very sophisticated. But these days we aren't even watching out for smoke signals.

Radio and TV may be like that to other civilizations. They might only find us by accident, or not even want to know us till we had gotten past current technical levels.

One can speculate forever on this topic because nothing is known.

Answer 2

You see that's the biggest problem we would have in interstellar correspondence. We prolly are not alone, but we are not only separated in space but in time as well. Our galaxy alone is 100,000 light years from side to side and that's just our own galaxy. Andromeda our nearest galactic neighbor is 2,000,000 light years away. So there very well could be at this moment and hundreds, thousands or even millions of other civilizations out there. But then again it could be just us, I mean someone has to be first.

At this point you are equally correct in saying we are alone, or we are not alone, there is no evidence to prove that we are alone. (just because you can't see somehting doens't mean it does not exist.) Or would could be a member of an intergalactic comunity that we don't yet know about. For all we know an alien civilization might know about us, and the return message of "hello and welcome to the galaxy" might in in transit to us right now.

There is a equation worth google'ing it's called the Drake Equation and it's designed to predict how many other civilizations are out there in our own galaxy. We don't know what all the variables are though....

Hope this helps.

~D

Answer 3

In the city, where everyone is right on top of everyone else, "good fences make good neighbors."

Out in the country and out in the galaxy where there is plenty of elbow room, you don't need no stinking fences.

We are alone until we learn to bend space to close those gaps. It is possible another group has already come up with a "warp" dive and come to visit us. But, we can't visit them unless they loan us the car.

Answer 4

Yes relisticly there is no way to comunicate with other life because it is so far away. If you wanted to talk to them you would have to what 100 of years for a responce. So even thought the might be life comunicating will be a big problem.

Answer 5

Look up the D.R.A.K.E. Equation. also it wouldbe a waste of time to shoot for someone that far out. Try something closer like Andromeda its only 4 L.Y. away. We arn't alone not in the physical asspect but until we find more advanced techonological meens to communicate it will be hard.

Answer 6

regardless of cuts government has to think approximately in time of recession, it would save the Royal military's shipbuilding programme intact, alongside with the two new airplane cariers, as this ensures the way forward for what little shipbuilding skill we've left in Britain. The stupid decision of a prior Labour gov't to cancel new vendors in the 1960's meant that there ws an prolonged era in the 1970's the place Britain had no airplane vendors in any respect, and had purely purely have been given the 1st of a clean era into provider in 1982. devoid of them, we would not have kicked the Argies off the Falklands. And Britain has slumped to 5th greatest military in the international, i'm afraid. the Russians exceed us, of direction (just to be predicted). After that, intestine instinct and British delight says we could consistently be 0.33-greatest. yet we are actually not. Shamefully, we've a smaller military than our old WW2 enemy, Japan. (How did we permit this happen!) And those days, the French, of all international locations, surpassed us in naval capability. one in all those sticks in the throat and is amazingly demanding, given which ecu u . s . we've spent longest at conflict with and whom we hit upon, with sturdy reason, annoying to believe. via the way, the easy marketplace is SOCIALIST??? ... you learn soemthing new daily. i assumed it replaced into purely a crafty way for the French to tear easily all of us else off via, between different issues, insisting we conform to idiotic policies which they themselves have no objective of obeying

Answer 7

Assuming that all you say is true, I don't call that alone. We could send messages to them and receive messages from them, but it would be a really slow motion exchange, with a 1,000 year delay to get an answer to any question. But even so, it would be communication, so I say that qualifies as not alone.

Answer 8

you never know it is possible that other lifeforms exist in outer space