>>13265137When the Manhattan project was first completed they had concluded that the atomic explosion would not consume the earth.
But still, they had lingering doubts and fears that when they tested that first bomb it would be a chain reaction that would be the end of everything as we know it.
Imagine if as a sentient species develops something like that, a technological test that real does end them.
Maybe it’s made in the pursuit of weapons, maybe in the pursuit of energy, maybe in the pursuit of faster space travel.
Maybe it’s just an accident from something far less grand.
The point is the Fermi paradox means that we are either extremely, extremely unique as a sentient entity. (Unlikely, given the age of the universe)
Or expansionist sentient entities are culled throughout the universe in a way that barely leaves any trace. (Likely, by process of elimination)
A technological booby trap where the sentient creatures get pulled into their own black hole does fit the criteria.
Complete eradication and no trace of the entity, assuming they never escaped its reach before it was triggered.
A tech booby trap is not even a novel idea.
Thermonuclear weapons are already a kind of technological booby trap for the survival of our species.
It just probably wouldn’t wipe humans out completely, which is why nukes are not a solution to fermi’s paradox.
On the bright side, if we manage to expand in space beyond the danger zone of a black hole then it would disprove this theory.
As it would prove a sentient species can expand beyond the range of a black hole’s destructive effect. (Thus preserving their existence and eventually growing back to the level of the other worlds which got wiped out.)
But Fermi’s paradox would still loom over us until we have enough evidence to determine that we are just alone and there is no unseen phenomenon culling sentient species.
