When human beings walked out of the earth and saw the vast universe with the help of science and technology, we realized that the earth is so small, from the perspective of the universe, whether it is the Milky Way, the solar system or the earth, it can only be regarded as a grain of dust.
When we recognize the vastness of the universe and the smallness of the earth, a question that has to be considered arises: Is the earth the only living planet in the universe? Does alien life exist? Is there an intelligent civilization like human beings in the universe?
Before we stepped out of the earth, from the small angle of the earth, many people believed that: human beings are the only one in the universe, and there is no alien life in the universe. But when we really saw the vastness of the universe, most people changed their views, thinking that there is a high probability of extraterrestrial life, and there may be many intelligent civilizations like humans in the universe.
Standing on the scale of the universe, it is difficult for us to doubt the existence of extraterrestrial life and civilization, so scientists began to search for extraterrestrial life and civilization from the moment humans left the earth. In order to find extraterrestrial life, scientists launched Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 in the last century.
They all carry a compact disc that records information about life on earth and human beings, and more importantly, records the coordinates of the earth’s position in the universe. In addition to sending out interstellar spacecraft, scientists also use probes to search for possible alien life in the solar system, and use radio telescopes to search for signals of possible alien civilizations in the universe. In addition, humans have taken the initiative to send wireless signals to the universe many times, hoping to get a response.
Have so many methods achieved significant results? The answer is no. Whether it is Voyager, an intra-solar probe or a radio telescope, we have not found any traces of alien life. In addition to the beauty of the galaxy, what the entire universe gives us is more loneliness. It seems that the entire universe has only one life planet, the earth, and only humans, an intelligent civilization.
So is it possible that human beings are the only civilization in the universe? Many people may refute that this is absolutely impossible. A small galaxy has hundreds of billions of stars and trillions of planets. In the current observable universe, there are at least trillions of galaxies. Such a large galaxy. With a huge base, how can there be only one civilization of humans?
It may be difficult for many people to accept that there is only one civilization in the universe, but some scientists believe that this possibility is not completely non-existent. In the 1960s, NASA invited British atmospheric scientist James Lovelock to discuss the existence of extraterrestrial life.
At that time, James proposed a “Gaia theory”, which believed that only under the interaction of life and environment can the earth be suitable for the continuous existence and development of life. What does it mean? To put it simply, Gaia’s theory believes that the earth is conscious and possesses various characteristics of life forms.
Such theories did subvert the cognition of many people at the time and were not recognized by people. However, with the passage of time, scientists have discovered through continuous research and exploration that the Earth’s ecosystem is far from being as simple as we imagined. We must know how many asteroids have been experienced in the 4 billion years since the birth of life on Earth. Crash disaster.
Through the several huge craters left on the earth, it can be seen that in the history of life on the earth, there have been many collisions of huge asteroids. An asteroid with a diameter of about 10 kilometers hit the earth 65 million years ago, causing the extinction of the dinosaurs. This asteroid with a diameter of about 10 kilometers is nothing compared to the huge asteroids that have hit the earth.
The earth may have been hit by asteroids up to 100 kilometers in diameter a long time ago, but such a huge asteroid did not completely collapse the earth’s ecology. After the impact, it recovered again after a long period of time. This powerful ecological restoration ability reminds us of the metabolism of life. Meteorological experts have found that many functions and capabilities of the earth’s ecology are very similar to the metabolism of life, so the Gaia theory may be true.
The earth has such a powerful self-healing ability, and it can recover from the disasters of outer space and natural disasters. However, such a powerful ability is becoming weaker and weaker in front of mankind. We all know that the birth and activities of mankind are causing more and more damage to the earth’s ecological environment.
The activities of Homo sapiens in Africa tens of thousands of years ago quickly turned what was originally an oasis into a desert, which is currently the largest Sahara Desert in the world, covering an area of 9 million square kilometers. This desert is the ecological destruction and deterioration caused by the activities of the ancestors of modern humans, Homo sapiens.
After mankind entered the era of science and technology, the massive development of industries has caused the earth’s ecology to undergo tremendous changes in just a hundred years. This destructive capacity far exceeds the self-recovery capacity of the earth system. If you follow this speed If the destruction continues, it is possible that after hundreds of years, the earth will no longer be suitable for human survival, and even the earth’s ecology will be completely wiped out and become a desolate planet like Mars, with no possibility of recovery.
The continuous development of mankind can completely collapse a powerful ecosystem. Is this the same for other intelligent civilizations in the universe? We can think of it this way: when a highly developed civilization develops to a certain level, the civilization will become more and more self-expanding, thinking that technology determines everything, despising other life on the planet, and even losing awe of nature.
A highly developed civilization will consider itself the most special, strongest, and most important existence on this planet, and everything else is a floating cloud. Under the influence of this expansion, the development of civilization eventually led to the complete deterioration of the ecosystem, causing a living planet to lose Gaia consciousness, without the ability to metabolize, and finally evolve into a desolate planet that is not suitable for life. .
Without a place to survive, a civilization will slowly die out, and finally disappear in the long river of universe. Perhaps the universe once had many intelligent civilizations, but when their civilization became more and more developed, they were eventually destroyed by nature due to self-expansion.
In fact, mankind is currently on the road to destruction, and we are also beginning to continue to expand, thinking that mankind is the overlord of the earth, and other life is just ants in front of us, and we will destroy it if we see who is not pleasing to our eyes. As for nature, we also gradually lost our awe, and started all kinds of destruction instead of remediation and restoration.
If human beings do not conduct self-reflection, then as the ecology continues to deteriorate, there will be more and more natural disasters in the future. When the ecology deteriorates to a certain extent, the earth’s Gaia consciousness will no longer exist. At that time, the earth loses its ability to repair, the ecology will completely collapse, and there will be no possibility of recovery.
After human beings lose their homeland of the earth, can we still survive? It may be very difficult. Even if we transform Mars into a home that can barely allow us to survive, no matter how we transform Mars, its innate advantages will not be as good as the Earth, and it will be difficult for humans to survive for a long time.
Some people may say that the universe is so big that we can go to other galaxies to find a natural home for survival. Although the ideal is very beautiful, but let us not forget, how can interstellar voyage regardless of distance be so easy to achieve? This requires us to truly grasp the mysteries of time and space, and to be able to do it by jumping in space. To achieve such a goal, it takes a very long time, which may be tens of thousands of years, or hundreds of millions of years or even longer.
But will the conditions of the earth give us such a long development time? Obviously not, so some scientists believe that humans may be the last civilization in the universe. After the disappearance of mankind, the universe will continue to evolve, and new civilizations will emerge in countless years. This civilization will also embark on a development path similar to that of mankind. In the end, it may also come to an end because of the loss of respect for nature.
