There could be at least 36 active communicating intelligent civilizations in our home Galaxy, claimes new study led by Christopher Conselice, Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Nottingham.
The study, published in The Astrophysical Journal, has taken a new approach to one of the biggest questions in the history of human thought: Are we alone? is there intelligent life? Do extraterrestrial civilizations within our Universe?
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The research team has taken a new approach to these questions using the hypothesis that other intelligent life forms in a similar way as it does on Earth. They have obtained an estimate for the number of intelligent communicating civilizations within our own galaxy -the Milky Way.
The team believes that there should be at least a few dozen active civilizations in our Galaxy “Assuming that it takes 5 billion years for intelligent life to form on other planets, as on Earth where civilization formed after 4.5 billion years,” Conselice explains. “Looking at evolution on a cosmic scale call this calculation the Astrobiological Copernican Limit.”
The study shows that there must be two criteria to calculate the number of civilizations: metal content equal to that of the Sun is needed (the Sun is relatively speaking quite metal-rich), and, depends strongly on how long they are sending out signals of their existence. signals include radio transmissions from satellites, television, etc. If other technological civilizations last as long as ours which is currently 100 years old, there will be about 36 active intelligent technological civilizations in our Galaxy.
The average distance to these civilizations would be 17,000 light-years away. Making detection and communication very difficult with our current technology. The researchers emphasized that it is also possible that we are alone in our Galaxy unless the survival times of civilizations like our own are long.
Professor Conselice continues: “Our new research suggests that searches for extraterrestrial intelligent civilizations not only reveals the existence of how life forms, but also gives us clues for how long our own civilization will last. If we find that intelligent life is common then this would reveal that our civilization could exist for much longer than a few hundred years, alternatively if we find that there are no active civilizations in our Galaxy it is a bad sign for our own long-term existence. By searching for extraterrestrial intelligent life — even if we find nothing — we are discovering our own future and fate.”
