>The real threat isn't from alien intelligence, but from alien AI. A dumb AI, at that, of the kind that mindlessly travels the galaxy, self-replicates, and harvests material without discrimination. But again: a race advanced enough to develop such technology would probably be aware of the consequences of letting it run amok. There would be checks against that scenario by design.
Don't have too much confidence in that. If a civilization creates AI, it could possibly improve itself and become incredibly intelligent, but still keep the simple goals that it was originally programmed with. Thus endlessly self-replicating, consuming the universe to create bigger computers, or destroy threats to itself, or preserve it's existence as long as possible.
Don't have too much confidence in that. If a civilization creates AI, it could possibly improve itself and become incredibly intelligent, but still keep the simple goals that it was originally programmed with. Thus endlessly self-replicating, consuming the universe to create bigger computers, or destroy threats to itself, or preserve it's existence as long as possible.