论文标题
接触不平等 - 首次联系可能与较旧的文明
Contact Inequality -- First Contact Will Likely Be With An Older Civilization
论文作者
论文摘要
首先与另一个文明的接触，或者仅仅是某种智能，这可能会大不相同，具体取决于该智能是否比我们自己更先进。如果我们假设智能的寿命分布遵循大约指数的分布，则可能天真地假设短暂寿命实体的堆积在任何检测或接触方案中占主导地位。但是，在这里认为接触的可能性与所述智力（或可能更强大）的年龄成正比，这引入了选择效果。我们证明，使用指数模型，检测到的智能的平均年龄将是基础（检测到的 +未检测到的）人群的两倍。我们发现，我们的第一次联系很可能是较旧的情报，前提是，智能人口的最大平均寿命为$τ_{\ rm max} $，是比我们自己的$> $倍。较旧的智能可能很少见，但它们不成比例有助于首次接触，引入了我们所谓的“接触不平等”，类似于财富不平等。这种推理正式的直觉论点，并强调了第一次接触可能是单方面的，对我们如何接近SETI的影响有很大的影响。
First contact with another civilization, or simply another intelligence of some kind, will likely be quite different depending on whether that intelligence is more or less advanced than ourselves. If we assume that the lifetime distribution of intelligences follows an approximately exponential distribution, one might naively assume that the pile-up of short-lived entities dominates any detection or contact scenario. However, it is argued here that the probability of contact is proportional to the age of said intelligence (or possibly stronger), which introduces a selection effect. We demonstrate that detected intelligences will have a mean age twice that of the underlying (detected + undetected) population, using the exponential model. We find that our first contact will most likely be with an older intelligence, provided that the maximum allowed mean lifetime of the intelligence population, $τ_{\rm max}$, is $>e$ times larger than our own. Older intelligences may be rare but they disproportionality contribute to first contacts, introducing what we call a 'contact inequality', analogous to wealth inequality. This reasoning formalizes intuitional arguments and highlights that first contact would likely be one-sided, with ramifications for how we approach SETI.
