   the fermi paradox (or fermi's paradox) is the apparent contradiction between high estimates of the probability of the existence of extraterrestrial civilization and humanity's lack of contact with, or evidence for, such civilizations.the washington post the basic points of the argument, made by physicists enrico fermi and michael h. hart, are: * the sun is a typical star, and relatively young. there are billions of stars in the galaxy that are billions of years older. * almost surely, some of these stars will have earth-like planets. assuming the earth is typical, some of these planets may develop intelligent life. * some of these civilizations may develop interstellar travel, a technology earth is investigating even now (such as the 100 year starship). * even at the slow pace of currently envisioned interstellar travel, the galaxy can be completely colonized in a few tens of millions of years. according to this line of thinking, the earth should already have been colonized, or at least visited. but no convincing evidence of this exists. furthermore, no confirmed signs of intelligence (see empirical resolution attempts) elsewhere have yet been spotted in our galaxy or (to the extent it would be detectable) elsewhere in the observable universe. hence fermi's question, "where is everybody?"  ==overview== the age of the universe and its vast number of stars suggest that unless the earth is very atypical, extraterrestrial life should be common.sagan, carl cosmos, random house 2002 isbn 0-375-50832-5 in an informal discussion in 1950, the physicist enrico fermi questioned why, if a multitude of advanced extraterrestrial civilizations exists in the milky way galaxy, evidence such as spacecraft or probes is not seen. a more detailed exami
Astrobiology Enrico_Fermi Extraterrestrial_life Fermi_paradox Interstellar_messages Physical_paradoxes Scientific_problems Search_for_extraterrestrial_intelligence Unsolved_problems_in_astronomy