Energy probes: Another solution to the Fermi paradox

Energy probes: Another solution to the Fermi paradox: "

We have looked at alternative solutions to the Fermi Paradox and one of the ideas I touched on was that aliens might be here but in a form we would struggle to comprehend as suggested by the Subanthropic Principle or other Stanislav Lem-like scenarios. Now, over on Secret Sun, Chris Knowles has this... quote? thought-nugget?

A quick side note on that train of thought: Scientists now believe that alien abduction phenomena is the result of sleep paralysis, usually preceded by a feeling of being shocked or electrocuted. That's all well and good, but what if the resulting narrative isn't the result of cultural conditioning but in fact the reflection of a reality - a kind of alien virtual reality. As we evolve alongside our technology, will we bother to physically travel to distant stars, or stay safe at home and send digital recreations of ourselves via remote satellite or even truly esoteric technology like neutrino beams? If we can conceive it, how can we say someone else hasn't acheived it?

Source (apparently - I can't seem to find the quote there, even if it Alan Moore didn't say it the point stands)

Hat tip

I've mentioned something similar as one of solutions to the strange clouds in Darklore 2 - could aliens by using energy probes to project a presence here rather than use physical means to reach us?I had a look around to see if anyone else has suggested this and the ever-reliable Jenny Randles mentions it as one of her favoured solutions to the UFO problem (and includes the possibility that we may be being scanned, or even upgraded):

The other possibility is that a real contact is occurring  between some other intelligence (perhaps extraterrestrial or inter-dimensional) but  not in the traditionally assumed sense. No space ships are landing and no aliens  are getting out to kidnap humans (thus our dearth of physical evidence). Instead  contact occurs using some kind of energy probe that manifests as the UFO and to some  is merely seen as that, although its side effects can create physical evidence (such as car stops or burnt skin). With the abduction prone personality the beam switches  them into an ASC [altered states of consciousness] and induces a waking lucid dream that conveys a contact message.  Upon waking the witness recalls the light, recalls losing consciousness and subsequently  waking again and perhaps vague images of the dream like contact. These may recur  during subsequent flashbacks, dreams or even be stimulated by hypnosis. The result  will be a mixture of genuine recall of the vision and distorted imagery introduced  by our own conscious mind. But in essence the person will recall that an alien intelligence  probed them, exchanged data with them, and then left. This may appear in the memory  as if it were a medical probe, or an examination inside a craft, but most of this  imagery will be imaginative and added to the experience by our own subconscious through  its store of images about what aliens are supposed to be like. The fundamental truth about abductions would be that a scanning form of contact took place -- via a beam  and at a distance -- but never as a result of a literal alien kidnap.

Source

In fiction we see this idea crop up in the TV series Threshold, where a five dimensional energy probe turns up and starts rewriting the witnesses' DNA (the DNA manipulation is one that also crops up in Invasion, as discussed by Chris Knowles). Here is a clip of the probe (without sound as it contains a song or something):

The idea that aliens are jumping into their flying saucers and travelling across the universe to dick around on Earth seems more a product of late 19th and early 20th Century science fiction as well as the early days of the Space Race. Once the American government ticked "get to the Moon first" off their to do list it became increasingly clear that blasting astronauts off on various missions around the universe was an awfully expensive way to go about things and we have mainly relied on robotic probes to do our exploring for us. Now even ideas about colonising new Solar Systems rely on the idea of seeder ships rather than generation ships. The idea of energy probes is just one step beyond that and removes problems with punting mass across space and may take advantage of fiendishly cunning physics. If you need interact with the physical environment there are always force fields (or even hard light holograms).

Now read the previous entry on the earlier 20th Century "abduction" experiences.

If this were anything like reality we will have essentially created a cargo cult over alien (or far future or extra-dimensional/ultraterrestrial) technology that is well beyond our ability to understand - for more see this. Of course, if this is a natural, but poorly understood, phenomena (endogenous DMT, Randles' "time storms" which is some kind of breakdown in reality that often seems to appear as an odd fog, plasma phenomena, etc.) then we are little further on than our ancestors who blamed lightning storms on Thor or Zeus.

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