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We Might Be the Chimpanzees of the Galaxy

Aperture | July 16, 2026



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The universe is unimaginably large. There are hundreds of billions of galaxies. Each galaxy contains hundreds of billions of stars. Around many of those stars are planets. And on a significant fraction of those planets, the conditions should be right for life. Statistically, the cosmos should be overflowing with civilizations far older and more advanced than ours. So where is everyone?

00:00 End of All Cosmic Civilizations
01:16 The Great Filter
11:29 Energy Consumption
15:38 Technological Destruction
22:54 Artificial Intelligence
27:55 Socio-political Limitations
32:35 Technological Limitations
36:00 The Search For More Samples

Aperture explores the ideas shaping how we think — philosophy, psychology,
and the hidden forces behind human behavior. New perspectives, every week.

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#Civilization #Cosmos #Science #Space #GreatFilter

Written by Aperture

Comments

This post currently has 28 comments.

  1. @daniellickel9867

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    Im glad I found this channel. I dont know anyone to talk to about really deep thinking. It seems that is rare, but its here on this channel. Still no one to talk to about it, but at least I can hear it somewhere.

  2. @catfacepoetry3211

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    Fun to think about it, but death is as close as WW3 and getting rammed by a truck while driving. A shame to worry about sunset and eclipse with precious time that is never enough for happiness and laughter.

  3. @mikehoncho7534

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    You know it’s not scientifically possible for life to just randomly generate
    They’ve just proved the theory of unintelligent design evolution back in like what 2009
    This video is a little bit dated and aged like milk

  4. @TheLordOfWolves

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    If the speed of light is truly the absolute speed and worm holes are only fantasy then most likely no matter how advanced another species would be in the universe they, just like us are most likely are stuck to a specific region in their galaxy. Even if their life span is 100 thousand years it still a short time to live to travel millions of light years if you are limited by the speed of light, even if they somehow have transcend and became digital instead of biological the problem would be not time, but energy, maybe while travelling inside a galaxy you might be able to stop close to a star and refuel/recharge but that would mean that you are not travelling at the speed of light since for matter to travel at the speed of light would need to have access to an infinite amount of energy. So, it is impossible to reach the speed of light as long as your ship is made of matter, even if you were to travel at 95% of C you would still need astronomical amounts of energy to not only reach 95% of C but to also maintain it to be able to avoid gravity wells. Another issue is intergalactic space because the space between stars that you can stop near by to refuel will vastly increase meaning you might find a star at every 10LY or more, so, unless you have your "route" well planned which is impossible since there isnt a precise map of the Universe and godlike energy storage capabilities no civilisation will be leaving their galaxy. And the worst part is: lets say you discover a planet with life on it but is at 30 thousand LY away which means that whatever properties that planet had at the time of its discovery is 30 thousand years old information since it took light 30 thousand years to reach the telescope, the planet might not even exist at the time of discovery, maybe its parent star died or the planet was struck by a meteor today and you would find out about it in 30 thousand more years from now, this is what most likely deter any civilisation from travelling to far in the Universe besides the other reasons i mentioned.

  5. @mikegeld1280

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    Did this guy mention ideas of something larger than us,like the possibility of some kind of God,something deeper, something about the cosmos and how it could have a conscious,everything thing might not be just "science "there's definitely something more than that,until some see it,then one can only give so much opinion on the origins of complex life and consciousness

  6. @matthewolsen8370

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    Why is the very logical and mathematically sound notion that is the average lifespan of known civilizations are short. Additionally, as far as we know the universe has been in existence for 14 billion years. Short average lifespan of "intelligent" civilizations + Billions of years of existence + stupid distances separating areas in the "sweet spot" for life to exist/our limited ability to gather information from a distance= no current evidence for other "intelligent" life during the short blip we've had any ability to detect it. I don't get why the lack of observed life elsewhere in existence seems so difficult to accept.

    Even though there are other locations life can exist does not mean it ever will. Considering we do not even understand how life began how plausible is it that, using mathematics alone, we claim to know the probability for the existence of life elsewhere in the universe?

    It seems entirely likely that time, in and of itself, is quite sufficient to easily separate intelligent life from any interaction or overlap with another. Add distance to the mix and it seems even less likely our paths would ever cross. Then, there's the means to travel such distances, and on and on.

  7. @AngDuc-h4z

    July 16, 2026 at 6:09 pm

    The idea that we might just be a blip on the cosmic timeline, or that an advanced civilization is hiding in the dark forest, is both fascinating and terrifying. This video really puts our existence into perspective.

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