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  • What is the Dark Forest Theory?

  • Dark Forest Theory is a concept from the science fiction novel "The Three-Body Problem" by

  • Liu Cixin, which offers a grim explanation for the Fermi Paradoxthe question of why

  • we haven't detected signs of alien civilizations.

  • It suggests that the universe is like a dark forest where civilizations are hidden predators,

  • silently hunting.

  • Due to the vast distances and unknowns in space, civilizations view any other life form

  • as a potential threat.

  • The safest strategy is to preemptively destroy other life forms before they can do the same.

  • Consequently, civilizations stay silent and hidden to survive, avoiding any form of interstellar

  • communication or revealing their location, thus explaining the silence of the cosmos.

  • This theory presents a bleak view of the universe as a place of survival-driven secrecy and

  • isolation and renders the cosmos as an infinitely vast, cold, and lonely place, where each civilization,

  • isolated by the immeasurable gulfs of space and fear, exists in its own silent bubble,

  • forever speculating about the presence of others.

What is the Dark Forest Theory?

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