Comment by andrewflnr

6 days ago

> It feels as though there must be sufficiently advanced civilizations out there witnessing this exact scenario play out without the necessary technology to stop it. Though that fate would be horrifying.

I suspect this is not actually that common. Giant impacts are more common in early solar systems; things eventually settle into nice circular orbits like we have now. Whereas intelligent life does seem to take a while to evolve, so probably more common later in a solar system's life cycle.

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andrewflnr

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echelon  6 days ago

Uncommon for sure.

Our sun and earth won't last long enough, but Mercury's orbit is potentially unstable.

A red dwarf might harbor live bearing planets long enough to see its long-lived orbits eventually destabilize. Or perhaps witness the even rarer interstellar collision or destabilization from rogue planets, etc.

dylan604  6 days ago

> Whereas intelligent life does seem to take a while to evolve

basing that theory on an anecdotal story of 1.

  • andrewflnr  6 days ago

    Depends how you count it. One planet, but a solid handful of mass extinctions with big adaptive radiations, most with several million years of development, and tons of reasonably intelligent social animals, only one of which produced industrial civilization. But yes, working with the best evidence we have...

  • kaliqt  6 days ago

    While true, the opposite is true that we have zero evidence of any life whatsoever, anywhere, ever, except with us.