Talk:Drake equation

	This Astronomy related article has been awarded SILVER status for quality. We like it, and you should too! See RationalWiki:Article rating for more information.

Actually...

Actually, this equation already appears on the Exobiology page. . . . weaseLOId~ 09:25, 24 November 2008 (EST)

Maybe a redirect would be in order, but this is also a topic in itself... I dunno. I saw we didn't have an article and wanted to link to it, so I paraphrased the presentation from Wikipedia and added some commentary from memory. Wazza (Not Wazzock, Wazza)^{Approach the Presence} 09:27, 24 November 2008 (EST)

I think this warrants a separate article. It could just do with formatting it up all nice and pretty and then adding a little bit of SPOV to it (similar to the xkcd version of the equation). ArmondikoV^sshole 09:37, 24 November 2008 (EST)

An interesting read on Drake although I can't see where to include it in the article. The comments aren't that full of stupid, either, which is impressive considering the subject matter. The usual mix of "humans suck too much for ETs to notice us" and "but life could be so much different". ^narchist 15:14, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

The comments are, indeed, pretty good with a few minor exceptions. I added it as an EL, if nothing else it is an interesting read for people. ħuman 22:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Removed sidebar

I deleted the <Ufology> sidebar, it has nothing to do with ufology or woo. (except maybe SETI woo.. but that's not ufology) Mainly I wanted to get rid of the Ufology category at the bottom of the page, and that was how to do it. I'm new here; I don't know if there's an astronomy or SETI or cosmology or (exo-)biology etc sidebar, but it would be appropriate under any of those. ^{— Unsigned, by: 110.20.158.134 / talk / contribs (signed by bot)} 12:15, 07 March 2015 (UTC)

It looks like someone put it back, alas. Since I'm new here, I'm not going to throw my weight around, but add my agreement that the category is inappropriate, and I vote for re-removal. Zontar (talk) 20:16, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, @Zontar. I've removed it again. It looks like a BoN added it for not particular reason. Bongolian (talk) 20:38, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

@Bongolian: Thanks for the quick response and teaching me what "BoN" stands for. I've been wondering about that one. (Been lurking on RW for a couple of years, finally decided to take the plunge and create an account today. Must be the rain and/or chocolate biscuitscookies.) --Zontar (talk) 02:13, 28 January 2019 (UTC)

Inverse-square law

I added the inverse-square law because it is an important problem with detecting civilizations.--BruceGrubb (talk) 14:25, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

Humorous addition

Could there be a 'ducks and drakes' joke somewhere?

Given how large the universe is it would be illogical to assume that there was only one statement of the Drake equation (though elsewhere something locally pronounceable is used). Anna Livia (talk) 15:49, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

"only one statement" is kinda ambiguous. Would you mind explaining further what you mean? ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 15:51, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Other sentient species elsewhere in the universe have their own versions.

The key problem aspects are the last two parts of the equation (except for those who judge that it is not worth attempting to communicate with sentient species elsewhere in the universe because they are probably the first or the last such). Anna Livia (talk) 15:58, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Oh, yeah, sure. That's totally reasonable. I don't think anyone assumes other intelligent life would be incapable of doing the things we're capable of, though. ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 16:09, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Making due allowance for different physical forms - some sentient creatures may find it difficult to leave their planets (high escape velocity/dense asteroid belts and other local inconveniences - and Ents and Jabba the Hutt will become planet bound while 'sentient insect hive entities' might well need others to set up viable spaceship construction facilities).

And there are likely to be more 'first and last sentients' than the individual communities imagine. Anna Livia (talk) 12:56, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Self-Destruction?

The claim that intelligence leads to self-destructive tendencies is presented as fact, with absolutely no evidence to back it up. IMO supporting evidence needs to be offered, or the assertion removed--or at least restated as a question. Zontar (talk) 20:25, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Fixed

The Fermi paradox has been resolved, fairly decisively: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1806.02404.pdf --2604:6000:1115:C784:9963:FD15:C5A1:35F3 (talk) 03:25, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

I clicked the link, and read the paper. The only thing that this paper 'resolves' is that it is plausible that there are no other civilizations in our galaxy or the observable universe. The paper says in several places that their assumptions could be correct, or not. And that some of the variables could differ by several magnitudes. There is no way to approach these equations without making assumptions that are said to be 'as good' as any other assumptions FairDinkum (talk) 11:22, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Sagan

I am unable to find any citations for the claim that Sagan "refined" the Drake Equation. Is anyone here aware of such a reference? Vee (talk) 19:16, 10 November 2022 (UTC)