Could the entire universe be one massive alien being?

Could the entire universe be one massive alien being? Caleb Scharf, an astrophysicist at Columbia University, feels it is conceivable.

The near-infinite intellect of an extraterrestrial civilization so old and advanced that it transported its whole existence into the quantum domain, according to Scharf, might be the driving force behind the entire cosmos.

Scharf claims in a fascinating piece published in Nautilus that an extraterrestrial species may evolve to the point where it is indistinguishable from magic. Or physics, since the way it works is nothing short of a miracle.

“You’d definitely appear fairly miraculous if you dropped in on a bunch of Paleolithic farmers with your iPhone and a pair of sneakers,” Scharf wrote. “However, the contrast is just mediocre: the farmers would still recognize you as someone who looks a lot like them, and they’d soon be shooting selfies. But what if life has progressed so far that it no longer looks mystical, but rather physics?”

We don’t know what most of the cosmos is comprised of, according to Scharf. We also don’t understand how or, more importantly, why it works. Only 5% of the cosmos is made up of normal stuff, with the rest consisting of an unusual mix of dark matter and dark energy.

 

“Some astronomers have argued that dark matter has a deeper inner life based on small discrepancies between observations and models.”

The physical reality we see is dark and full of terrors, just like the night in Game of Thrones.

“In that situation, dark matter may have actual complexity, and it’s possible that it’s where all technologically evolved life ends up or has always been. What better way to avoid the wrath of supernovae and gamma-ray bursts than to take on a shape that is impervious to electromagnetic radiation? Upload your universe to the vast quantity of dark-side real estate and call it a day.”

The conversion of the mundane into the heavenly, or as Scharf put it, the “normal-matter-to-dark-matter data-transfer mechanism,” might potentially be recreated in a different, far safer medium if a civilization lived long enough to decipher the plethora of intricacies life includes.

Perhaps the fact that dark matter is being intentionally controlled from within is what throws astrophysicists off and muddles any link between astronomical models and observations.

“Or,” Scharf said, “perhaps the behavior of normal cosmic matter that we assign to dark matter is caused by something else entirely: a living state that manipulates bright matter for its own purposes.”

When the astronomer claims the universe performs “funky and surprising stuff,” I agree. It began to expand at a faster rate five billion years ago. Scientists believe this is a direct result of dark energy, but no one understands why it took so long to accelerate. Is it a coincidence that life arrived on Earth at the same time?

“For many cosmologists, this implies that our universe is part of a huge multiverse in which dark energy intensity changes from place to place. We reside in one of the areas that is conducive to our way of life. Dark energy is more powerful elsewhere, and it rips the cosmos apart too rapidly for cosmic structures to develop and life to take root.”

Between the beginning of the universe and the day it began to speed its expansion, eight billion years elapsed. If life originated early in the universe, it’s reasonable to assume that it had enough time to grow into a Type V civilization on the expanded Kardashev scale.

 

It would have been easier to travel between stars and galaxies and therefore conquer space when the universe was considerably more compact than it is now. It’s almost clear that the cosmos used to be a lot more energetic and hazardous than it is now. All the more incentive to board an unusual flight.

We might not identify advanced life, according to Scharf, since it is “an essential and unsuspicious component of what we’ve believed to be the natural world.”

Dark matter and dark energy shape and hold our universe together; gravity is just too weak, and galaxies would disintegrate if these unusual components were not there. It’s possible that the hyper-advanced aliens provided life as we know it an opportunity to manifest itself by moving themselves into this environment.

Scharf says, “Perhaps hyper-advanced life isn’t only exterior.” “Perhaps it’s already all over the place. It’s built into everything we think of as physics, from the fundamental behavior of particles and fields to the processes of complexity and emergence.”

This is one of the most fascinating theories I’ve ever heard. It investigates and verifies all possibilities. It teaches us that aliens are real in its purest form. They are and aren’t at the same time. They’re both living and dead at the same time. They made us by allowing us to make our own decisions. They’re everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

What do you think of this for a bar story?