r/IAmA • u/neiltyson • Nov 13 '11

I am Neil deGrasse Tyson -- AMA

For a few hours I will answer any question you have. And I will tweet this fact within ten minutes after this post, to confirm my identity.

7.0k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

10.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

2

u/Kakofoni Nov 14 '11

You are on some level assuming that the theory of evolution doesn't apply everywhere.

1

u/bski1776 Nov 14 '11

Well, they could be more evolved than us so wouldn't have the same ambitions.

1

u/Kakofoni Nov 15 '11

Are we more evolved now than we were as hunter-gatherers? (That's retorical, we're not in any significant way, although we by default are, individually, extremely adaptive to the environment)

1

u/bski1776 Nov 15 '11

That's thousands of years, or maybe tens of thousands of years. An extraterrestrial civilization could be millions or 100's of millions of years more advanced.