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Fermi paradox

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The Fermi paradox is the conflict between the lack of clear, obvious evidence for extraterrestrial life and various high estimates for their existence. As a 2015 article put it, "If life is so easy, someone from somewhere must have come calling by now."Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi's name is associated with the paradox because of a casual conversation in the summer of 1950 with fellow physicists Edward Teller, Herbert York and Emil Konopinski. While walking to lunch, the men discussed recent UFO reports and the possibility of faster-than-light travel. The conversation moved on to other topics, until during lunch Fermi blurted out, "But where is everybody?" (although the exact quote is uncertain).There have been many attempts to explain the Fermi paradox, primarily suggesting that intelligent extraterrestrial beings are extremely rare, that the lifetime of such civilizations is short, or that they exist but (for various reasons) humans see no evidence. This suggests that at universe time and space scales, two intelligent civilizations would be unlikely to ever meet, even if many developed during the life of the universe.

Fermi paradox - Wikipedia Jump to content Checked From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia This is the latest accepted revision , reviewed on 13 July 2026 . Discrepancy of the lack of evidence for alien life despite its apparent likelihood This article is about the absence of clear evidence of extraterrestrial life. For a type of estimation problem, see Fermi problem . The Fermi paradox is the apparent inconsistency between the lack of conclusive evidence of extraterrestrial civilizations and the apparently high likelihood of their existence. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] In simple terms, the Fermi paradox a

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