BTW, I am convinced that the reason why so many people believe the universe is chock full of other intelligent life is because of the media. It makes for interesting books, movies, and TV shows. But the "cruel" fact is that we are probably ALONE in the universe. I find that to me actually more fascinating than there being a universe full of intelligent civilizations although that premise would make for a rather boring Star Trek series.
The chemistry of a self-replicating "thing" is pretty complex, involving the "thing" that replicates, as well as a protective shell. The simplest "thing," a virus, can't replicate without harnessing some other living thing's energy factory.
Even though the universe is immense, it's possible to estimate the number of atoms, starts, planets, etc. ... ends up being a big number, I think the number of atoms is estimated to be 10 to the 50th power or something like that. Then, do the probability of the chemistry of self-replicating (not intelligent, or even self-aware) thing. That's a very small number, but, in light of us being here, not zero.
I see God's hand.
In the grand scheme of things we have more pressing things to worry about.
If they are out there and more advanced and able to get here, we are giving them directions, to wit we more than likely will be enslaved/eradicated.
If not out there, or they are and less advanced we will never meet or exchange information anyway, so it is a waste of time and money. Any signal sent to another system once received will not return until hundreds of generations have past so it will have a shelf life anyway. It would be like basing your stock buys on a 1900 NY Times.
I worry more about the government and/or its spawn fulfilling their agenda and enslaving me if I am still here and/or my children.
I’m just not interested in intelligent life in space. I want planets we can utilize for our own expansion.
Robert L Forward had some interesting ideas on intelligent life. In his book Saturn Rukh, intelligent life was discovered flying in the atmosphere of Saturn but its intelligence was limited to its own experience and of virtually no use to us.
In fact it was determined that the intelligent life was the very reason we wouldn’t return. They had gone to Saturn to study the feasibility of mining Saturn for Helium but the intelligent life would be determined to be an impediment to industrial use.