How to Take Over the Universe (in Three Easy Steps)

Summary

This script outlines a theoretical plan to conquer the cosmos using three main steps: constructing a Dyson swarm for energy, developing self-replicating probes, and launching them to propagate across galaxies. It posits that with modest energy from the sun and plausible future technologies, humanity could exponentially expand its reach across the universe, raising intriguing questions about the Fermi paradox and the potential existence of extraterrestrial civilizations.

Takeaways

• 🌌 The script outlines a hypothetical three-step plan to take over the universe by harnessing the sun's energy and deploying self-replicating probes.
• 🔆 A Dyson swarm, composed of solar collectors, is proposed as the primary energy source for the project, which would be built by disassembling the planet Mercury.
• 🚀 The plan involves the creation of self-replicating probes that can land on other planets or asteroids and use local resources to replicate themselves and build additional Dyson swarms.
• 🛰️ The probes would be launched to every reachable galaxy, potentially reaching between 116 million to 4 billion galaxies, depending on their speed.
• 🕊️ The expansion method is considered more efficient than sequential colonization within the Milky Way, as it can be done simultaneously across vast distances.
• ⚙️ The feasibility of the plan is based on the principles of exploratory engineering, which assumes that any natural process can be replicated with human technology.
• 🤖 Automation is a key component, suggesting that the scale of the project could be managed without direct human labor through the use of advanced AI and robotics.
• 🔬 The script is based on a paper by Stuart Armstrong and Anders Sandberg, which explores the physical possibility and plausibility of intergalactic spreading of intelligent life.
• 🔢 The paper makes several conservative assumptions about the efficiency of solar collectors, the energy required for material processing, and the time needed to complete the Dyson swarm.
• 🛡️ The design of the probes includes considerations for deceleration, fuel type, data storage, and potential protective measures against intergalactic hazards.
• 💡 The Fermi paradox is sharpened by the paper's argument that intergalactic colonization should be feasible with minimal resources, yet we see no signs of extraterrestrial projects.
• 🏁 The script concludes with a call to action, suggesting that humanity should begin its expansion into the universe to claim galaxies before they become forever out of reach or are claimed by others.

Q & A

What is the main goal of the video script?

The main goal of the video script is to outline a theoretical plan for humanity to take over the universe in three steps, using a Dyson swarm and self-replicating probes.

What is a Dyson swarm and why is it proposed in the script?

A Dyson swarm is a multitude of solar collectors orbiting the sun, designed to capture solar energy. It is proposed to power the launch of self-replicating probes to other galaxies.

How does the script suggest we obtain the energy needed for the Dyson swarm?

The script suggests using the sun's energy by building a Dyson swarm, which would collect and convert solar radiation into useful work.

What are the three steps mentioned in the script for taking over the universe?

The three steps are: 1) Disassemble Mercury and build a Dyson swarm, 2) Build self-replicating probes, and 3) Launch these probes to every reachable galaxy.

Why is Mercury chosen for disassembling in the script?

Mercury is chosen because it is a rocky planet with a composition of 70% metal and 30% silicate, which can be transformed into reflective surfaces for the Dyson swarm, and it is conveniently located near the swarm's intended orbit.

What is the concept of 'exploratory engineering' mentioned in the script?

Exploratory engineering refers to the process of reasoning about what techniques and designs are physically possible and plausibly achievable by human scientists, without necessarily having the technology at hand.

What assumptions does the script make regarding the replication of natural processes and automation?

The script assumes that any process in the natural world can be replicated with human technology and that any task that can be performed can be automated, especially with advances in AI.

How does the script address the Fermi paradox in relation to its proposed plan?

The script suggests that since spreading through the universe doesn't require a lot of resources, the lack of observed alien colonization implies that either there is no other intelligent life, or they might already be expanding through the universe.

What are the potential methods for deceleration of the self-replicating probes as proposed in the script?

The script hypothesizes three types of fuel for deceleration: nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, and matter-antimatter annihilation. It also mentions other speculative options like using gravitational assists, magnetic sails, or the Bussard ramjet.

What is the estimated timeframe for completing the Dyson swarm according to the script?

Under the assumptions made in the script, the disassembly of Mercury and completion of the Dyson swarm would take approximately 31 years, with most of the mass being harvested in the last four years.

How does the script suggest we could launch the self-replicating probes?

The script suggests using fixed launch systems like coilguns, solar sails accelerated by lasers, or particle beams instead of rockets, to achieve the necessary acceleration to relativistic speeds.

Outlines

00:00

🌌 Galactic Conquest: The Dyson Swarm Initiative

The script introduces an ambitious three-step plan to take over the universe, starting with the construction of a Dyson swarm by disassembling Mercury to harness solar energy. This energy will then be used to build self-replicating probes, which are to be launched into every reachable galaxy. The video emphasizes the efficiency of this method, suggesting that expanding to the furthest galaxies is no more difficult than to the nearest ones, just more time-consuming. It references the paper by Stuart Armstrong and Anders Sandberg, which explores the feasibility of intergalactic spreading of intelligent life and its implications on the Fermi paradox.

05:02

🛠️ Engineering the Dyson Swarm: Mercury Disassembly and Automation

This paragraph delves into the practicalities of disassembling Mercury to create a Dyson swarm, a network of solar collectors around the sun. It discusses the energy requirements for launching millions to billions of probes and the advantages of a swarm over a rigid Dyson sphere. The script suggests using lightweight mirrors for the swarm and calculates the mass and surface area needed based on Mercury's orbit and mass. It also introduces the concept of an exponential feedback loop for mining and assembling the swarm, highlighting the importance of automation in managing the scale of this project.

10:03

🚀 Designing Self-Replicating Probes for Universal Expansion

The script outlines the design considerations for self-replicating probes capable of landing on planets, using local resources to replicate, and initiating new waves of probes to spread across galaxies. It draws parallels between natural replicators and the proposed probes, discussing size limitations and data storage options. The paragraph also explores potential fuel sources for deceleration, including nuclear fission, fusion, and matter-antimatter annihilation, and considers methods to protect probes from intergalactic dust at high speeds.

15:06

🔋 Launching the Probes: Energy Requirements and Timescales

This section discusses the energy needed to launch the self-replicating probes using a fixed launch system, such as coilguns or solar sails, as opposed to rockets. It provides a table showing the time required to power the launch based on different probe and replicator types, emphasizing that even with a large number of probes, the energy needed is minimal compared to the Dyson swarm's capacity. The script also contemplates the strategic sequence of launching probes within the Milky Way and other galaxies, considering the universe's expansion and the urgency of beginning this expansion.

🌟 The Future of Humanity: Colonizing the Universe and the Fermi Paradox

The final paragraph envisions a future where humanity initiates the colonization of the universe, with a playful scenario of a Solar System President asking everyone to turn off their virtual reality for a brief period to focus on this grand endeavor. It discusses the timeline for the probes to reach millions to billions of galaxies and the implications of the Fermi paradox, suggesting that the lack of visible alien colonization efforts might indicate the absence of other intelligent life or that they are already here. The script concludes by urging humanity to seize the opportunity to expand into the universe before it's too late.

Keywords

💡Dyson Swarm

A Dyson Swarm refers to a hypothetical structure composed of a multitude of solar collectors encircling a star to capture its energy. In the context of the video, the construction of a Dyson Swarm around the sun is the first step for harnessing the energy required to launch self-replicating probes into space. The script mentions using the sun's energy and disassembling Mercury to build this swarm, illustrating the scale of ambition for humanity's expansion into the universe.

💡Self-replicating Probes

Self-replicating Probes are theoretical devices capable of creating copies of themselves using local resources found on other planets or in space. The video's theme revolves around using these probes to colonize other galaxies by sending them to every reachable galaxy simultaneously. The probes are designed to land, replicate, and restart civilization, highlighting an efficient method for humanity's cosmic expansion.

💡Exploratory Engineering

Exploratory Engineering is an approach that involves assessing the physical feasibility of theoretical concepts and technologies. The script uses this concept to discuss the practicality of building a Dyson Swarm and self-replicating probes by considering what is physically possible and plausibly achievable with human scientific advancements. It represents a methodical way to innovate and plan for futuristic projects.

💡Fermi Paradox

The Fermi Paradox is the apparent contradiction between the high probability of extraterrestrial life and the lack of contact with or evidence for such civilizations. The video touches on this concept when discussing the implications of humanity's potential to spread throughout the universe. The paradox becomes 'sharper' if the expansion requires minimal resources, questioning why we have not seen signs of alien colonization.

💡Cosmically Insignificant

The term 'cosmically insignificant' is used in the script to describe the amount of time and energy required for humanity's intergalactic expansion as being trivial on a universal timescale. It emphasizes the vastness of the universe and the relatively small impact of human actions in the grand scheme of cosmic time.

💡Mercury Disassembly

Mercury Disassembly refers to the hypothetical process of taking apart the planet Mercury to obtain the necessary materials for constructing the Dyson Swarm. The script explains that Mercury is a convenient source due to its proximity to the sun, composition, and the fact that using it requires no assumptions of future super materials.

💡Exponential Feedback Loop

An Exponential Feedback Loop in the script refers to a self-reinforcing process where each cycle of activity produces more resources or capabilities, leading to an exponential growth in output. This concept is central to the rapid construction of the Dyson Swarm, as the energy collected from the sun is used to mine more material, which in turn is used to build more solar collectors.

💡Intergalactic Spreading

Intergalactic Spreading is the concept of expanding human presence or influence across galaxies beyond our own. The video's main theme is about achieving this through the use of self-replicating probes, emphasizing the potential for humanity to reach and colonize billions of galaxies.

💡Molecular Assembler

A Molecular Assembler is a theoretical device capable of arranging atoms and molecules to construct various products, including copies of itself. The script mentions this concept in the context of designing self-replicating probes, which would require such a mechanism to replicate on other planets using local resources.

💡Coilgun

A Coilgun, short for electromagnetic railgun, is a proposed method for launching objects into space using magnetic forces. The script suggests using coilguns as a fixed launch system for the self-replicating probes, highlighting an alternative to traditional rockets for achieving the high velocities necessary for intergalactic travel.

💡Expansion of the Universe

The Expansion of the Universe refers to the ongoing increase in volume of the universe, causing galaxies to move away from each other. The script discusses how this expansion affects the feasibility of intergalactic travel, noting that as time passes, more galaxies become unreachable due to the accelerating rate of expansion.

Highlights

A three-step plan to take over the universe using a Dyson swarm and self-replicating probes.

The concept of harnessing the sun's energy for an intergalactic expansion strategy.

Disassembling Mercury to build solar collectors for a Dyson swarm as a resource-efficient method.

The efficiency of using self-replicating probes for simultaneous expansion across galaxies.

The theoretical underpinnings of the paper by Stuart Armstrong and Anders Sandberg on intergalactic spreading.

Assumptions of exploratory engineering for plausible and physically possible interstellar technologies.

The advantages of a Dyson swarm over a rigid Dyson sphere in terms of construction and maintenance.

The calculation of material needed from Mercury to construct solar collectors for the Dyson swarm.

The exponential feedback loop for the construction of the Dyson swarm through mining and energy generation.

Automation's role in the large-scale construction and operation of the Dyson swarm and probes.

Estimations of time and energy required to complete the Dyson swarm based on conservative assumptions.

Design considerations for self-replicating probes including size, data storage, and fuel for deceleration.

Hypothetical fuel sources for probe deceleration: nuclear fission, fusion, and matter-antimatter annihilation.

Strategies for probe protection against intergalactic dust and the use of redundancy to ensure arrival.

Fixed launch systems as an efficient method for propelling probes to relativistic speeds.

The timeline for the universe's expansion and the urgency for humanity to begin intergalactic colonization.

The Fermi paradox implications and the potential existence of extraterrestrial civilizations.

A call to action for humanity to initiate its expansion into the universe before other civilizations do.

Transcripts

Let's take over the universe in three easy steps.

Welcome. We've heard that you want to take over the universe.

Well, you've come to the right place.

In this video, we'll show you how to reach as many

as 4 billion galaxies, with just a few relatively easy steps

and 6 hours of the sun's energy.

Here's what you need to do.

One: Disassemble Mercury and build a Dyson swarm,

a multitude of solar captores around the sun.

Two: Build self-replicating probes.

And three: Launch the self-replicating probes

to every reachable galaxy.

In science fiction humanity's expansion into the universe

usually starts within our galaxy, the Milky Way.

After a new star system is occupied, humanity jumps to the next star

and so on.

Until we take the whole galaxy.

Then humanity jumps to the next nearest galaxy

and the process is repeated.

This is not how we're going to do it.

Our method is much more efficient.

We're going to send self-replicating probes

to all the reachable galaxies at once.

Getting to the furthest galaxies is not more difficult

than getting to the nearest ones.

It just takes more time.

When a probe arrives at its destination galaxy,

it will search for a planet to disassemble,

build another Dyson swarm and launch a new wave of probes

to reach every star within the galaxy.

And then each probe in that galaxy will restart civilization.

We already hear your protest, though: 'This whole thing

seems pretty hard to me,' you say.

'Especially the "disassembling mercury" part.'

But actually, none of these steps are as hard as they first appear.

If you analyze closely how they could be implemented,

you'll find solutions that are much easier

than you'd expect.

And that's exactly what Stuart Armstrong

and Anders Sandberg do in their paper, 'Eternity

in six hours: intergalactic spreading of intelligent life

and sharpening the Fermi paradox.'

This video is based on that paper.

Exploratory engineering and assumptions.

What we mean by 'easy' here is that we will require amounts

of energy and resources that are small

compared to what is at our disposal in the solar system.

Also, the technology required is not extremely far

beyond our capabilities today, and the time required

for the whole feat is insignificant on cosmic scales.

Not every potential future technology will make sense

to include in our plan to spread to the stars.

We need to choose what technologies to use by reasoning

in the style of exploratory engineering,

trying to figure out what techniques and designs

are physically possible and plausibly achievable

by human scientists.

The requirement 'physically possible' is much easier

to comply with than 'achievable by human scientists',

therefore, we introduce two assumptions

that serve to separate the plausible from the merely possible:

First: any process in the natural world

can be replicated with human technology.

This assumption makes sense in light of the fact

that humans have generally been successful

at copying or co-opting nature.

And second: Any task that can be performed

can be automated.

The rationale for this assumption is that humans

have proven to be adept at automating processes

and with advances in AI, we will become even more so.

Design of the Dyson Swarm.

Now we've said we're going to launch probes

to every reachable galaxy.

This means a hundred million to a hundred billion probes.

Where do we get the energy to power all these launches?

We don't need to come up with exotic sources of energy

we can't picture yet.

We can use the sun itself!

That's why we're going to build a Dyson swarm.

To be fair, in order to be sure that a Dyson swarm

will be sufficient, we need to already have

plausible designs for probes and launch systems in mind.

But this is a tutorial for pragmatic, wannabe grabby civilizations.

So we'll get to that later, when we actually use them.

A Dyson swarm is simply a multitude of solar captors

orbiting around the sun.

The easiest design is to use lightweight mirrors,

beaming the sun's radiation to focal points

where it's converted into useful work -

for example, using heat engines and solar cells.

A Dyson swarm has major advantages compared to a rigid Dyson sphere.

A swarm isn't subject to internal forces

that might make it collapse, and it can be made

with simple and conventional materials.

Even a swarm isn't without potential problems, though.

The captors have to be coordinated to avoid collisions

and occluding each other.

But these are not major difficulties.

There are already reasonable orbit designs in today's literature

and the captors will have large amounts

of reserves at their disposal to power any minor course correction.

The efficiency of the captors will not be an issue either.

We'll need only a small amount of energy to power our expansion

into the universe compared to the energy

a Dyson swarm will be able to collect.

The biggest problem to solve is how to get all of the material

necessary to build the solar captors, even assuming the lightest design

achievable with today's materials.

That is lightweight mirrors.

You'd need to take apart Mercury to get everything

you need for the swarm.

And that's exactly what we're going to do.

There are potentially other pathways to get the material,

but being able to take apart Mercury is the conservative assumption

to make, as weird as it sounds.

We're not assuming future super materials

that would let us build a swarm with extremely thin

and efficient captures and therefore with way less material.

Mercury looks very convenient to use in comparison

to the other planets and the asteroid belt.

Its orbit is approximately at the same distance

from the sun as the swarms, and it's a rocky planet.

70% metallic and 30% silicate.

This is material that we can transform

into reflective surfaces for the swarm

and use to build heat engines and solar cells.

The Semi-major axis of Mercury's orbit

is approximately 60 billion meters long.

Therefore, a sphere around the Sun with that radius

would have a surface area in the order of ten^22 square meters.

The mass of Mercury is in the order of 10^23 kilograms.

Now, let's assume we'll use about half of Mercury

to build the swarm.

If we conservatively pretend that the swarm

is a solid sphere around the Sun, we can take the fraction

between half of Mercury's mass and the surface of the sphere

we just calculated to get the mass of the sphere

per square metre, which is 3.92 kg/m^2.

This is plenty!

Iron has a density of 7874 kg/m^3, so we can obtain mirrors

with a thickness of at least half a millimetre.

We can already easily make mirrors this thin.

You can order them online if you want,

but most probably we would use a structure

with a much thinner film of the order of 0.001 mm,

supported by a network of rigid struts.

Disassembling Mercury.

Now let's disassemble Mercury and build this swarm, shall we?

We're going to build the Dyson swarm during the process of disassembly.

While we get material from the planet,

we build more of a swarm, and as we build new captors,

we get more energy to power more of the planet's disassembly,

and so on.

Essentially, we need a feedback loop like this: We mined

necessary material, we get the material into orbit,

we make solar collectors out of it, we get the energy

from the collectors, and we use that energy

to mine more material, and so the cycle repeats.

Sandberg and Armstrong assume a seed of 1 km^2

of solar panels constructed on Mercury

to start the feedback loop.

After the seed, the loop can begin with mining the initial material.

At each cycle, we have more energy at our disposal

to power more mining, and the process can easily speed up exponentially.

In fact, the feasibility of Mercury's disassembly hinges

on if we get an exponential feedback loop or not.

If we can't complete the loop or if it's not at least

near exponential, then we're out of luck.

The process would grind to a halt or be impossible to complete

in any reasonable amount of time.

If we want the energy at our disposal to increase exponentially,

the number of captors must increase by a fixed percentage at each cycle.

That means that the energy required to mine minerals,

get them into orbit and make captors must remain nearly constant

or decrease at each cycle.

But this is not a big concern.

Mining material and making solar collectors

shouldn't consume more energy as the disassembly progresses.

On the contrary, towards the end of the disassembly,

less energy will be required to get material into orbit,

as Mercury's gravity will be much easier to overcome.

A potential problem could be cooling Mercury's core,

but this is a fixed cost, and Mercury's heat

might be harvested to get more energy.

And now maybe you're thinking: 'Wait, even if we can get

an exponential feedback loop in theory,

how on Earth are we going to get the workers to do all this?'

And that's where our assumption that 'any task that can be performed

can be automated' comes in.

With automation, the sheer scale of projects

is simply not a problem.

New machines and factories can be built essentially

without human intervention.

Time, material and energy become the only things we need.

Encouragingly, NASA had a design for a self-replicating

lunar factory in 1980.

And surely, in the future we'll be able to do much better

than NASA in the 80's.

Sandberg and Armstrong make a few additional assumptions

to precisely estimate how long it'll take

to complete the Dyson swarm.

They assume: Solar captors with an efficiency of 1/3.

Only 1/10 of the energy will be used to propel material into space.

The rest will be used for mining or reprocessing material,

or simply be lost.

It takes five years to process the material

into solar captors and place them into the correct orbit.

And only half of Mercury's material will be used

to construct the captors.

Under these assumptions, the power available

will increase exponentially every five year cycle.

Mercury will be disassembled in 31 years with most of the mass

harvested in the last four years.

But as long as the exponential feedback loop

is possible, the details aren't that important

and will complete the disassembly within a few cycles

and a short amount of time.

And even if an exponential feedback loop

turns out not to be possible, it doesn't necessarily mean

we can't build a Dyson swarm.

This is just one way to attack the problem,

which relies on plausible future technology

constrained by conservative assumptions.

For example, if we're able to produce super materials,

taking apart a large asteroid might be sufficient.

Design of the probes.

Now that we've built the Dyson swarm, we have the energy

to launch countless self-replicating probes

into the universe.

Our probes should be capable of safely landing

on other planets or asteroids, using the resources there

to make copies of themselves.

Building other Dyson swarms, launching another wave of probes,

and ultimately starting civilization on other star systems.

By guessing that building self-replicating probes

will be possible with future technology,

we're essentially making use of the assumption

'Anything possible in the natural world

can also be done under human control'.

Every living thing is capable of replicating.

Here's a table of some of the smallest replicators

in nature. The smallest seed on earth weighs a billionth of a gram,

and the smallest acorn weighs 1 gram.

Think about it.

An acorn is a solar powered factory for the production of more acorns

that generates large structures in the process: Namely oak trees.

When thinking about the size of our probes,

we need to make a distinction between the self-copying piece

of the system, and the whole object that gets launched,

which may include fuel, rockets for deceleration,

and other equipment.

A reasonable upper limit for the size of the replicators

is 500 tons.

This is the size of the replicator in NASA's self-replicating

lunar factory design, which made very conservative assumptions.

As a lower limit, we can use the design

of Molecular Assembler by Robert Freitas and Ralph Merkle,

from their landmark book 'Kinematic Self-Replicating

Machines', a comprehensive review of self-replicating designs

up until 2004.

The mass of this replicator would be in the order of 10^ -18kg.

For reference, this is about a million times smaller

than a red blood cell.

The data storage on the probe would probably be

of insignificant mass.

An extremely compact design would be a diamond

constructed with carbon 12 and carbon 13.

The two isotopes would encode the bits 0 and 1.

A memory like this would have a capacity

of 6 billion terabytes per gram.

Or we could use a data storage mechanism

with the same compactness as DNA, in the order

of 100 million terabytes per gram.

As a comparison, the total amount of data

in the human world in 2020 could be stored

in about 500 grams of DNA-level storage.

Apart from the replicator, the probe needs fuel to decelerate

when approaching its destination.

Sandberg and Armstrong hypothesized three possible types of fuel

to power the deceleration.

In order of increasing speculativeness and efficiency,

they are: Nuclear fission, nuclear fusion,

and matter-antimatter annihilation.

As you can see in this table, they calculated the mass of fuel

needed, given different deceleration amounts

and type of fuel.

In the table the replicator is assumed to weigh 30 grams.

You can take the 'delta v' column as also indicating

'starting velocities' if the probe then decelerates to zero.

The values in bold are the kilograms of fuel needed,

given the most reasonable combinations of starting velocities

and type of fuel available.

This table doesn't take into account many things

that could aid deceleration, though.

For example, the trajectory of the probe

might be designed to use gravitational assists

to slow down, or magnetic sails could be used to create drag

against the local magnetic field in the destination galaxy.

Moreover, the expansion of the universe

means that some amount of deceleration

will come for free, and probes launch to distant galaxies

would arrive with little velocity.

In that case, we would need fuel only for maneuvering at the end.

There are many other speculative options

to help decelerating, such as the Bussard ramjet,

which uses enormous magnetic fields to collect hydrogen atoms

from the interstellar medium and compress them

to achieve nuclear fusion.

Another potential design choice for the probes

is to equip them with shields.

Intergalactic space is not empty.

The probes might encounter dust, and at relativistic speeds,

collisions can easily destroy our probes.

Another solution is simply to launch redundant probes

to compensate for the fact that some might be destroyed.

Sandberg and Armstrong estimate that for speeds

of 50% to 80% the speed of light launching two probes per galaxy

is enough to expect that at least one will arrive.

If the probes travel at 99% of the speed of light,

then we'd need to launch 40 probes to each galaxy.

The launch phase.

All right, now let's say we've chosen a viable design for the probes.

Their construction has taken little material

compared to the Dyson swarm.

The final combined mass of all the probes,

redundancy included, is in the order of 10^11 to 10^12 kg.

This is about the mass of a mountain.

The Dyson swarm is operational and provides us

with all the energy we need.

It is time to launch the probes.

We'll not use rockets, but a fixed launch system.

Rockets would be needlessly difficult and inefficient

to use for achieving acceleration to relativistic speeds.

They need to carry fuel, which would in turn

need to be accelerated and the fuel needed increases

exponentially with the change of speed we want to achieve.

Fixed launch systems sidestep this and are often reusable.

For example, we could use coilguns.

Essentially long barrels around which coils are arranged

and switched on and off with precise timings,

closing the probe in the barrel to accelerate

due to the magnetic forces generated by the coils.

With coilguns we could shoot our probes

into space in combination or by themselves.

We can also use solar sails accelerated by lasers

or particle beams.

Now look at this table.

For each type of probe and for each type of replicator

you can find in bold the time required to power the launch

if the energy of the Dyson swarm were entirely devoted to the task.

In the case of the 30 gram replicator,

the numbers are insignificant on a human scale.

6 hours of the sun's energy is the maximum we would need.

Instead, if the replicator is the 500 tons version,

we would need hundreds of years of the sun's energy.

But this also looks very feasible if you consider

that humanity might survive millions of years

and over time might divert some energy

of the Dyson swarm to power launches and not necessarily

launch all the probes at once.

After the universe, the galaxy.

Now picture a future President of the Solar System

proclaiming: 'Everyone turn off your virtual reality sets

for 6 hours.

We're taking over the universe!'

The probes are launched to every reachable galaxy,

and the travel begins.

Once this first wave is en route, we can launch a new wave of probes

within the Milky Way at lower speeds.

So we'd start expanding into our own galaxy only

after having started expanding into the wider universe.

Meanwhile, the probes we've launched to other galaxies

will progressively continue to start new civilizations

for the following 10 billion years, and after that

our expansion will be complete.

10 billion years may sound like a lot,

but the universe will last for trillions of years.

Future humanity will have plenty of time to enjoy

even the most distant galaxies.

Armstrong and Sandberg calculated that at speeds

between 50% and 99% of the speed of light,

the probes will reach 116 million to 4 billion galaxies.

The higher the speed, the more galaxies

the probes can reach because the universe is expanding

at an accelerating pace.

And as time passes, an increasingly large number

of galaxies become forever out of reach.

If we can't find a way to sidestep the speed of light limit.

Final considerations.

And now that every step is complete, you know how

to take over the universe.

You don't need to do everything exactly this way, though.

This paper proposed many possible designs

and methods at each step, but there are

certainly many more ways to go.

Moreover, Armstrong and Sandberg used conservative assumptions.

The real designs will probably be better.

The point of the paper was to illustrate

that the feat is in principle, possible with cosmically

insignificant amounts of time and energy.

One additional point motivating the paper

is that since spreading through the universe

doesn't require a lot of resources, that means that the Fermi paradox

is a lot sharper than we imagined.

There are millions of galaxies that could have potentially

reached us by now, and yet we don't see

any alien colonization projects in our local neighborhood.

This could simply mean that there's pretty

much no one else out there.

Or another answer could be the one given

in the grabby aliens videos.

If we could have seen aliens, they would be here now instead of us.

If there are indeed aliens out there, that means our time

to begin expanding into the universe is even more limited

than we previously thought.

Not only is the universe expanding at an accelerating rate,

making more and more galaxies forever out of reach,

but aliens might also be out there grabbing galaxies instead of us.

So what are we waiting for?

Let's go and do it ourselves.

Let's take over

the

universe!