Right now we're just alcohol-infused grape juice, not fit to cleanse the palate.

plausable answers.

It generally tries to avoid the first problem of exceeding the speed of light. If our galaxy is 100,000 light years across, that's a long time to get close to anything interesting. Andromeda is the closest galaxy, but it's 200,000 light years to get across, and then you have to get here.

So,the first problem is the incredible distances. Then you have the problem of different evolutions-- what about the silicon based life forms that developed on a waterless world?

Physicists speculate on dimensions and formulae, but writers have far more freedom to speculate whether this world even exists.

Personally, I have no doubt we are not alone in the universe, but we are sort of alone because we can't contact anyone else.

Have aliens seen and ignored us? If so, we are fortunate they got here before the ones who want to eat us or are looking for target practice.

Perhaps in the history of the universe, our race is at the most advanced stage that any life form has been able to reach.

Perhaps we're not.

that may well be correct. We are possibly the most advanced species so far, at least in our galaxy.

Other galaxies are so far away, to the point that some 60% or more are already so far away there is zero chance we could ever go to them, that what's happening in them is meaningless.

Not quite.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Do you have any hard evidence or are your thoughts merely speculation?

That is as likely true that there are millions of stars out there. As someone who has studied the galaxy and'
the stars in our galaxy...keep in mind there are many galaxies, not just the "Milky Way".

...So in our galaxy millions of stars, and ours is the only one with intelligent life that has advanced this far?

...I would think not...Is our "SUN" the only star to have planets with "intelligent life" I would think not..

Now everyone has a point of view on this, and I have mine. With millions of stars out there, are we the only
intelligent life around?. I think not...(AND YES THERE ARE MILLIONS OF STARS OUT THERE!)

Have the aliens visiited us?...Perhaps they have. If they are that far advanced that they can "visit us" then, the aliens
can also hide the fact that they are here. With millions of stars, are we the only ..."Intelligent Life" around?
...By deduction, I have concluded that the answer is..."NO"

LOOK AT THE ORGINAL POST...If you were able to go back 500 years, and talk to somebody about present day inventions
and incredible progress...What would that person likely say about you and your ............."TALK"...

i BELIEVE THAT THERE ARE MILLIONS OF STARS OUT THERE, AND WE ARE NOT THE ONLY INTELLIGENT LIFE..
AND THAT SOMEWHRE OUT THERE, THERE IS "INTELLIGENT LIFE" THAT HAS ADVANCED 500 YEARS AHEAD OF
US,... AND YES, THEY HAVE COME TO VISIT AND TAKEN A LOOK, AND SAID (IN THEIR LANGUAGE)
"NOT THESE BEINGS...TOO DANGEROUS..".iF THE ALIENS COULD MAKE IT HERE, THEY WOULD BE ABLE TO HIDE THEMSELVES ENOUGH, (BECAUSE OF THEIR 500 YEARS AHEAD OF US) TO TAKE A LOOK, FIND OUT ABOUT US
AND GET AWAY VERY FAST.. BECAUSE WE (BEINGS ON PLANET EARTH)...ARE JUST TOO DANGEROUS

Oh I forgot something very important.."Thank You for reading this MY HAT is off to you for getting this far...............

Think hard about just how old the universe is, and the odds of a technological civilization lasting any great length of time.

Even within our one galaxy, interstellar distances are such that it's probably completely impossible to travel to other stars, other than with generation ships. Between galaxies? Are you serious?

And, while at this point pretty much every single star we look at has planets (My Son The Astronomer is doing exoplanet research), the conditions in the center of the galaxy would probably make potential living conditions on planets there difficult at best. And keep in mind that the majority of stars, as in 85%, in this galaxy are red dwarfs, that means conditions on any planet in the habitable zone of a red dwarf would be very different that on our planet. Which means life, if it actually starts (and that's another huge unknown) would no doubt evolve vastly differently from the way it did here.

I also offer this to think about intelligent life. What if it evolves on a Jupiter? They might never make it to the upper edge of that atmosphere and see that there's a whole lot other stuff out there. Or on a Europa, a planet covered in ice? They'd have no clue there is anything else out there. Or if their vision evolves in a way that they simply don't see stars. Or somehow have no curiosity about the rest of the universe, are content to stay home and produce great works of their art and literature?

In short, I can think of a lot of reasons why intelligent life might well evolve, but never even try to visit us.

But I honestly think that the possibility of actual overlap of at least two technological civilizations is vanishingly small.

Getting here: portals.

Having anything to do us: they seeded this planet. Genetic adjustments have been made, which is what the abductions are about. The adjustments are already starting to show changes, one of which is a less violent version of us.

and picking up their poop and they figured the dogs were in charge.

that cars are the dominant life form.

God created a puppy for His House, and it started running around crapping on His floors and chewing up His shoes and it got so bad He just doesn't want to deal with it.

No species lasts forever. Around a million years is a pretty good run. Eventually, a species passes away. And please don't bring up the rare species that have lasted a lot longer, because none of them (things like horseshoe shrimp, lamprey, jellyfish) are not evolving in the direction of intelligence.

Also, the Universe is over 13 billion years old, which is a vastly long time, at least compared to how long humans have been around. So even if intelligent species evolve regularly and go on to create a complex, industrial civilization like ours, it may well be that they simply blow themselves up sooner rather than later, or destroy their planet as we are happily doing. A few thousand years isn't a lot of time. The odds of even two overlapping in time is close to zero.

You also need to think about the precise conditions needed to start life in the first place, and how unusual it may well be for life to get past single cell. On Earth, even though the first life showed up at least 4 billion years ago, it wasn't until 600 million years ago that the first multicellular life evolved. It may not be inevitable. It may well take extremely good luck, as well as a moon like the one we have, which among other things stabilizes our rotation.

But even if my skepticism is wrong, as Treasonous Bastard has pointed out, the vast interstellar distances are probably a permanent barrier. Physicists are pretty certain the the speed of light cannot be exceeded. And for all the blithe assumptions that we can use mythical wormholes to travel vast differences very fast, well even if wormholes are discovered to actually exist, it would probably not be possible to survive getting in one.

If we were to build a ship that could travel at 99% c, the speed of light, you need to remember that space is filled with LOTS of deadly radiation. And, guess what? The faster you travel out in space, the worse it would be, because you would be exposed to all that radiation in a relatively short time. Right now we couldn't possibly shield a ship to make travel that fast possible, although developing very advanced radiation shielding may well be possible. To learn a whole lot more, I highly recommend How To Die In Space by Paul M. Sutter. It's amazing. And funny.

My Son The Astronomer tells me that astronomers are inclined to think we may be pretty much the first advanced civilization around.

...US, as we have evolved in the future.

So the Aliens are actually US from the future, as going-back-in Time Travelers.

So the UFOs/UAP are Time Travel devices, NOT space ships from distant Alien Galaxies.

On the History Channel.

So it must be true, right?

Case closed.

we don't notice because we lack the capability and the "aliens" either don't notice us or simply do not care as humans of no consequence from the "aliens" perspective.

Sometimes to amuse myself, I conceive of Earth and life upon Earth as cosmic athlete's foot in a being we cannot comprehend.

Humans tend to anthropomorphize potential "aliens" (and "gods" as well).

....which is in general agreement with the op.

"Any sufficiently advanced civilization is indistinguishable from magic".
Arthur C. Clarke

I don't care how much research you do, it is research born and developed on Earth. While there is no direct proof, there is also no direct proof they do not exist.
The fact of the matter is there is not enough knowledge gained throughout the history of mankind to explain away "magic".

Based upon the limited knowledge I personally have, I would say the odds fall in the favor of extraterrestrial life at about 99%. I believe there is maybe, and I repeat maybe a 1% chance the universe is devoid of any other life but our own.

While a lot of people may think they know everything, their everything may sound like an infant uttering its first words to a civilization that, as the op put it, could be more advanced than humans by a mere 500 years, much less thousands or millions of years.

ALSO: "If you were in charge of an alien species, or on the governing board of that species, would you give orders to
avoid the ..."Planet Earth" for obvious reasons"

.... of a joke I have told here before. I thought about the possibility of an alien race making the decision too send a delegation to Earth. This might be a joke, but since we cannot prove nor disprove the existence of extraterrestrial life, the joke itself could possibly be a reason for total avoidance. "Oh, pardon us. Wrong address".🤔🪐✨✨✨✨✨👀

A race of aliens visits earth one day; they come in peace and surprisingly, they speak English. Obviously all of the heads of government and religious leaders want to speak to the aliens so they set up a meeting with our new visitors. When it's the pope's turn, he asks: "Do you know about our lord and savior Jesus Christ?" "You mean J.C?", responds the alien. "yeah we know him he's the greatest isn't he? He swings by every year to make sure that we are doing ok". Surprised, the pope follows up with "He visits every year?! It's been over 2 millenia and we're still waiting for his SECOND coming!" The alien sees that the pope has become irate at this fact and starts trying to rationalize "Maybe he likes our chocolate better than yours?" The pope retorts "Chocolates? What are you talking about? What does that have to do with anything?" The alien says "Yea, when he FIRST visited our planet we gave him a huge box of chocolates. Why? What did you guys do?"

I think there are a lot of truths contained in it.

That joke has been one of my favorites for years.

He saw a black op chart (agency unknown) w/his name on it and the acronym: AAAIPF (alien android artificial intelligence project failure) - Status: Escaped.

Project mission: Create anatomically functionally correct human-like stable genius capable of hiding in plain sight. Superpower Capabilities: Mind melds w/susceptible humans by taking advantage of evolutionary DNA-programmed brain errors in judgment, intelligence, mission critical thinking skills. Furthermore, he must be incapable of shame in the creation of said cult-like members, being able to promote fear, stress, and chaos in humans, capable of inciting the violent tendencies of humans who enjoy hobbies connected to weapons, and capable of defrauding humans of life, liberty, and the honest pursuit of happiness.

Flaws: Major comprehension issues of written language; degenerative word salad speech; evidence of kinetic and balance issues (imperfect propioception, episodes of arm flapping; Orange Men Can't Dance); multiple organ system failures (requires Depends), minor synthetic skin tone and hair implant issues, not immune to novel pathogens, errors in response to chemical hormonal homeostasis processes to fear and love, energy efficiency, and nutritive metabolism. Requires constant security and supervision as would a good parent of a child in order to maximize greatest effect.

Recommendation: Urgently locate with caution and compassionately detain, incarcerate and/or euthanize this clear and present danger. This is not, repeat, not a human. This specially created alien life form did not pass human prescribed quality control testing in our strictest secure laboratory location.