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Old 01-22-2016, 03:45 PM  
Paul Markham
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Join Date: Jun 2001
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It depends on what one calls intelligent. Homo erectus, Neanderthals, Australopithecus, were all intelligent. They used tools. Like chimps to today.

To reach where we are now from the beginning of life with a brain took 600 million years. It's only been in the last 110 years that we developed flight, 55 years ago we first went into space. And if we carry on destroying the planet at this rate, we'll be gone in a few hundred years.

Lots of archeologists spend decades searching for signs of early hominids and the sum total of their discoveries wouldn't fill the average dustbin. Dinosaurs, who lived for millions of years, bones can be bought on Ebay because they're so plentiful.

Maybe we would find buildings of our level intelligent life. More likely we would find their equivalent of a dinosaur. A creature not intelligent enough to destroy itself.

As for visiting Earth, think about the cost of putting a man on Mars and the profitable return. The money required to put a man or spacecraft into the next solar system puts it all into perspective. It's on par with a Neanderthal building a car.
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