Overview

• Astrophysicist Dr Robin Corbet of UMBC, based at NASA Goddard, proposes that many extraterrestrial civilizations plateau near current human capabilities.
• The hypothesis argues such societies lack the means or motivation for galaxy-spanning projects or long-duration high-power beacons, limiting obvious technosignatures.
• Corbet contends detection could still come via unintentional radio leakage as telescope sensitivity improves, though any contact might be underwhelming technologically.
• Experts challenged the premise as anthropomorphic, with Prof Michael Garrett favoring a post-biological scenario in a forthcoming Acta Astronautica paper.
• SETI policy scholar Prof Michael Bohlander pointed to unexplained aerial phenomena as a possible empirical avenue, though no new detections were reported.