Fabulous piece here. Very crunchy.

So your opening gambit is a declaration that if we do "X" we will save the Earth and maybe mankind, and during that process we will discover why we are not aware as a culture, that the Universe is full of other intelligent species. X is a veiled depopulation scheme? The Great Simplication/Reset?

You are either brave or crazy to discuss this kind of stuff I'll give you that.

If you will, I'll throw in a few other curve balls to really mix this all up.

The Fermi Paradox? You say "There is a myriad of possible solutions to this question, everything from ‘We are all alone’ to ‘We are too stupid to see them yet, " I say there is currently so much evidence that the Earth is full of other species that a 6th grader can see and know it to be true. Most folks just think that they must not be here because there are no Alien Malls or trash dumps. (Sorry going for some levity here).

I will also address the photo you have used in this piece. The man's sign reads "no intelligent species would destroy their only home and planet!" Yes it's true, but what about another species harvesting resources from a planet that is not their home and doing everything they can to corrupt, bribe and intimidate the local species to do their bidding?

The great filter is probably very true for many planets especially when society is tinkered with by exo-influences. Have you noticed the logarithmic development curve to tech these last few millennium? Seem natural to you? Some would say yes... I'm not so sure. My take on the Great Filter is that it is power based. The ancient stories of the collapse of a few civilizations like the Hindus tales, the bible, Atlantis if you believe in that story, speak of terrible weapons that destroy all in a flash. There is actual documented evidence of exo-interference with ours and Russia's Nuclear Arsenals.

I am guessing that supressed "free" energy development is for our own good because it's never good to give a civilization that has the emotional development of a teenager an ability to create clean unlimited electrical power because as we can see already it will be turned into weapons immediately. The Great Filter indeed. Maybe the great filter is intentionally used on many resource planets to flush and reset.

You state that "The easiest solution to climate change is obvious and painful. It is degrowth on a massive scale, the scaling back of our industrial society to something more in-line with the carrying capacity of our planet. It’s obvious we need to pull the reins on our collective population growth and fossil fuel use lest we completely destroy ourselves."

That is a very brave and fine statement and might be what is taking place right now, however you could remove the word painful and certainly obvious. All things are possible afterall.

Maybe the Good Aliens can help us??? The ones they wrote the bible about. The ones that love us.