Academic literature on the topic 'Kardashev scale'

Abstract “Phrenology in Space: Legacies of Scientific Racism in Classifying Extraterrestrial Intelligence” traces parallels between the foundational assumptions embedded within two seemingly unassociated debates on intelligence: nineteenth century racialized “science” and contemporary SETI science. Although vastly separated by time and space, this chapter argues that like phrenology (the now-discredited practice of measuring skulls to determine mental traits, especially intelligence), current mainstream typologies on extraterrestrial intelligence also apply selective evidence within ethnocentric models. It focuses specifically on Fermi’s Paradox, the Drake Equation, the Great Filter, and the Kardashev Scale. It discusses the ways in which their axiomatic tenets exclude Indigenous and other non-Western ways of knowing, as well as limit broader imaginaries regarding the nature of extraterrestrial intelligent life. It proposes a “civilizational cancer” metaphorical framework to describe development of self-destructive behaviors of unbounded expansionism in a planetary society, providing an alternative approach for resolving Fermi’s Paradox.