00:03for decades scientists have been searching the cosmos for alien civilizations one that often
00:09includes looking for extraterrestrial megastructures ones that would indicate not just intelligent life
00:14but hyper advanced civilizations now a group of researchers is proposing an alternative
00:19saying instead of building megastructures like energy gathering dyson spheres advanced
00:24civilizations might be capturing gigantic objects like planets for utility instead this all comes
00:29as recent estimates of the number of exoplanets continues to grow so far we've only identified
00:34some 5 000 but astronomers now expect billions of planets in our galaxy alone so this new theory
00:40posits that instead of building megastructures to harness the energy around a star or provide
00:44another place for a civilization to live these extraterrestrials could instead grab one of these
00:49high-value exoplanets and bring them closer to their own home then using the planet's resources as a
00:54sort of nearby support center without destroying the rest of the star system with the researchers
00:59writing quote extraterrestrial intelligence could bring in a planet and use it up
01:03kick it out of the system and bring another one
