this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2025
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Actually a very cool article, thanks for the share
The final quote that you *helpfully added in is great.
I once read an offhand remark online that said effectively "if Dark matter was real and dark energy was real, we could observe that energy being used by life but we don't"
Strikingly astute observation imo.
Edit: they went on to extrapolate that they don't believe it is possible to harvest energy from quantum vacuum fluctuations for the same reason. Something alive would have done it already
There are tons of phenomena or technologies that exist but aren't used by life. The most famous is probably the wheel (with an axel, rolling a whole body doesn't count, nor does cellular machinery).
As far as I know no living thing has selected for transmitting or receiving radio frequency radiation, ~~nor X-rays or gamma rays.~~ [Edit: eventually and with no useful guidance I managed to find This. Note how I linked it so others can learn about it. Still didn't find anything for RF. End edit.] (I'm sure electric eels and such put out some RF, but only as a side effect. They aren't using it for communication or sensing for example)
RF is pretty low on the EM totem pole when it comes to energy. There's plenty of IR to use, which is just above RF... and it's available 24/7.
Sure. But RF can go through dense bush or a forest even better than audio if it's high enough power - and without alerting any non-RF animals like audio would.
Or imagine animals with actual radar for finding prey. IR is good for that (I know snakes use it) but again radio could penetrate cover, and yet nothing uses it like that.
The main point though, is that RF exists despite non-use by life (excluding human technology of course). The same likely applies to dark matter and dark energy whatever they end up being.
OTOH (I was just reading the other day), cats can't even see red (looks grey to them) ... only green and blue. Looks as though higher-freq visible light worked just fine for Feliformia. The organs/antennae needed to send and/or receive RF would be highly ungainly for speedy smaller predatory mammals.
Who knows - maybe some of the dinosaurs -did- use RF?! High EMF from solar CME's might have burned out their receptors.
Heh, that would be neat. Maybe that's what stegosaurus plates were: a MIMO array.