On a remote island on the Indian coast called North Sentinel, lives a native tribe of about 200 people. According to the estimate of some scientists, the Sentineles have been living on this 72 km2 piece of land for thousands of years, and their way of life has hardly changed since then. There has been very little contact with us (as in this short video where men offer them coconuts) as they refuse all approaches and kill anyone who ventures on their land. India officially renounced contact with them in the 1990s in respect of their desire for isolation. In 2010, the Indian government decided to prohibit approaching the island in order to preserve their culture, and their existence as their immune system is not adapted to our infectious agents.
You’re probably wondering: “What’s going on? We didn’t sign up for an anthropology newsletter”. Actually, we, humans on Earth, could be someone else’s Sentineles… If that’s the case, extraterrestrial humans have already found us. Humans from a civilization so evolved that we’re a primitive tribe to them. We can send as many Voyager probes and build as many SETI as we want, it is very likely forbidden for anyone to approach us. This is a well developed idea in SciFi alike the Star Trek’s Prime Directive: “Do not interfere with the development of other species in the universe as long as they have not managed to travel faster than light”. This theory has actually a scientific name: the Zoo hypothesis! A good keyword if you want to look for books or films that elaborate on this idea. Another plot twist would be, what if there are other humans, on earth, not at all extraterrestrial, so evolved that they have decided not to reveal themselves to us?
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