Energy Competition–Redundancy Erosion: Explaining the Fermi Paradox and the Great Filter

The Fermi paradox asks: if technological civilizations are common, why has no sign of any such civilization ever been observed? A qualitative "Energy Competition-Redundancy Erosion" (ECRE) model is proposed, providing an endogenous dynamical mechanism for the brevity and isolation of technological civilizations. The model rests on three axioms and two core assumptions. Its core mechanism is that competitive pressure drives systems to actively erode redundancy, pushing total energy consumption toward the available energy ceiling. When redundancy falls below a critical threshold, a moderate disturbance can trigger a fast cascading collapse. Under these constraints, technological civilizations have difficulty maintaining long‑term homeostasis and interstellar expansion faces systemic limits. Roman civilization and the 2008 financial crisis serve as mechanistic illustrations. Four testable qualitative predictions are offered: modern collapse would be much faster than ancient collapse; stable interstellar‑expanding civilizations are very rare; ultra‑large‑scale projects such as Dyson spheres are unlikely to exist; and civilizations tend to be locked into their home star systems. The model provides a self‑consistent structural explanation for the Fermi paradox and serves as a new analytical tool, not a final answer.