It's not clear to me why the Fermi paradox should be evidence of an unexpected great filter, as opposed to one that's just hard. Can you explain?
One of the easiest ways to have a hard filter is if it is unexpected. But yes, the Fermi paradox is more generally evidence of a hard filter rather than an unexpected filter by itself.
CSER at Cambridge University joins the others.
Good people involved so far, but the expected output depends hugely on who they pick to run the thing.