By some accounts we should probably be desperately hoping we are alone in the universe (at least with regards to technological civilizations), since it would mean the Great Filter is behind us rather than ahead. The alternative being we're very likely to go extinct before we get a chance to colonize the galaxy, and since that could probably be done using synthetic biology developed within the relatively near future, that would give our civilization an expected lifetime of less than a few hundred years at most. The more life that exists close to or surpassing our own level of development, the more bleak the future looks for our civilization.