Originally Posted by 3rdvogon

There is nothing anthropocentric about saying that a species simply has not advanced sufficiently to indulge in interstellar travel - either they have achieved the necessary level of technology or they have not. If not then they are not going to be around here any time soon.

As for saying they have not "budgeted" for it whilst I may be using a human fiscal expression that is simply a "shorthand" way of stating the obvious that interstellar travel will require the allocation of resources (probably considerable resources) regardless of the type of species and whatever passes for culture among them. Starships don't come for free, regardless of whether you are humanoid, insectoid, hive intelligence or any other type of multi-cellular lifeform. Therefore it is quite possible that any such species may well choose to use those resources for other purposes (purposes that we humans might find difficult to comprehend) than sending some of its biological components on a journey of many light years. There is nothing anthropocentric about that either, just that for any complex organism considering insterstellar colonisation "there is no free lunch".