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We can find alien life within 25 years, claims astrophysicist


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25 minutes ago, astrobeing said:

You think those are very extreme environments? Take a look at the typical environments of, well, any other planet in our solar system. Extreme heat, extreme cold, extreme temperature changes, extreme pressures, extreme radiation, scalding chemicals, and every imaginable condition destructive to life as we know it. Those are the kinds of planets that our universe produces mostly.

But not exclusively.

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11 minutes ago, Piney said:

Didn't he factor in currents? 

......don't hit me....:unsure2:

Why do you always spoil the fun?

:angry:

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22 minutes ago, Abramelin said:

A guy was about to cross a river. According to statistics he had read about beforehand the river was on avarage 3 feet deep. The guy, who couldn't swim, was 6 feet tall.

He drowned.

Yes, I've found that most people know next to nothing about statistics beyond gambling. That's why we have to take statistic classes in college to get engineering degrees.

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Just now, astrobeing said:

Yes, I've found that most people know next to nothing about statistics beyond gambling. That's why we have to take statistic classes in college to get engineering degrees.

I did. Looong ago.

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10 minutes ago, Trelane said:

But not exclusively.

Learn about the history of Earth. You'll discover that this planet has gone through a series of fortuitous changes that are unlikely to ever happen again. The laws of the universe are not friendly to the formation of life.

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@astrobeing

We don't know how life was formed from inorganic matter. Scientists throw up all kinds of educated ideas, but that's all they got to offer.

Not until we find alien life forms will we know more about it.

Statistics? Statistics using what facts? There are none.

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2 minutes ago, astrobeing said:

Learn about the history of Earth. You'll discover that this planet has gone through a series of fortuitous changes that are unlikely to ever happen again. The laws of the universe are not friendly to the formation of life.

Oh no, I do agree. The Earth certainly has had several factors that allowed life to begin and develop.  The gas giants acting as magnets for asteroids and comets, sparing us from many impacts. The wonderful moon of ours that has also contributed to the evolution of life. Most definitely or glorious sun and the life-giving benefits it provides as well. All very unique and quite possibly a one off.

However, we simply don't know if this an outlier based off of our limited knowledge of rocky planets that are inside the goldilocks zone of their respective stars of similar sequence.

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5 minutes ago, Abramelin said:

@astrobeing

 

Statistics? Statistics using what facts? There are none.

EXACTLY!!! With no information we can't say anything about the likelihood of extraterrestrial life or the unlikelihood of extraterrestrial life.

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2 minutes ago, Trelane said:

Oh no, I do agree. The Earth certainly has had several factors that allowed life to begin and develop.  The gas giants acting as magnets for asteroids and comets, sparing us from many impacts. The wonderful moon of ours that has also contributed to the evolution of life. Most definitely or glorious sun and the life-giving benefits it provides as well. All very unique and quite possibly a one off.

However, we simply don't know if this an outlier based off of our limited knowledge of rocky planets that are inside the goldilocks zone of their respective stars of similar sequence.

These factors are better understood as a series of events that happened to our planet. There's nothing that suggests that these events had to happen other than the planet cooling. Scientists still can't agree about where all the water came from, and the explanation of how we got our nitrogen (highly neutral) atmosphere seems weak to me.

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15 minutes ago, astrobeing said:

EXACTLY!!! With no information we can't say anything about the likelihood of extraterrestrial life or the unlikelihood of extraterrestrial life.

So, there could be alien life out there.

But personally, I think that if life was able to evolve on our planet from...what?... then there is a fat chance it was able to evolve on a couple of the zillions of other planets swirling around their suns.

Maybe you think there's a chance we are unique, but I don't think so.

Maybe life is as unique as diamonds. Rare, but there.

Edited by Abramelin
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8 minutes ago, Abramelin said:

So, there could be alien life out there.

Or there might not be. As you learned in statistics, in the absence of evidence both statements are equally valid.

9 minutes ago, Abramelin said:

But personally, I think that if life was able to evolve on our planet from...what?... then there is a fat chance it was able to evolve on a couple of the zillions of other planets swirling around their suns.

OK, say life popped up on another planet somewhere. That's just the first hurdle. Now it needs to stay alive long enough to evolve which isn't easy for many reasons. The main problem is that life consumes all available resources and fills its environment with waste products making it harder to obtain necessary resources. When those resources are consumed, all life on the planet will die. The life on our own planet nearly met that fate but incredibly another kind of life suddenly appeared that consumed the waste product and converted it back into a resource for the older life. The formation of the oxygen cycle narrowly prevented life on Earth from extermination.

There is absolutely no reason that an oxygen cycle (or the many other cycles in our environment) had to form. It was by pure chance that it happened before all terrestrial life killed itself. That is just one of many strokes of luck this planet has had that you'll learn about when you learn about the history of life on our planet. They make it increasingly hard to imagine that other planets had such luck.

20 minutes ago, Abramelin said:

Maybe you think there's a chance we are unique, but I don't think so.

There is a chance that we are unique no matter what you think. We've been told our entire lives that there just has to be other life in the universe gosh darn it. There is no evidence to support this claim.

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2 minutes ago, astrobeing said:

There is absolutely no reason that an oxygen cycle (or the many other cycles in our environment) had to form.

Life can exist without oxygen. We have life forms here on earth that are not dependent on oxygen.

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3 minutes ago, Abramelin said:

Life can exist without oxygen. We have life forms here on earth that are not dependent on oxygen.

DUDE! For crying out loud, I just explained that originally the only kind of life on Earth produced oxygen as a waste product! Of course it didn't need oxygen! Oxygen was killing that form of life!!! Only later on life which consumed oxygen fortuitously appeared saving life on Earth from extinction.

Please read about (and understand) The Great Oxidation Event. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxidation_Event

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4 minutes ago, astrobeing said:

There is a chance that we are unique no matter what you think. We've been told our entire lives that there just has to be other life in the universe gosh darn it. There is no evidence to support this claim.

Of course there is a chance we are unique. But I think that chance is infinitely small. Why do you think we, or life forms in general could be unique? Just because no alien life forms have been detected up to now? Maybe because we don't know what signs to be looking for? We search for signs of life similar to life signs on earth. And it's my guess that that is narrowing down the search too much.

 

Ok. This is what I expect will happen one day: scientists create life from inorganic matter. Maybe with the help of artificial intelligence.

And only thèn will we know what signs to search for.

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2 minutes ago, astrobeing said:

DUDE! For crying out loud, I just explained that originally the only kind of life on Earth produced oxygen as a waste product! Of course it didn't need oxygen! Oxygen was killing that form of life!!! Only later on life which consumed oxygen fortuitously appeared saving life on Earth from extinction.

Please read about (and understand) The Great Oxidation Event. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxidation_Event

Sorry, missed that one. I'm also busy posting in a totally different topic.

And I do know about the oxidation event.

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1 hour ago, astrobeing said:

Learn about the history of Earth. You'll discover that this planet has gone through a series of fortuitous changes that are unlikely to ever happen again. The laws of the universe are not friendly to the formation of life.

The laws of the universe are about infinitely large numbers.

What you consider 'fortuitous changes' may be rule.

And so we can dance along till the end of time.

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2 hours ago, astrobeing said:

You think those are very extreme environments? Take a look at the typical environments of, well, any other planet in our solar system. Extreme heat, extreme cold, extreme temperature changes, extreme pressures, extreme radiation, scalding chemicals, and every imaginable condition destructive to life as we know it. Those are the kinds of planets that our universe produces mostly.

Let me mention Jupiter's moon Europa. It is not a planet, but in any case it is a very interesting object in the space. I don't believe that a conditions in the ocean below ice sheet on this moon are anywhere near as extreme as, say, in the sulfur pools at Yellowstone Park.

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Honestly panspermia is more likely than not. Why else would tardigrades and viruses be adapted to make it through space? There is no way that all of space is full of matter and it is acting differently here than everywhere else. Life is too resilient.

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Just now, Nnicolette said:

Honestly panspermia is more likely than not. Why else would tardigrades and viruses be adapted to make it through space? There is no way that all of space is full of matter and it is acting differently here than everywhere else. Life is too resilient.

Also wasn't earth involved in a collision of two bodies? Maybe the water- earth mixture is a random freak occurrence. But that also means space bodies are out there swapping materials.

 

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3 hours ago, Trelane said:

...and Flint, MI.

Camden, NJ.......Their water is also worse.....

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2 hours ago, astrobeing said:

Or there might not be. As you learned in statistics, in the absence of evidence both statements are equally valid.

OK, say life popped up on another planet somewhere. That's just the first hurdle. Now it needs to stay alive long enough to evolve which isn't easy for many reasons. The main problem is that life consumes all available resources and fills its environment with waste products making it harder to obtain necessary resources. When those resources are consumed, all life on the planet will die. The life on our own planet nearly met that fate but incredibly another kind of life suddenly appeared that consumed the waste product and converted it back into a resource for the older life. The formation of the oxygen cycle narrowly prevented life on Earth from extermination.

There is absolutely no reason that an oxygen cycle (or the many other cycles in our environment) had to form. It was by pure chance that it happened before all terrestrial life killed itself. That is just one of many strokes of luck this planet has had that you'll learn about when you learn about the history of life on our planet. They make it increasingly hard to imagine that other planets had such luck.

There is a chance that we are unique no matter what you think. We've been told our entire lives that there just has to be other life in the universe gosh darn it. There is no evidence to support this claim.

And solar flares wipe out anything in the "Goldilocks Zone" around red dwarfs.

I think there is life out there. Just not technological because we are a first generation rocky planet with metals around a unusually quiet yellow sun. You would also need just the right amount of oxygen for fire to develop said technology. Too much or too little and you would have no fire or uncontrollable fire.

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16 hours ago, astrobeing said:

Both are statistically possible, and with absolutely no evidence to show that one is more likely we have to assume (at this point) that they're equality as likely.

In fact it's even possible that it's more likely that there would be no life anywhere in the universe and our Earth beat tremendous odds.

We are so special.  I disagree, it is more likely we are just so isolated we have no way of knowing and too far out for anyone who might to come looking.

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22 hours ago, Piney said:

I always wondered if "island giantism" and a lower gravity would cause ocean moons to have huge organisms. Like "The Kelp" which lived in the entire ocean of Frank Herbert's fictional planet Pandora.

There could be large clouds or structures of matter in the universe that interact in such a way that intelligence and even consciousness is formed similar to that of our ow brain. But it does not qualify as life in our defenition of life.

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