21–30 of 161 posts
I don't understand. They say the observable universe contains 10x more galaxies than previously thought, and the reason for that is the concentration of galaxies being greater in the part of the universe that our telescopes can't see?
And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) That's entire galaxies. Not just stars, and that's just the observable universe. We are still being surprised by the lifeforms we observe here on Earth, and the environments and conditions they can thrive in (including the outer hulls of our spacecraft), and we still have yet to discover and catalog all the life on our planet. Life may even com…
Until we actually observe it, no, we can't be sure; the probability of it existing is high simply due to the sheer amount of dice rolls there are in the universe, but the likelihood of us observing it is low. We already know there is and was no intelligent life in our solar system besides what's on Earth; there's still hopes of finding traces of microbial life on Mars and maybe that ice moon. But unless we get a signal from far away (what the SETI project has been scanning for for decades now), we'll not find evidence of alien life in this generation.
I also doubt humanity will find a way to travel fast enough to get to another solar system within a human lifespan. If we do, it'll probably involve bending the fabric of space-time and the Great Old Ones will return from Beyond the Observable Universe and will start eating us.
And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) That's entire galaxies. Not just stars, and that's just the observable universe. We are still being surprised by the lifeforms we observe here on Earth, and the environments and conditions they can thrive in (including the outer hulls of our spacecraft), and we still have yet to discover and catalog all the life on our planet. Life may even com…
> And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) Until we actually observe it, no, we can't be sure; the probability of it existing is high simply due to the sheer amount of dice rolls there are in the universe, but the likelihood of us observing it is low. We already know there is and was no intelligent life in our solar system besides what's on Earth; there's still hopes of finding traces…
We do not know all that was on Earth. We wouldn't have known about dinosaurs if we didn't chance upon their remains, and we only recently learned that they had feathers.
There is probably no way to know everything that has happened on this planet.
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And that brings another facet of the point in the GP:
It's not just the distances between different planets that hinders life from meeting other life; even life on the very same planet is prevented by vast periods of time from ever encountering each other.
And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) That's entire galaxies. Not just stars, and that's just the observable universe. We are still being surprised by the lifeforms we observe here on Earth, and the environments and conditions they can thrive in (including the outer hulls of our spacecraft), and we still have yet to discover and catalog all the life on our planet. Life may even com…
mankind has been extremely lucky with our environments, among others: - Jupiter & Saturn pick out most of the comets, so we encounter massive reset only very rarely - thanx to hitting other planet long time ago, we have a spinning molten metal core inside planet generating magnetic shield for all nasty radiation - moon gives us tides & stability - our sun is just the right size and age to be stable - we're located at…
Mars lost its magnetic field long ago, but it had one once.
Venus, well, it's an acid rain oven but it could have been different.
Both could have had conditions for life (as we know it) once.
And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) That's entire galaxies. Not just stars, and that's just the observable universe. We are still being surprised by the lifeforms we observe here on Earth, and the environments and conditions they can thrive in (including the outer hulls of our spacecraft), and we still have yet to discover and catalog all the life on our planet. Life may even com…
> And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) Until we actually observe it, no, we can't be sure; the probability of it existing is high simply due to the sheer amount of dice rolls there are in the universe, but the likelihood of us observing it is low. We already know there is and was no intelligent life in our solar system besides what's on Earth; there's still hopes of finding traces…
The next solar system is only four lightyears away. Given the will to break nuclear test ban treaties we think we could develop nuclear pulse propulsion drives that achieve about 10% the speed of light. Even after accounting for acceleration and deceleration that gets us there in a human lifespan.
Granted, even at that speed generational ships make a lot of sense, and the selection of targets is still somewhat limited. But we can get to our neighbouring solar systems in "reasonable" time if we want to, with very doable development effort
And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) That's entire galaxies. Not just stars, and that's just the observable universe. We are still being surprised by the lifeforms we observe here on Earth, and the environments and conditions they can thrive in (including the outer hulls of our spacecraft), and we still have yet to discover and catalog all the life on our planet. Life may even com…
> And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) Until we actually observe it, no, we can't be sure; the probability of it existing is high simply due to the sheer amount of dice rolls there are in the universe, but the likelihood of us observing it is low. We already know there is and was no intelligent life in our solar system besides what's on Earth; there's still hopes of finding traces…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Me, I think there is no life beyond Earth. > How, when given the evidence of practically infinite planets out there (considering that almost every star may have at least one planet, and there are even rogue planets [0] that don't orbit any star, and that asteroids and comets or even dense nebulas could also harbor life), can we even consider the possibility that this is the only planet with life? Who gives a shit? If…
One could flip your argument and say defining life as purely organic is a failure of imagination. The thing about searching for "life" over "intelligence" is that life doesn't necessarily need to be intelligent for it to be interesting. I also think the SETI example you've made is a tad unfair because their process dictates that their search be for intelligence (crudely put, radio transmissions). Whereas when you're…
And some people still aren’t sure if there is other life beyond Earth. :) That's entire galaxies. Not just stars, and that's just the observable universe. We are still being surprised by the lifeforms we observe here on Earth, and the environments and conditions they can thrive in (including the outer hulls of our spacecraft), and we still have yet to discover and catalog all the life on our planet. Life may even com…
"Are we alone in the universe?" she asked.
"Yes," said the Oracle.
"So there's no other life out there?"
"There is. They're alone too."