life is prevalent throughout the universe

[marty369]

I have found it very ignorant and arrogant all my life to understand all the people on this planet who think that we are the only life in the universe and that they think that they are intelligent life and right there is a contradiction in terms, i have always known that life is prevalent throughout the universe both intelligent and not so much, think about this, scientists have found fossilised microbial life in asteroids that originated on Mars and came to our planet through processes that have been going on since the beginning of time so for there to be two planets in our itsy bitsy teeny weeny solar system that has life just says it all and shows us just how much life is spread throughout the cosmos not to mention the types of life but not as we know it that occupy the other dimensions of reality

 

[voidpotentialenergy]

We just have no clue about life.
Is it a freak accident? Or a straight line of nothing to life.
Mars samples so far are suspect for life, they are at an order smaller than any life on Earth so those Mars rocks could simply be chemical trails.

Life in our solar system is probably on every planet/moon that it can be because of the exchange of material but it says nothing about life in the rest of the universe.

IMO life is a bit of a freak happening.
Probably just a few solar systems with primitive life in our galaxy or primitive life is on lots of them.

Intelligent life has to fill in so many check boxes, bottle necks and freak events that we could be it.
ET might be not even in our galaxy or even in a close galaxy if life isn't a common thing.

 

[MoretoSee~]

I have found it very ignorant and arrogant all my life to understand all the people on this planet who think that we are the only life in the universe and that they think that they are intelligent life and right there is a contradiction in terms, i have always known that life is prevalent throughout the universe both intelligent and not so much, think about this, scientists have found fossilised microbial life in asteroids that originated on Mars and came to our planet through processes that have been going on since the beginning of time so for there to be two planets in our itsy bitsy teeny weeny solar system that has life just says it all and shows us just how much life is spread throughout the cosmos not to mention the types of life but not as we know it that occupy the other dimensions of reality

Marty: My first post. Your comment is easy to agree with. In fact, I just started this account. One thought came to mind , generated by the wallpaper picture of a beautiful , majestic southwestern panorama, seeing how much it looks like MARS did during our recent, magnificent , color coverage video. What's the difference between the two landscapes? I thought, "water!" Water appears to be the only difference. Thinking of our landing, with the rover and the drone-copter to be used and the extraordinary, engineered technology, proving there is nothing we can not accomplish...and thinking like a 6th-grader in science class asking..., did we think to take some water and tomato seeds?" Continuing, I wondered if the scientists considered it and choose not to, what could have been the reason(s)? And could we not have at least seen if the plant would germinate? And sadly, if this idea is just now being raised, I suggest for our next planned trip, have a 6th-grade, science class weigh in and suggest some new ones.

 

[Dr Suresh Vatsyayann]

Hi
A good topic and simple to deduct.
How the so-called inanimate got converted into animate (RNA, prokaryotes, eukaryotes, then endosymbiosis, especially the mitochondria (prokaryote) getting to live in eukaryotes, then division and propagation into multicellular collections, tissues, organs and systems and the animals and plants formation, generally all being triggered by mutations as a result of extreme devastating ice ages and cataclysmic events, all depicting the struggle of the inanimate to become self-controlling animates ... the recent discovery of another set of prokaryotes entering the eukaryotes that use nitrogen to carry on energy production in the eukaryotes (endosymbiont: ‘Candidatus Azoamicus ciliaticola’) tells us that there is life on millions of planets and their sort as nature has many ways and means to get life going. Moreover, we could not see anything beyond the next-door neighbour a few thousand years ago, and now we see and record billions of light-yers distant neutron stars colliding, etc. We can imagine anything and that would be there somewhere. 3 Billion base pairs of genetic code in DNA would mean, that the DNA could make anything if we can search for it.
Great discussion and topic and I am in, and believe marty369 (near-infinite combinations and permutations out of 3 Billion base pairs) is a smarty, believe it or not!! Love you guys.

 

[Catastrophe]

marty:
"I have found it very ignorant and arrogant all my life to understand all the people on this planet who think that we are the only life in the universe "

Intelligent people on this planet know that there is not yet proof of life outside Planet Earth.
Most (if not all) know that there are conditions under which life might arise, and are keen to hear of any positive information on the subject.

Most (if not all) of us regard blind belief in unsubstantiated assertions as being rather childish and unworthy of our time.

I hope this provides you with some reason for introspection.

Cat

 

[sam85geo]

To quote Fermi: "Where are they"? Alternatively, A weirdly tilted planet dominated by a violent, well armed species indulging in continual mayhem, in a mundane solar system , in a backwater arm of a spiral galaxy would have little to no appeal for alien space explorers/tourists. In the interim, there's no harm in Earthlings wishing/hoping that if any extraterrestrials happen to show up on Earth, they will look like those beautiful women in the Star Trek TV series or of course Mr. Spock.

 

[Catastrophe]

To quote Fermi: "Where are they"? Alternatively, A weirdly tilted planet dominated by a violent, well armed species indulging in continual mayhem, in a mundane solar system , in a backwater arm of a spiral galaxy would have little to no appeal for alien space explorers/tourists. In the interim, there's no harm in Earthlings wishing/hoping that if any extraterrestrials happen to show up on Earth, they will look like those beautiful women in the Star Trek TV series or of course Mr. Spock.

 

[Wolfshadw]

A weirdly tilted planet dominated by a violent,

I wouldn't say "weird". Half the planets in the solar system tilt between 20° and 30°. Two others are WAY off kilter (Venus 177° and Uranus 98°)

well armed species indulging in continual mayhem,

That being a relative term. If they have Gort, we mean nothing to them.

in a mundane solar system

Supposedly, the majority of solar systems are binary or even tri-star systems. Our could be the odd-ball worth looking at.

in a backwater arm of a spiral galaxy

I'd call us "Off the beaten path!"

In the interim, there's no harm in Earthlings wishing/hoping that if any extraterrestrials happen to show up on Earth, they will look like those beautiful women in the Star Trek TV series or of course Mr. Spock.

If we're lucky, we'll get the Greys. If not, the Yautja bringing Xenomorphs for hunting.

-Wolf sends

 

[sam85geo]

Ok! I'll admit Earth's tilt is not weird; just the people. As for Gort, that's my kind of robot, if it shows up I have a "little list of society's offenders, none of whom would be missed". Also, I will lobby my representatives for immigration restrictions on extraterrestrials that don't look like 7of9 or Vulcan beauties, not Romulans; they're too much like us. If one discriminates, it has to be done right.

 

[rod]

Newfound super-Earth alien planet whips around its star every 0.67 days

We keep getting reminders that the Milky Way's planetary diversity dwarfs what we see in our own solar system. Newfound super-Earth alien planet whips around its star every 0.67 days : Read more

forums.space.com

An interesting report to ponder concerning how abundant life may be in the universe.

 

[Catastrophe]

Thank you Rod. That is interesting.

On another tack, are we not going to be bound, for some considerable time, by the fact that we will be finding larger planets (viz gas giants) rather than Earth size (and smaller) planets, purely by the means of detection favouring this?

Cat

 

[rod]

Thank you Rod. That is interesting.

On another tack, are we not going to be bound, for some considerable time, by the fact that we will be finding larger planets (viz gas giants) rather than Earth size (and smaller) planets, purely by the means of detection favouring this?

Cat

Cat, apparently not. There are 21 exoplanets listed with masses 1.2 earth masses or less, some near 0.9 earth masses, at the exoplanet link I cited. http://exoplanet.eu/catalog/

FYI, there are 20 listed at this site too, https://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/index.html

TRAPPIST-1 system has at least 5 reported near earth mass exoplanets.

 

[Catastrophe]

Rod, thank you for that information.

Do you have any data or feeling for the ratio of
Type: outer 4 planets in our SS / Type: inner 4 planets in our Solar System?

Cat

Addendum: that was meant to be totals, not any one system.

 

[rod]

Rod, thank you for that information.

Do you have any data or feeling for the ratio of
Type: outer 4 planets in our SS / Type: inner 4 planets in our Solar System?

Cat

No Cat, just look at the TRAPPIST-1 7 planet system

Copy Of exoplanet_current - stars with multiple planets

CountOfmass_earth
7​

Okay, min is 0.33 earth masses, max is 1.38 earth masses. Exoplanet diversity is astonishing, so is our very habitable Earth teeming with life on it today

 

[Catastrophe]

No Cat, just look at the TRAPPIST-1 7 planet system

Copy Of exoplanet_current - stars with multiple planets

CountOfmass_earth
7​

Okay, min is 0.33 earth masses, max is 1.38 earth masses. Exoplanet diversity is astonishing, so is our very habitable Earth teeming with life on it today

 

[rod]

No, my bad. Min 0.33 earth masses, max 1.38 earth masses at TRAPPIST-1. Astonishing exoplanet diversity is shown and so is the Earth astonishing with habitable and life abundant on it. There is something I learned about exoplanet studies. In real estate I hear location, location, location is important for the sale. Same applies to exoplanets

 

[Catastrophe]

Sorry, I did not get the bit below CountOf mass Earth in the preceding post 14.

 

[Trevize62]

We just have no clue about life.
Is it a freak accident? Or a straight line of nothing to life.
Mars samples so far are suspect for life, they are at an order smaller than any life on Earth so those Mars rocks could simply be chemical trails.

Life in our solar system is probably on every planet/moon that it can be because of the exchange of material but it says nothing about life in the rest of the universe.

IMO life is a bit of a freak happening.
Probably just a few solar systems with primitive life in our galaxy or primitive life is on lots of them.

Intelligent life has to fill in so many check boxes, bottle necks and freak events that we could be it.
ET might be not even in our galaxy or even in a close galaxy if life isn't a common thing.

The dimension of the structures found in Mars rocks do not exclude that could be microfossiles, because this conclusion is based on the aprioristic assumpt that Martian bacteria should be similar to Terran ones.
Note that I am not claiming that these structures are effectively microfossils, but only that their size is not a valid argument to deny a possible biological nature.
Certainly, "alternative" biochemistries could exist only in universes with different chemical/physical laws than ours, but four nucleotides and twenty aminoacids can produce virtually infinite kinds of lifeforms, so we cannot assume that Martian bacteria, if they exist or have existed in the past, would have the same cellular organization than those living on Earth.
There are no biochemical reasons for which Martian cells could not be little, big or bizarre, or in whatever way cannot have a different look than Terran ones.
Also,given the random nature of biological evolution, life may be common in the universe, but complex cognitive habilities could be very rare, so there is a real possibility that we humans may be the only sentient lifeform in our galaxy.

 

[Catastrophe]

VPE:
"Intelligent life has to fill in so many check boxes, bottle necks and freak events that we could be it."

Of course, this suggestion has been seen many times, but it seems to me to have anthropomorphic limitations.
We seem to forget, on the one hand, that we have been here for such a tiny fraction of the life of the Universe (and developed so quickly in comparison) that statistically we (meaning intelligent life) could have developed many times and many places over and maybe spread widely;
but, on the other hand, whilst for these reasons, some intelligent life may be aquatic with limited mechanical communication, or otherwise maybe the enormous distances between stars may never have been overcome by FTL travel (or even FTL communication generally).

Cat

 

[voidpotentialenergy]

The dimension of the structures found in Mars rocks do not exclude that could be microfossiles, because this conclusion is based on the aprioristic assumpt that Martian bacteria should be similar to Terran ones.
Note that I am not claiming that these structures are effectively microfossils, but only that their size is not a valid argument to deny a possible biological nature.
Certainly, "alternative" biochemistries could exist only in universes with different chemical/physical laws than ours, but four nucleotides and twenty aminoacids can produce virtually infinite kinds of lifeforms, so we cannot assume that Martian bacteria, if they exist or have existed in the past, would have the same cellular organization than those living on Earth.
There are no biochemical reasons for which Martian cells could not be little, big or bizarre, or in whatever way cannot have a different look than Terran ones.
Also,given the random nature of biological evolution, life may be common in the universe, but complex cognitive habilities could be very rare, so there is a real possibility that we humans may be the only sentient lifeform in our galaxy.

I agree that life needs not follow earth life to a tee.
We could be a freakish form of life in the universe so we should keep an open mind.

I also agree that life will be in our galaxy and probably in many places on moons around largish planets in the goldilocks zone and not in the goldilocks zone with tidal flexing.

Finding ET might be a very long look and if C is the limit for travel we might never find them and one day visit.
We are early days for a tech society so never say never, we might just be very ignorant of natures real possibilities of life and travel.

 

[voidpotentialenergy]

VPE:
"Intelligent life has to fill in so many check boxes, bottle necks and freak events that we could be it."

Of course, this suggestion has been seen many times, but it seems to me to have anthropomorphic limitations.
We seem to forget, on the one hand, that we have been here for such a tiny fraction of the life of the Universe (and developed so quickly in comparison) that statistically we (meaning intelligent life) could have developed many times and many places over and maybe spread widely;
but, on the other hand, whilst for these reasons, some intelligent life may be aquatic with limited mechanical communication, or otherwise maybe the enormous distances between stars may never have been overcome by FTL travel (or even FTL communication generally).

Cat

I agree the chance for intelligent aquatic life has got to be many many times what it would be for land walking ET

Tough to imagine an Earth/Moon and freak events setup happening very often so i bet if ET exists he/she lives on a moon of a big planet.
Odds for that setup are quite good.
Odds for an Earth/Moon setup pretty poor.

 

[Catastrophe]

VPE
Are you implying that life will be more likely on the moons of gas giants than on terrestrial planets?

Cat

 

[Trevize62]

I agree the chance for intelligent aquatic life has got to be many many times what it would be for land walking ET

Tough to imagine an Earth/Moon and freak events setup happening very often so i bet if ET exists he/she lives on a moon of a big planet.
Odds for that setup are quite good.
Odds for an Earth/Moon setup pretty poor.

I think the occurrence of little planets with huge moons may be much more common that we could think at first sight. Only in our solar system we have Earth/Moon and Pluto/Charon, and for what we are starting to know about the genesis of solar systems the collisions between planets and protoplanets in the beginning of this process could be quite common.
Also, the claim that a big moon could be necessary for the evolution of sentient life seems to me too anthropocentric to be seriously considered.
We have also discovered many gas giants in the Goldilock zone of their stars that could have habitable moons.
So, the places in which complex lifeforms can evolve could be very common in our galaxy.
But the occurrence of sentient life cannot be evaluated in those terms.
In fact, the origin of life is a chemical process, deterministic for its nature, while the evolution is an historical process that happens in a completely random way, resulting from the interaction between genetic variabilty and environmental variables, so we cannot use statistic instruments to estimate if the arise of a sentient species may be common or rare.
Moreover, is also impossible to predict the possibility that a sentient species not living in an aquatic environment could develop a technological civilization,

 

[Catastrophe]

The bottom line is that we have no definite knowledge whatsoever of life other than on Earth.

Everything else is speculation or extravagant imagination.

Cat

 

[voidpotentialenergy]

VPE
Are you implying that life will be more likely on the moons of gas giants than on terrestrial planets?

Cat

The probability of an earthlike world colliding with a mars like world and ending up with a big moon and Earthlike world is not good.
Just a small change in that impact angle and we end up with no world at all.

Maybe a 1 in a million collision then each needs to be left with just the right amount of stuff of the right type of materials going around the right type of star at the right type of distance with freak events that bring water to a planet that formed in a dry location.

See how fast the odds get bad.
To big of a moon and we get gigantic tides and crazy weather, to small and we get a planet that wobbles it's poles making it very difficult for land life to evolve.

Big moons even in our solar system are pretty high in number and well protected and in stable orbits for long term life development.
Put Saturn or Jupiter in the goldilocks zone and we end up with multiple moons with a decent chance with lots of water already.