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Yes, there must be a lot of Earth-mass rocky planets out there in habitable zones. Twenty years ago I'd have said we just don't know. There may've been some rea
by abecedarius 9y ago
Yes, there must be a lot of Earth-mass rocky planets out there in habitable zones. Twenty years ago I'd have said we just don't know. There may've been some real progress too on figuring out the origin of life, but our knowledge is still compatible with almost all potentially-habitable planets being lifeless -- it wouldn't badly contradict what we know so far (afaik) and would explain why we haven't seen any advanced aliens taking stars apart, etc.
- opportune 9y agoWell, I think you're assuming intelligent life must be common given that life is common. I'm of the opinion that life in general is pretty common, but that intelligent life is very uncommon, possibly unique. I'm basing this assumption on the fact that life has existed on Earth for ~4b years but intelligent life has only existed for about ~40,000 years, depending on when you consider humanity to have become "intelligent."
- abecedarius 9y agoNot assuming that -- I'm just uncertain. I was arguing against "life must be common" but not arguing for "life must be uncommon". I think your scenario is plausible, though I wouldn't want to bet that way -- octopuses are very distant relatives of us.