>So just looking at the timelines involved it seems like the origin of life wasn't the hard part. The OP twitter thread has a very interesting counterargument

>So just looking at the timelines involved it seems like the origin of life wasn't the hard part. The OP twitter thread has a very interesting counterargument to this point in your article: >Life emerged fairly early on Earth: evidence that it is easy and common? Not so fast: if you need multiple hard steps to evolve an observer to marvel at it, then on those super-rare worlds where observers show up life statistically tend to be early. At least this does just amplify your conclusion, that intelligent life is more likely to be exceedingly rare rather than die out prematurely.