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I'd never seek to deprive anyone of entertaining alien-life theories, but in general people wildly underestimate the factors that play into making Earth habitab

I'd never seek to deprive anyone of entertaining alien-life theories, but in general people wildly underestimate the factors that play into making Earth habitable. The only evidence for a habitable planet-type is the very precise conditions that comprise this one. Worse, it's unclear as to how much those conditions rely on the complete configuration of the greater solar system.

iamgopal 2y ago
While your argument is true, I would guess aliens will be quite a lot different than anything we know on this earth. Even different in so called life and death cycles, or even in the very definition of what we can call alive and dead. We should much broaden our search scope.
- zdragnar 2y ago
  Water is practically a miracle in itself. Reasonable range between freezing and boiling, simple structure, polar solvent and non-flammable. The hydrogen bonds allow lots of interesting processes, and it gets used in many many foundational biological functions as hydroxyl groups. The chemistry of such a simple molecule is difficult if not impossible to replace, and if you have it, the processes that we are familiar with are already efficient enough that there wouldn't be an advantage to not using them. Is it possibly there are configurations of life, such as not using either DNA or RNA? Sure. Is it likely that we wouldn't recognize that it is life? I doubt it very much. Aside from virii which likely devolved from living things rather than forming along side them, it's not hard to make a distinction at all.
  - pockmarked19 2y ago
    It’s also magnetic, making MRIs (and floating frogs) possible.
- mrangle 2y ago
  Forgetting that we just leapt over the fact that the conditions of this planet are the only-evidence for the genesis of Life, and went straight to evolution, and while you logic is sound in theory, I'd again point to the probable fact that the necessary conditions for Life are massively underestimated. Perhaps mostly in terms of genesis, but also sustainability and even given theoretical evolutionary differences for hypothetical aliens. But genesis is really the only discussion that matters. Which is also very true for those that believe that there is a good possibility for alien Life. The math is beyond me to do, but I once got into a conversation with Claude that sought to find the probable distance of the nearest exoplanet that has possible Earth like conditions matching only a couple of additional factors that aren't commonly considered. Whereas I have dozens more. Claude's estimation was that the nearest such planet would be over two million light years away. Another conversation sought to understand the probability of an exact replica of this solar system somewhere else in the Universe. That probability is zero.
firebot 2y ago
Right, this particular solar system happens to have a planet that peoples. Yet the origins of life are elusive, and perhaps even multiple and relative, that the origins of life might just be a process the universe does countless times, independently. Or perhaps the seeds all started long ago, and life on this side of the universe is related to life on every side of it.
nox101 2y ago
Given that they've found living organisms in nuclear reactors and other extreme conditions it doesn't seem likely that "earth like conditions" are a requirement for life
- zdragnar 2y ago
  There's a difference between life forms that can survive a particular environment, and all of the phases of incremental steps towards forming the first life in such an environment. There's nothing to do but speculate until proven otherwise, since we don't actually know what those steps exactly are. My personal suspicion is that we are more likely to find life in earth like conditions than anywhere else, though.
- mrangle 2y ago
  And yet nuclear reactors are on Earth. Again, people underestimate the factors involved. Have these organisms been shown to derive from an alien taxonomy?
bmitc 2y ago
The universe is a big place, and we don't really possess the ability to find or see an Earth-like candidate as of yet. Our exoplanet searches are fairly rudimentary. For the solar system, it's very possible that at least two planets have had life and that even some moons may currently have it. Given that, it seems pretty unlikely that there isn't life elsewhere. Given the right conditions, such as Earth, life isn't hard. It showed up almost immediately.

iamgopal 2y ago

While your argument is true, I would guess aliens will be quite a lot different than anything we know on this earth. Even different in so called life and death cycles, or even in the very definition of what we can call alive and dead. We should much broaden our search scope.

zdragnar 2y ago
Water is practically a miracle in itself. Reasonable range between freezing and boiling, simple structure, polar solvent and non-flammable. The hydrogen bonds allow lots of interesting processes, and it gets used in many many foundational biological functions as hydroxyl groups. The chemistry of such a simple molecule is difficult if not impossible to replace, and if you have it, the processes that we are familiar with are already efficient enough that there wouldn't be an advantage to not using them. Is it possibly there are configurations of life, such as not using either DNA or RNA? Sure. Is it likely that we wouldn't recognize that it is life? I doubt it very much. Aside from virii which likely devolved from living things rather than forming along side them, it's not hard to make a distinction at all.
- pockmarked19 2y ago
  It’s also magnetic, making MRIs (and floating frogs) possible.
mrangle 2y ago
Forgetting that we just leapt over the fact that the conditions of this planet are the only-evidence for the genesis of Life, and went straight to evolution, and while you logic is sound in theory, I'd again point to the probable fact that the necessary conditions for Life are massively underestimated. Perhaps mostly in terms of genesis, but also sustainability and even given theoretical evolutionary differences for hypothetical aliens. But genesis is really the only discussion that matters. Which is also very true for those that believe that there is a good possibility for alien Life. The math is beyond me to do, but I once got into a conversation with Claude that sought to find the probable distance of the nearest exoplanet that has possible Earth like conditions matching only a couple of additional factors that aren't commonly considered. Whereas I have dozens more. Claude's estimation was that the nearest such planet would be over two million light years away. Another conversation sought to understand the probability of an exact replica of this solar system somewhere else in the Universe. That probability is zero.

firebot 2y ago

Right, this particular solar system happens to have a planet that peoples. Yet the origins of life are elusive, and perhaps even multiple and relative, that the origins of life might just be a process the universe does countless times, independently. Or perhaps the seeds all started long ago, and life on this side of the universe is related to life on every side of it.

nox101 2y ago

Given that they've found living organisms in nuclear reactors and other extreme conditions it doesn't seem likely that "earth like conditions" are a requirement for life

zdragnar 2y ago
There's a difference between life forms that can survive a particular environment, and all of the phases of incremental steps towards forming the first life in such an environment. There's nothing to do but speculate until proven otherwise, since we don't actually know what those steps exactly are. My personal suspicion is that we are more likely to find life in earth like conditions than anywhere else, though.
mrangle 2y ago
And yet nuclear reactors are on Earth. Again, people underestimate the factors involved. Have these organisms been shown to derive from an alien taxonomy?

bmitc 2y ago

The universe is a big place, and we don't really possess the ability to find or see an Earth-like candidate as of yet. Our exoplanet searches are fairly rudimentary. For the solar system, it's very possible that at least two planets have had life and that even some moons may currently have it. Given that, it seems pretty unlikely that there isn't life elsewhere. Given the right conditions, such as Earth, life isn't hard. It showed up almost immediately.