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The Drake equation was meant to be illustrative; lowballing everything (particularly the L term, since we were in the midst of the maddest of MAD at the time) a
by stan_rogers 14y ago
The Drake equation was meant to be illustrative; lowballing everything (particularly the L term, since we were in the midst of the maddest of MAD at the time) and still coming up with a non-zero value was really the point. As long as what you're plugging in isn't on the order of "the Scriptures say it can't be, therefore it's zero", you will arrive at a non-zero value, and that makes at least the attempt to find and make contact with other technological civilizations reasonable.
- lotharbot 14y ago> "coming up with a non-zero value was really the point." When you're multiplying a bunch of non-zero quantities, that's the only possibility. It's not really illustrative or useful, though -- particularly because the range of possible estimates still includes "we are alone in the universe". You don't need the Drake Equation to tell you that it's reasonable to explore and search.