We are not alone.

In our galaxy alone, there are an estimated 50 BILLION planets orbiting suns. If just one in 10,000 dwells in the "Goldilocks" zone, that would mean there are 5 MILLION planets in the "Goldilocks" zone in just our galaxy.

Then think of the billions of galaxies out there.

 

I'm disappointed.

I thought there was actual evidence presented in the thread, of ETs..

You're right though, in the OP, there MIGHT indeed be others out there.

 

The odds are good, especially that they are more advanced than mere humans.

 

Based on everything we know about extra solar systems, we've not found any evidence of life anywhere else.

I suspect this is probably all there is.

 

I fail to understand why this subject is the "Conspiracy Theories" section of the forum. No I'm not alone, my wife and kids remind me every day. But on the serious side, the many corroborating accounts of UFOs and alien abductions are too numerous to dismiss. For now, they can only be categorized as circumstantial evidence. Logically speaking, it is extremely unlikely that the only life forms in the Universe exist only on this planet.

 

Duplicate

 

We have just started to explore the universe. We have not even gone to another planet in our solar system much less even sent a probe yet to another solar system. If 1000 years from now we have yet to find evidence of another intelligent life form out there then your case will be 1% better for you.

 

So more than likely I'll grow old and die without ever being proved wrong.

 

Now that is something positive to look forward to!! LOL

Just curious is your belief that we are the one and only planet with life in the entire universe based on a religious belief? I am nit looking to argue with your beliefs just curious.

 

No, I have no religious beliefs. Rather, it seems that the idea of life "out there" is more religious-like since it's a belief based on zero evidence. What is faith but the belief in things unseen?

It's simple really. We've advanced pretty far in our understanding of biology; "life" as we know it, but we can't create it from scratch in the lab. That's a trick we should have mastered decades ago if it was a simple and inevitable process of natural forces. That suggests that "life" may be a totally off the wall, once in a zillion occurrence. How that would happen I don't have a clue, but since we can't replicate it, we can't estimate the odds of it occurring elsewhere no matter how many planets in the universe are in the Goldilocks zone.

There may come a time that we are able to replicate it experimentally in a way that could occur naturally, and at that point I'll reconsider my position, but right now, I feel pretty safe in thinking that we're alone in the universe.

 

Ok that is a very logical and intelligent explanation of your position. Thank you.

 

So bottom line in your opinion because we (as in us homo sapiens, the species whose technology is arguably 2 to 3 thousand years old in a Universe that's 13.8 billion years old give or take) can't replicate life (except the usual way), the logic is convincing evidence (to you) that life is unique to this planet. No offense but that sounds pretty arrogant to me.

 

Unless you believe that life is the product of magic or deities, then it has to arise from natural processes, so our technology should be more than sufficiently advanced enough to replicate a natural process...if it were that easy.

 

Correct.

1. What makes you believe our technology is more than sufficiently advanced enough to replicate a natural process?

2. What's "easy" about creating life? Black holes are also a natural process, it should be easy to create it one, no? How about a star or a galaxy, our technology should be able to create one since those are also natural processes, no?

I don't understand your correlation between nature and our technology.

 

Actually the Milky Way Galaxy has an estimated star count of 100 billion.

And the current estimate of the number of galaxies is around 2 trillion.

2 trillion galaxies with hundreds of billions of stars each...Even if you put the estimate of the odds at 1-in-1 Billion for life...there's a metric crap ton of it out there.

I honestly do not believe that out of all that space...we're the only living things in it.

 

Most "calculations" on life in the universe like the Drake equation posit X number of planets in the Goldilocks zone of class G or F stars. Depending on the time frame, and whether you are referring to the galaxy or the entire universe, the number can be hundreds of billions to trillions.

However that assumes there is an easy formula for life that if all of the right conditions are provided, life will appear. Our technology is more than sufficiently advanced to demonstrate that experimentally. So since we've not been able to replicate that, it's safe to say that we don't know how life would arise. Without that knowledge, it doesn't matter how many planets suitable for life there are.

 

The Miller-Urey experiments have produced 30 amino acids including some that make up proteins. So while we haven't created life...those experiments are showing that our ideas may be correct. We just lack that special something that really got the compounds to start spontaneously coding up proteins.

 

What we don't know has nothing to do with the existence (or not) of life outside our planet. Our technology is limited to our invented mathematical probability that life exists outside our planet. The alleged "Goldilocks zone" that we believe is the only environment suitable to life is merely theoretical, not factual. We don't know how life arises but that's meaningless since life does arise and the biological species that inhabit this planet are proof that life arises ... somehow. All our technology can provide for us at this stage of our technological evolution is theory. And one theory is that the seeds of life exist throughout the Universe (panspermia).

 

Hmm... that special something. Well until we figure it out, it's more likely that I'm right than not.

 

Panspermia isn't really a theory because it doesn't explain anything that we observe in the universe. We have not found life on another world.

Look I get it. This belief is all about some feeling of religious wonderment, which is why this thread is so full of Mulder's who believe because they want to believe. But there is no evidence that there is life anywhere but here.

 

It's still a theory and it has nothing to do with what's observed. By the same token, no one can observe a Black Hole but we theorize they exist. A theory doesn't require observation otherwise it's a fact not a theory.

Could that be because our primitive technology does not have the capability to send us to another world that has life? The same primitive technology that is incapable of creating life?

OTOH those who claim to have seen UFOs, aliens and those who claim to have been abducted by aliens would dispute your claim.

I'm an atheist but most western religions hold the belief that we are the only life forms in the Universe so that would contradict the above. Methinks it's you who has a problem with the notion that life may exist outside this planet.

There is an abundance of circumstantial evidence (and hard evidence for those who claim to have encounters). Just because you personally do not have evidence doesn't mean there is no evidence and much less that there is no life outside our planet.

 

They said that about the Sound Barrier until Chucky broke the sucker.

 

You're an atheist? Your comment reads like some religious apologetic. Unlike Black Holes, which fit a mathematical model of the universe long before anything like that was detected, there is no physical or theoretical evidence arguing for extra terrestrial life. Look, I get it if you feel that you have some sort of spiritual need that requires filling by the belief in a universe brimming with life. I however, don't, so I'm free to apply only logic and reason to the issue.

 

The thing of it is...mathematically or theoretically, there is no reason that life should have started at all. We don't understand the mechanism, don't have more than a few arcane guesses as to how it might have happened...

...yet here we are.

Not knowing the mechanism doesn't mean that there isn't one nor does it mean that in the estimated numbers of planetary systems with planets in the goldilocks zone we're going to be the only ones in the vast universe.

When you consider that the universe is a pretty predictable place, gravity works the same way everywhere, hydrogen fuses into helium, supernovae create the heavier elements...it would actually be statistically improbable that out of all the Universe...life only occurred here. It would be as if in all the dense pockets of hydrogen gas, dust and whatnot...we were the only star that ignited.

 

See the rest of my answer in post #23. Apparently there is plenty of religion involved in this question.