Nvm, that one was a fake tweet, albeit very believable.

Quote from: Blackleaf on December 17, 2022, 01:53:29 PMTrue. We can't quantify how common life is in the universe until we start finding more examples, however it seems more unlikely that Earth is the only planet with life on it. The Earth is estimated to be 4.5 billion years old. When was life thought to have first appeared on Earth? 4.2 billion years ago. That means there was only a period of about three hundred million years where Earth had no life on it. That might sound like a big number, but that's just a tiny sliver of Earth's history, when it was almost completely covered in magma. It's like the moment Earth had become just hospitable enough to not immediately kill it, life appeared. If life could appear so early in Earth's history, abiogenesis can't be so unlikely to happen that it hasn't happened before, even once, on another planet.

There's a lot we can't know yet. We can't know exactly how likely abiogenesis is to happen. We can't know how likely it is for life to become multicellular. We can't know how likely it is for an alien species to reach human-like intelligence. Especially since we're the only ones to arise in all of Earth's history. But if the chance of life is any bigger than zero, I'm certain there is life on at least one of the planets in the two trillion galaxies in the observable universe.

But you see, there is a fallacy in that line of thinking too.

It was a youtube vid that pointed it out to me.
We think life will probably arise because here on earth it did so pretty much from as soon as the conditions allowed it.
But that again is not telling us more than thr fact that it did so here. It is no more evidence for a 'widely populated' universe than our own existence as is. A single point of data.

This is how the vid explained it. And i am paraphrasing.
Imagine a jail with a million prisoners. All in an individual cell. Each is given a lockpick and is told they must escape their individual cell within one minute, before a deadly gas is released.the prisoners are not aware that orhers are in the same predicament. Only that they are.
Imagine that 999.999 of them can't open the lock. Because opening the lock with a lockpick would take you on average 30 minutes of blindly trying.
And imagine that 1 guy managed to do it in like 20 seconds. If he were unaware of the others failing so often, and he was asked if it was easy to escape with the lockpick. He would say it was. Perhaps even first try.
But this would simply be a statistical anomaly.
Perhaps life is like that: it has to arise quickly to become, before it's small window of chance is snuffed out. And wether we took 20 seconds or 59 seconds is barely any difference in time and likelihood of happening. Anything within that one minute is extremely unlikely. But if that is the only window of opportunity, all prisoners who survived, if any, would think it was an easy lock that was clearly pickable within the alloted time. After all, for our lone survivor: He didn't even need the 'extra 40 seconds'! It happened so fast and easy.
Just like any life  that sprang forth would think life would spring forth as soon as it could, because it did so for them.

The quickness with which life arose, does not necessaryly imply that life does when the conditions are right. For it could be that in most cases it won't and if it doesn't quickky, it will never. Perhaps the window for life to appear and to begin a cycle of selfsustaining those conditions for continuing life are so incredibly small.

If that makes sense. I feel like i am botching up the final part.


And still. I do feel like it is likely that in different places life sprang into being.
But without any more data and feeling like i should be equally stern in my intuition in this, essentially an unbased feeling, as i  am towards anyone who has such an unbased feeling towards the existence of a deity, i feel like i can't say more than that i am agnostic to this question. With no rational way to justify my belief or disbelief in the matter.

Quote from: Hydra009 on December 17, 2022, 02:53:08 PMNvm, that one was a fake tweet, albeit very believable.

Ha ha. Annoying, isn't it?

Quote from: Mr.Obvious on December 17, 2022, 03:59:21 PMBut you see, there is a fallacy in that line of thinking too.

It was a youtube vid that pointed it out to me.
We think life will probably arise because here on earth it did so pretty much from as soon as the conditions allowed it.
But that again is not telling us more than thr fact that it did so here. It is no more evidence for a 'widely populated' universe than our own existence as is. A single point of data.

This is how the vid explained it. And i am paraphrasing.
Imagine a jail with a million prisoners. All in an individual cell. Each is given a lockpick and is told they must escape their individual cell within one minute, before a deadly gas is released.the prisoners are not aware that orhers are in the same predicament. Only that they are.
Imagine that 999.999 of them can't open the lock. Because opening the lock with a lockpick would take you on average 30 minutes of blindly trying.
And imagine that 1 guy managed to do it in like 20 seconds. If he were unaware of the others failing so often, and he was asked if it was easy to escape with the lockpick. He would say it was. Perhaps even first try.
But this would simply be a statistical anomaly.
Perhaps life is like that: it has to arise quickly to become, before it's small window of chance is snuffed out. And wether we took 20 seconds or 59 seconds is barely any difference in time and likelihood of happening. Anything within that one minute is extremely unlikely. But if that is the only window of opportunity, all prisoners who survived, if any, would think it was an easy lock that was clearly pickable within the alloted time. After all, for our lone survivor: He didn't even need the 'extra 40 seconds'! It happened so fast and easy.
Just like any life  that sprang forth would think life would spring forth as soon as it could, because it did so for them.

The quickness with which life arose, does not necessaryly imply that life does when the conditions are right. For it could be that in most cases it won't and if it doesn't quickky, it will never. Perhaps the window for life to appear and to begin a cycle of selfsustaining those conditions for continuing life are so incredibly small.

If that makes sense. I feel like i am botching up the final part.


And still. I do feel like it is likely that in different places life sprang into being.
But without any more data and feeling like i should be equally stern in my intuition in this, essentially an unbased feeling, as i  am towards anyone who has such an unbased feeling towards the existence of a deity, i feel like i can't say more than that i am agnostic to this question. With no rational way to justify my belief or disbelief in the matter.

The problem with that argument is it just doesn't take the shear size of the universe.

We think there are about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets orbiting stars in the observable universe. That's 10 septillion planets. If 1 in a million of those planets have life, there are 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 (10 quintillion) planets with life.

If it is 1 in a billion with life, there are 10,000,000,000,000,000 planets with life.

If it is 1 in a trillion with life, there are 10,000,000,000,000 planets with life.

If it is 1 in a quadrillion with life, there are 10,000,000,000 planets with life.

Even if it is just 1 in a quintillion (1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000,000) with life, there are still 10 million planets with life in the universe.

But we don't know. It could be be just us. The odds are there is something else out there somewhere though.

Fox News depiction of the average American school:

Quote from: PopeyesPappy on December 17, 2022, 04:53:44 PMThe problem with that argument is it just doesn't take the shear size of the universe.

We think there are about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets orbiting stars in the observable universe. That's 10 septillion planets. If 1 in a million of those planets have life, there are 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 (10 quintillion) planets with life.

If it is 1 in a billion with life, there are 10,000,000,000,000,000 planets with life.

If it is 1 in a trillion with life, there are 10,000,000,000,000 planets with life.

If it is 1 in a quadrillion with life, there are 10,000,000,000 planets with life.

Even if it is just 1 in a quintillion (1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000,000) with life, there are still 10 million planets with life in the universe.

But we don't know. It could be be just us. The odds are there is something else out there somewhere though.

I would think that, given the amount of potential life we are finding across just our Solar System, that "life" in some form or another is probably more likely the norm where it's possible than not.

Quote from: PopeyesPappy on December 17, 2022, 04:53:44 PMBut we don't know. It could be be just us. The odds are there is something else out there somewhere though.

YEAH!

Quote from: PopeyesPappy on December 17, 2022, 04:53:44 PMThe problem with that argument is it just doesn't take the shear size of the universe.

We think there are about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets orbiting stars in the observable universe. That's 10 septillion planets. If 1 in a million of those planets have life, there are 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 (10 quintillion) planets with life.

If it is 1 in a billion with life, there are 10,000,000,000,000,000 planets with life.

If it is 1 in a trillion with life, there are 10,000,000,000,000 planets with life.

If it is 1 in a quadrillion with life, there are 10,000,000,000 planets with life.

Even if it is just 1 in a quintillion (1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000,000) with life, there are still 10 million planets with life in the universe.

But we don't know. It could be be just us. The odds are there is something else out there somewhere though.

Actually, it removes the size of the universe from the equation.
Exactly BECAUSE we don't know the chance for life occuring on a planet that technically has the proper circumstances qt one point or another.

Because we can't tell what the chance for abiogenesis is in such a situation, you can't logically infer the probability of life being elsewhere in the universe.

What you are saying here is exactly why i instinctively feel there must be life somewhere else. But if we use your numbers rather than mine, it would be like saying that if 'what if the chance for qbiogenesis is one in a quintillion times quintillion'.
Does that seem likely to me? Not really. At least not intuitively.
But can you logically infer that the chance for abiogenesis taking place given the 'correct circumstances' is large enough, dven given a quintillion possible worlds, that it would become likely? No. No you can't. We have to rely on our intuition to say the number of inhabitable worlds is far greater than the chance for abiogenesis to occur, for it to be likely to have other life out there somewhere. It may very wel be, but we have nothing to base it on. (It may be almost 'infinitely small'.)
And if intuition is all we got, i'm not going to put any money down on this. It is far too easy to fool human intuition.

Quote from: Mr.Obvious on December 17, 2022, 08:25:06 PMActually, it removes the size of the universe from the equation.
Exactly BECAUSE we don't know the chance for life occuring on a planet that technically has the proper circumstances qt one point or another.

Because we can't tell what the chance for abiogenesis is in such a situation, you can't logically infer the probability of life being elsewhere in the universe.

What you are saying here is exactly why i instinctively feel there must be life somewhere else. But if we use your numbers rather than mine, it would be like saying that if 'what if the chance for qbiogenesis is one in a quintillion times quintillion'.
Does that seem likely to me? Not really. At least not intuitively.
But can you logically infer that the chance for abiogenesis taking place given the 'correct circumstances' is large enough, dven given a quintillion possible worlds, that it would become likely? No. No you can't. We have to rely on our intuition to say the number of inhabitable worlds is far greater than the chance for abiogenesis to occur, for it to be likely to have other life out there somewhere. It may very wel be, but we have nothing to base it on. (It may be almost 'infinitely small'.)
And if intuition is all we got, i'm not going to put any money down on this. It is far too easy to fool human intuition.

Yeah, I don't think we can predict the odds until we understand the process better. I know a lot of smart people do assume there has to be alien life somewhere, given the incomprehensible numbers. I lean that way but also think it is still possible the odds are infinitesimally small. If it does turn out the universe(s) is(are) infinite, well then it is a sure thing by definition.

Quote from: Hydra009 on December 17, 2022, 09:11:39 AM

The guy in the middle gets stabbed in the heart? I think that would work...
🤔

Quote from: Blackleaf on December 17, 2022, 11:48:24 AMThey probably do. Space is pretty vast for us to be the only ones. Are aliens already here on Earth, spying on us, experimenting on us, and doing gods know what else? Nah. Will we find aliens sometime in the future, or will they find us? Maybe. We'll likely both be long gone before first contact is made.

I doubt they exist at all, but even if they do they're so far away that they'll never get here.

Quote from: Unbeliever on December 17, 2022, 09:30:52 PMI doubt they exist at all, but even if they do they're so far away that they'll never get here.

That's the real issue, given the vast distances involved. Even trying to communicate, like with SETI just receiving, one has to consider how many different communications protocols (starting with spark gap, up to Quadrature Phase Shift Keying, or even Digital Spread Spectrum); we'd be unlikely to have a system to receive the signal(s), let alone detect them, given the way EM radiation disperses through space.

Quote from: Blackleaf on December 17, 2022, 01:53:29 PMTrue. We can't quantify how common life is in the universe until we start finding more examples, however it seems more unlikely that Earth is the only planet with life on it. The Earth is estimated to be 4.5 billion years old. When was life thought to have first appeared on Earth? 4.2 billion years ago. That means there was only a period of about three hundred million years where Earth had no life on it. That might sound like a big number, but that's just a tiny sliver of Earth's history, when it was almost completely covered in magma. It's like the moment Earth had become just hospitable enough to not immediately kill it, life appeared. If life could appear so early in Earth's history, abiogenesis can't be so unlikely to happen that it hasn't happened before, even once, on another planet.

There's a lot we can't know yet. We can't know exactly how likely abiogenesis is to happen. We can't know how likely it is for life to become multicellular. We can't know how likely it is for an alien species to reach human-like intelligence. Especially since we're the only ones to arise in all of Earth's history. But if the chance of life is any bigger than zero, I'm certain there is life on at least one of the planets in the two trillion galaxies in the observable universe.

I'll grant that life, at least simple life, may be out there, but it took about  3.5 billion years for life to even reach the multicellular stage here on Earth. I'm not willing to assume there's anything else like us in the observable universe, not without evidence.

Quote from: Unbeliever on December 17, 2022, 09:30:52 PMI doubt they exist at all, but even if they do they're so far away that they'll never get here.

I looked this stupid thing up and you're not wrong. Apparently this riddle comes from Japanese TV in the 80's and, having never seen the show, may not have been a real riddle as the solution back then was for one of the three to commit suicide with the knife.

So, yeah. Somehow I think things like this are better if there's a clever solution. But, life isn't always clever, is it?