[Infiseeenvelp]

Well, when you consider how immense the universe is, and how mamy incredible number of stars and planets there are, and we are talking in the trillions to septillions or more, I mean come on! There must be life out there.

Remind me of a quote from the "Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy,"

"Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it is a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space."

But I am with you, there almost has to be someone else out there, I find it hard to believe that we are the only ones. The Fermi Paradox says "if other life exists, where are they?" but do we honestly have the technology to know? The closest star is light years away. As of right now, I think it is technically impossible to know if there are currently other civilizations, because their signals are still light years away, assuming there are civilizations that are sending signals, and that they evolved at about the same rate us us. Maybe in thousands/millions of years, if we are still around, we may receive old signals from distant planets, but I doubt it will happen in the near future (or that we will be around that long). I have all kinds of crackpot theories about why we can't be the only ones, but I will spare you all from them, hehe.

[replicaypu]

I wish I had the speech I gave back in college but I can't seem to find it. It dealt with this and got into the specifics of everything, since I have't dealt with it for years and years then alot of it has slipped my memory.

[xtrudood]

What if some day we are invaded by outside life forms?

I get scared of the same thing sometimes and also invading other planets as well. I get frightened if the atomosphere suddenly changes by any influence from the earth, we explode the other planets...

It is so fascinating to see what is out in space, that almost drives me crazy!

[Savviers]

"The best proof that there is intelligent life on other planets is that they haven't tried to contact us."

-Or something like that. (It's from an old Calvin and Hobbes.)

[tinamasak]

Cross platform I like your pic (Dr Zoidberg)

Now down to the question, yes i do believe that we can live on other planets (But not at this time).
I was watching a program one time which was yapping on about Mars and we as humans could live their in the future.
How we do (what they said was) to build reactors that triggers (on earth the green house effect) but on mars they say it would have the opposite effect and create life.
Very interesting you agree?

p.s Now we just got to get their, which would take aleast 10 years

[QvhhbjLy]

They will be sending a machine to scan Europa by 2008.
They wanna see if there is water under the ice.
The problem is if there is is sending humans in ships.
The thing is it is giving off a crap load of radiation which(and I quote from a show on the science channel I saw last night)"Will kill a human in the means of 10 min."

The other thing i'd like to add is yes many planets may not be able to support life like on earth, but what says there isn't a life form that adapted to the type of area that is on these planets. Just because it can't support our life doesn't mean it can't support some other life form. Don't let that slip your mind.

[u8MmZFmF]

Yeah, maybe we should start STI -- Search for Terrestrial Intelligence.

[Edit]I just realized what a retard I am.

[seicslybearee]

Arekkusu you say that we are not unique, but come to think of it a this moment in time we are. At this moment they is NO PROOF that they is life on another planets ! so that makes us different ! we are very unique. You say whats differeance between our planet and others ? our planet can sustain life, is in a perfect orbit, perfect temperature. Your right the universe is very big and they a prob many earth like planets.
But you say about all this invading, you just talking sheer star-trek here. Only sorta of thing i could see, is disease from other planets.
Arekkusu please respect my views, i have yours , your last posted, was abit disrespectful towards me.
But nps, ciao

Luke

[vipluka]

I dont really know what to believe. But i dont believe in Aliens, i think people are just wishing for that. Our planet is just so unique, so different. To be honest i think we are the only planet in the whole universe to have life, but they is bacteria on other planets, and water has been found on them.
But people thinking that Aliens and stuff likt that exists, is just thinking wishfully. So im abit of a 50/50.

We are truly unique.

[gogFloark]

"The best proof that there is intelligent life on other planets is that they haven't tried to contact us."

-Or something like that. (It's from an old Calvin and Hobbes.)

If Calvin and Hobbes said it then I believe it..they know alot. Seriously.

[Saqwnht]

"The best proof that there is intelligent life on other planets is that they haven't tried to contact us."

IMO it is unreasonable that there be exactly one intelligent, technological, lifeform in a universe the size of this one.

It is also not very likely for there to be a long established technological lifeform other than us in this galaxy which isn't readily noticable.

My conclusion is that the chance of intelligent, technological, life existing in any particular galaxy is probably

[TritteTouff]

I like to keep an open mind, so I do believe in extraterrestrial lifeforms outside of the Earth, and also the paranormal to a certain extent.
I've yet to see a ghost or spirits or whatever, but I'd like to. I'd be cooler to see aliens too (and not in bacterial hard-to-see-with-the-naked-eye type of alien, that is).

[Aminkaoo]

Very good points Arekkusu you certainly know your stuff !

Sorry for ealier comments , ciao

Luke

[bWn4h8QD]

oh, there is life on other planets.....whether any of it is intelligent is debatable, tho...

just like the dominant life forms here.....no, not humans, bacteria!

[Smeaphvalialm]

It's also debatable if any life on Earth is intelligent.

[BoomBully]

I know it is abit of an old thread, but I feel I must post. I do beleive there is life beyond our own solar system. How advanced it is or whether it is intelligent, we cannot say. There are over 500 000 million stars in our galaxy alone and our galaxy is one of millions within the universe. To say ours is the only one is a little conceited IMHO. We also think as life must exist in our norms for life, an oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere, when life could evolve in another type of environment. Just because our level of genetics and understanding of life is not that advanced it doesn't means that it cannot exist.
As for contact with life beyond our solar sytem. Think of the following; we have been beaming radio signals out into space for about 100 years. If there is life within 100 light years it must been at a stage when they could hear our radio signals. It would then depend on whether they would think about answering. would you answer a random radio signal? If they did answer they would then have to send it back to us. Even at the speed of light it would take years. Maybe we have been detected and answered, it just the fact we haven't recieved the answer yet.

[JohnVK]

there can be another option - we just didn`t understand that we were answered

[Coededgeme]

My one concern is; at a 100 ly's distance, would the radio signal that is at the amplitude 1/10,000th of the amplitude at 1 ly's distance be meaningful enough to be 1) detected 2) decoded ?
What about the possiblity of a weak signal becoming indistinquishable with background noise ? Wouldn't it be like shouting into the Atlantic from Land's End and trying to pick it up with a high-end receiver at Tokyo Bay ?

Another concern is reflection. Short wave radio signals were chosen to reflect back down to earth's surface; not much escaping into outer space ?

[CymnMaync]

Maybe real life is like Star Trek - the aliens are out there and waiting for us to be advanced enough to be worth talking to.