Phoenix Launched

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 7:36 pm

paazin wrote:Yes, except no. As we honestly don't know how many 'viable' entries there are into this lottery as well as the number of 'winners.' You're assuming there's only one which most likely is quite incorrect

Considering that DNA is required for life, and considering how complex DNA is without any other purpose than for life, its very existance in the first place is extremely unlikely, so I doubt life will be all that common. And obviously not just one. There are 6 billion or so people on this planet. There are probably thousands, maybe even tens of thousands of billions of planets just in our galaxy. And there are maybe a hundred billion galaxies out there. Meh. Yes, I know you can pick it apart further. It was an abstraction.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 7:44 pm

Grand Fromage wrote:Yeah, it doesn't make sense. If everyone in a group has a single ticket, everyone's chance of winning are precisely equal, no matter how many times you draw.

Sure, if you take Mars as an individual planet, it is just as likely to independantly form life as any other planet with exactly the same conditions. Hence why I said "Point Taken". However, I don't believe it is as likely for two concurrent planets to develop a one in a trillion (or whatever) occurance. Of course it's possible, but much less likely.

Or, more or less what Rotku said.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 7:48 pm

Grand Fromage wrote:You wouldn't care about the confirmation of existence of alien life?

With Castano on this one. How would finding alien single celled organisms really impact our lives? We know that life can start up on other planets? So? A lot of people believe that anyway. We may even learn some new things, if their DNA is still intact, but there's still plenty we don't even know about ourselves.

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:15 pm

NickD wrote:
Grand Fromage wrote:You wouldn't care about the confirmation of existence of alien life?
With Castano on this one. How would finding alien single celled organisms really impact our lives? We know that life can start up on other planets? So? A lot of people believe that anyway. We may even learn some new things, if their DNA is still intact, but there's still plenty we don't even know about ourselves.

There's a big difference between "very likely" and "confirmed". Belief is worthless, knowing is everything. It would be the single greatest discovery in the history of the world, proof that life is a consequence of chemistry and almost certainly abundant in the universe. Earth is no longer special, much as previous discoveries showed the solar system is nothing special. I hope it'd give space exploration a new boost, get it really going again like it was in the 60s. Most of the ignorant just think "oh rocks in space, big deal" and don't care anymore. Life is different.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:44 pm

Grand Fromage wrote:There's a big difference between "very likely" and "confirmed". Belief is worthless, knowing is everything. It would be the single greatest discovery in the history of the world, proof that life is a consequence of chemistry and almost certainly abundant in the universe. Earth is no longer special, much as previous discoveries showed the solar system is nothing special. I hope it'd give space exploration a new boost, get it really going again like it was in the 60s. Most of the ignorant just think "oh rocks in space, big deal" and don't care anymore. Life is different.

Even if evidence of life is found on Mars, people are still going to believe that life existed there because God put it there. Or people are going to say it originated from Earth, even if it is vastly different, people will come up with reasons why. Shroud of Turin: It was carbon dated to a thousand odd years ago, so it couldn't truely be the shroud of Jesus Christ. People have already come up with reasons why it still could be, and now it has a huge chunk cut out of it for nothing.

Knowledge is just a strong belief that hasn't been disproven yet.

Maybe it will get space exploration going again, and obviously I think that's a good thing. But maybe people will still be more concerned about that funding going to life here on Earth.

fluffmonster · Post by **fluffmonster** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:57 pm

NickD wrote: Knowledge is just a strong belief that hasn't been disproven yet.

That definition is so horribly tortured that it makes you seem disingenuous. Something that people believe that hasn't been disproven is just a belief, but that's beside the point. You are talking about construction of knowing and at the same time introducing evidence as if evidence were something separate from knowing. Evidence is how we sort fact from fiction. "Knowledge" can include fact and belief at the same time, but it cannot include speculation. On top of that though, and more to GFs point, you are missing the difference between speculation and fact. We can speculate that there is life elsewhere, believe it to be so, but that is very different from the fact of life on other worlds. Just like speculating there is another beer in the fridge is very different from the fact of it being there (or the fact of its absence).

Post by **paazin** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 9:19 pm

NickD wrote:
paazin wrote:Yes, except no. As we honestly don't know how many 'viable' entries there are into this lottery as well as the number of 'winners.' You're assuming there's only one which most likely is quite incorrect
Considering that DNA is required for life, and considering how complex DNA is without any other purpose than for life, its very existance in the first place is extremely unlikely, so I doubt life will be all that common. And obviously not just one. There are 6 billion or so people on this planet. There are probably thousands, maybe even tens of thousands of billions of planets just in our galaxy. And there are maybe a hundred billion galaxies out there. Meh. Yes, I know you can pick it apart further. It was an abstraction.

So what if DNA is complex? :p You've got billions of years in which this stuff can occur, in billions of places on those billions of planets. We honestly haven't a clue how microscopic these odds are - obviously it ain't all that common but as far as if it's 10 or 10,000 planets in the galaxy with life, who knows? Everything said on the subject is purely conjecture.

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 9:25 pm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence

Vast complexity from simplicity happens all the time.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 9:39 pm

fluffmonster wrote:[blah blah blah] Just like speculating there is another beer in the fridge is very different from the fact of it being there (or the fact of its absence).

Sure, you can know there's another beer in the fridge because you just got the 2nd to last one 10 minutes ago and there's no-one else there. But when you open the fridge there are no beers because super ninjas broken into your house and stole the last beer for their nefarious schemes all without you noticing!

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 9:41 pm

paazin wrote:So what if DNA is complex? :p You've got billions of years in which this stuff can occur, in billions of places on those billions of planets. We honestly haven't a clue how microscopic these odds are - obviously it ain't all that common but as far as if it's 10 or 10,000 planets in the galaxy with life, who knows? Everything said on the subject is purely conjecture.

10,000 planets having life in this galaxy is still 1 in 100 million. And that's a low estimate of the number of planets.

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 9:44 pm

Grand Fromage wrote:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence

Vast complexity from simplicity happens all the time.

At work, so just skimmed that... The real question is, does that happen outside of Earth? Is it influenced by the existance of life, or is life influenced by that? Is it because of our exact situation within the solar system, galaxy, universe, multiverse? There are too many parameters to apply it universally.

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:02 pm

NickD wrote:At work, so just skimmed that... The real question is, does that happen outside of Earth?

Yes, emergent processes happen everywhere. Hurricanes and other storms are a good example.

NickD wrote:There are too many parameters to apply it universally.

Basic scientific principles always apply universally.

Souvarine · Post by **Souvarine** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:02 pm

Extremely low actually.

And while the life we know has structural DNA, remember that it might happen for life to evolve on a whole other base than carbon so who knows what sort of bizarroid stuff exist out there.

If you're interested in astronomy, i really encourage you all to download the Stellarium program (free) on the net. It's very good to learn what is just above your heads during the night (especially for people who live in light-polluted cities). It's basically a 3d planetarium.

http://www.stellarium.org

Post by **ayergo** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:08 pm

Charlie wrote:T Xenophobia is a survival instinct, unless said lifeforms are giant fungi, or space-borne creatures like whales who are too dumb to get out of the way.

*adds space-whale in giant mushroom sauce to his list of foods to try*

NickD · Post by **NickD** » Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:20 pm

Grand Fromage wrote:Yes, emergent processes happen everywhere. Hurricanes and other storms are a good example.

Basic scientific principles always apply universally.

Hurricanes and storms happen on Earth. Makes them irrelevant. There may not be butterflies flapping their wings in the Amazon of other planets.

And I believe it was Einstein who speculated that scientific principles may not necessarily be applied universally, that different parts of the universe may well work differently.

Or maybe it was Hawkings...