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.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
Phoenix Launched
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
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.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.
Or, more or less what Rotku said.
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
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 wrote:You wouldn't care about the confirmation of existence of alien life?
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
- Grand Fromage
- Goon Spy
- Posts: 1838
- Joined: Sat Jan 03, 2004 9:04 am
- Location: Chengdu, Sichuan, China
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 wrote: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 wrote:You wouldn't care about the confirmation of existence of alien life?
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.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.
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.
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
- fluffmonster
- Haste Bear
- Posts: 2103
- Joined: Mon Jan 05, 2004 11:54 pm
- Location: Wisconsin, USA
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).NickD wrote: Knowledge is just a strong belief that hasn't been disproven yet.
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.NickD wrote: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.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
People talk of bestial cruelty, but that's a great injustice and insult to the beasts; a beast can never be so cruel as man, so artistically cruel.
- Grand Fromage
- Goon Spy
- Posts: 1838
- Joined: Sat Jan 03, 2004 9:04 am
- Location: Chengdu, Sichuan, China
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!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).
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
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.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.
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
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 wrote:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence
Vast complexity from simplicity happens all the time.
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
- Grand Fromage
- Goon Spy
- Posts: 1838
- Joined: Sat Jan 03, 2004 9:04 am
- Location: Chengdu, Sichuan, China
Yes, emergent processes happen everywhere. Hurricanes and other storms are a good example.NickD wrote:At work, so just skimmed that... The real question is, does that happen outside of Earth?
Basic scientific principles always apply universally.NickD wrote:There are too many parameters to apply it universally.
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
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
Coming soon in a server near you.
- ayergo
- Penguin AKA Vile Sea Tiger
- Posts: 3521
- Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2004 8:50 pm
- Location: Germany (But frequent world travels)
*adds space-whale in giant mushroom sauce to his list of foods to try*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.
There's a place I like to hide
A doorway that I run through in the night
Relax child, you were there
But only didn't realize and you were scared
It's a place where you will learn
To face your fears, retrace the years
And ride the whims of your mind
A doorway that I run through in the night
Relax child, you were there
But only didn't realize and you were scared
It's a place where you will learn
To face your fears, retrace the years
And ride the whims of your mind
Hurricanes and storms happen on Earth. Makes them irrelevant. There may not be butterflies flapping their wings in the Amazon of other planets.Grand Fromage wrote:Yes, emergent processes happen everywhere. Hurricanes and other storms are a good example.
Basic scientific principles always apply universally.
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...
Current PCs:
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc
NWN1: Soppi Widenbottle, High Priestess of Yondalla.
NWN2: Gruuhilda, Tree Hugging Half-Orc