The simple biochemistry of the notion that life is inevitable is absurd. The truth is that for all the (false) claims of “scientists discover life in a bottle!” we still can only explain spontaneous production of a few of the wrong nucleotides, and some idea how a lipid layer could be formed. It’s like saying you know how fully-functioning, self-replicating robots formed because you found some traces of metal ore.
We haven’t even found a single planet anything like Earth. I was reading about a supposed “super-Earth” in the “habitable zone.” The estimated temperature on this planet was 70 degrees below zero, so if there ever was any water, it would be locked tight in ice. And it was bathed in infra-red. They explained why it may not be bombarded with deadly radiation at regular intervals, but the point is that there was almost no available visible-spectrum light for photosynthesis.
And here’s the kicker no-one talks about:
We are in the exact center and the exact oldest part of the universe. Yes, it’s a quirk of relativity that we’d have to be. But the point is that when we look 3.6 billion light years away, we’re seeing a universe that is EVEN NOW billions of years YOUNGER.
I don’t mean that’s because it took light 3.6 billion years to get here. I mean that as an effect of temporal distortion of high-speed travel, there’s been less time for stuff to happen.
Years ago, I calculated the Drake equation and estimated less than 10^1 (in other words, less than ten) worlds with intelligent life in the universe. I had badly underestimated the number of planets in a typical galaxy, but I also badly overestimated the likely habitability of life on a given planet.
“The simple biochemistry of the notion that life is inevitable is absurd.”
Indeed, I agree.
“We haven’t even found a single planet anything like Earth.”
It’s worse than that. We haven’t even found another stellar system that resembles our own, which has effectively thrown their “nebular hypothesis” for planetary evolution into the trash bin.
“We are in the exact center and the exact oldest part of the universe.”
Correct, although most scientists refuse to acknowledge this and cling to the “cosmological principle”, an assumption that contradicts the evidence.
“I don’t mean that’s because it took light 3.6 billion years to get here. I mean that as an effect of temporal distortion of high-speed travel, there’s been less time for stuff to happen.”
Interesting. I hadn’t considered that myself, but you may be right. The only thing I’m wondering is, does temporal distortion kick in if the motion is due to the expansion of space itself? I’m not sure one way or the other, I have never really thought about it...
“Years ago, I calculated the Drake equation and estimated less than 10^1 (in other words, less than ten) worlds with intelligent life in the universe. I had badly underestimated the number of planets in a typical galaxy, but I also badly overestimated the likely habitability of life on a given planet.”
Seems like an optimistic estimate to me even so. If we didn’t know there was life on at least one planet, I would say the probability was effectively zero. Since there is life on at least one planet, then either it’s due to some extraordinary circumstance (like divine intervention), or we hit the biggest lottery drawing ever held.