Stephen Hawking: Alien but primitive life likely

AP ^ | Apr 21 | SETH BORENSTEIN

[Aristotelian]

WASHINGTON - Famed astrophysicist Stephen Hawking has been thinking a lot about the cosmic question, "Are we alone?" The answer is probably not, he says.

If there is life elsewhere in the universe, Hawking asks why haven't we stumbled onto some alien broadcasts in space, maybe something like "alien quiz shows?"

Hawking's comments were part of a lecture at George Washington University on Monday in honor of NASA's 50th anniversary. He theorized that there are possible answers to whether there is extraterrestrial life.

One option is that there likely isn't life elsewhere. Or maybe there is intelligent life elsewhere, but when it gets smart enough to send signals into space, it also is smart enough to make destructive nuclear weapons.

Hawking said he prefers the third option:

"Primitive life is very common and intelligent life is fairly rare," he then quickly added: "Some would say it has yet to occur on earth."

[varyouga]

Yes, the chance of humans evolving on other planets is small.

But the chance of any intelligent life is there. The number of planets out there is too much to comprehend and that is just the detectable universe. We don't know how old it is or how far it goes past what is detectable.

We will most likely never know just because of the vastness of the universe and rarity of life. Even if teleportation was possible by us or other lifeforms, simply finding a planet with life would be unlikely.

We are more likely to be visited by intelligent life than us visiting them. But both are almost impossible.

[dragnet2]

Famed astrophysicist Stephen Hawking has been thinking a lot about the cosmic question, "Are we alone?" The answer is probably not, he says.

I agree.

"Primitive life is very common and intelligent life is fairly rare,"

Rare yes, but I also believe other very intelligent life exists outside earth. Like diamonds on earth are rare, but it's there.

[processing please hold]

I envy that man his mind. What a gift. His being an atheist though.......

[DannyTN]

"I fear some physicist will accidentally stumble upon a way of inducing a microscopically small black hole. It will be all over for us within a fraction of a second. You won't feel a thing.

Ironically, another scientist will deduce that all black holes had to have been induced by intelligent life, each of which was wiped out by the black hole that they induced. But his discovery will come too late to stop our physicist from developing the black hole that will wipe out ours.

[Diverdogz]

Yes there is the time problem: We’ve been broadcasting some signals to the nearby stars for a hundred years or so, but how long will we continue? Will humanity last another 10,000 years? Who knows.

Not only is there a time problem, but because of the big bang echo...the ‘humm of the universe”...signals that have emitted from planet earth over the past hundred years or so will quickly,due to the inverse square law, become muddled and indistinguishable from the white noise of the universe. Also, the radio signature of planet earth has drastically diminished in recent years due to more efficient signal transmission (directed microwaves, fiberoptic networks)

Thus far, signals from planet earth have traveled past just a very few stars (maybe in the 100’s).

But with hundreds of billions of stars in a typical galaxy, and with the hundreds of billions of galaxies in the known universe, I can’t help but believe (yes, believe...a matter of faith) that there is lots of life out in the universe...and that our chances of ever learning about that live out there is very, very small.

[processing please hold]

Maybe the descendants of Adam and Eve where the pair didn't take a bite of forbidden fruit?

Ahhhh, the parallel universe' theory.

[JRandomFreeper]

Wusses don't want to accept repsonsibility for being old and wise.... :)

I'm so old, when I totter around the house, folks get smart and go outdoors where the air is fresh.

I'm ready to take charge of the universe. I'm just too tired. I need a nap.

/johnny/

[DouglasKC]

I once thought of writing a short story were the explorers found another planet that knew of Christ. I wonder if there are any good stories out there like that.

Philip Jose Farmer wrote a book called Jesus on Mars. It's been a while since I read it, but I seem to remember it was interesting.

[HerrBlucher]

We are more likely to be visited by intelligent life than us visiting them. But both are almost impossible.

Agreed. And by the same logic, the existence of human beings is almost impossible......but here we are. I feel so special......:)

[Reeses]

Maybe a physicist living inside a black hole will discover how to create an inverse black hole. Hopefully his notes will survive the big bang. Maybe there's a star formation already out there in the perfect shape of the physicist's handwriting.

[Hyzenthlay]

Fortunately for us, black holes get smaller by giving off Hawking Radiation (yes, as in Stephen Hawking) so a black hole that small would evaporate almost instantly... we did the math in my cosmology class last week. Nothing to worry about, unless we can think of way of inducing non-microscopic black holes, but those even generally require astounding amounts of mass. For example, if the sun were to collapse into a black hole (which is impossible, since it doesn’t contain enough mass, we did those calculations in cosmology class as well) its event horizon would only be about 2997 meters (roughly 1.5 miles) across. Even if the entire earth was collapsed into a black hole, its event horizon would only be about 8.8 millimeters across - less than the height of two lines of text here on FR.

[Psycho_Bunny]

It's not a matter of being "satisfied". The objective, irrefutable fact is that no one knows the numbers to the equation that would determine probability.

No one even knows the first number that's needed: the size of the Universe. There are only good guesses as to the size of the observable universe, which is not "The Universe" as a whole.

And - not to say you care what I think about you - I'd never, ever use the "Tornado/Junkyard" statement with someone whose respect I wanted. Not only is it a flawed "argument", it's actually dumb.

[Kirkwood]

If he is so smart, he should be thinking about more important things like making gasoline free.

[pjd]

If human beings evolved by chance via natural selection, and that chance was beyond 1 x 10 to the 65th power, I don’t care how big and old the universe is and how many stars and planets are out there, there is likely NO other life out there.

I think the likely hood of life occurring as a result of random combination is far less likely that that figure.

Consider that there are 20 standard amino acids found in biological systems. Even the smallest of proteins consist of more than 100 amino acids chained in a particular sequence. So even for a relatively small protein, the odds are less than 1 in 10^130.

To put that number in perspective, it is more than the total number of elementary particles in the universe times a billion billion billion. That's the odds of producing just one small protein molecule. A very primitive cell would require many other such proteins and larger, and they would all have to come together at the same time in the same place.

So when people use the argument, "The universe is so vast, there must be thousands of planets with life on them," they have no clue how small the universe is compared to the odds required.

No one. Absolutely no one can explain how life came to be, except by God.

[HerrBlucher]

Thanks pjd, I will be using your revised number in the coming wars that “Expelled” is spawning.

[Psycho_Bunny]

That only makes 30 or 50 unknowable assumptions.

[Rastus]

Thanks. I’ll check those out.

[Erasmus]

I've long thought that the greatest evidence for life elsewhere, is the incredibly low intelligence of people on Earth.

Hobbes once speculated to Calvin,

"The best evidence for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe is that it hasn't tried to contact us."

[Bender2]

Re: "Primitive life is very common and intelligent life is fairly rare," he then quickly added: "Some would say it has yet to occur on earth."

Stephen is right... if he means the Liberal Democrats!

[NTHockey]

>>I want the first words to come from outer space to be: “Have you heard of Jesus Christ?”<<

Followed by the inevitable Mohammedan riots.