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http://news.yahoo.com/light-alien-super-earth-seen-1st-time-215909030.html

Just curious what people think about there being the possibility of life on other planets.

The universe is big. Really big. Bigger than I can imagine. Given that, it seems like it is all but guaranteed there is not only life, but intelligent life out there. But it's probably a million light years away, so it won't effect me unless we learn to go .999c.

That being said, this article is garbage. How is it DENSER if its mass is 8x that of earth and its radius is 2x? 2^3 = 8, brohan.

EDIT: Okay. I read that article earlier today. I just reread it and see they updated it. I still don't trust it if the author missed that the first time.

What if They are out there, and they are not a fallen race like us? What if they didn't eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?

My problem with this is the infinite monkey theorem. When pointing out the insane odds it would take to create life, an evolutionist will always say "Given an infinite amount of time and space, it'd eventually happen." And to expect this to duplicate it twice within the universe's expanding state? Seems unlikely. I'm no expert on the subject though, so feel free to correct me.

That article doesn't mention anything about life as far as I read.

I do not believe there is life on other planets and here's why:

The bible says we are his best creation (The bible will say this in different ways depending on your translation), if we are the best creation that means there is not life more intelligent then the life here on earth. Now you may say that just means that we are the most prized creation, not the only planet with created life on it. Well if you look at the statistics, it is NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE for life to be on any other planet given the NEARLY PERFECT conditions needed to support life. Also in the bible there are many things that indicate no other life forms in the universe save for the ones on this planet, I will not get into these verses thought.

In my next post I will post an article from AiG (Answers in Genesis) that shares more on this subject.

 

So you don't believe in life on other planets because of the statistics involved, and also because you believe a higher power that nullifies statistics in the first place.....k.

We are an intelligent life form that has not mastered space travel so does that mean we don't exist? We've been to the moon and nowhere else. The universe is huge beyond comprehension, just because we haven't found it yet does not mean it is not there, and even if our species never advances to the point of being able to travel t other solar systems and galaxies, it is still no indication of there not being life somewhere else in the universe.

I think, since it seems pretty well established that you can't travel past the speed of light, that it doesn't seem likely that there are galactic space federations out there that we don't know about (at least none that we will come in contact with unless we're really bored or Russia decides to race America to some random planet).

Is it possible? Well, it's thinkable, so it's possible in that sense.

Is it likely? This is actually completely theory dependent.

There was, in fact, a time when the idea of other planets was unthinkable.

Pre-Copernicus, the idea that there were other earths was impossible (although there were a few Greeks in the 6th century that had considered it). The reason is that gravity, during that time period, wasn't explained by the earth's mass. The theory during that time period was that everything moved towards the center of the universe (earth), which was why the earth was round (everything moving equally towards the center). So for there to be another earth with the Pre-Copernican theory would be both impossible and inconceivable, because it would be dragged towards the center of the universe (our planet).





Of course, with our current theory (post-Newton), life on other planets is conceivable, but only because the structure of the theory itself allows us to imagine it possible. We don't actually have any scientific observations to go off regarding the possibility of extraterrestrial life. 

The thing I always think about when the topic goes here is, what's to say we're not the most advanced civilization?

I thought China was doing better than us now?

What do you mean, using 100% of our brains?

That's actually not true. We use all of our brain, and most of it is active all the time.

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


Oh. It seems to me that it is very likely that there are simple, microscopic organisms on other planets, simply because of the regularity of nature (in terms of elements, for instance).

But you have to wonder if what we consider "intelligence" is innate or sociological. Whales, for instance, have much larger brains that human beings, and I heard a lecture in which a neuroscientist who studies whales said that they even have the areas of the brain that human beings use for religious belief/experience.

Since we have no idea what whales are saying to each other and don't have Spock around to mind meld, I think that's as far as we can go besides speculation.

Anyways, just because there is other intelligent life doesn't mean that they would be, say, "space faring." Look at the events in history that led to the development of science and technology. There are many factors which are seemingly "accidental." If the Persians had succeeded in invading Greece, for instance, we might have never had science as we know it.

Well that's interesting, but without trying to start a new debate here I still believe we were actually more intelligent in the past. All of my evidence for this is compleatly circumstantial though.

Take the Pyrimids, Stonhenge, the Nazca Lines, Even Noah's Ark. How do we explain how to make these structures?  Even with all of our computers and knowledge we still can't explain all of these wonders. Now obviously our knowledge has accumulated over the years but as for pure intelligence I believe we are digressing. This is reflected in the Bible as well. We have recorded stories of men living to be hundreds of years old. The further you get from the garden the shorter average lifespans get. I don't see why our mental status wouldn't mimic our physical stature.