Spacecraft Blasts Off To Hunt Alien Life...

[naomi24]

//...on a distant moon.

Europa Clipper will now travel 1.8 billion miles to reach Europa, a deeply mysterious moon orbiting Jupiter.

It will not arrive until 2030 but what it finds could change what we know about life in our solar system.

Trapped under the moon’s surface could be a vast ocean with double the amount of water on Earth.//

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1482xzrge1o

 

 

Would you like alien life to be discovered - and if not, why not?

[Atheist]

I'd be delighted if life was discovered, as it would suggest we are not the only life in the universe, and that there could possibly be intelligent life somewhere (not on Europa of course).

 

[ToraToraTora]

The only chance we have of any sort of encounter with alien life is from within our solar system and Europa with it's sub ice crust warm ocean is a good candidate. There may well be simple organisms beneath the ice. There are equivalent conditions on earth and life has emerged in them. I think it's a reasonable possibility that it also has under the ice on Europa. I would not like to say I'd like it or not like it just that I understand the possibility. 

[ToraToraTora]

Using the drake equation we can pretty well guarantee that our galaxy and indeed the wider universe is teaming with life. Due to the distances involve we can also more or less guarantee that we'll never encounter it or even communicate with it.

[Atheist]

The Drake equation guarantees nothing. Depending on the inputs (all guesses) fed into the equation, the odds of life elsewhere can vary between next to nothing and near certainty.

There is lots of evidence that things have been seen in our atmosphere which can outmanoeuvre any terrestrial craft, and which can apparently challenge our understanding of gravity and inertia. There could be advanced civilisations which are millions of years ahead of us, and who knows what they might have discovered and invented in all that time?

[Old_Geezer]

Depends on whther they intend to invade Earth !

[naomi24]

I think they've already been - and gone again.

[Atheist]

OG; if they were here they could invade Earth whenever they like, without fear of retaliation. I think it's more likely that they would be neither overtly hostile or friendly, just keeping an eye on us purely out of interest, in case there is anything useful to them in the future. Maybe they could quietly influence a parameter or two so as to encourage our harmless development if we have the potential for that, otherwise to take measures if we seem to be simply too bad stock to hope for a good outcome.

[davebro3]

they may already be here - ON AB !!!!

[naomi24]

Now to come to mention it, Dave, there are those who appear to come from another planet.  😂

[Old_Geezer]

Probably wishful thinking but:

 

https://youtube.com/shorts/i4gIVEJ_ocI?si=EDMdciK2uhcoXCd2

 

[Old_Geezer]

Hmmm... that seems to have blacked out 🤔

[Canary42]

Works OK for me OG.

[Old_Geezer]

Yeah, I think it tried to open in the wrong browser. Ah well.

[tomus42]

I'd love them to find life outside of this planet during my lifetime.

It obviously exists, and where there's water there's a fair chance.

[Bazile]

Life as we know it is one thing .

What about life as we don't know it ?

I think it is a terribly arrogant view of someone to assume that we are the only intelligent entities in the known universe - never mind the unknown universe  

[ToraToraTora]

bazille: "I think it is a terribly arrogant view of someone to assume that we are the only intelligent entities in the known universe - never mind the unknown universe  " - has anyone suggested that? Not me I am certain the universe is full of life. Mathematically it must be.

[tomus42]

Logic and science  dictates that there must be all sorts of life in the universe.

Only a religious (ie nonsensical) belief would cause one to think otherwise. 

[Atheist]

Logic and science dictates no such thing.

 

[tomus42]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_analog#:~:text=This%20means%20there%20could%20be,hundred%20quintillion%20Earth%2Dlike%20planets.

[tomus42]

From the above..

//This means there could be as many as two billion Earth-sized planets in the Milky Way galaxy alone, and assuming that all galaxies have number of such planets similar to the Milky Way, in the 50 billion galaxies in the observable universe, there may be as many as a hundred quintillion Earth-like planets.[42] This would correspond to around 20 earth analogs per square centimeter of the Earth.[43]//

I suggest it would be illogical to believe that out of a hundred quintillion earth like planets, no type of life has developed ever developed on any of them - except this one.