Friday Question - Is There Life on Other Planets?
Friday May 9, 2008
Is life unique to Earth? Could life have developed anywhere else in the universe? We're not asking about UFOs. Do you believe that it's possible that life exists on another planet?
Comments
As space is so vast and galaxies are so numerous, and time so long, then statistically life should be everywhere. However the question should be how easy is it for life to get started in the first place, and how long can it maintain it’s existence once started. Even though it may reach an evolved intelligence the vast distances involved may keep us insulated from each other, assuming our understanding of physics is correct. However their undertsanding of physics may be greater and the distances involved or the timescales may be completely irrelevant. They may be here already with a universal agreement to keep discrete from us and not interfere in our development. Perhaps some of them may be among us already, who knows? As Carl Sagan said: ‘It would be a pretty big waste of space’
ps Nick, love many of your articles.
As space is so vast and galaxies are so numerous, and time so long, then statistically life should be everywhere. However the question should be how easy is it for life to get started in the first place, and how long can it maintain it’s existence once started. Even though it may reach an evolved intelligence the vast distances involved may keep us insulated from each other, assuming our understanding of physics is correct. However their undertsanding of physics may be greater and the distances involved or the timescales may be completely irrelevant. They may be here already with a universal agreement to keep discrete from us and not interfere in our development. Perhaps some of them may be among us already, who knows? As Carl Sagan said: ‘It would be a pretty big waste of space’
ps Nick, love many of your articles.
How could we be so arrogant as not think that WE are the only inteligent, advanced creatures in the universe ?
We only have one example of an inhabited planet as yet, but we can still draw some deductions.
The Earth is about 4.5 billion years old; life has been present for at least the last 3 billion of those years, and possibly got started even earlier.
Complex, multicelled plants and animals go back about 600 million years - so for half the Earth’s history or more, bacteria had the place to themselves.
What most people mean by ‘Intelligent’ life - i.e. technological, machine building civilisation able to send and recieve radio signals, launch space probes, et.c - has been in existence for less than a century.
Note that ‘intelligence’ in the sense of abstract language and reasoning has been around much longer than that - but whales, dolphins, cuttlefish and australopithecines won’t show up over interplanetary distances, pace Star Trek IV.
So…for every ‘intelligent civilisation’ out there, there are going to be a heck of a lot of other worlds where the top predator’s an amoeba.
I suspect that *life* isn’t uncommon in the galaxy, but that *civilisation* is vanishingly rare - in fact it wouldn’t surprise me if we were it.
There are simply too many variables required to be in perfect balance in order for life to survive on earth. Anyone who takes time to research the ingredients necessary to sustain life knows this. The odds against life elsewhere in the universe are in reality astronomical. The evidence points to intelligent design for those who view it objectively.
Imagine that the occurence of life was a million to one, ten million to one even a hundred million to one, with these immense odds life would have to occur in this galaxy many times. That is just in this galaxy. The universe is too big for life to occur only on this tiny insignificant planet. Once it was thought that Earth was the center of the cosmos. This belief was inspired by the attempt to make people more important than they are. This argument that life only took place here is also an attempt to make humanity seem important through making life unique to Earth. If we do not destroy ourselves first, we will find that life is a fairly common occurence throughout the universe.
So, what does God say?
Exactly @Dick. Me personally, I think that all this talk about out of space and lifeforms of any type. Its hard to believe in such things based on the bible. Some ppl dont like to have the bible as reference. They would rather believe in science. But my thing is, how can you not? The bible is the first book ever created. It speaks of God and how he created the Earth and everything that is here and beyond. There was never any mention of aliens or other life on any other planet. Now I know someone might say, the other planets came later and blah blah blah. Which may or may not be true. But to think there’s life on them is kind of far fetched. Thats just my opinion. Heck, I dont even believe that dinosaurs ever existed.
Z, dinosaur fossils are everywhere! How could you not believe they existed? I live in Oklahoma and there is a creek 4 blocks from my house that has an ancient coral bed exposed. Fossilized in it are small weird looking crustaceans from eons ago when Oklahoma was part of a giant inland sea. I have seen chunks of sandrock with fossils in them of half squid, half crayfish looking creatures.
I can tell you truthfully that there was no one there to write down the creation story as it happened. I do believe the Bible but I’m also wise enough to know that creation happened over a long period of time and is in fact still happening. As for other life in the universe, I had an out of body experience due to being told I had 3 to 6 months to live after I was diagnosed with kidney cancer in Oct. ‘06. I was praying to God fervently when I was suddenenly enveloped in a grey mist and my spirit lifted up out of my body. The mist cleared and I was laying on my back in deep space with the edge of a galaxy in front of me. I was very close to the galaxy, I’d say just a couple of light years away, and I could see other galaxies out and beyond the one that lay before me. A mental video went through my mind of these galaxies being populated and with commerce going on between planets and galaxies. The universe was shown to me to be a very busy place!
The rest of my OBE doesn’t have anything to do with the subject of this thread so I will end it here. But I will tell you that our body doesn’t end at the outer lining of skin. The whole universe is part of your body. Could you live without the universe anymore than you could live without your heart? Could you live without the sun anymore than you could live without blood circulating throughout your body. No you couldn’t, so everything is a part of you and you a part of everything.
I don’t like the question because it is so wide open. It seems to me that as big as the universe is, microbes (at least) *must* have evolved somewhere else. A civilization that supports science is a much more rare occurrence. Carl Sagan said that Science requires Democracy, and, on Earth, only the Greek civilization has developed democracy.
[BTW, when I was a believer, I saw no conflict between Genesis and Evolution. I had already come to the conclusion that God prefers to use energy-efficient means to accomplish its ends.]
My best to you all,
tomS
Yes, I will be brief. Not only are other worlds, but if the vivrating springs theory is correct, there are many dimentions,(9 I think) there can be another world next to ours in a difereny dimention. And I´m sure that our big bang whas de product of a gargantuan black hole that transported all it absoved from another dimention to the one we live on.
This is a fascinating topic and there have been some interesting responses. For those who believe life is possible, how would you define intelligence? Some believe that dolphins are intelligent. Some gorillas use sign language while other apes use tools.
And if we ever come across another intelligent and civilized race, I would hope there weren’t any religions in their society and thus little or no history of warfare. The result would no doubt be peaceful aliens.
We all begin from a place of not knowing. So, my best guess is that it’s much more likely that life exists elsewhere in in the universe than some mythological god.
Hi, great question my comments are three fold:
A. People dismiss UFO’s generally out of hand as some sort of insane science, however it should be noted that we have been dropping them on other planets for years!
B. I would consider the Drake Equation to be missing a vital element, as its benchmark for intelligent life is the ability to transmit in radio waves. What I think is missing is religion. 90% of the planet is Religious, and in some extreme cases it can effect the evolution of technology i.e the Taliban. It could be that secular evolution (i.e the pursuit of technology) may be the exception rather than the rule, this may account for the apparent silence. But just to add to that, when I was at school, we made a very basic radio device, however five thousand years ago a fairly primitive society built the pyramids, something we can’t duplicate today. So according to the SETI benchmark I’m intelligent and they are not.
C. I think that you have to use mathematics, the universe is vast, and old, I think that therefore life and evolution are not a probability but a mathematical certainty.
And on a personal note: If ET ever landed here on earth, I think it would be a great day and a very sad day too. Great because we would then know we are not alone, but sad because if they’ve come here then they don’t know all the answers also.
Since we all begin from a place of “not knowing,” there can be no certainty that life exists anywhere else.
Well, we certainly begin life as a “clean slate.” But, we were created with the ability to learn and I think it’s a sin to not use the abilities we have been given.
I believe there can be certainties on many issues, and perhaps some day on the question of life elsewhere in the universe.
Still, even though we do not “know” about life on other planets, it is still possible to speculate.
I always think of the line from the film Contact based on Carl Sagan’s novel. The main character’s father says to her regarding the possibility of life on other planets: “I don’t know, Sparks. But I guess I’d say if it is just us… seems like an awful waste of space.”
Carl Sagan put that question into perspective very well when he talked about the billions of galaxies and billions of stars, and even more billions of stars with planets and even billions of planets that could support life. And if only a few of those billions of planets could support life, and if only a few of those billions of planets could generate intelligent life forms, we would still see billions of planets with potential intelligent life.
Are we so egotistical to believe we are the only intelligent life forms in the universe? I don’t think that God created the vast universe for just one planet with intelligent life. Fortunately, he created such vast distances between such possibilities that it is not likely that we will ever come into contact with such remote chances of intelligent life on other planets at least until we are ready to deal with such an event. Even with the fictional “warp” speeds of our science fiction stories, it is not likely we would encounter other intelligent life forms.
And if we were able to achieve that technology, perhaps we would be ready to welcome our far neighbors with the peaceful grace that God has intended for use to act here on earth. I think that God has created other intelligent life forms on other planets, and I don’t believe that contradicts the Christian belief that Jesus was only on earth. I believe that Jesus appeared on each planet that needed salvation from sins against God.
When one looks at the immensity of the universe, how can anyone say it was an accident with a big bang? If anything, God was the big bang.
The bible tells only of our world none others.But then again it was written by man,so this makes it more of a history book leaving a lot of unanswered questions.Humans are to self centered and to believe that we are the only life in all these galaxies is very arogant.
All the elements for life are in the atmpsphere around Titan the Moon of Satrurn. Follow the space probe cassini as it orbits saturn as we speak.
there is life on other planets.it is god who cretaed everything.people do not accept this fact .
and they waste their time in not beliening that
i dont get how to do it
Everyone keeps referring to us humans as intelligent….. I believe that is our first grave mistake. It was only 200+ years ago that our vast intelligence thought the earth was flat. It was only 50 years ago we supposedly landed on the moon. It was only 1 year ago that we landed an RC car on the closest planet to us (mars). I think as far as intelligence goes, humans are very low on the list and we shouldn’t overestimate ourselves. (i know. it’s hard
Ex. Did you ever see a dolphin kill another dolphin in the name of God or Alla? Maybe for food or some basic necessity to sustain life but never have I wathed a wild animal kill another for petty political beliefs.
Just a simple thought from a dumb human….
I believe that there is life on other planets. But I can’t be sure because our human race doesn’t have enough evidence as to if there are other humans out there somewhere. Then again, there’s not much of a chance that humans were a mere coincidence in the universe. There must be some other galaxy or solar system that is very much like our own that has planets like Earth and those planets must be capable of supporting human life forms. Of course when most people think of other life in space they think of 6 armed 9 eyed green creatures. But I believe that those kinds don’t exsist. Any other human life forms must have some significant facial simularites if they evolved in the same way we did. There is no way we are the ONLY life form in the universe considering there are other solar systems that rotate around a central star like us. Those solar systems should have the same adaption to evolution and life possibilities as Earth has because it isn’t very likely that Earth is the only planet in the universe that has general technologies. Anyway, that is just my opinion. How many of you scientists and any other person within a scientific field believe that a 12 year old girl in the seventh grade could possibly have the knoweledge of these facts and this exspansion of vocabulary and comprehension? Probably not many. Well guess what? I am a 12 year girl in the seventh grade and I have more opinions and theories about this topic. And this all came from my wide knoweledge of comprehension and science. I thought and visualized all of this in about 20 to 25 minutes. This is all based upon my opinions and intelligence.
wow, so crazy, i don’t even know what to say
bible was not the first book, there 1000s of religons that predate it 100s of years only reason most of the world is christian because roman ruled the known worlded and outlaw everything else
We want to know if other planets or life exist, but here on earth we cant even live happilly together,
The universe in which we live is very vast and contains billions og galaxies. It will be foolish to think that earth is unique.This type of climatic conditions may be rare, but we know only our type of biology. Even on earth we find life forms on unexpected places & hostile enviornmental conditions.
Life is universal but intelligence is rare.
I personally do not know whether or not life is out there. I would like to think it is since it would give scientists something to look for. I would hate to think of humans as our best shot to making life all worthwhile. I personally think we are a let down to God’s plan, so another life form may be more uplifting to him. All we do is fight and we have become destructive to our planet. There was also talk, not long ago, of an Earth 2. Are you serious?! We cant even take care of the Earth we have and now because this one is all dinged up, we are going to move to another one? People are freaking crazy!!
I have no doubt that there is civilization on another planet. If they don’t believe in income tax, I want to live there.
for the people who dont believe in big green monsters we had them here about 60 million years ago so i cant understand why thats so unbelieveable. What upsets me is were probably never going to have the techonology to find out a mean the closest star after ours, i think is alpha centauri about 4.3 light years away even travelling at 40000 k/ph it would take us something like 12000 years to get there so for all this discussion we’l never know anyway.
I do beleive there is life beyond our planet so says “Meral Jackson” a former scientist of the NTA. Says he has proven for a fact there is life in outer space beyond our world. Read abut it plz. www.outerspace69.com
I am sure there is life on plenty of planets as our universe has trillions trillions of planets so my guess could be at least a billion of planets might have life.
Raj
In reply to this:
22) speed says:
there is life on other planets.it is god who cretaed everything.people do not accept this fact .
and they waste their time in not beliening that.
Okay, what about the reverse? What if your thoughts are actually the incorrect ones? Aren’t you in turn wasting your time following your beliefs that god created everything? You don’t know how everything was created. You are just saying that because you’ve read it or heard it and that’s what you believe. There is no correct answer right now though because we don’t know for sure. The science works for the science people and the religious stuff works for the religious people. Will we ever truly find out? Doubtful.
James what you said maybe true but you have to admit that science is a hell of a lot closer than religion will ever be.
The bible doesn’t say that God did or did not create more than humans. Its just a story about us. So because we pick up one book about someone, we cannot assume there aren’t others. I am christian, and believe there is other life out there. Although I believe there is other life, I also know that it is very fragile. Everything has to be exactly correct to start life and keep it going. A planets orbit, distance from its sun (if it has one), food, oxygen, atmosphere, and the ability to sustain that long enough to evolve its life into what we are. What we all really are is lucky to be here. Our 90 years of life doesnt even register with the timeline that the universe operates on. If we were to fast forward the life of earth, it would probably be created and destroyed in about one second. Assuming this, can we all look out there and really believe we are the only, and most superior beings in all of exsistence? Can we really say that with every distance gaze we give of the night sky, there will never be anything out there also looking up and away? As humans, we should be less arrogant and selfish. Space is a giant project waiting for us to evolve and advance to release its secrets. My opinion is that we stop fighting each other and start looking out. Theres alot of work to do!
They are watching us!!!
Odds of life somewhere in space…good, odds of intellegent life, good…..odds we meet them anytime soon…..not so good. Assuming we don’t destroy ourselves, one day we may have the Tech. to interact with other life forms. And I believe it’s possible they already know of us, but as stated before, for whatever reason, they have decided to let us develop on our own. This is all speculation of course. And One more thing…..Who has the right to say Aliens are not also children of God? i remember hearing that somewhere in the bible God states ” I have other lambs, of whom you do not know yet.”
I have to agree with Alex yea you may say im not so bright im in the 8th grade 13 years old and i believe there is other life out there yes im a Christian but who says God didnt make other lifeforms other there in space the universe is filled with many wonders and things we havent learned yet like why cant alll the nation be at peace we gonna end up destroying our selves with all of this going on now along with a prophecy of December 21st 2012 being the end of the world which I dont believe the end of the world is near only God knows and i think it will be aliens showing them selves on that day for all I know.
“For those who look at it objectively”????? HAHAHAHA
You have GOT to be kidding me. Do you mean that for those who believe in the “Universal Sovereignty” it is easy to see the evidence? So in other words, because a couple of dudes…..like Paul, Jeremiah, Peter, Moses, ohhhhhh…..maybe even David got the hankering to write some cool stuff and put a flashy title on it like “Genesis” or “Micah” or “Corinthians”….or my favorite “Revelations”…..that THIS is what we call EVIDENCE? Oh but let’s support this EVIDENCE with the fact that we found some pottery shards in the deserts of Iraq, or Jordan, or “Sumaria”……..that call out the names of people who are listed in the bible as actual people. ……HA…..”SEE SEE SEE……we knew it all along!!” RIGHT????
PHHHOOOOEEEY!
There’s no arguing that “books” were written by people who ended up in the bible and the fact that we can prove this is a real testament allright……..a real testament to the fact that our archeology skills are WAYYYY better than our reasoning skills …..OBVIOUSLY!
The fact is……there are those who believe in creation. There are those who believe in intelligent design. Then there are those who love to believe in God but know that until REAL EVIDENCE is presented we might as well believe what we see in M.I.B. II. But honestly, believing in GOD, Yahweh, Jehovah, or Bob……couldn’t possibly hurt you either……if your will to remain “objective” and not become some zealous blinded freak!
ofcourse!
There has to be life on other planets in the universe. The universe is so vast and maybe even still expanding. Our solar system can’t be a coincidence. Our just something that happened out of the blue. If and when the big bang happened billions of other galaxies were made just like ours. I don’t think that only 1 of billion galaxies has only 1 solar system that has only 1 planet that can support complexlife That would be a big waste of space. There has to be atleast one other galaxie that has a solar system with a planet similar to ours. I think that there is civilzations out there waiting to be discovered. I think that when we find other civilizations out there it will be the answer to life as we know it.
P.S. I do believe that there is a greater being such as god. I still don’t quite know if its a god.
When peole think aliens, they think big oval eyed, skinny bodied, high tech creatures, but they are forgetting that they could be like us! I mean look at it… we watch tv, we play video games, we make comedys; what if they do too!?
In reading through the myriad of responses, everyone is saying, intelligent life. Leave off word intelligent. How about just life.
to you above my comment. In my comment, I, also, said “intelligent life”. Because specifically, I was talking about humans… or something within the range of humanity. If I would have said just “life”, I may have been talking about bacteria or parasites or any small kind of life. We are just trying to be specific.
i think if the LIFE is or will be exists on other planets so y GOD can’t do it by himself????????????????
if life can exists on other planet sssssssso i think why God can’t do this by himself????????????
View this question from a cosmic view point. Earth is a special place, not to many in the universe.. The Universe IS life itself. Earth is just a place were the air so to say is just right. A place where our energy can materialize a material shell we call a body…meditate on this you must!!!
to the person near the top who said the bible was the first book ever written so how can we not believe it, that is complete and utter crap. the ancient chinese had writing abilities thousands of years ago. before even the people who made up the greatest fiction of all time named the Bible.
as tantilising as an excuse it is the devil does not burry bones in the ground to make people disbelieve in god. that just sounds like an excuse for someone loosing an argument.
and lets be completely honest, religion is what causes all suffering, wars, and destruction. i cant wait til they find life on other planets so all the christians and such have to become ordinary people.
we should stop caring so much and believing in an outside force to lead us and just believe in ourselves! maybe then our planet wouldn’t be slowly being destroyed by us!
lets be honest, all things have a start.
the big bang was a start.
first life to crawl onto land was a start
man becoming top of the food chain by outsmarting its competion was a start
why can’t we just use the reason of there not being SO much life in the universe purely because life is only just starting out, and where it does exist is distantly spaced out in the infinite reaches of the universe. this just makes us special and early, but not necasarily the only ones.
and for all we know far away planets could have civilisation but because of how light travels we are so far away we wont see it for thousands of years.
I TRULY BELIEVE THERE ARE LIFE FORMS ON OTHER PLANETS. SOME OF US NEED TO GET THE HUMAN IMAGINATION OUT OF THE WAY.I DONT BELIEVE THERE ARE HUMAN LIKE PEOPLE ON OTHER PLANETS BECAUSE GOD YAWEH JEHOVAH THE ALMIGHTY LORD WHATEVER NAME YOU USE IS A CREATOR A CREATIVE SUPREME BEING.JUST LOOK AROUND YOU ANYTHING THAT HAS LIFE BIRDS INSECTS SEA MAMMALS TREES PLANTS VEGETATION IT IS ALL DIFFERENT AND CEATIVE AND ALL HVE LIFE FORM.
SO OUR SUPREME GOD IS A CREATOR.
I do believe there is life on other planets. My family and I got in this discussion while driving home from up North. But I mean this Universe.. is just so big. Our Galaxy is tiny compared to it But there are tons of other galaxys, Solar Systems, and Planets. We just don’t know what is on them becuase we do not have the technoligy to visist them. But guys think of it this way, we are living right now. We are 1 planet out of… ALOT. WE CANNOT be the only one with life, Intelligent life exists somewhere else i belive as well. Like someone said, we have been dropping these so called “UFO’S” on planets for years. We probably will not see these other life forms for a long time though, we wont be living, but maybe… just maybe someday, we will come in contact with other Lifeforms.
Think of when us Humans started out, we sailed by boat and had alot of unknown land. The universe is like that, we fly to places we do not know of. And their is ALOT we do not know of in Space.
Their is jut no way we can be the 1 plannet, out of all the trillions and billions of the others, the 1 planet with life. NO WAY! Their is life other places.
And for all of you talking about the bible, ok 1st off its written by a man. A man who obviously also thaught the world was round. But regardless, dont let your religious thaughts crowd your head, the bible means nothing in this case.
If this world were alone in the universe then it would only take on little mistake of nature or mankind to ruin the only life there would be. I argue the statement ” Life is unique to Earth and will only be to Earth.” We are not alone and we know it, but just to afraid to face it. The Universe is endless and galaxies unknown. Who are we to say we are unique. We are waiting for somone to open up and tell us. We are waiting for Them To find us and say “We are here!” So if you have to argue go right ahead, But say it to my e-mail. My e-mail omg.danny@yahoo.com
I rest my case
This is the way it is plain and simple. Life exists on earth because all the conditions are right. We are the right distance from the star we orbit. Therefore we are not too hot like Venus nor too cold like mars. We have an atmosphere, we have water, we have the organic molecules from which life first evolved and we have an electromagnetic field necessary to shield us from the dangerous radiation in space. The chances of any given planet having all the right conditions for life are very remote. But our star we refer to as the sun is only one of about 200 billion other stars in just our galaxy. There are about 150 billion galaxies in our known universe. There are more stars in the known universe than there are grains of sand on earth. Each one has the same chances for a planet to orbit which has the right conditions for life to form. Again those chances are slim. But if you think our star, is the only one that is orbited by a planet with all the right conditions for life to form your a complete fool.
I believe there are alien out there. They are not necessarily humanoid but who knows, they could be. It’s possible we may never have the technology to find them, and most likely not within our lifetime will we see proof of intelligent life on other planets. But if they are out there, I bet they’re playing Xbox live and watching alien pr0n on the internetz
Wow, such a broad spectrum of responses to this question! It’s good to see that we are actually THINKING about what we PERSONALLY believe, and not what is fed to us, so to speak. I am a former Christian. Before I realized my true self (not a Christian), I automatically accepted everything my church told me. I never questioned a single idea or concept. Honestly, it never even occurred to me to question information pertaining to creation of life, life outside of Earth, and other theories not relevant to this topic. However, one day I DID think for myself, and asked my church to explain the dinosaurs, not to be facetious, but because I genuinely wanted to know a Christian response to this question. And the “answers” that I did get, ultimately led to my seperation from Christianity. Now, I believe that each of us is entitled to our own opinion. I believe that is what makes us intelligent (this form is used loosely, to describe humanity as a whole, not on the individual intelligent-o-meter… that’s an entirely different discussion). If you believe in a God, or Gods, or a Supreme being, or whatever, that’s what you believe. No one can make someone else believe/disbelieve in that anymore than I can make you believe 2=2+5. And dependent upon that fundamental belief rests your opinion regarding life on other planets, moons, etc besides our Earth. Before my… conversion… my church (which I believed) said that the chance of life existing elsewhere was pretty slim, but if it did, any lifeforms equivalent to humans would look like us, because we were created in God’s image.
Now, since I’m able to think for myself, and to answer the question at hand, I will tell you what I, an individual, intelligent enough, human woman, believe. I believe like many of you that life, intelligent or not (on a side note… who is determining what/who is intelligent or not? Are we using ourselves as the control?) is exceedingly probable on other entities besides Earth. The probability of some form of life NOT existing is nil, when you really understand how ENORMOUS space is. And I’m sure that we have not even touched the surface on sheer size. Like it was stated before, we only now our own chemical makeup and the necessities of our atmosphere and such to sustain life here. How bold are we to assume that any other forms of life would only exist if our situation were replicated? Has it not occurred to us that other life forms may be faaaaar more advanced, and laugh at us as we contemplate their existence? Or, has anyone considered that the only reason we haven’t encountered other life forms (yet… as I believe there will come a day of “reckoning”, I guess I would call it)because they don’t WANT to meet us? I mean, look at the mess we have created for ourselves. Our home, Earth, is a mess. We as a whole fight continuously, and over ideas as petty as beliefs. Since I have been able to think for myself, not only have I come to realize that I have more questions than I ever thought possible, I also feel a sense of shame, as a human being, for how we have let ourselves come to this.
I wouldn’t be surprised if there were real intelligent life forms intercepting this exact debate, and finding humor in what will always be our human downfall… the ability and desire to fight amongst one another to prove our own personal idea right, instead of enjoying the debate, and voicing our own theories, notions, and ideas peacefully, which in the end is what makes us unique. The ability to form your own beliefs; the ability to be individual.
I really enjoy talking with other people about these types of things. Especially since I live in the “Bible Belt”, and I’m sort of the outcast
If you would like to contact me, my email is smith.c22@student.sscok.edu I would love to learn more, and ponder upon the ideas of others.
i think there could be life in other planets but planets in other galexy’s ….if you notice the fbi know and i think they have ufo’s somewhere they just dont let us know it sowe wont freak out
Finally…someone brings in the Govt. My thoughts exactly. There has been past stories such a the Rosewell New Mexico story. Why was that covered up and such a hush hush? Hmm…
Amber Lynne said:
“There has been past stories such a the Rosewell New Mexico story. Why was that covered up and such a hush hush?”
Perhaps because it didn’t happen.
Do you know that for a fact? Or is that your guess?
Mathmatically, the chance of life on other planets is astronomical…one can only hope we can exchange knowledge with a civilization of a greater value of life than that of Earth…considering we are mostly enemies, and are killing ourselves directly and indirectly…I hope that if the human race can overcome the inevitable, we are MUCH more evolved than we are now.
Why there is such hostility towards people of faith or the bible is some what of a mystery to me.
When my dad became a Christian he changed from a loveless home filled with poverty into a preacher man filled with love for others and finding great eternal riches.
I feel compassion for those of you who have not let Jesus into your life, but rather have given place to such darkness in this old world.
Jesus has answered prayer for me, is with me all the time, I feel His loving presence in me, have seen other’s healed, and changed for the better instead of having a life wasted and hurt.
You may reject me; I don’t mind. But if you reject the unmerited favor of God that was bought by His son Jesus you’ve rejected the best part of life.
I have no doubt.
Statistically speaking of course there’s life on other planets. But the non-believers shouldn’t feel alone; I’m sure there are idiots on other planets who don’t believe in us either.
A Man of Faith:
I’m sorry if my post had anything to do with upsetting you. However, when I was a Christian, I was told that everything about life on other planets was for the most part fiction. I recieved conflicting answers. When I asked questions, it was if I was being judged just for being an individual who NEEDED some sort of evidence to believe. There are a great many Christians who do exemplify love, unity, respect, etc. However, just as with any other group, there are also those who abuse and misuse the title of Christian they have given themselves. I do not hold any hostility towards Christians or the Bible. It is what it is. I do agree with you, but in a different approach. I feel that those who haven’t questioned themselves, who haven’t traveled the depths of their being to find out what they really believe in, those who wholeheartedly accept what others tell them as truth without doing research of their own, have rejected the best part of life… being an individual who doesn’t use that to the full potential. The great thing about being individual is that you CAN think for yourself. You CAN ask questions, and seek out answers.
I would pose this question: how can you say, “I feel compassion for those of you who have not let Jesus into your life, but rather have given place to such darkness in this old world”? Are you saying that anyone who hasn’t accepted “Jesus” into their life has accepted darkness in his/it’s place? If you are, let me be the first to inform you that is NOT an accurate statement. Also, those of us who don’t pray to Jesus don’t all “have a life wasted and hurt”. You are entitled to feely give your opinion, as is everyone else. However, we must all accept that those opinions will be debated.
Ah, the individuality!! I love it!
But, to the question at hand… do YOU believe there is life on other planets (if you’ll remember, that was the question posted)? Why or why not? What does your religion say about the matter? I’m not trying to sound… mean… at all, I’m genuinely interested. Thanks!
I am 100 percent positive that there is in fact life out there. I have been abducted numerous times over the past fifteen years. They are also very intelligent, much more than we, as a human race are. They ran tests on me and returned me back to the exact spot where I was taken from. I am super cereal!
Dorris I think they took your wheaties sweetie.
If all was started with a big bang doesnt that assure the odds are in favor of other life ouside of earth? Or was earth a single seed? Then that would bring you back to the postulatum of God. I truly believe that string theory will evolve to a holographic theory and that will explain the infinite matter of things to the next degree….a fragment of a fiminite of the singular vibrating symphony of God. Based on super string and m theory I would say that the dimensional loops must be another barier to break thru…yhe division beyween the branes may contain nothing. this is a barrier that cannoy be crossed but within another brane then may be something just totally different and be anti-string. When the next bing bang occurs we may know the answers.
I hope Darth Vader never finds us
If the odds are that there is life on other planets than odds are there are much more advanced life forms. I think they say earth is as about 1/3 the age of the universe? Somewhere out there is a real big brother!
I wonder why this has become a religion debate. Remember the topic, people!
I used to be Catholic, but then I was Atheist, now Graecist. I asked myself, “Are all of the answers satisfctory?” They were, though I chose to interperet all of the stories slightly differently. For instance, when Hera took Argus’ eyes and adorned her “peacock” with them, the “peacock” was actually a pecock-like creature, which then gave the eyes to its children when they were born, thus evolution worked the beautiful pecock’s decorations into itself.
Anyway, I think, like so many others, that the Universe is too big for us to be alone. Certainly we have found planets/moons that have the basic requirements: liquid water, nutrients, and some light. Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons, has these, and the 6-times-the-size-of-Jupiter planet orbiting 70 Virginis (a star) is warm enough for liquid water. Even though it probably is a gas giant, the moons might support life.
I don’t know. The idea of cats in humanoid form seems pretty cool!
I am currently doing a project on this trying to learn abou the ideas of life or intelligent life on other planets. If anyone would like to have a good discussion with me to help me with my paper just shoot me an email.
Hey Stacey so you finally listened
OF COURSE THERE IS….THERE”S NO LIFE inteligent, advanced creatures in the universe ?
HERE
JUST US
I’ve been thinking about this topic for some time now and I can’t seem to form a stance for either.
In my opinion.Im actually not sure.You may call me an idiot for thinking this but i dont care.Although life does seem definate on other planets how can you be sure?Sure peaple say the universe is to big for just us but its just words.Maybe life did exist but got wiped out by war or some other hostile entity like were doing to ourselves?Maybe there watching as you read this?Maybe life does exist but were the most technically advanced so in turn we have no way of knowing?Call me an idiot but in fact you know it could be true. thats my opinion.
If we ever do find an inteligent life we could never ever predict what it could be like. They could be god-like race millions of years advanced from us, or maybe a sentient race being born. maybe we will wipe them out or vice versa, maybe there is one but because the universe is so ultimetly huge we wil never find them. or maybe we are already be occupying the same space we do not even know they are there. We cannot possibly believe that their is no life out their. Its the nature of that life that is the question
anyone who thinks that there can’t be other life out there because its not the word of god or the bible is just plain foolish. not to sound entirely to mean or judgmental, but if that is your stance on this issue than you are uneducated. the bible is a book that was created thousands of years ago by the church to gain power and to scare people. it was created in a time when there was no science and the only answer to unknown questions was god. the bible and god are the only things that humans still hold onto and believe to have relevance, meaning and truth even though its from thousands of years ago. do you still believe that the world is flat? or that the earth is the center of the universe? because those are also ideas from that time era that the church endorsed. in todays time however, we understand science and how things work and how our planet was formed, and it was not created by some mythical being in seven days. thats just plain stupid. god is something that was created by man, just the same as the easter bunny, santa claus and leprechauns.
with that being said, i find it almost impossible for there to not be other life forms out there. for starters, were miraculously insignificant in the grand scheme of things. we are one species living on one planet amongst millions, perhaps even billions or trillions, of other planets and galaxies. there has to be other life somewhere out there. whether there as intelligent as us however (perhaps there even more intelligent), is the only real question
I believe in a GOD but not as described to be in man made books. I believe in GOD to be the source of all existence. GOD is proof enough that there is life elsewhere. How could there be such a powerful entity and not be more life in the universe, multi-verse, parallel dimensions, etc. I nod my head in disbelief when I hear people say the bible says this and that so it must be true. That is so moronic and ignorant that I’m boggled by the idea. We as a society have been told of this book and raised to believe in it’s words and teachings all written and designed by men in a time in history when they needed to come up with a method through politics to create “religion” to control the masses. This lead to the bible being written and is why so many wars have been fought and people have died. There is no need for religion anymore but by now it’s blown completely out of control. If they all knew the truth some religious fanatics heads would explode.
Whether we believe it or not there are life forms on other planets and I believe all types of life forms, even ones we dont know. Humans are very ignorant creatures, we think that we are the most intelligent life forms… HA are you kidding me, do you see the human race? the fights we get into… over what? f***in oil? religion? land? POLITICS? okay first with oil, thats nothing to fight over, religion thats one of the dumbest subjects I do believe there is something after death but I do not believe in an almighty god. Now with land we shouldnt even be fighting for that, this earth is not ours to own. And politics holy hell, this is one reason we are dumbass creatures, do you think politics or a civilization is a good thing? do you think it helps us live? look at all these poor people.. do you remember what the nazis did to the jews? how do humans come up with the sick sh** we do? Yeah I believe there are other life forms and other life forms that are much more intelligent than any creature we know of. I bet they are watching us now and just laughing. We humans are destroying this earth, and it is because we are ignorant and we take everything for granted, believe it or not. On December 21st 2012 this world will be coming to a major turning point. I dont know what is going to happen but I do believe it is going to be huge and I am hoping that the human race is exterminated from existence.
I can not believe how many ignorant people enter their comments here. Don’t get me wrong some of the comments I’ve read are intelligent. Walter Arevalo and Jordon have it right. Civilization has come way too far for us to be basing our theories on religion and the bible. In 1543, when Nicholas Copernicus first said the earth goes around the sun and not the other way around, people thought he was a total crackpot. Churches were horrified by this supposively rediculous belief. It was stated that “if God created the Earth and man in his own image than the Earth must be at the center. Then Jahannes
I accidently sent my comment too soon. As I was saying Jahannes Keppler then trumpeted the the world that Copernicus was right and we are clearly going around the sun. Then Galileo downright proved it. Throughout history science continuously proves religion wrong. I’m not saying I don’t believe in God. But my belief is completely scientific. As for all of this matter coming into existence, through the Big Bang, that’s where I believe the divine creation was. But that Creator, in my opinion, was an almighty force that we can’t even begin to comprehend. But some being that just said “let there be light” and “poof” it appeared? Please. People need to wake the hell up. It’s not the fourteen hundreds anymore. Science has it right. Science started getting it right five hundred years ago when Coppernicus first said the Earth goes around the Sun. As for life on other planets if you think Earth is the only planet with life you obviously aren’t grasping the sheer size of the universe.