Is there other intelligent life out there?

Is there intelligent life out there?

How’s that for a loaded question?  Is there intelligent life out there?  For the moment, let’s narrow the focus down to non-intelligent life, something perhaps single-cellular or multi-cellular but not intelligent.  The first part of this posting is going to be fairly simple to follow, but I think my conclusions might cause a number of people to roll their eyes at me.  Dr Jill Tartar and Dr Seth Shostak, for example, won’t like my conclusions one bit. 

There are only two possibilities.  The first is that there is simple (or perhaps even complex) non-intelligent life out there.  The second possibility is that there isn’t simple (or perhaps even complex) non-intelligent life out there. 

The best estimates about the number of stars in our galaxy alone is somewhere between 200 – 400 billion stars.  That’s a lot.  (And yes, it’s also another ‘duh’ moment.)

The best estimate about the number of galaxies in the Universe is somewhere between 100 – 200 billion.  Although, a recent German supercomputer estimate pegged that number at perhaps 500 billion.  Sometimes these galaxies collide with each other, and sometimes they start sloshing around.  (NOTE:  I am NOT suggesting that all the life forms in the particular galaxy all got intoxicated at the same time (ie: ‘sloshed’) and they got together on the galaxy internet and said “Hey, we’re all sloshed so let’s see if we can get our galaxy sloshed too!  So tomorrow, lean really really far left and then begin rocking back and forth!   We’ll get our galaxy sloshed in no time!  (And please don’t forget the Nauzene or similar anti-nausea liquid.  I don’t want another couch ruined!”) ) (*)

So in multiplying out 100 billion times 100 billion we get … a really big number.  A really really big number.  If your brain isn’t hurting yet, it just might be by the time you read the rest of this.

Add to that the fact that most physicists believe we exist in a Multiverse, where our Uninverse is but one of many(N1).  Although, for now, we’re going to concentrate on just this Universe which we’re in.  I wouldn’t want anybody’s brain to explode. 

Given that really really big number, can I state with certainty that Earth is alone in all the Universe in that it’s the only planet which has life?  I think we can pretty much rule that out on just the sheer numbers alone.  But it also violates everything that Copernicus and Galileo were trying to tell us when they said that Earth is not special as a place, nor as the only place in the Universe where the laws of physics work the way they do. 

So the conclusion is no, I don’t think Earth is the only planet to have ever evolved life. 

But now we come to the really hard question; is there intelligent life out there?  Again, given the sheer numbers of stars involved, I believe that there is intelligent life out there.  Having said that, in my opinion it’s going to be so rare and so far distant from each other that the chances of making contact are indeed slim.

Why?

Our Earth is about 4.67 billion years old.  The giant impact hypothesis (*2) states that about 4.5 billion years ago the Earth got whacked by a Mars-sized object with the ejecta forming the Moon.  Our Moon does a number of things for us:

* - it gives us moon-lit beaches to walk upon, hand in hand with the person we love.

* - it slows the Earth down.  Without the moon, we’d be spinning a 4-hour day.  Two hours of day and two hours of night.

* - it gives us ocean tidal forces.

* - It makes Human life more likely.  Without the moon’s being there, the Earth’s surface winds would be between 350 – 400 km per hour.  Humans would have great difficulty trying to live on such a planet.

Add to that the fact that there have been 15 mass extinctions on this planet, 10 of which appear to have been caused by … wait for it … global warming(*3).  Indeed, at 10 of these mass extinctions we find isorenieratane at the surface of the ocean.  This can only occur if the surface of the ocean is anoxic (has no oxygen) and is saturated with hydrogen-sulfide; enough to come out of solution(N2).  96% of all life on the planet died after the mass extinction known as the Great Dying(*4) of 250 million years ago.  The Thrinaxodon(*5), for example, with a skull the size of a robin’s egg, was the only mammal that survived this mass extinction.  If not for it, I am not here – something else is.

Exactly what caused this mass extinction is still hotly debated, but there is growing evidence of the release of noxious and poisonous gasses into the atmosphere.  Some people think it was due to a flood-basalt of lava from the Siberian Traps(*6).  And, indeed, fully one-quarter of Siberia is buried under lava. 

But then we come to the famous (or infamous) K-T Event(*7) of 65 million years ago.  It’s perhaps the most famous of all extinction-level events and is the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. 

Add to that the fact that Toba went off 74,000 years ago and about wiped out the human race.

And there have been various other things that have happened over the years.

But here is the crux of what I’m getting at:  Over 4.7 billion years the Earth has gone through many changes, some happening due to natural disasters(N3) and some due to chance events, such as the K-T Event.  And, of course, there has been the occasional genetic mutation thrown in just to keep things honest. 

4.7 billion years of events happening in the same sequence, in the same time frame(s) and with roughly the same outcome.  The Thinaxodon, the only surviving mammal of the Great Dying is the only reason you and I are here.  The K-T Event is the chance impact that wiped out the dinosaurs.

So we have a very specific sequence of events happening at a certain timeframe and with a certain outcome.  The odds against that happening in the same sequence at the same time and with the same outcome are virtually nill.

CONCLUSION:  Yes, I do believe there is other intelligence life out there.  However, it will almost certainly look nothing like us and will in all probability be so rare and so far apart from each other that the chances of contact, at least with our current level of technology, are virtually nill.

(*) – Sloshing galaxies - http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2011/a2052/

(*2) – giant impact hypothesis - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_impact_hypothesis

(*3) – Kump et al hypothesis – 2005. “Greenhouse Extinctions.”

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v441/n7093/full/nature04905.html

(*4) – Great Dying - http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2002/28jan_extinction/

(*5) – Thinaxodon - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thrinaxodon

(*6) – Siberian Traps - http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/education/events/cowen2a.html
(*7) – K-T Event - http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/sl9/back3.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretaceous%E2%80%93Paleogene_extinction_event

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicxulub_crater
(*8) – Toba - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toba_catastrophe_theory

NOTES:

(N1) Note One:  This is the many worlds theory which states that every time the Universe has to make a choice (or we ourselves are faced with a choice) both choices come into existence.  For example:  I am currently wearing a black shirt.  But I had a choice of wearing the black shirt I’m currently wearing, or the blue one which has the word “California” emblazoned on it.  In this Universe, I put on the black shirt, but in the other Universe I put on the blue one.  Another example would be taking two different routes to work.  Should I take the shorter, more direct route?  Or should I take the longer route which might actually save time due to traffic conditions?  In this Universe, I took the shorter route, but in the other Universe I took the longer route.  (Is your brain hurting yet?)

(N2) Note Two:  Hydrogen-sulfide (H2S) is a colourless gas that smells like rotten eggs.  200 parts per million (PPM) is enough to kill you dead.  H2S as well as the above-mentioned isorenieratanes tell us that at least 10 of the mass extinctions appear to have been due to “Greenhouse Extinctions.” (Kump et all hypothesis – 2005)

(N3) Note Three: Hydrogen Sulfide vent off the coast of Namibia:  http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=12831

Lake Nyos - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Nyos  It has happened before.  It will happen again.