What's your opinion on extraterrestrial life?

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An image of distant galaxies is evidence only of galaxies, image capture technology, and someone intelligent enough to operate the technology and produce the image.

Isn't it enough to admire the pretty lights in the sky without having to believe that there is intelligence behind each one?

You put too much emphasis on "physical evidence". By this standard you limit your own self from other, greater possibilities. By this standard existence becomes a dull mix of unprovable and unknowable blacks & whites because you demand physical evidence for every thing. It is not my job to convince you of anything. As far as other, non physical evidence for ET's goes, there is plenty of witness testimony, photographic and video evidence for your consideration. If you care, go look into it yourself but don't ask me or anyone to do your research for you, this is your responsibility. It is true though, that there are a good amount of hoaxes and false information in this field, you will have to use your own discernment and intuition to separate the crap from the truth.

Some of those are G type stars with a similar "Goldilocks" zone to that of our own Sun. If the chemical makeup of the star is similar to ours there is some chances that rocky planets with water may exists around those suns. No sure but, but it is possible. With billions of such suns it is difficult to say that some sort of water-carbon based life doesn't exist somewhere. Even if we grant that, that is not sufficient reason to presume that any such life or proto-life that may arise Out There is intelligent. I think intelligence is a fluke and a rare happening.

ruveyn

You put too much emphasis on imagination. I have done my own research, and continue to do so. I was hoping that you'd have more to offer than just the same old alleged "eyewitness" accounts, doctored photos and blurry videos. Belief is irrelevant without cold, hard, demonstrable facts to back them up. It takes more - much, much more - than some semi-literate, unemployable drunkard claiming to have been abducted, or some bored housewife looking out the window of her double-wide and claiming to have seen something in the sky that she can't identify before I will accept the claim that "We Are Not Alone". Only an idiot would take the flying leap from "I done seen sumpin and I dunno wutt it is" to "It mus be them alien fellers!" Faith is for religion, not science.


Ruveyn, I can go along with your reasoning of "possibility", but to take a flying leap from "It's possible" to "It's certain" without any intervening empirical evidence is too far inside the realm of religion to be anything useful.

Physical evidence is the only basis for science. Anything else is speculation and pixie dust.

All scientific theories and hypotheses must be tested empirically to have any credibility.

ruveyn

"Tested Empirically" = "Demonstrated"

All else leads to fantasy, fallacy, or delusion.

This is very true. I don't think speculation is harmful though. If some people were not willing to boldly go ahead with new, "out-of-the-box" ideas there would be little advancement. It seems that sometimes speculation can lead to greater understanding if it leads to a line of thought that results in a new discovery

Scientific creativity is a form of art. Any solid hypothesis has a run up in imagination first. Generally the scientists who are the most correct (in the empirical sense) think farthest outside the proverbial box. Einstein is a good example. Max Planck is another. He was by inclination conservative but was forced to think the unthinkable by the facts at hand. Given the failure to deal with black body radiation he was ultimately force to think of energy coming in lumps (quanta) rather than as a continuous quantity. He didn't like doing it, but the facts of the situation gave him no other choice.

ruveyn

Considering the raw numbers of potential sites, and the tenacity of life in general. There is at least basic microbial life in almost every star system. It doesn't take much, some water, a few basic organic molecules, an energy source of some kind, and life takes hold.

When it comes to more complex multicellular life, that number would drop significantly. That would require a somewhat more stable ecosystem that would allow for the basic life to evolve to something more complex. I'd guess on the order of several million star systems in this galaxy.

The numbers of earth-like planets with plants, animals (some kind of hybrid or similar alternate) would be more in the thousands, maybe tens of thousands in the galaxy.

But then sentient life, similar to us, but not necessarily "technologically advanced" may be present on hundreds of worlds
in the galaxy. Most of which would be bound to their homeworld like we are.

Then the question of interstellar capable life, likely only a handful are present in the galaxy.

But there could also be intergalactic capable life, and extra-dimensional life.
And what about the actual definition of life?

But as far as any of the above visiting earth? I dunno. The waters of that subject are so muddy that is hard to tell fact from fiction. And is pretty much irrelevant when it comes to day to day life. All we get a sketchy videos, impressive light shows, and unprovable accounts of the strange. If ET's are here, they are obviously hiding from us on purpose. And those reasons can only be speculated.

Until an alien craft lands outside my home and I get to meet some ET's myself, I will remain skeptical about alien life visiting earth.

But there is DEFINITELY some kind of life all over the friggn place out there.

Correction: There may be basic microbial life in almost every star system. Since we don't know with absolute certainty, we can not make an absolute claim if "is".

With this one slight correction, the rest of your thesis makes sense.

Given the combinatorial properties of carbon based compounds, the existence of simple replicators (aka life forms) is a highly plausible hypothesis. We still need evidence that where carbon, hydrogen, phosphorous and carbon abound (along with water) then some form a biota will emerge. But it makes a great deal of sense just from the p.o.v. of physical chemistry.

ruveyn

Correct. There is also the factor for ultraviolet radiation - too much, and organic molecules break down too quickly; too little and photosynthesis (as we know it) would not work (if it would even evolve). There is the need for some tide of "churning" effect - something to keep the chemicals moving around just enough to allow access to each other. On Earth, the tides and estuaries perform that function.

Again, we just do not know with absolute certainty what conditions exist on other worlds, even on those that the scientist deem to be "Earth-Like", so we can not declare with absolute certainty that extraterrestrial life exists (although it may be likely), and it is even more presumptuous that any extraterrestrial life has reached the level of intelligence and technological superiority to have visited Earth.

Maybe it happened, but there is no empirical evidence to support an absolute claim of such - only suspicion and wishful thinking, neither of which can be considered "proof".

This

The poll didn't have my option. I vote:

Hey now folks, I think you aren't being open-minded enough about this. After all, if aliens never visited Earth, how did Jay Leno get that chin?

(I am a bad person and I feel bad now)

"Close encounter" = mis-identification of something quite mundane.

Here is a true story: Shortly after the famous Orson Welles broadcast of Halloween, 1938 (Martians landing at Grover's Mill near Plainsboro Nj) a very scared citizen shot at a steel windmill tower nearby with his shotgun thinking it was one of the Martian war machines. That windmill complete with holes from the buckshot can still be seen to this day.

ruveyn