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Originally Posted by Rob Instigator
the sad and deeply scary realization that our Earth may indeed be the only planet in the entire galaxy that has the means to support life forms needs to be explored. If you truly study what caused life to occurr, and what myriad of things had to go just so, just right, for basic life forms to appear, one ould truly understand why people call life a miracle.
just a small sampling of the checklist needed to have Earth be what it is today.
a stable star around which to revolve
a stable planetary system where gravitational perturbations do not distort the Earth's stable orbit
a planetary system far removed from the center of our galaxy, where supermassive black holes, and periodic supernovas and star formation bathe everything in highly intense radiation, which is deadly to life
Large giant planets to attract and " clean up" the debris within the solar system. This allows the earth to develope without constant asteroid collissions.
the perfect distance from the star, where the rays warm the planet but are not powerful enough to strip the planet of it's atmosphere.
A large and stable sattelite/moon rotating arund the earth at such a perfect rate and speed that it balances out any small perturbations in the Earth's rotation, creating stability and semi-stable weather patterns. Hell, the lunar tides may have been the catalyst for the first actual cell formation as the waves crashed on shores throughout the planet.
an atmosphere composed of mostly nitrogen, which keeps the sun's lethal radiation from destroying life.
liquid oceans of water, which are extremely unlikely. If the Earth's temperature ever dips a few degrees too low or the earth moves just a bit too far from the sun all water would be ice, and life could not flourish. If the temperature gets a few degrees too high or the planet's orbit is just a bit too close to the star, then all the liquid water would be vaporized, and if the atmosphere is gone then the water would do what it did on Mars, which is to turn to rust as it reacts with the soils.
These are just a very minute criteria for a planet to have life like ours. very sall. this does not evn go into life itself.
frankly, the odds are most favorable that the Earth is the single planet in our galaxy of billions of stars that is capable of supporting life for what amounts to more than 3 BILLION YEARS.
I would find it preposterous to assume that this nearly unfthomable sequence of events can unfold regularly in our galaxy.
If anything, eafch galaxy out there may have but one planet around but one star system that can harbor life as the Earth can, allowing it to florusih and to create ever more complex and intelligent creatures.
if this is the case then we humans are ALONE, or as alone as can possibly be.
travel between stars is ridiculous. travel between ends of the galaxy is nearly unfathomable. Now, travel between the unimaginable recesses of deep space betrween galaxies? Nigh impossible to imagine.
we could very well be alone, and therefore we are responsible for caring for and propagating the seeds of life. I feel humans mission is to spread life, even bacterial or microorganism life, to any place we can. we may very well be the FIRST advanced civilization in the entire Universe, all hocuspocus bullshit aside. that is a very real possibility
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