Mathematical odds out of this world

I really didn't know where to post this question, but I am not a crazy conspiracy theorist. I do believe there is other intelligent life in the universe, so much so we can't count. I don't believe we are not anything special in the universe, although we would like to think so, but here is the question. With all of the known and mainly unknown galaxies out there, trillions upon trillions and the ones we don't know about, what are the odds that you or I were born on this planet and not some other planet that is like star wars where almost every technological challange is conquered. What are the odds of that? There maybe some person like me on another planet with 6 arms, 6 legs and 6 eyes asking the samething, but what are those odds and how does it fit in with current SCIENTIFIC thinking on aliens of other worlds? Don't give me the bible because thats just contamination on this planet, or well because we can't get there because of our conventional thinking therefore they can't get here which is just a arguement that is as dead as uuuuh dead. Any guesses?

reply to post by RyanLA123


Those odds depends on the number of planets with intelligent life, if any. Any guesses may be anywhere from 100% correct to 100% incorrect.

Not including our Solar System, maybe 100% of all stars have intelligent life, in which case the odds of having been born on Earth are tiny, or maybe 100% of all other stars don't contain a single trace of life, in which case the odds of being born on Earth are huge.

We really dont have technology to calculate any type of odds. and there are SOOO many more questions and variables you need to plug into the equation before you can even get a number.

Are they carbon based life forms?
do they need light?
do they need water?
Do they need air?
are they biological?
are they mechanical?
do they burn easily?
do they freeze easily?
do they live long enough to be detectable?
do they need to inhabit a planet to survive?

[I will add more questions as they come to me, but these are some of the basics]


if the awnser is 'no' to any of those questions then the odds shoot up EXPONENTIALLY.

the exponential curve, which looks just like a skateboard quarter pipe, hints to us that there is a 99.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% chance that life is abundant throughout the boundless universes.

Life is FAR to complex to be like a closed system; meaning it would be seemingly infinitely IMPROBABLE, that earth is the only place with life in the universe.

reply to post by RyanLA123


Interesting question, the famous equation which is said to work out the probability has one major problem - we don't know ANY of the variables yet! It depends on how easy it is for life to evolve, how many life systaining planets exist, etc, etc.

Well almost everything we learn about these factors is pushing towards a high likelyhood of many, many forms of life exisiting. A fairly recent experiment showed that sealed tubes can generate the precursor to life given the right conditions, it seems that the conditions to create complex life are fairly easy to create and many, if not most, areas of the universe are going to be able to support life in one form or another.

However the process takes a long time, asuming that we took an average time to generate to this level we can assume that for each planet higher forms of life only exist towards the end of its life, after that point we can then assume some destroy themselves or are wiped out while others move onto type 2 and 3 civs - as we have no idea how likely a complex life form is to get inteligence we can't say how many of the planets are going to currently have surviving species.

We might be very special case or we might be run of the mill, certainly it's possible that given the same starting point (big bang) the universe is full of type one and expanding type two speices, depending which way you think about the numbers really has a lot to do with how they come out, for sure we won't know untill and if we ever know.

It's possible that we're going to come up to a hard limit on ship speed (maybe even as low as 1/2 or 1/3 of light speed) which will severly limit our ability to travel space, all the dimensional travel could turn out to be pie in the sky hopes, This little island of planets stuck on the outer edge of the universe might be all we get, maybe some long term deep space probes to near stars but alas we might find some of the more interesting bits of the universe forever off limits!

The actual maxamum ability to travel space, collect resources, use power, etc is the decideing factor in what sort of society might be existing in space, do aliens meet up and trade? form aliances and war endlessly? it all depends not only on the biology, physics and psychology of the infiniate but also largely on pure chance and luck - we just can't second guess it, although we can speculate wildly which is always more fun

I personally think that the likelyhood of someone in our visible star field looking out, seeing Sol and a myriad of other twinkling stars is highly likely - far more so than i would be able to rationaly prove, i think they probably look and act like us in many ways while other traits will differ wildly - i asume their historical development will while having been entirely unique resemble in many ways ourown, industrial revolutions, romantic eras, empires and wild religions slowly forming a cohesive world character based on scientific principles and morals similer in the end to ours.

Further i think that the harmonics, desires and fears we experience are universal to all species - everyone will have a form of music, art and moral theory. Some of the styles will overlap, watercolors will exist on all planets with blue skys and seas - drums will exist in all but the rarest, weirded worlds. The factors involved in existing make these things a part of all existing things lives, even as far as all politicians are liers and cheats

Anythings possible, all we can do is dream and hope. hehe untill we get our stuff together and make some kickass rocket ships!

Well if you look at the planets we know of. You can count them out. There won't be any one like us on them.

But the odds are at least if you count in our planet. 1 to the infinite.
But the odds are good that there might be more when you have a infinite number

The Drake equation states that:


where:

N is the number of civilizations in our galaxy in which communication might be possible;
and

R* is the average rate of star formation per year in our galaxy
fp is the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne is the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets
fℓ is the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point
fi is the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop intelligent life
fc is the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space
L is the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space

It all depends on the values for each variable in the equation. With even conservative numbers the equations postulates that there is abundant life in the universe.

However the chances of you being born on earth would be 100% because your genetic makeup and genetic predocessors are here on earth. So i don't see how theres any percentage of a chance that a human would be born away from earth at this point in time.

Originally posted by RyanLA123
There maybe some person like me on another planet with 6 arms, 6 legs and 6 eyes asking the samething, but what are those odds and how does it fit in with current SCIENTIFIC thinking on aliens of other worlds? Don't give me the bible because thats just contamination on this planet...

Let's try figure out something less demanding. What are the odds that the physical features of another universe dweller that you described are related to the world-polluting Bible, namely to Revelation 13:18, where the notorious number 666 is listed? Then, there is another lesser math problem to figure: What are the odds that an ET lifeform with 6 arms, 6legs, and 6 eyes is related to the earthly devil?

reply to post by stander


bizzare question, didn't we learn from the dead sea scrolls that the number used to be 616 back before the evil catholics got control of the bible?

An interesting thought is weather monotheism exists in all species historys? I suspect most cultures which manage to develop into a solar system filling race will have dabbled with the idea of a single god, dropping it when they manage to develop complex scientific answers to the questions that plauge them. I suspect also that most races will look back on that time with shame and embaresment, i think monotheism is tied to many complex control issues which are bound to turn a society crazy. Although ir no doubt helps to create a cohesive bond in which society can flourish, almost like a chick developing with in the embriotic fluid of the egg, protect by the shell of religion. When the time comes the shell breaks away and society is able to explore the wider world of possibilitys.

Originally posted by RyanLA123
I really didn't know where to post this question, but I am not a crazy conspiracy theorist. I do believe there is other intelligent life in the universe, so much so we can't count. I don't believe we are not anything special in the universe, although we would like to think so, but here is the question. With all of the known and mainly unknown galaxies out there, trillions upon trillions and the ones we don't know about, what are the odds that you or I were born on this planet and not some other planet that is like star wars where almost every technological challange is conquered. What are the odds of that? There maybe some person like me on another planet with 6 arms, 6 legs and 6 eyes asking the samething, but what are those odds and how does it fit in with current SCIENTIFIC thinking on aliens of other worlds? Don't give me the bible because thats just contamination on this planet, or well because we can't get there because of our conventional thinking therefore they can't get here which is just a arguement that is as dead as uuuuh dead. Any guesses?

Famed physicist Richard Feynmann answered this one... the odds are 100%.

You're here. Therefore the odds are 100%.

Most scientists think there are alien lifeforms and even alien civilizations. But given the size of the galaxy and the age (14 billion years), civilizations could have existed before the Earth formed or at the other end of the galaxy... and communication with them is unlikely.

The Drake Equation is often used in these discussions, but I should point out that it's hung on a chain of suppositions and we don't know how good it is.

here is a good wiki explaining what all goes on to make the earth habitable for life in the first place;

Fine tuned universe