To people who do not believe in alien lifeforms...?

Question

I would start by giving you some facts, or at the least, theories, and then proceed to my question.

I) It is known that there are billions and billions of stars (Sorry for the poor Carl Sagan impression)
II) A majority of those stars has a good possibility of being simular to our sun.
III) Each Star, or sun, has the possibility of having planets revolving around it, simular to ours.

Keeping these "theories" in mind, how can anyone possibly deny that it is almost impossible for there not to be alien lifeforms out there?

I have been keeping up with some of the topics in the religion section, and those hard core religious people keep saying that we're the only life in the universe. I'm sorry, but that is so strange to me. So, I figured I'd ask here in the science section, all religions aside, and see what you guys have to say.

Is it fair to say that statistically speaking, there must be alien life forms somewhere else in the universe, considering the 3 statements above?

Sorry guys, checked my wifes email for her and forgot to log back on mine, so this is in her name... oops.

Anyhow...

One thing about something someone said, about us transmitting for over 50 years. Consider how old the universe is and what a tiny amount of time 50 years is...

As for the rest of you guys responses, I agree that there has been no visits to earth from an alien species. I believe that this is because of the distances involved. Until the theory of worm holes is actually proven, there is no, in my opinion, logical explanation to explain how one could travel from one solar system to another, unless those beings happen to live for millions of years and an inter-stellar trip would seem like a drop in the bucket. And even I, who like to dream a lot, can't picture a living organism that can live that long.

Again guys, sorry, but I'm not asking about whether or not we've been visited, will be visited, or anything to do with aliens coming to earth, I was simply asking how anyone out there could believe that earth has the only lifeforms in the universe... it is simply mind boggling to me that people could be so close minded. Yet, at the same time, they believe in a higher power. Nope, makes no sense to me at all :/

Answer 1

i agree, there is a strong possibility of life elsewhere. but i dont beleive that little green men come to earth and abduct trailor trash so they can give them anal probes

Answer 2

There are billions of stars. And astronomers have found some evidence that a lot of stars probably have planets. And there is some more evidence found recently that suggests that a lot of these planets might be more suitable for life that we formerly thought.
OK, so what does that get you? OF course, there could be life out there. Probably is. But there is not one IOTA of evidence that life exists anywhere except on Earth. The SETI people have been listening methodically to all the random radio noise in the universe for decades,,,, not one single peep of noise that indicated intelligent life.

And as for visits from aliens. That didnt happen. It is sad that the guys who tend to think about alien visits are such a bunch of whackos and losers. Even if an alien did show up, if they told us about it no one would believe them. I was at a meeting once of some of the most famous UFO guys. One of them got up and described in great detail how a huge flying saucer had landed in Central Park in New York city. All the other UFO guys were sitting there listening and nodding their heads. The reporter I was with stood up and asked the speaker why it was that this had not been reported in the NY TImes and other newspapers? The speaker said, "Well, in New York, people are used to seeing unusual things."

OK, that isnt going tohappen anyway. Mainly because even if aliens existed, space is just way too big to come for a visit. The Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977 were the fastest spacecraft ever. They took twelve years of travelling before they got to the orbit of pluto! That isnt even close to being out of the solar system, never mind heading for the closest star. Crossing space to the closest star would take tens of thousands of years!
'
So, bottom line, there might be aliens out there, but not an iota of evidence or proof... and we arent going for any visits anytime soon.

Answer 3

The problem is, that we just don't know how easy it is for life to arise.
There are many extra solar planets - probably very, very many. But all of those discovered so far are completely incompatible with life.
There is only one place where we know life evolved, here. And there is a powerful argument that the conditions here were so specific as to be unique. That is why the search for life within our solar system - on Mars, Titan etc, is so important. If life arose more than once in one system, then it is fair to assume that it is common. Until then, we just can not say. Simple statistics do not constitute proof. And don't forget the evolution of life need not automatically lead to the evolution of complex life - the universe may be teeming with simple organisms, it doesn't follow that there are vulcans or klingons!
Personally, I do think there are life-bearing planets out there, but they are like the lands where the Jumblies live - far and few, far and few!

Answer 4

It is fair to figure there is a possibility of other life forms somewhere in this or other universes. What is not easy to accept is that those life forms visit earth 15 or 20 times a day and no one sees them except the chosen ones.

Also, many people assume alien life forms are vastly superior to humans on earth. That ain't necessarily so. It could be they are way behind us. And it could be they once were abundant and now or extinct. But one thing is for sure where ever they are and what ever they may be they sure don't visit earthlings 15 or 20 times a day.

Answer 5

A lot of times when I say I don't believe in aliens, I mean aliens that visit the Earth. Those alien abduction stories are science fiction that some people try to pass off as reallity. I believe there is life elsewhere in the Universe. I don't believe that we get visited by it.
I find it funny that most people think aliens have to be smarter than us. Life on an alien world could also be in an earlier stage of development than life on Earth. We are the smartest organism to ever exist on Earth.

Answer 6

I think it's critcal to make a distiction between Life and Intelligent Life. I doubt that finding alien bacteria will cause the religious to lose any faith but finding humanlike intelligence will

I also have a problem with Item#3 in your list. Earthlike planets are probably exceedingly rare. Think about the requirements. It needs to be in a narrow zone of habitability as far as it's distance from its sun is concerned. It needs to have significant amounts of liquid water, an atmosphere thick enought to retain heat (unlike mars) but not so thick it has runaway greenhouse effects (like venus), a liquid iron core to generate a magnetic field to shield it from radiation, enough variability in environment to encourage evolution to adapt but not so much that all life is killed off etc. There are probably more things but those come to mind now.

Some kind of life might develope even if one of these things was missing but since intelligent life too almost 4.5 billion years to evolve on earth (and there is no guarantee that it has too, 99.999% of life get's by just fine with it's lesser cognitive abilities) I think that even with billions and billions alien life may well be incredibily rare. So rare in fact that we may never meet them or if we do it will take so long that "we" will not be "we" anymore having evolved into something else.

Answer 7

It is based on only this type of presumption, governments have been spending large sums of money to find if there are extra-terrestrial forms of life. We have so far not been able to find any life that we are familiar with in the nearby planets or planets of near by stars. But this does not mean there is no other life form any where else. We should remember, our search with scientific means is less than 100 years old while the universe is billions of year old. If ants do not know that animals like lions exist or those like dinosaurs existed, it is neither the fault of lions or of ants. The question of religion does not arise anywhere.

Answer 8

I agree with you that life must exist out there but I also think that its reasonable to presume that life, particularly intelligent life, is rare. I think the reason we have not been visited or invaded or heard any whispers on our radios is the vast expanse of space. Our nearest star is light years from us. The distances are vast! I believe we a lost in a sea of dark cold space. Its not like on Star Trek where the galaxy is teaming with life and we can travel within hours to nearby solar systems. On the other hand we have been broadcasting our existence for more than 50 years. Aliens out there in an ever expanding radius are capable of picking up our old TV shows. The odds of them contacting us increase every day. I just hope we aren't judged to harshly by our popular entertainment!

Answer 9

There shall be life in any form in other galaxies or there may not be. But progress of science has not come to a level to authoritatively say that there is life. There are religions in the world like hinduism that there can be life of inferior or superior beings and there are other worlds. Therefore the aliens presence require scientific proof for the present day scholars only. There are belief existing in other religions for presence of life in other worlds.
VR

Answer 10

(extremely hoping you're no longer making use of an answerer's faith with prejudice right here :|) i'm Christian and don't have self belief in alien lifeforms. It has little to do with my faith as quickly as I say that there is in simple terms no longer adequate information for me to truly even evaluate too lots the perception. The memories of their existence in early mankind have not yet been defined yet until eventually there is an alien on my television, workstation, or newspaper i'm explaining them as acts of extremely severe mind in early human beings.

Answer 11

That "we" are the only life in the universe is deniable by taking a simple look at the biosphere of the Earth. So many forms exist on this planet that they are uncountable. Given that the Universe is limitless, supposedly, then the reasoning that would necessarily follow is there are limitless possibilities for other life forms to exist in limitless other biospheres. To believe that "we" are the only life in the Universe is conceit at its most ridiculous.