How many planets in this universe could there be just like our own planet Earth?
2007-06-07 03:24:16 · 15 answers · asked by Mike M. 7 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
It's a rare gem, our earth. The moon is an incredibly huge satellite that has been moving away since its formation from a great collision billions of years ago. It is hard to tell how much of what we have is absolutely necessary for life to form. Is it enough simply to have liquid water and oxygen atmosphere, or do we also need a magnetic core, and a moon creating tides. Is there some specific combination of ores and rocks in our soil that make it possible for Oxygen and Nitrogen to be present... Too little oxygen and there's no breath--too much oxygen and and the atmosphere is explosive.
There are a lot of things about our planet that make it very unusual, the biggest of which is probably the presence of life forms that wonder about such things.
That being said, all indications seem to be that the universe is infinite (if we wait long enough), and no matter how unlikely the earth is, there are or will be other planets similar to it.
Looking at galaxies billions of light years distant, you are looking into ancient history. Perhaps thousands of species have evolved to technological civilizations, expanded and collapsed, or were destroyed by comets or stars, but we will not know until the light reaches us, millions of years from now.
2007-06-07 04:20:01 · answer #1 · answered by Jon 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Well there's an equation that brainiacs like Carl Sagan worked on that states that we may find in the neighborhood of 40,000 planets in our own galaxy alone. So for the entire universe, lets see if we can put this in perspective:
40,000 worlds possible in just the Milky Way according to that equation. In just 20 years we have spotted over 200 worlds so far, but only a handful of planets are even similar to ours with many more almost gauranteed to come as observational techniques continue to be refined. There are more stars in this galaxy alone than there are grains of sand on every beach on earth. With the relative ease at which we're starting to find new worlds now, even that '40,000' estimate might turn out to be too low. Process that for a second. It's a lot.
And then just think: the Milky Way is only one galaxy among TRILLIONS.
So how many possible earths? This is a huge guess in probability, especially considering the mind-blowingly hugeness of the universe we live in, but I'd have to say it's possible to find tens of thousands of earth-like worlds if not more, given enough time and the right technology.
Of course all of this assumes that we don't blow ourselves up first.
2007-06-07 04:29:23 · answer #2 · answered by Nunna Yorz 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The definitive answer is at least one (you're looking at it) and up to infinity. Sorry, but that's as precise as we can get.
There are approximately 10^24 stars in the universe. So, even if there is only one Earth-like planet around one in a billion stars, that leaves about a billion Earth-like planets.
So far, though, we have no idea what the frequency is. Also, we have no idea what other types of environments could be suitable for life. It could be that life is possible in environments vastly different from our own. We just don't know.
Yet.
2007-06-07 04:03:08 · answer #3 · answered by gebobs 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Just like earth? I doubt any are JUST like earth. There could be too many to count that are VERY SIMILAR to earth. I think there could be thousands that are livable for humans.
I don't think it's so much a question of how many, but when we will find one. That's what I think would be SO cool... even if there's no "intelligent" life on the planet, if we find a planet with water and plants. Wow.
2007-06-07 03:29:59 · answer #4 · answered by Becka Gal 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Um...try many trillions of them? So far they have only found one planet (Gliese 581 c) which is sufficiently like Earth to be habitable to our kind of life in the same way Earth is (that is to say liquid water on the surface). This is out of about 250 known planets, so if we don't count the Earth or the other planets in the Solar System then we should expect about one in 250 planets to be sufficiently Earth-like to support terrestrial-type life. Given that there are an average of billions of stars per galaxy and that there are several trillion galaxies in the Universe, there are probably many, many habitable planets out there.
2007-06-07 03:28:47 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
There are trillions and trillions of planets in the universe. I'd say .001% could be similar to earth. So a few billion.
2007-06-07 03:29:18 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋
There is a good possibility that there is other intelligent life out there . But in our Galaxy things are so far apart it is near impassible to have any chance of communicating. Outside our galaxy the possibility is impossible.
2007-06-07 04:04:41 · answer #7 · answered by JOHNNIE B 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
yes, they just discovered Planet X in outer space by Pluto. It has water and Oxygen.
2007-06-07 04:14:50 · answer #8 · answered by David 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋
The has a moon that could be like ours and there is another planet that looks like it has ice on it with water underneigth.
2007-06-07 03:32:26 · answer #9 · answered by sarah 4 · 0⤊ 3⤋
no one knows for sure
but till now the possibilities r increasing day by day.
2007-06-07 03:27:01 · answer #10 · answered by Uncle Under 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋