http://www.completetranslations.com/...opic.php?t=296 (mirror)

Why We Are, For All Practical Purposes, Alone in the Universe:

1. It doesn't matter that there are billions of galaxies with billions of stars. The distance between galaxies is so staggering that any civilization in another galaxy would have changed or died during the time it would take to communicate to another galaxy.

2. Things are not as they appear. And reality is not as hopeful as scientists who are looking for ET suggest. Technology has given us the ability to look for extra-solar planets. But scientists fail to mention that they are focusing their attention on star systems that are not binary. You see, eventhough there are billions of stars in our galaxy, you can take more than 2/3rds of those stars and disgard them in a search for ET because they are binary stars. http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/as...s/980402c.html

3. Even if Life is abundant in the Galaxy, plant and animal life is rare. Take our planet as an example:
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/alllife/threedomains.html
Plus, it took a long long long long long time for plant and animal life to come about:
http://ares.jsc.nasa.gov/astrobiolog.../timeline2.htm. Also notice that plant and animal life occurred after a series of unlikely events. And, on top of all this, human life and other intelligent life is even rarer. Even if you take Earth as a model of a planet that exists throughout the galaxy we are still most likely alone.

4. Liquid water is rarer than you might think. Scientists that are hopeful that we are not alone in the galaxy often mention that all is needed is the existance of liquid water. It is a very common mistake that temperature is the only factor in keeping water in a liquid state. This is not true. Liquid water is rare because it requires a combination of temperature and pressure. Liquid water "boils" at room temperature in a vaccume.

By the way, it is the lack of atmospheric pressure on Mars (1% of that on Earth) that is the reason why liquid water does not exist there today.

5. Geologists think that our sort of Earth/Moon arrangement is important for the existance of the kind of life we have: http://www.spacedaily.com/news/life-01x1.html. So the question arises, how probable is it that a small, rocky planet could have a planetoid moon of our size. According to the BBC special "The Planets" it is very improbable. Part of the mission of the Apollo project was to determine the origin of our moon. Because of the age and compisition of the rocks on the moon it was eventually determined that the moon was born from a collision of another smaller planet into the Earth. Somehow the Earth survived and the upheaval of debris formed the moon. It is not very likely that our Earth/Moon arrangement is common.

6. The fact that we are alone is proved by Enrico Fermi's paradox: http://zebu.uoregon.edu/~js/cosmo/lectures/lec28.html. Scientists whose employment at NASA and other simular organizations depend on their ability to find reasons to disagree with Fermi cannot say that somehow they know better: http://www.nobel.se/physics/laureate...fermi-bio.html.

http://www.ufoevidence.org/documents/doc92.htm

But what makes Fermi's paradox have even more weight is the fact of just how late a bloomer our solar system really is. According to the BBC's program "The Planets", the galaxy was around for tens of billions of years before ejected debris from an exploded star coalesced into what is now our solar system. If life had been and is a common thing, star systems would be thriving with life by now.

7. Evolution does not favor intelligence. Evolution favors power and stength over intelligence. Dolphins and The Great Apes are flukes that evolved their intelligence due to the fact Nature did not provide their bodies with the capacity to be natural killers. We don't have fangs or razor sharp claws and neither do dolphins. Intelligence had to evolve in these species because, with humans, they had to compete with 4 legged preditors and, with dolphins, they had to outwit sharks.

8. The life of a star is not long enough. Once again I site the BBC's program "The Planets" as a reference. The Earth has existed for about 4 billion years. Human beings have been around for probably less than one million years. But what makes the scenerio unpromising for ETI to evolve is the fact that today, right now, the Earth is middle aged. The Earth is middle aged because our sun is middle aged. We have passed the half-way point of the sun's life. By appearances, we are lucky to have popped into existance at all. I wonder how may star systems evolve life only to have it snuffed out while only the most primitive of mammals -- if that -- roam about.