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47 Comments
- lewystud, on 09/08/2009, -0/+28I love space.
Space is really awesome and super cool.
Someday I want to fly to space on a spaceship.
I love space. - jeremy111, on 09/08/2009, -1/+27You know what I find interesting? We just assume that all possible lifeforms in our universe have to live exactly like us or they cannot exist. Who is to say that there isn't a very distant where the life inhabiting it breathes ammonia, and methane, hydrogen or helium?
- inactive, on 09/08/2009, -2/+24"There may be super-Earths that have intelligent life that has concluded that no life is possible on puny planets such as ours," says Grinspoon.
Life out there as dumb as us? Lets meet them! - RobotKeaton, on 09/08/2009, -0/+19Man, that helium planet would sound hilaaaaaaarious.
- Konrad9, on 09/08/2009, -0/+13Who is to say they have to breathe?
- Konrad9, on 09/08/2009, -1/+13Every time I see any kind of declaration about how some planet is or is not right for life to exist, I rage so hard.
Not all life is going to be carbon based, not all life is going to need Earth-ish gravity (or gravity at all) and atmosphere, and not all life is going to need water or oxygen. In fact, it is just as likely for the first aliens we meet to be completely different from us in these terms as it is for them to be pretty similar to us.
Earth's climate varies drastically in some areas in very little in others, why assume it is the Goldilocks phenomena, and that it can't happen on oh I don't know, Pluto or Europa? Or Venus? - theplant, on 09/08/2009, -1/+12"'There may be super-Earths that have intelligent life that has concluded that no life is possible on puny planets such as ours,' says Grinspoon"
... well then they wouldn't be very intelligent, now would they - shinkou, on 09/08/2009, -1/+11I'm not a scientist, but it sounds like all these studies would collapse if the hypothesis "life forms can only survive under similar conditions as what we're having" was false.
- Cpd4224, on 09/08/2009, -1/+9Well it makes sense that an earth sized planet is a good size for harboring life, after all we live on an earth sized planet
- rolf, on 09/08/2009, -1/+8http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade
Temperature — tardigrades can survive being heated for a few minutes to 151 °C (424 K), or being chilled for days at –200 °C (70 K), or for a few minutes at –272 °C. (~1 degree above absolute zero).[13][citation needed]
Pressure — they can withstand the extremely low pressure of a vacuum and also very high pressures, more than 1200 times atmospheric pressure. It has recently been demonstrated that tardigrades can survive the vacuum of open space and solar radiation combined for at least 10 days.[6] Recent research has notched up another feat of endurance: they can withstand 6,000 atmospheres, which is nearly six times the pressure of water in the deepest ocean trench. [8]
Dehydration — tardigrades have been shown to survive nearly one decade in a dry state.[14]
Radiation — Tardigrades can withstand median lethal doses of 5000 Gy (gamma-rays) and 6200 Gy (heavy ions) in hydrated animals [15]. (5 to 10 Gy could be fatal to a human). The only explanation thus far for this ability is that their lowered water state provides fewer reactants for the ionizing radiation.
Recent experiments conducted by Cai and Zabder have also shown that these tardigrades can undergo chemobiosis — a cryptobiotic response to high levels of environmental toxins. However, their results have yet to be verified.[16][17] In September 2008, a space launch showed that tardigrades can survive the extreme environment of outer space for 10 days. After being rehydrated back on earth, over 68% of the subjects protected from high-energy UV radiation survived and many of these produced viable embryos, and a handful survived full exposure to the sun.[6] - xGeneric, on 09/08/2009, -0/+7I've always wondered this too. What's the reason for the mass assumption that any sort of life not from this planet, has to be built exactly like the life on this planet is? I'm just wondering, it's a serious question. I could understand since life here is all we know, it's a good place to start, but is there some sort of scientific reasoning that the way we evolved is the only way possible?
- WilD9, on 09/08/2009, -0/+6THE article has a very unnecessary all caps beginning.
- Lunarparcel, on 09/08/2009, -0/+6Not to belittle their research, but it seems to boil down to: "Earthlike planets might be best for sustaining life."
Ummm.....looking around, I'm wondering, "Damn....what was your first clue?"
Did they figure that ***** out all on their own? - B1665r, on 09/08/2009, -0/+5Goldilocks strikes again!
- mizati, on 09/08/2009, -0/+5a stargate .....dont you know anything?!
- Gizza, on 09/08/2009, -0/+5Well it's a pretty good assumption. When there are literally trillions of planets to look at, it helps to narrow things down a bit.
Common sense dictates that a good place to start to look at all the life we know exists and work out what requirements that life has. Now it just so happens that the only proof of life we have is on this planet, and it all has similar requirements.
There could of course be millions of other types of life forms that have requirements nothing like our own, but there's no point looking for those, because we wouldn't even really know what we're looking for or where to look.
And if you really want to look into the future, finding planets like our own could become future homes for us, or we could find aliens who are similar to us (which would allow communication/trade better than with a race of beings that can't even exist in the same conditions as us. - darklights, on 09/08/2009, -0/+5I for one welcome our new Tardigrade overlords.
- lewystud, on 09/08/2009, -0/+4SUPER-AIDS???
- dontdoitjake, on 09/08/2009, -10/+14Nickelback sucks.
- Gizza, on 09/08/2009, -1/+5Lots of our current theories would collapse if evidence arose to contradict current observations.
- kero552, on 09/08/2009, -0/+3No [1]. There is no reason, we are simply carbon chauvinists [2]. We have whole planet with examples of carbon based life, but nothing with silicon. Carbon is seriously good for this type of thing.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothetical_types_of ...
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_chauvinism - ripple123, on 09/08/2009, -0/+3NO *****. WHAT TIPPED YOU OFF?
- snowfree52, on 09/08/2009, -0/+3So you assume they all look like Uma thurman, right?
- LonelySavage, on 09/08/2009, -0/+3Yeah, some other people have already touched on this, but the basic hypothesis only works if you append the phrase "Earth-sized planets are just right for life" with the phrase "as we know it". There might be millions of other types of life except the types we're most familiar with.
- JBizness, on 09/08/2009, -0/+2That was the one thing that bugged me about the article. Just because WE need those things to survive doesn't have to mean that some other life form out there doesn't.
- megablue, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1Scientists nowadays are so narrow minded...
- danimal317, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1The impact that created our moon and planet earth, as well as the tides that the moon creates, are the main factors that led to life on this planet. Factor in planet size, distance from sun, rotation, tilt on axis, axis rotation and many other small impacts that influenced the creation of life and we are a pretty special place in the universe. All of these factors need to be present, plus many more not mentioned, for a humanoid life form to evolve in to what we have become today.
- Gizza, on 09/09/2009, -0/+1Yes there is evidence of life existing before man. But it still doesn't contradict my point that the only life we have evidence of is carbon-based.
- Shm33g, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1I think they probably do.
- Gizza, on 09/08/2009, -1/+2"Earth's climate varies drastically in some areas in very little in others, why assume it is the Goldilocks phenomena, and that it can't happen on oh I don't know, Pluto or Europa? Or Venus?"
Because it has happened here and not there. Pretty simple really. In science we tend to make assumptions and theories based on evidence. We only have evidence of carbon-based life-forms, therefore, assumptions and theories of what planets can harbour life are going to be based on that evidence. - rebo2, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1Lucky us.
- yammy1688, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1I just can't wait till we find a real alien race so we can discriminate like no one has discriminated before. I'll show you the true meaning of RACIST.
- wrek, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1The Prawn come from a planet that is larger than Earth and has 7 moons.
- JYoungest1, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1Science is based on evidence. We only have one instance of evidence with life. That is earth. Therefor we need to look for other earth like bodies until we find further evidence. Speculation is a great thing, but facts are where science really needs to stand.
- 4degrees, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1There is evidence of life existing before man, there is no evidence of god existing before man. Life is known to exist so it is posited to exist elsewhere. God, on the other hand is not known to exist at all. God may be a consequence of sentience and\or a manifestation of man.
- Shm33g, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1About 20 years behind us. maybe?
If they thought like that - Shm33g, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1Anyone seen District 9?
The picture on the newspaper of the man ***** an alien... lol - 4degrees, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1that hypothesis is false. have a look at thermal vents at the bottom of the ocean. its too hot for "conditions as what we're having" and there is zero sunlight that gets down there, toxic chemicals in the water, very high pressure and yet life flourishes. science consistently finds life in corners of the earth that it had thought impossible to harbor life.
- 4degrees, on 09/09/2009, -0/+1one could argue that theory of silicon based life is based on what we know about the similar chemistry of silicon and carbon. So, ideas of other life forms is based on carbon-based life.
- 4degrees, on 09/08/2009, -0/+1you are right, absence of evidence is NOT evidence of absence.
- barasawa, on 09/08/2009, -0/+0Exactly, just because we can't live there, it doesn't mean that alien life can't.
Just a little something for you to think about, when I was a kid the scientists all said that life cannot survive in the hot water of a geyser, the bottom of the ocean, an acidic solution stronger than battery acid, or in the frozen ice of Antarctica. We now know that is false, have found life in each of those locations.
If you want details, look up "Extremophiles".
So two points here, one is when 'they' say life can't exist there, you can snicker at them and remember how many times 'they've' been wrong.
The other one, is that whenever anyone says that Earth is perfect for Humans, or life in general, point out that the planet was first, and it's us who've adapted to it... We are perfectly adapter for Earth, not the other way around. - RAEP, on 09/08/2009, -1/+1super-co2?
- Konrad9, on 09/08/2009, -1/+1It has not happened there as far as we know. They have been around for quite some time, and will continue to be around for quite some time, it is entirely possible life existed there some hundreds of thousands of years ago, and that it may exist a billion years in the future.
- qbthemc, on 09/08/2009, -4/+4If they find a planet with life i want to plant my seeds on the women.
- Gizza, on 09/08/2009, -3/+3Lots of people in here seem to be bringing up the "life as we know it" argument. I find it funny that most of these people probably don't believe in God and find the concept of God ridiculous because we have no evidence to support it, yet seem happy to argue that there could be life other than carbon-based even though we have just as much evidence of that as we do God.
- DiggerLater, on 09/08/2009, -2/+1Our poor puny planet. Super-Earth is where super-AIDS comes from. Where is superman when you need him? But really, assuming carbon dioxide concentrations as a prerequisite for life seems small-minded, they need to think more super.
- smitas, on 09/08/2009, -5/+2How to go there?
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