What is "Earth-like"?

[JimC]

Brian Peacock wrote:

Of course, the Fermi Paradox somewhat undermines Drake's optimism.

Not if the premise of my recent post is true, that although life may be reasonably common, the evolution of intelligence is a freakishly rare event...

Most planets with life may be filled with pond scum...

[pErvinalia]

Filled with right-wingers?

[JimC]

I think you will find that most pond scum are economically centrist, with a slight leaning to the left on social issues...

[pErvinalia]

Apologies to pond scum for inferring they were right wingers...

[rainbow]

Brian Peacock wrote:

Of course, the Fermi Paradox somewhat undermines Drake's optimism.

Not if the premise of my recent post is true, that although life may be reasonably common, the evolution of intelligence is a freakishly rare event...

Most planets with life may be filled with pond scum...

Which is a baseless assumption, since we have a single example to work with and this did evolve intelligent life.

[Brian Peacock]

Speculation on the matter is not unreasonable. Probabilistic and logical arguments like The Drake Equation and the Fermi Paradox help us to pin down what we actually know of our cosmic environs, what we don't, and what we might need to know to address the issue, and even what we might never be able to know.

[JimC]

Brian Peacock wrote:

Of course, the Fermi Paradox somewhat undermines Drake's optimism.

Not if the premise of my recent post is true, that although life may be reasonably common, the evolution of intelligence is a freakishly rare event...

Most planets with life may be filled with pond scum...

Which is a baseless assumption, since we have a single example to work with and this did evolve intelligent life.

I'm not so much asserting that the evolution of intelligence is definitely very rare, rather I'm questioning a very common assumption that asserts that intelligence will virtually inevitably arise in any alien biota.

[mistermack]

Nobody knows what freakish circumstances caused humans to evolve such a huge brain.
But it is a fact that nearly all human species went extinct, in spite of this huge freakish rise in intelligence. ( of course, that's probably down to us ).

But just ten thousand years ago, the bow and arrow was our greatest achievement. And people lived like animals in caves, or rudimentary tents.

We could very easily have stayed like chimps, and not grown a huge brain. ( like chimps did )
Or grown the big brain and gone extinct. ( like all the other human species did )
Or just carried on living in shit and eating grubs. ( Like the Abbos did )

So there was a lot of freakish chance involved, in our rise to a scientific dominant force in the world.

[pErvinalia]

You really are a fuckface. You've been told that "Abos" is racist. Why do you keep using it?

[mistermack]

You really are a fuckface. You've been told that "Abos" is racist. Why do you keep using it?

Mostly because I know it annoys the morons. Works every time.

[pErvinalia]

Useless conservative gets amused by being a racist. The sooner ancient racists like you pop their cogs, the better.

[rainbow]

You really are a fuckface. You've been told that "Abos" is racist. Why do you keep using it?

Mostly because I know it annoys the morons. Works every time.

I don't think it annoys anyone here, palefuckface.
At least the Indigenous Australians don't have to worry about scraping their knuckles on the ground when they walk.

[mistermack]

You really are a fuckface. You've been told that "Abos" is racist. Why do you keep using it?

Mostly because I know it annoys the morons. Works every time.

I don't think it annoys anyone here, palefuckface.
At least the Indigenous Australians don't have to worry about scraping their knuckles on the ground when they walk.

Not like your precious "blade runner" then? Dragging his knuckles never stopped him from being the African golden bollocks.

[rainbow]

You really are a fuckface. You've been told that "Abos" is racist. Why do you keep using it?

Mostly because I know it annoys the morons. Works every time.

I don't think it annoys anyone here, palefuckface.
At least the Indigenous Australians don't have to worry about scraping their knuckles on the ground when they walk.

Not like your precious "blade runner" then?

What are you on about?

[rainbow]

http://www.wbur.org/npr/505386423/big-d ... deep-earth