A deep thought regarding life out there

[Aussie Gamer]

I am not a Biologist or anything like that but it seems a bit narrow minded to remove the possilblity of life breathing other gases.
We understand really our own biology but have not yet found life on another world to study it. This could be because yes you do need O2 or the worlds near us just suck.

Hopefully one day we get to find out that we are not alone is this universe.

[Marty Ward]

I don't understand how we can even attempt to think of what other "life" may exist. We only know that our type of life form exists and all our assumptions are based on that. Given the number of galaxies out there we are definately not alone, we just may have trouble recognizing others if we meet them.

[Sirkit]

With regard to the thoughts of species living on other types of gases complex lifeforms currently live on earth 'breathing' a type of methane oxide mix, now I must admit since these things are considered plants due to the fact they rely on something called cemo-sythesis, witch instead if using light oxegen and carbon dioxide they react the methane oxides in their bodies in what appear to be modified chloropLasts the reactions is, energetic, and provides sufficient energy to produce ATP (The chemical that animals store energy in) So a methane breather is not that far out there. Hydrogen, however is a major component on most of the shugars and fossile fules, but because they requirement of oxygen to create these chemicals is needed I don't know how succesful the species would be because I know of no process in witch hydrogen can be burned without carbon to produce anything but water. For a species witch did manage to breath methane fire would be no big deal as inside their bodies reactions so strong would be going on that they would be a furnace unto themselves, personally I feel mans greatest feat was to figure out puting a magnet through a coil of wire produced an electric current, this single feat produced the culture witch exists now. How many people are reading this with a light over their computer?

[Lucanos]

quote:

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Originally posted by Marty Ward:
I don't understand how we can even attempt to think of what other "life" may exist. We only know that our type of life form exists and all our assumptions are based on that. Given the number of galaxies out there we are definately not alone, we just may have trouble recognizing others if we meet them.

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So how about something like: "everything is alive"?

or

"All things have conciousness"?

or

"activity is life"?

What? ...no? I didn't think you'd think so either...

[Steve A]

Sirkit:

Methane oxide = CO2 + H2O.

Fire is just a chemical reaction that has a temporary plasma phase that usually emits visible light. On earth it is usually an oxidation reaction. In a methane atmosphere, heat a rock made from potassium nitrate and watch it burn.

Steve

[Marty Ward]

Lucanos,
Sorry I didn't elaborate more. I meant that given the large number of galaxies there are it is almost certain that there are life forms similiar to ours, life forms that we are totally incapable of recognizing, and every possible combination in between.
There is also probably a 50 - 50 chance that the first life form that comes in contact with us will be one we will not obviously recognize. If it happens that we meet another life form I hope we do recognize it, we may only get one chance.

[This message has been edited by Marty Ward (edited 04 April 2001).]

[Lucanos]

quote:

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Originally posted by Marty Ward:
Lucanos,
Sorry I didn't elaborate more. I meant that given the large number of galaxies there are it is almost certain that there are life forms similiar to ours, life forms that we are totally incapable of recognizing, and every possible combination in between.
There is also probably a 50 - 50 chance that the first life form that comes in contact with us will be one we will not obviously recognize. If it happens that we meet another life form I hope we do recognize it, we may only get one chance.

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I totaly agree (almost). I think the chance of recognition is smallar than 50%, though. More like 1% or so.

The small insect doesn't know it's crawling on a more intelligent lifeform when it's crawling on a human, as the humans don't know they're walking on a more evolved lifeform. They don't recognize the planets as alive.

Maybe they are alive? What do we know? Really?

If you ask me - everything that is moving is alive - while saying this I might add: nothing is actually still.

[Aussie Gamer]

More on that thought of what's alive and what's not.
Does a insect think that a tree is alive, I mean that it does not really change much over the life of an insect.
So we humans live 100 years and who's to say that the earth is alive and very slow compared to us. Say it takes 10 million years for it to get around to scratch that itch!

[CaptSpoogy]

The dog year thing is just an approximation because a dog's life is realitively short compared to ours, so when we say a dog is old (like around 12), we just compare him to a old person (like 84) - so we kind of understand that the dog is really old (because normally 12 years is nothing to us).

[Suicide Junkie]

Basically the 7:1 ratio just converts the labels "old", "teenage", "baby" etc.

So I'd expect most working dogs to retire before age 10 ( 7x10 = 70 years for a human)