Water Came Before Earth; Implications "Exciting" for Alien Life

[Kieve]

Correct...but then again, the aliens might not upgrade their equipment for millenia for all we know. Normally I'd just go with "correct", but when aliens are involved, who can say?

When has technology or it's application or ideas ever stood still for a thousand or so years? ANy species that could go a few thousand years without innovating probably would never have figured out maths or the internal combustion engine in the first place.

I know this is kind of a hard perspective to grasp, but you're still thinking in terms of human development and evolution. We've only one example to go by - our own - and judging every other possible sentient species in the universe by that standard is insanely self-centered. Hell, what if they're intelligent trees and it takes them a whole earth-year just to communicate their version of "hello?"
Our advancements exploded in the last couple centuries, but there's no rule that says this is the standard model everywhere. It's certainly possible, but until / unless we meet up with a few other civilizations, it's all just speculation.

 

[The_Scrivener]

Am I the only one who read that title and immediately imagined the voice of Mordin Solus saying it?

Not until you mentioned it. Then I reread it and will never even try to hear it differently.
Thank you for that.

A true hero. Not (just) Mordin. You.

 

[Agayek]

OT: General chances of life in other star systems are already too high, and this surely makes them even higher, so why havent we made contact with anyone? At least there's a lot of places humankind can expand in this solar system in case we dont fuck up.
Future appears brighter everyday.... If we dont fuck up

We haven't made contact with any alien species for precisely two reasons:

1) Space is really, really, really, really big.

2) Traversing meaningful distances on a stellar scale, even for sapient-made radiation (radio signals, et al), is really, really, really, really expensive.

 

[Lord Garnaat]

Interesting news. I'm always intrigued by news that supports the existence of alien life, intelligent or not, so hearing a bit more about it is always welcome.

On the other hand, I don't think anything short of complete proof of it will change my stance, and that's that humanity has to forge ahead on its destiny without worrying over whether alien life exists or not. Personally, I think that it's the right and duty of mankind to expand out into the universe ceaselessly, constantly, and as soon as possible. I acknowledge that it's certainly possible that intelligent alien life exists, but part of me would prefer if it didn't, and I definitely don't think the possibility should factor into any of our decisions on the survival and prosperity of the human race.

You know, stuff like this should be the end of all religions. Isn't it sad that people still can't accept simple facts?

Why would this be the end of religions? Is it because it asserts that Earth, and the universe, developed over a long period of time? Because that's been suggested by groups like the Catholic Church since the 4th-century, and is pretty much held as an accepted fact by religions today. Or do you mean the possibility of alien life? Because again, that's not seen as impossible by religions either: most say that humanity has a special place in the universe, but that doesn't mean that no other sentients exist. Heck, the Pope said not too long ago that the existence of alien life is completely in tune with scripture, and that it's overly proud of people to assume that there is a limit to God's ability to create life. He hardly represents every faith on Earth, but it's still a worthy example.

 

[rutger5000]

Sweet Christmas, that's weird to think about. Some of the water we drink - hell, some of the water we're made of - is older than the planet we stand on and the giant glowy sky ball that keeps us warm.

GET OFF MY LAWN, MERCURY

Well technically, all the carbon in your body was forged in the heart of a dying star. So you are made of stuff older than the solar system.

Also come to think of it, alot of the hydrogen is from the primordial big bang, it just so happened to come together to form you.

Pretty darn sure that Carbon is made in the normal live stage of stars. You're thinking of heavier elements. (There is a carbon cycle going on in our very own sun, and I'm pretty sure it isn't dying.

Yea, carbon is pretty light, so it wouldn't take something like the big bang or even a dying star. I mean carbon is only 6 protons, which means you only need to get over that level of repulsion, the repulsion between 6 protons, to form it. The larger the proton nucleus the more energy required to make those elements, but the things we're talking about, carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, they're all very basic. Humans, and other complex carbon-based life forms, need more complex elements to sustain life, like nitrogen (28) and for humans, iron (77) [although this is mostly for oxygen transportation i believe, and i think i've heard of organisms using lighter metals to do the same thing, like copper]. So it makes perfect sense that water, which is formed from the most basic 1-digit proton elements, is going to be one of the earlier compounds on the scene.

Uhm, that's not entirely correct either. Water is H2O, the O oxygen is rather heavy. The 8th element with an atomic mass of 16. Not quite sure if the fusion of 2 Berilium ( 4th element) is energetically favourable or not.

 

[Ylla]

snip

I think you just failed with the quote or completely misunderstood my post. None of what i said is against what you said and i do agree with you.... Dude do you even read? XD

snip

Same goes with this one, im saying chances of alien life as we know it are high. Can you explain me why post what you did?... You say; the chances of life someplace else are even higher if we can expand our understanding of what is life.

What the hell is wrong with this thread??? Everybody is denying points of view very similar to their own??
Im out of the internet, this has gone too far...

 

[FalloutJack]

You know, stuff like this should be the end of all religions. Isn't it sad that people still can't accept simple facts?

Since there is no reason god can't be scientific, religion endures. By my reckoning, one cannot actually disprove the influence of an entity believed to be omnipotent and omniscient without reaching those points themselves. By doing so, you then become what you seek to disprove, and therefore prove and disprove god existence at the same time, no contradiction.

For more mindscrews, please attend classes involving Heizenberg's Uncertainty Principle, Quantum Mechanics, and Political Psychology.

 

[ryukage_sama]

Any bets as to when someone will sincerely state, "The water isn't that old, God just deuterated the water."

This is a fascinating conclusion. I wonder if the same experiment could be done with methane (CH4) found on other planets and moons.

 

[Tarfeather]

The deuterium they're talking about is a hydrogen isotope. It doesn't have shit to do with molecules. Their data isn't about water, it's about an atom that happens to be part of water, and the conclusions they come to don't seem to relate at all to the things stated in the article.

 

[happyninja42]

Interestingly enough, one of my former professors from college (he's an astrophysicist) used to talk about this a lot. It was his pet theory. He didn't believe for a second that life began on Earth, and he thought that panspermia is too convenient, but he didn't rule it out. This was his favorite theory of how life came to develop on Earth. It already existed in the water according to him. He's probably ecstatic now.

You know, stuff like this should be the end of all religions. Isn't it sad that people still can't accept simple facts?

When you are willing to accept things as "facts" without any evidence to confirm them, and lots of evidence to refute them, paltry things like evidence is hardly going to chip away at your belief structure.

But cool, glad to see there is more evidence to support the idea of life in the universe. Hope we get to Europa soon with some submersibles and go exploring, see what's swimming around in there.

 

[Maze1125]

Water is a very finicky molecule. It splits into it's component atoms very easily thusly destroying it

No it doesn't. Water splits easily into two ions, but not its component atoms. Water is actually a very stable compound despite being an unstable molecule.
Of course there ARE situations in which is can be broken down completely, but that's true of every single compound.