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Extraterrestrial or Ex-Terrestrial?


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Have you ever heard of a concept called 'panspermia' http://mv.lycaeum.org/mu/_panspermia.html ?

 

Basically it is saying that there is a good possibility that life propagates itself throughout the universe by means of spores. There seems to be an unvoiced assumption that 'Terra' is solely an importer of these spores and takes little notice of Terra as an exporter of spores.

 

There is avery high probability that Terra's life forms have been capable of propagating at least bacterial spores for up to three billion years. The universe may be only twelve or so billion years old, and it takes at least a second generation star to support the heavy elements necessary for biological systems. It is relatively unlikely that spore producing organisms could have existed at a significantly earlier time anywhere in the universe.

 

I think that there is a reasonable possibility that the sort of 'yeasty/mushroomy' critters the UFO people call 'Greys' might represent a re-immigration of terrestrial life that may have been evolving independently within the competition free environs of the comet filled outer reaches of our solar system.

 

Aguy2

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I believe that they will be many forms of life that are based on elements we have never come across yet.

 

What are these elements then? Like hydrogen, but with one and a half protons?

 

Up to the level we have discovered, we have a complete periodic table; this reminds me of a science fiction story, in which the aliens had a different one. Complete junk.

 

Whilst there are elements we haven't discovered, they all lie higher up the periodic table, and are produced in particle accelerators. They also have shortening lifespans, all of them much less than a second.

 

Whilst there is a conjectured 'Island of Stability', it seems implausable for any reasonable amount of these elements to exist outside the lab.

 

[edit]

 

Or inside the lab, for that matter.

 

Its not a favourite of mine for spreading life.After all that would infer all life was carbon based.

 

Do you know WHY carbon is the basis of life here?

 

Do you know how many possible carbon reactions there are? How many carbon compounds?

 

There are more possible carbon compounds than those involving ALL OTHER ELEMENTS

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Aguy2

I like the panspermia concept for three reasons:

1. It addresses weaknesses in the conventional view that life originated on Earth.

2. Even if the conventional view proves correct, panspermia can be a useful Devil's Advocate position to focus on inconsistencies in that conventional view.

3. It's refreshingly different. I like different.

 

But please! Grey's evolving in the Oort Cloud! There's different, then there's different

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But please! Grey's evolving in the Oort Cloud! There's different' date=' then there's [u']different[/u]

 

I really don't think that the idea that life could survive and even flourish in the 'Kuiper' and 'Oort' clouds is that farfetched. Observation has shown that comets appear to have a sooty carbonous outer shell, and soot is about as close as you can get to an ideal 'black body'. An ideal black body is a theoretical object that absorbs radiant energy without emitting any energy until it's internal temperature reaches a set point. With soot I believe that the internal temperature would have to be about 300 degrees Kelvin or about 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Comets have had billions of years to absorb enough energy to support internal temperatures above the freezing point of water. The biggest problem I can see is that due to their small gravitational effects, comets would start venting gases at relatively low temperatures.

 

Aguy2

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I like the way crazies try to convert other people to the idea they've just discovered by hijacking it and relating it in a completely bastardised way.

 

For what its worth I found the concept of 'Panspermia' while researching the possibility of my 're-immigration' speculation having any merit. If I have done any 'hijacking', the concept of 'ideal black bodies' would be a more likely candidate.

 

Aguy2

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Urey and Miller (no one guy with two last names so you're in the clear) are two scientists who showed that carbon compounds could form in the primaeval atmosphere. Later scientists have shown that life could also occur in other possible primaeval atmospheres (we're not certain exactly what the early atmosphere actually was) using any source of energy, be it geothermal, lightning or UV rays.

 

What they still have yet to show is exactly how life originated from these carbon compounds. I mean if you put a pile of amino acids into a box they don't form life do they?

 

But whilst life could possibly survive within the Oort cloud I doubt that it could evolve to such a complex stage that it could survive to intelligence like the "Greys" which could then survive by technology. Unless you mean they evolved to that intelligence level here, then left for the Oort Cloud. But that would make no logical sense, why not just live on Earth. Even if they have some totally alien way of thinking to get to the Oort Cloud they must have had technology. Surely there'd be some traces of them remaining on Earth.

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But whilst life could possibly survive within the Oort cloud I doubt that it could evolve to such a complex stage that it could survive to intelligence like the "Greys" which could then survive by technology. Unless you mean they evolved to that intelligence level here' date=' then left for the Oort Cloud. But that would make no logical sense, why not just live on Earth. Even if they have some totally alien way of thinking to get to the Oort Cloud they must have had technology. Surely there'd be some traces of them remaining on Earth.[/quote']

 

I guess I should make it clear that I'm really not an UFO person. My re-immigration speculation just developed as an offshoot of investigations of the possibility of comets as black body like 'rest-stops/gas-stations' in interstellar space.

 

The 'Cambrian Explosion' of multi-cellular development began here 1/2 billion years ago, if comets were 'seeded' up to three billion years ago they would have had plenty of time to fully develop even in their very restrictive environments. There is also the possibility that they are still at a pre-technology level, and they (or at least their spores) re-immigrated via comets entering the inner system. Haven't the serious studies of 'abductions' concluded that the 'abductees' don't actually go anywhere, but the phenomenon is much like a waking dream?

 

Ago2

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Has anyone checked out the NASA link in post #17, in the 'Coke in Space' thread, in the Astronomy forum? Shuttle experiments have shown that yeast cells adapt to near zero G environment by becoming stronger and 3 times more productive.

 

aguy2

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aguy2

I have no problem with life exisitng in the Oort Cloud. Many of Hoyle's early predictions about organic molecules in interstellar dust, and the carbon covering of comets, have been borne out. Sure, he got carried away trying to match the spectral signature of the dust to microbial spores. But anything out there, in the Oort or Kuiper zones, is a)simple b) inert/hibernating. That was why I was so dismissive of the little grey men.

I remain a committed panspermiaist for the reasons set out in post #10.

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aguy2

I have no problem with life exisitng in the Oort Cloud. Many of Hoyle's early predictions about organic molecules in interstellar dust' date=' and the carbon covering of comets, have been borne out. Sure, he got carried away trying to match the spectral signature of the dust to microbial spores. But anything out there, in the Oort or Kuiper zones, is a)simple b) inert/hibernating. That was why I was so dismissive of the little grey men.

I remain a committed panspermiaist for the reasons set out in post #10.[/quote']

 

What do you think of my speculation that due to the possibility that comets could be acting akin to 'ideal black bodies' they might very well be supportive of chemical and biological activity? If the interior temperatures of comets rise due to the absorption of star light then the more crowded the star field the sooner the comet would reach the set point where it would begin to emit radiation. I believe that at or shortly before the set point temperature the cometary body would de-stabilize or at least be violently venting. If the cometary bodies in the vicinity of our star are anywhere near the set point temperature it would mean that cometary bodies in the more crowded star fields closer to the 'milky ways' central core should have already reached their 'set points' and that there should be a gaseous ring containing significant amounts of hydrocarbon by-products around the more crowded central core of the galaxy. Moreover this 'ring' should be moving out through the galactic arms at a predictable rate.

 

aguy2

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