Are We Searching for Aliens in the Wrong Place?

[Skywizard]

http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/blogs/dnews-files-2014-02-superhabitable-exoplanet-670x440-140203-jpg.jpg
Super-Earths with shallower bodies of water could be more habitable for life than Earth.

Earth may be a nice and cozy place for life as we know it to evolve, but is it really the best place for life to thrive? Probably not, say two researchers. In fact, Earth may be one of the more extreme examples of a “habitable” world where life was lucky to survive.

The search for extraterrestrial life is fraught with uncertainly. Faced with a seemingly infinite Universe and an assumption that life beyond our planet is an inevitability, we focus on nooks and crannies that have similar habitable environments to Earth and exoplanets that resemble our world orbiting stars that resemble our sun. But finding these special places feels like we’re looking for a very specific needle in a very big haystack. What if our definition of “habitable” is just not all that, well, habitable?

“The Earth just scrapes the inner edge of the solar system’s habitable zone — the area in which temperatures allow Earth-like planets to have liquid surface water,” said René Heller of McMaster University, Ontario, Canada. “So from this perspective, Earth is only marginally habitable. That led us to ask: could there be more hospitable environments for life on terrestrial planets?”

Looking at the history of our planet, it may seem amazing that life was ever able to gain a foothold. Between the asteroid and comet bombardments, intense volcanic activity, frigid ice ages and often poisonous atmospheres, how were the conditions ever ripe for single celled lifeforms to form? Perhaps life was just really lucky to have found its way in such an inhospitable place.

Heller and colleague John Armstrong of Weber State University think that we may be looking for life in all the wrong places and suggest that we should be looking not for “second-Earths” but a class of planet that is superhabitable.

In an article published in Astrobiology in January, the researchers describe some of the characteristics a superhabitable planet may have. Some of the features — such as the necessity for a global magnetic field to protect life from ionizing solar wind particles — sound very familiar. But Heller and Armstrong highlight the need for a more efficient global “thermostat” that would avoid damaging ice ages. Also, a more massive planet with shallower oceans may be a more habitable solution.

In their research, they highlight the nearby star Alpha Centauri B as an ideal candidate that could support a superhabitable world. Slightly smaller than our sun, Alpha Centauri B would be able to incubate hypothetical lifeforms on a superhabitable world for much longer owing to its longer lifespan. "You want to have a host star that can keep a planet in the habitable zone for 7 to 10 billion years," which would allow enough time for life to evolve and ecosystems to flourish, Heller told New Scientist.

“We propose a shift in focus,” said Heller. “We want to prioritize future searches for inhabited planets. We’re saying ‘Don’t just focus on the most Earth-like planets if you really want to find life.’”

The researchers believe our hunt for extraterrestrial life is too set in its ways and blinkered toward worlds that we consider to be habitable because they resemble Earth. It’s a grand observational bias that may ultimately mean that while looking for second-Earths, we overlook far more habitable planets.

While discussions like this are valuable, I think they can be counterproductive.

Although it is very important to have “out of the box” thinking when it comes to the search for extraterrestrial life (whether that life be single-celled organisms hidden deep inside Mars’ crust or highly intelligent alien civilizations), using life as we know it as a template is no bad thing. After all, we are the only lifeforms we know of in the entire Universe, why would we ever consider Earth “barely habitable”?

How life is sparked remains one of the biggest questions hanging over modern science and the search for extraterrestrial life is an offshoot from that. Perhaps Earth, in its barely habitable state, is actually the perfect environment for life to gain a foothold?

Lacking evidence to the contrary, seeking out second-Earths probably isn’t such a bad idea.


Source: http://news.discovery.com/space/alien-life-exoplanets/are-we-searching-for-aliens-in-the-wrong-place-140203.htm


peace...
skywizard

[ghostrider]

the place to find them is in the mirror , some people are of old lyrian decent , spirit forms that came here 289,000 years ago ...

[sirdipswitch]

WTF!!! Is wrong with our illustrious scientific community???? Can't these people think for themselves? Must one become a dumbed down no think, accept only that which is produced by science, individual, to be accepted as a scientist? Why is it that they "flatly" reject, the massive evidence for Extra-Terestrial presence, on this rock for thousands of years? Which to me means that those very ET's that come here, must be comming from, somewhere else? Another planet, in our own Milky Way Gallaxy, or another. Oh ya! Wait, I know! Ya can't go to another Gallaxy, with a rocket.

"I", for one! CANNOT finish an artical such as this one, for that very reson. Because first up... I know beyond a shadow of a doubt... that these people do not know WTF they are talking about. Or then maybe they do... and are just writing sh*t like this to make the stupid masses think there isn't other life out there, and could be, already comming here? hmm.

Yep! That works... also.:wizard:

[Agape]

.......

It's more likely .. not seeing forest for the trees . They don't think in holistic patterns, in big pictures a lot, deny their own intuition would be a valid part of their intelligence . So they start counting Stars. Search for the 'needle in the haystacks' .

The thing/s they do not see is not somewhere out of them , it's in their brain. Brain like any biological matter can solidify , douse it with lots of vitamins, minerals and program it on 'functions' , parts turn to computer device ,
it performs fine logical calculations and nit picks errors . Grey matter does that .

But there's more than one version of intelligence .. the other is fluid . It thinks in images and concepts, it's intuitive , it finds solutions without computing them why because the solutions were already there.

We do not invent nature ;) or reality. Universe and its laws are boundless and the speed we process and discover them is upon us .


They'd have to find out that we're moving to past by 'evolving future' , discovering what has already happened . Mankind is very retrograde race in that manner .. but they show talent and efforts .

[Becky]

Also, we seem to be preoccupied with the 3D world when many of know that ET life comes from many different dimensions.

[Nasu]

WTF!!! Is wrong with our illustrious scientific community???? Can't these people think for themselves? Must one become a dumbed down no think, accept only that which is produced by science, individual, to be accepted as a scientist? Why is it that they "flatly" reject, the massive evidence for Extra-Terestrial presence, on this rock for thousands of years? Which to me means that those very ET's that come here, must be comming from, somewhere else? Another planet, in our own Milky Way Gallaxy, or another. Oh ya! Wait, I know! Ya can't go to another Gallaxy, with a rocket.

"I", for one! CANNOT finish an artical such as this one, for that very reson. Because first up... I know beyond a shadow of a doubt... that these people do not know WTF they are talking about. Or then maybe they do... and are just writing sh*t like this to make the stupid masses think there isn't other life out there, and could be, already comming here? hmm.

Yep! That works... also.:wizard:


I couldn't agree more, what a load of tosh.. Habitable in what sense??? That we could travel all that way to live on the surface of some distant planet, battered by weather, but protected from adverse space weather???.. Only those who have not moved past their own moon could even think like this.. The most sensible idea is to build underground, or rather under the surface of the planet. Away from harmful planet or space born weather, climate controllable and unseen from space for any passing ship, giving the colony a chance to thrive.. These "scientists" would be better off looking at the history of our own planet, in only a few days of reaserch on this forum and they could actually have a good idea or two. Yup, clearly they are looking for aliens in the wrong place.... N

Ps. Also, building our supposed future colony under the surface would increase the number of our potential planets exponentially..

[Sunny-side-up]

I yes yes to your above reply's, great words.
It is the main stream scientific community that is a self fulfilling/perpetuating illusion/lie to help keep the majority of the population asleep!
Maybe a great proportion of the sheeple are in fact illusions as well. So in reality those awake are not such a small percentage of the whole after all! which in turn helps project an apathy effect to keep us going around in circles and powered down Doh!

[indigopete]

Why is it that they "flatly" reject, the massive evidence for Extra-Terestrial presence, on this rock for thousands of years?

Because there isn't any evidence for an "Extra-Terestrial presence".

Aliens are not arriving here in spaceships from other worlds I'm afraid, despite the predomenance of UFO sightings, crop circles, ancient spaceship carvings and whotnot. Although impressive, none of this demonstrates that beings have actually travelled here from "other worlds" in a physical body. What it demonstrates is that a vast amount of creativity and ingenuity exists on this planet, some in the public domain and some not.

The reason the "UFO" phenomenon has garnered an extraterrestrial explanation for these phenomena is that people tend to think about long-distance space travel the same way as they think about long distance earth travel. i.e., that traversing distance between habitable worlds in the galaxy is just a "longer" version of travelling here on earth but you can still do it.

Then, when difficulties such as special relativity and lightspeed limitation get in the way, they just invent "solutions" such as "hyperdimensional transport" as if we can just get in a spaceship and remain in 3-dimensions with respect to the ship but be hyperdimensional relative to everything else in existence.

I used to actually subscribe to the idea myself until I really sat down and thought about it and thought about what "hyperdimensionality" really means. I also thought about all the relative timescales and distances involved and realised that whatever the UFO phenomenon is or isn't, the idea that it's visiting aliens from other planets is a huge hoax. The way to arrive at this planet hyper-dimensionally is in a human or animal body. End of story. Anything else you see is manmade or earth bound.

So, to be sure there is a very common form of hyperdimensional travel readily available without the need for "spinning tin cans". It's called "dying". :) You'll get to another world far faster that way than you ever will within a living lifetime.

In the meantime, if you want to know the real nature of the UFO phenomenon, have a listen to this pretty fascinating interview that was given by a CIA insider recently…

http://www.redicemembers.com/secure/radio/program.php?id=811

[778 neighbour of some guy]

In the meantime, if you want to know the real nature of the UFO phenomenon, have a listen to this pretty fascinating interview that was given by a CIA insider recently…

http://www.redicemembers.com/secure/...ram.php?id=811

Thanks, what's your log in and password, I like to listen to it via the link you provided;)

[STR]

http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/blogs/dnews-files-2014-02-superhabitable-exoplanet-670x440-140203-jpg.jpg
Super-Earths with shallower bodies of water could be more habitable for life than Earth.

Earth may be a nice and cozy place for life as we know it to evolve, but is it really the best place for life to thrive? Probably not, say two researchers. In fact, Earth may be one of the more extreme examples of a “habitable” world where life was lucky to survive.

The search for extraterrestrial life is fraught with uncertainly. Faced with a seemingly infinite Universe and an assumption that life beyond our planet is an inevitability, we focus on nooks and crannies that have similar habitable environments to Earth and exoplanets that resemble our world orbiting stars that resemble our sun. But finding these special places feels like we’re looking for a very specific needle in a very big haystack. What if our definition of “habitable” is just not all that, well, habitable?

“The Earth just scrapes the inner edge of the solar system’s habitable zone — the area in which temperatures allow Earth-like planets to have liquid surface water,” said René Heller of McMaster University, Ontario, Canada. “So from this perspective, Earth is only marginally habitable. That led us to ask: could there be more hospitable environments for life on terrestrial planets?”

Looking at the history of our planet, it may seem amazing that life was ever able to gain a foothold. Between the asteroid and comet bombardments, intense volcanic activity, frigid ice ages and often poisonous atmospheres, how were the conditions ever ripe for single celled lifeforms to form? Perhaps life was just really lucky to have found its way in such an inhospitable place.

Heller and colleague John Armstrong of Weber State University think that we may be looking for life in all the wrong places and suggest that we should be looking not for “second-Earths” but a class of planet that is superhabitable.

In an article published in Astrobiology in January, the researchers describe some of the characteristics a superhabitable planet may have. Some of the features — such as the necessity for a global magnetic field to protect life from ionizing solar wind particles — sound very familiar. But Heller and Armstrong highlight the need for a more efficient global “thermostat” that would avoid damaging ice ages. Also, a more massive planet with shallower oceans may be a more habitable solution.

In their research, they highlight the nearby star Alpha Centauri B as an ideal candidate that could support a superhabitable world. Slightly smaller than our sun, Alpha Centauri B would be able to incubate hypothetical lifeforms on a superhabitable world for much longer owing to its longer lifespan. "You want to have a host star that can keep a planet in the habitable zone for 7 to 10 billion years," which would allow enough time for life to evolve and ecosystems to flourish, Heller told New Scientist.

“We propose a shift in focus,” said Heller. “We want to prioritize future searches for inhabited planets. We’re saying ‘Don’t just focus on the most Earth-like planets if you really want to find life.’”

The researchers believe our hunt for extraterrestrial life is too set in its ways and blinkered toward worlds that we consider to be habitable because they resemble Earth. It’s a grand observational bias that may ultimately mean that while looking for second-Earths, we overlook far more habitable planets.

While discussions like this are valuable, I think they can be counterproductive.

Although it is very important to have “out of the box” thinking when it comes to the search for extraterrestrial life (whether that life be single-celled organisms hidden deep inside Mars’ crust or highly intelligent alien civilizations), using life as we know it as a template is no bad thing. After all, we are the only lifeforms we know of in the entire Universe, why would we ever consider Earth “barely habitable”?

How life is sparked remains one of the biggest questions hanging over modern science and the search for extraterrestrial life is an offshoot from that. Perhaps Earth, in its barely habitable state, is actually the perfect environment for life to gain a foothold?

Lacking evidence to the contrary, seeking out second-Earths probably isn’t such a bad idea.


Source: http://news.discovery.com/space/alien-life-exoplanets/are-we-searching-for-aliens-in-the-wrong-place-140203.htm


peace...
skywizard


When we lived in Alaska far north I discovered something. My mind awakened more. The farther north you go the more aware I seemed to become. Not immediate mind you. You have to be there a time. It starts with dreams. Then knowing. Just knowing. How you don't know. People ask something you know. Instantly, sometimes not for stuff you were even known to be wise in. Over time visitations of light would envelope me in some of these dreams. Communication took place, but what was not immediately understood and sometimes not even remembered till much later. We moved south again and I noted I was more in tune (for a time) to 'hot spots' in my local area. These I could feel especially well with my bare feet when walking, much as the Natives taught me to feel the earth by taking the blinders off (shoes).

It is my belief. I cannot prove it other than experience, but it is my belief based on some topical research only but enough to suggest higher elevations and north latitudes allow less shielding or compression of our memory of perhaps things we should be aware but now are not.

I suggest to you that during the cataclysm. The flood everyone refers to, whatever it encompassed, it involved making the planet such that giant beings could not live here any longer. All animals bigger than a giraffe for today died off. This must be related to compression or suppression of conscious awareness also which can only mean that our resultant amnesia from being here is directly related to the field of energies around the earth itself that protect us. So when you extend out of this stronger more condensed area or rise above it through a mechanical means maybe such as ancient people that maybe we do expand mentally which leads to wiser society as a whole. Now I suppose this could be used to go the other way as well as for good and it could be that the reason none of us have ever seen the poles on a map, or satellite view is maybe because there is on earth an 'incast' and an 'outcast' (guess which we are).

The incast? I believe they live beyond the boundary of the last strongest ring of energy on the earth grid. This which allows for them to be more awake and thus more able to run the world anyway they want while the outcast society not allowed into the zone of wisdom near the poles is completely in the dark about the true nature of this earth, the energy grid, her history, the fact that if they could migrate to a northern area or southern one away from the suppressive energies of our own grid that they would awaken enough to remember and become better life navigators all seems so wild and fanciful no one would believe it. I believe there is something to the way our energy flows electromagnetically and that awareness is directly related to our earths magnetic field. When our field weakens like now in our cycle people wake up on both sides of this duality! That is to mean, both evil and good awakens to blossom outward in a new way unlike before. We see it and people call it Star Children and stuff like this. Its deeper than that and not that the children are special so much as the time they are born into a weaker field of less suppression means they can and do bring more with them.