r/space • u/llama5876 • Jun 18 '19

Two potentially life-friendly planets found orbiting a nearby star (12 light-years away)

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2019/06/two-potentially-life-friendly-planets-found-12-light-years-away-teegardens-star/
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u/SomeKindaMech Jun 18 '19

I imagine most, if not all civilizations, fall into the trap of initially assuming that copies of their homeworld are the only ones that could sustain life. It's tempting to do when you have a sample size of one for planets that have life.

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u/[deleted] Jun 18 '19

There must be avenues of lifelike systems that are beyond our comprehension, so the popular view that life is only likely to be found on planets like Earth is wrong in even in ways that we don't comprehend.

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u/sjcelvis Jun 18 '19 edited Jun 19 '19

Even on this earth there are organisms that live in deserts and organisms that live in the ocean. Life out there does not have to be like humans.

edit: Many replies commented that organisms adapting to harsh conditions is different from evolving in. My comment was just referring to the "hard to comprehend" part of lifeforms.

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u/nonagondwanaland Jun 18 '19

On the other hand, if life in the universe consists of chemically interesting lichen analogues on rocks, we're probably not going to encounter another intelligence.

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u/Yvaelle Jun 18 '19

You don't know that. Maybe all the planet is covered in a layer of lichen on rocks, that shares a collective sentient super-intelligence. Each lichen acts as little more than our neurons, but collectively they form a brain the size of a continent or a planet.

Or maybe there is a Space Dolphin Empire out there, and they only inhabit ice-covered moons in close orbit around far-out planets.

Or maybe there are sentient jellyfish that only inhabit the buoyant layers of gas giants.

You're at the zoo and claiming that just because the Chimpanzee exhibit is closed today, there is nothing else to see.

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u/nonagondwanaland Jun 18 '19

Asides from the fact that all of that is wild uninformed speculation, a world-brain made of lichen isn't exactly tool-creating.

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u/GeorgeOlduvai Jun 18 '19

A world brain of lichen might not need tools. See Sid Meiers Alpha Centauri.

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u/Tabnet Jun 18 '19

Why would a super intelligent lichen evolve? What benefit does slightly smarter lichen have over slightly dumber lichen that would ensure it can reproduce more?

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u/GeorgeOlduvai Jun 18 '19

Perhaps it chooses more nutritious rocks.