'Alien life' may be found on Earth

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Apache

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http://www.news24.com/SciTech/News/Alien-life-may-be-found-on-Earth-20111101

He said speculation that finding many planets means that life is abundant in the universe is flawed.

"Maybe we like the idea of the universe teaming with life, I do. How can we test it? If we don't know what the mechanism of life's origin was, is there any other way we can test short of finding ET?
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According to Davies, the way to test whether life could originate in the universe was to test to see whether different forms of life originated on Earth.

"If life pops up readily in Earth-like conditions, surely it should have started many times right here on Earth. Because after all, no planet is more Earth-like than Earth," he said.
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Yes, why hasn't life started many times on earth, I mean we have the right conditions, right? We should be seeing many different "family" trees not just one.
 
I'm very lost. There is life thriving on Earth, so what's the point?

Also, why are we so focused on finding life similar to us? Earth doesn't have the perfect conditions for life, just for life as we know it.
 
Sysem said:
I'm very lost. There is life thriving on Earth, so what's the point?

Also, why are we so focused on finding life similar to us? Earth doesn't have the perfect conditions for life, just for life as we know it.
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I think what he is saying in the article is that if life on earth started the way it did, then it should have happened a couple of times, resulting in multiple trees of life. Correct me if I am wrong.
 
From a forum somewhere else, but it sums up my view on the question pretty well:

"First of all, from my understanding of abiogensis, it requires presence of substantial amount of freely available chemicals that can be used as building blocks and food. You can be sure if something like that exists now, it is immediately and efficiently used by organisms already present, not leaving much for abiogesis experiments.

Additionally, whatever life form emerges from abiogenesis it is initially very vulnerable, it has to evolve all necessary defense mechanisms. That requires time and is unlikely in the presence of zillions of other organisms, that spent last billions of years optimizing their techniques of killing/eating/digesting whatever happens to be around and can be used as a food."


Also, other forms of life do actually exist:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2003/30jul_monolake/
 
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Apache said:
Show us this other "family tree/s".
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Because the current earth has conditions to Sustain life as we know it. The earth of a billion years ago is the one that had conditions to spark the start of life as we know it. The same conditions that would be tumultuous enough to create new microscopic life, are the same conditions that would tear us all apart as larger, more complex organisms.

Evidently you are not very clued up on this topic, or you would not have found this "news" to be as interesting as you evidently do.
 
RaptorSA said:
From a forum somewhere else, but it sums up my view on the question pretty well:

"First of all, from my understanding of abiogensis, it requires presence of substantial amount of freely available chemicals that can be used as building blocks and food. You can be sure if something like that exists now, it is immediately and efficiently used by organisms already present, not leaving much for abiogesis experiments.

Additionally, whatever life form emerges from abiogenesis it is initially very vulnerable, it has to evolve all necessary defense mechanisms. That requires time and is unlikely in the presence of zillions of other organisms, that spent last billions of years optimizing their techniques of killing/eating/digesting whatever happens to be around and can be used as a food."
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Well two life or many more life forms could have formed at similar times in different parts of the earth, allowing for many millions of years of unimpeded development.... but it didn't happen.
 
I'm confused Apache, are you saying that insects, reptiles, mammals, birds, amphibians .... are all the same life form? And that all forms of life exist everywhere on the planet?
At what level do you classify something as a new life form?
 
Apache said:
Well two life or many more life forms could have formed at similar times in different parts of the earth, allowing for many millions of years of unimpeded development.... but it didn't happen.
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You seem like you have a point to make, just tell me what it is before I continue this discussion.
 
McSack said:
I'm confused Apache, are you saying that insects, reptiles, mammals, birds, amphibians .... are all the same life form? And that all forms of life exist everywhere on the planet?
At what level do you classify something as a new life form?
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People believe that life started on earth on its own with no outside help, and then from this one life form all life came. So what the guy in the article is implying is that why did it not happen more then once.
 
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