Are we alone in the universe?

[miashuni]

I think we are not( meaning i think there be aliens out in them there space), what about you guys, what do you think?

[CarolRiverArt]

Nop. we are not alone.

[DiegoPalacios]

statistically speaking, the chance of earth being the only place in the universe with living beings is pretty low.

[silverraven0]

With millions (or however much I don't remember) of galaxies in the universe, nope, there must be another living creature out there.

[aFistFull]

I really hope not. But will we meet them? I dunno, feels unlikely.

[qwerty]

I used to think there is definitely other intelligent life out there somewhere, given the sheer number of stars and such. I still think this line of reasoning makes sense.

But it leaves a problem of why we haven't detected anything, despite trying.

We could explain that with the standard 'government coverup' conspiracy theory, or the theory that alien life has advanced methods of remaining hidden and doesn't wish to be discovered by us. Or that we just haven't found anything by chance or all the aliens happen to be too far away or something.

But what if... any civilization roughly more advanced than humanity actually ends up being an artificial intelligence or something that reaches the 'singularity'? An entity that can recursively make itself smarter - to the point that it can easily figure out all the secrets of the universe and become like a god?

What if this entity, immediately after developing, would tend to take over the universe and wipe out all other life?

Maybe just the fact that we haven't been wiped out yet means that we are likely to be the first 'advanced' life to develop.

Or maybe... all possible universes exist somewhere, and there happen to be many more universes just barely capable of sustaining intelligent life than there are universes that can sustain many intelligent civilizations. In that case it also might be likely that we are the only ones in our particular universe.

TL;DR - No clue X)

[grimnir]

If intelligent life can happen one place, there's no reason to assume it won't happen elsewhere. Earth just isn't that special, and it didn't even take life long to develop here.

However, it's likely that whatever that life is, it won't resemble anything we know. It may be so strange we don't even recognize it as life.
(One of my favorite sci-fi books about this is Solaris, which is about a team of researchers trying to make contact with an alien intelligence barely even recognizable as life.)

[darkone4587]

Mathematically speaking it's highly unlikely considering how vast the universe is.

[jpnakashima]

Well, that's just a complex question, be it factually or existentially, right?

Personally? I guess not. It is a huge universe. It's too huge to even grasp. It's really hard to think about the size of the universe in material terms, but though it is made primarily of dark mater and dust, there are a shit ton of stars with a shit ton of planets. There's got to be, right?

Now, for some thoughts on the matter.
I feel like one explanation for why there has been no contact is that distances and time in the universe are so dispersed. Know how the light of a star takes thousands, sometimes millions of years to reach Earth? Well, messages would too. Honestly, if we ever receive a message from other beings, chances are they're extinct now. Same with us, I guess.
The universe's history is so long and hard to put in perspective that I think it's more probable that there are more planets with life (being it sentient or not), but in different points in time. We too shall be extinct long before the collapse of this universe.

Earth just isn't that special, and it didn't even take life long to develop here.

I think it's true that life didn't take long to develop here (in context, of course, because if I'm not wrong, life has started something like 480million years ago), but I do think Earth is special.
Earth is inside our Sun's Circumstellar Habitable Zone, the perfect area for it to allow the existence of life. It also has the perfect shape, gravity and atmosphere for it. All the chemical elements are right. No planet in the solar system is like Earth and none have such great conditions for life. I do believe the Earth is a special one, in this sense. I do not think humanity as a species is that special (though complex brains and thumbs, right?), but our planet is a sight to behold.

[alexthetrex]

"Everybody finds love In the end."

[alexthetrex]

Interesting and well written explanation..

[miashuni]

yeah i mean theres gotta be dudes in spaceships stalking peeps.

[indagold]

yeah realistically speaking it probably exits as bacteria or plants or something else. Just not grays sticking their fingers up your bums at night and fantastical spaceships lol

[Raven_C]

I told my coworker I believe there are other forms of life out there in the universe, and she looked at me like I’m some loony who believed in the “gray sticking their finger in your bums” type. Like, no you fool, i think we’re not alone in this universe, but it doesn’t have to be E.T. in a UFO or something.

[OneHappyChap]

Chances are we'll never know since the universe is constantly expanding though.

[vworksart]

I~ feel like it's a pretty arrogant statement to say that in the entire vastness of the universe, we are the only life that could have come about.

[Penni]

It would be incredibly hard to believe we are the ONLY life out there in the giant universe. I imagine they are staying the hell away from us cause we can't get our act together

[Shanny8]

I imagine they are staying the hell away from us cause we can't get our act together

THIS. Is the wavelength I'm currently on. Given the disastrous and toxic climate of humanity right now I wouldnt blame if some other lifeforms in spaceships passed our planet by- "no, not there..."

[baasinsimple]

There are millions of Galaxies out there and statistically speaking, we are not alone, but also statistically speaking, there's not many livable planets in our galaxy, we can never find a way to explore different galaxies because we would have to find ways to travel above the speed of light and there are events present in the universe that's the equivalent of god taking a record breaking shit, that can destroy all actual life in a galaxy. Even if the probability of it happening is one in a million.

[Lady_DarkStar]

Are we alone? No, most definitely not. Are we alone in this solar system? Perhaps now, perhaps not. There is probably life under Europa's ice, or Enceladus's ice for that matter. There are assumptions that make the question of other life problematic at best. Humans want life and intelligence like us, and have a hard time qualifying intelligence and life that is different from ours as life, or intelligence.We are three dimensional beings. Physics says a minimum of eleven dimensions. If intelligent life exists in dimensions other than the three we perceive, we will never know it's there. If you look at the matter / dark matter aspect, the likelihood is that intelligent life exists in dark matter, and again, we will never perceive it because we can't even see dark matter. The matter we can see is so vast that we can't even calculate how big the universe is, yet that only makes up a tenth of the matter out there. We mathematically can't be alone in the universe, but conversely, it will be mathematically damn near impossible to ever find or interact with other intelligent life. The other problem with the question of finding life is that it assumes the technology has the same or very similar basis as ours. That is possibly the most arrogant assumption in the premise, with the possible exception of life needing the same things we do. Why would a dark matter being need the same things, or have even remotely similar tech?