We are alone in the universe: Professor Brian Cox says alien life is all but impossible and humanity is 'unique'


The biological process which lead to intelligent life on earth was a fluke that is unlikely to have been repeated anywhere else in the universe, claims Professor Brian Cox.

The presenter and scientist blames a series of 'evolutionary bottlenecks' for the lack of extraterrestrial life on other planets, despite there being a mind-bogglingly vast number of them in the galaxy.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2809183/We-universe-Professor-Brian-Cox-says-alien-life-impossible-humanity-unique.html

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Thanks Lyn ....mmmm not shore i agree with him there .

Intelligent life mite be rear but i do think there will be some one out there .

Most will probably be just animals but not intelligent , but there has to be even if our circumstances where special .

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This is a surprise. On the science channel program Wonders of the Universe I am sure that he stated a belief that there must be thousands of civilizations scattered around the universe. I wonder what made him change his mind.

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

This is a surprise. On the science channel program Wonders of the Universe I am sure that he stated a belief that there must be thousands of civilizations scattered around the universe. I wonder what made him change his mind.

I've watched his show also, Bob. He does work for CERN. Maybe they changed is mind.

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"It's life Jim, but not as we know it."

Cheers.

"It's life Jim, but not as we know it."

Cheers.

Who's Jim, Wiggo??

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"It's life Jim, but not as we know it."

Cheers.

Who's Jim, Wiggo??

Ya havin' a go at me now arn't ya Lynn? :-O

Cheers.

And also from the song Star Trekkin' by The Firm. ;-)

Cheers.

I have yet to read the article but right now I don't agree with this.

The biological process which lead to intelligent life on earth was a fluke that is unlikely to have been repeated anywhere else in the universe, claims Professor Brian Cox.

Hm, what about "Everything that can happen, does happen"?

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I wonder what made him change his mind regarding this issue.

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

Since it would be impossible to prove this conjecture we must look for a counter-example to disprove it. Evidence of primitive life here in the solar system would be a start--either on Mars or one of the many moons would give a hint.

My own unfounded speculation is that any truly Earth-like planet is likely to be at least 30,000 light years away. I would like that to be proven wrong as well.

It is quite possible that there is biped life like us out there in the universe somewhere, it is that vast, so statistically it is pretty likely. But it is also likely that it will be so many hundreds of thousands of light years away, that they and us will never know that we each exist.

A little sad really ....

If they were anything like us and could survive, perhaps the search thru electromagnetic radiation could continue thru millions of years. Just to be able to communicate would be incredible.

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merle - vote yes for freedom of speech

When A Mind 'is' 'Changed' Quickly and 180, A Visit by Men In Black 'is' The Reason.

The Shadow 'Is' Cast.

' '

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May we All have a METAMORPHOSIS. REASON. GOoD JUDGEMENT and LOVE and ORDER!!!!!

Advanced life is probably rare, since a LOT of things have to go right. On our world, there had to be enough oxygen at the right time, enough catastrophes (but not too many), the stabilizing influence of the moon, large planets like Jupiter to protect us from most (but not all) asteroids, etc., etc. The planet itself had to have a molten core, both for continental drift to drive changes in the geography and climate, and also for a protective magnetic field. The list could go on and on, and I could add my own: we need fossil fuels to get civilization started, but we have to be smart enough to get off them of in time to prevent global warming from ending our civilization.

But similar statements could be made for other species too, and a number of them (e.g., dolphins) have developed a fairly high degree of intelligence independently of our line of primates. So maybe there are basic forces in the universe that favor such development. We don't know. If we listen long enough (and it could easily take 1000 years), we might find out.

Have read the article now. Reminds me a bit at the times, when mankind thought that earth is the center of the universe.
We don't know shit about the universe. We don't know how big it is, we don't know if it's infinite or not, we don't know if there is only one or if there are more. I guess that we don't even know 1% of all there is to know about the universe. So how can anybody claim that there are no other intelligent lifeforms out there?

I'm sure there are plenty out there. And I guess that we are rather on the low end of intelligence. There could be lifeforms out there so much more intelligent then us that we could never understand them, even when they would try to communicate with us. Like ants could never understand us, for example.

If such lieforms would cross our path I see 3 possibilities:

1: They try to communicate with us so we can learn from them. But I guess that is rather unlikely. Have you tried to communicate with an ant lately?

2: They completly ignore us

3: They kill us



However, allthough I can't proof it, I'm sure we are NOT alone in this universe. They are out there. And maybe they know about us already.

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Most people would say that we know a fair amount about our Universe.

We know that it is finite.

We know it's size,

We know it's age.

As to multiple universes--what is the evidence?

The UFO conspiracy brigade believe so, but the worlds governments are simply saying "unknown phenomenon at this time - keep under review".

They certainly won't come to learn anything from us.

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We are alone in the universe: Professor Brian Cox says alien life is all but impossible and humanity is 'unique'


The biological process which lead to intelligent life on earth was a fluke that is unlikely to have been repeated anywhere else in the universe, claims Professor Brian Cox.

The presenter and scientist blames a series of 'evolutionary bottlenecks' for the lack of extraterrestrial life on other planets, despite there being a mind-bogglingly vast number of them in the galaxy.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2809183/We-universe-Professor-Brian-Cox-says-alien-life-impossible-humanity-unique.html

well, cloroform also is present in single-cell organism...so we might find only "habitable planets" for us! Maybe a goal is to saearch for another Earth?

But recently I've been reading something about intelligent life & CFCs, like this one:
www.astrobio.net/news-exclusive/unintelligent-life-cfcs/
Though that life form should have at least instrusty stage 2 in their civilization!

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non-profit org. Play4Life in Zagreb, Croatia, EU

Back on Topic:

I wonder what made him change his mind regarding this issue.

I heard rumours he'd "contracted the god virus" Bob... but I can't find anything anywhere that backs that up - just people who find his voice irritating, especially when he's delivering particular superlatives in excessive quantities. I find it sends me to sleep which is really annoying - so I tend to watch it with the sound low and with subtitles turned on where I can - that way I get to the end and feel I've learned something :)

I kind of need a little more on why he's decided to make this claim, and until it's forthcoming I'm saying he's wrong :) I doubt he'll lose any sleep over it though :)