University of Edinburgh

Researchers have calculated that up to 37,964 worlds in our galaxy are hospitable enough to be home to creatures at least as intelligent as ourselves.

Astrophysicist Duncan Forgan created a computer programme that collated all the data on the 330 or so planets known to man and worked out what proportion would have conditions suitable for life.

The estimate, which took into account factors such as temperature and availability of water and minerals, was then extrapolated across the Milky Way.

Mr Forgan believes that the life forms would not be amoeba wriggling on the end of a microscope but species at least as advanced as humans.

Mr Forgan, who believes it will take 300 to 400 years for us to make contact with our neighbours, said: "I believe the estimate of 361 intelligent civilisations to be the most accurate.

"These would certainly be the most Earth-like civilisations but the bigger figures are certainly possible. We can't rule them out.

"Most of the other planets we have looked at are older than our own – so I would expect to see more advanced civilisations than ours existing."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/space/4521885/40000-planets-could-be-home-to-aliens.html

Yep,like planet k-mart and Planet home depot.many many aliens.....many

Yeah, ive heard something like this batted around in years past.
The word evolution comes to mind. So many variables, possibilities. What took us 40,000 years to acheive might be done in alot less time somewhere else or it could end up taking alot more time depending on something as simple an asteroid collision.
Thanks for the Read.

But there may be other kinds of intelligent life that do not have to be carbon based existing at different frequencies in a different dimension.

This means of course that intelligent life could exist everywhere. Including on the sun or on the inside of planets.

Think about that.

Very true Jeannie! Our feeble minds just can't comprehend some things that may be!

Hmmm...

When researched, the gentleman mentioned turned out to be a journalist from the British Isles not an astrophysicist...



Any way to establish an identity for this source? We could be listening to a shoe shine boy from New York City for all we know...

Every time a Bell rings, a Gray alien gets its wings!

"When researched?" Researched by whom? What kind of research? Where is your research?

I found him all over the Internet. Do you google?


He is currently working towards a PhD at the Institute for Astronomy of the Royal Observatory Edinburgh. So yes, he can probably be called an astrophysicist.

Research interests
Computational Astrophysics (in particular Radiative Transfer methods)
Simulations of Protoplanetary Discs
Theories of planet formation
Astrobiology

QUOTE:
The Edinburgh University astrophysicist behind research that predicts there could be 38,000 alien civilisations in our galaxy spells out how he came to that figure, and whether we are likely to get a message from outer space.

http://www.roe.ac.uk/ifa/people/dhf.html

If you really think of it, it would be more shocking to believe there are no other life in the universe. I mean, here we are in a very insignificant galaxy, in an insignificant location with an insignificant star (Sun) and there is life on this one planet, out of the 9, nowhere else to be found, something that absolutely no replication anywhere else, not even a close thing or similar , even though basically we came from the same material as everything else, and yet nowhere can be life ever developed for various reasons.
I think that's just arrogant.

Ah... I just did a quick search on google and it came up with the journalist...

Interesting article... what I found reading too was this tidbit...

A sugar molecule essential to life as we know it has been found in the far reaches of the Milky Way, scientists report. Astronomers working with the IRAM radio dish array in France report the presence of glycolaldehyde—a simple sugar found in RNA—in a region of our galaxy known to churn out stars. The molecule appears to have formed with all of the other stuff that makes up planets, suggesting that many other worlds are seeded with some of life’s ingredients right from birth [ScienceNOW Daily News].

and there's more...

Glycoladehyde is a building block of ribose, a component of RNA. Many scientists believe RNA preceded DNA in vesting the earliest forms of life with reproductive capabilities; thus the finding of glycoladehyde has particular significance for those searching for extraterrestrial life. The astronomers detected radio and microwave signatures of glycolaldehyde within the core of what appears to be a coalescing disk of dust and gas in a star-forming region called G31.41+0.31, about 26,000 light-years away. The sugar molecule can apparently form in a simple reaction between carbon monoxide molecules and dust grains [ScienceNOW Daily News]. The astronomers believe the molecules they see are a few hundred thousand years old.

oh my...

I don't know. It always amazes me how scientist can find a molecule 26,000 light-years away, and estimate its age at the time of their viewing, and they can't find cancer cells in time to save a human life.

Well... a few thoughts (mind you working on second cup of coffee lol)

Who says they truly haven't? Pharmaceutical companies have a huge vested political interest and maybe if the countries would put those intelligent heads together rather than worrying about who could win a Nobel peace prize.

and honestly can you imagine the implications if they did find a cure?

and perhaps they are overlooking what has been there all along in nature... then again with pollution, strip mining, tropical forest burning and all that we have done to Mother Earth... maybe she gets the last laugh

But I really think it is interesting what they find in outer space and honestly if some alien race flew by for a drive by to see our human compassion and intelligence... no wonder they come and go to see if progress is being made... then again they could be waiting to see if we do ourselves in...

more coffee... lol

Oh I think there is a cure for cancer. They just don't want to spread it around. That's what I mean when I say that if they can find a molecule light years away in space, then how can they pretend that they can't cure cancer? It's a sham to sell drugs.

And then they are so worried about over population of the earth they are creating viruses in the hope they can use them to kill millions of people. They encourage cancer I think. They cause cancer. They discourage medical doctors from natural cures that work.

So it just ticks me off when they brag about finding a molecule light years away in outer space. Good for them. Now cure cancer.

</end of rant.. >

Basically correct, but...

If you wanted me to find a needle in a haystack, would you pay me for looking or for finding it?

Yeah, like Species 8472.


Last time I go to Fluidic Space, that's for sure!



...*cough*

Wow, that's quite a big conspiracy you got there. I agree that they may have the capability of finding a cure if we'd just invest a bit more in research and education. Of course, America has been too busy spending 10 billion *per month* on the war in Iraq, which has killed nearly 1 million Iraqis and +4000 American soldiers. Not to mention the seriously injured and the destroyed families...

But, like always, I digress. >_O

As for already having a cure for cancer...that I don't know. However, you may be right. Every couple months, someone comes up with a experimental, likely cure for cancer, but it's always failed finally. Maybe some of those cures passed the initial testing phases fine, but some government payed off this and that person to make sure that the next phase of testing did not happen. O_o I'll not rule out the possible, lol.

And as for creating viruses in labs to kill us with...that's a little too much for me. Still, possible. We do hear every once in a while some Illuminati-esque talk about secret organizations planning to kill off large sections of the population or something. Perhaps they're already doing it by falsely teaching doctors to use a lot of antibiotics. You know that in the end, over-use of antibiotics just breeds stronger, more resistant bacteria?

It's scary to think that NYC's public water supply has been shown to contain small amounts of antibiotics! What I heard is that it seemed in from human feces deposited somewhere...to think that our crap has enough antibiotics to influence our water like that...

Interesting article. I have no reason to doubt that far more planets then that could harbor life. We certainly have not found all the planets in the milky way BY A LARGE MARGIN.

Light JB. Light brings us all kinds of information. If light bounces off an object, or is emitted via absorption and re emission then we get information about it, just like you get information about the color of a tulip by looking at it.

We get info like its spectral mass, which gives us its composition. So yes with nothing more then light we can tell what molecules are on the other side of the galaxy.

As far as cancer and biology goes, I am not even going to discuss your absurd conspiracies.

I will say the problem of cancer is extremely complex. To understand cancer we must first understand how our cellular system works, which is one of the most daunting tasks of our modern times.

Optics may be good at taking light from a distant galaxy. However the limit of the smallest wave length of light makes looking into the body a challenge. We are overcoming this challenge, but putting the pieces of the new technology into play is a slow process. This is only the tip of the ice berg, we also must understand how our immune system deals with cancer and how apoptosis and necrosis are involved, AND how replication errors occur, and are supposed to be dealt with by the immune system . . . the list goes on and on for the research we must complete to get a grasp on cancer, thank fully there are people out there who have dedicated there lives to this task.

To underestimate the challenges involved is to admit ignorance of the complexity of the topic.

Well what about smell? I heard that they have dogs that can smell cancer.

With technology to see molecules in space don't you think we could develop technology to sense smell?

I heard that some people have dogs trained to sniff out cancer in patients.