Do you think there is life on Europa?

What are the chances of life existing on Europa?

  • 81% - 100%

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • 61% - 80%

    Votes: 2 28.6%

  • 41% - 60%

    Votes: 1 14.3%

  • 21% - 40%

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • 0% - 20%

    Votes: 4 57.1%
  • Total voters
    7
outside looking in

outside looking in

<b>Registered Member</b>
Instead of just a yes or no, I thought it would be better to get a "percentage of a percentage" type of poll.

I'm not asking whether you think we'll actually find it (though, if it is there, we will eventually if we don't blow ourselves up first)... just what the chances you think are that life is actually there.
 
When it comes to defining life, i think most people expect to find life similar to the one we have here on earth, and imo is a fundamental mistake.

There could be life on the moon, but we just don't know how or what to search for. [/extreme example]
 
Exactly... if you define life by the very narrow definition we have on Earth then I would have to say no.
 
This might be an odd definition, but I would define life as something that, on its own, can consume fuel, expel waste, and reproduce itself, and requires a fairly complex system to accomplish this task.

Viruses cannot do that on their own. Cars cannot reproduce themselves on their own (though, the analogy between cars and our own genes is quite disturbing and interesting). Fire satifies most criterion, but is too simple of a system to qualify - it's just a simple chemical reaction.

If we were to find any complex assemblage of molecules on Europa that consumed materials, expelled waste, and reproduced... well, I think that would be the breakthrough of all time.



I'm curious as to why the average percentage is so low thus far? Europa almost certainly has liquid water oceans, and possibly warm thermal vents just like we find on the bottom of our oceans. We have found life in the middle of kilometers of ice, around hydrothermal vents much deeper than "normal" life, in the middle of rocks... and some even hypothesize that there might be life deep within the crust of the Earth feeding on buried hydrocarbons (I believe we have already found life in oil deposits, but I'd have to check on that to be sure).

Would your feelings change if we were to find life in lake Vostok in Antarctica (one of the five largest lakes in the world, completely buried under miles and miles of solid ice, and isolated from the sun and the rest of the planet for possibly 20 million years)?
 
no, my feelings would not change.

The Antartica is one thing, Europa is another, conditions on Earth are different.

Water != life.
 
The point being? So far as the life we have found thus far, water = life. But that's irrelevant. The acknowledgment that life could be non water based should make the chance of it being on Europa even greater.

I'm really confused by your reasoning. On the one hand, you seem to be arguing that we are too "limited" in our understanding of life, that it could be much more diverse than we imagine, and the it may be based on chemical systems that have nothing to do with water, carbon, etc. On the other hand, you seem to be arguing that there is no life on Europa because the "conditions are different on Earth."

:confuse3:

Europa is the closet conditions to Earth you're going to find anywhere in the solar system, most likely, unless you want to consider Mars a close tie for that honor. And if life can be so drastically different than what we are familiar with, that would only increase the chances of there being life elsewhere.

We have found life in extremely inhospitable places all over, and in, our planet. Why does Europa seem so "extremely extremely" inhospitable to you... so much so that you think it impossible or unlikely for there to be life there? After all, you said "there could be life on the Moon" due to life being so drastically different, but apparently not on Europa, where there are liquid oceans, and probably thermal vents, somewhere we have found life before.

I guess what I'm getting at is this: if we had found life on, say, the Moon, and I asked what chances you thought there are of life existing on Mars, what would you say?

Had you simply said "I think life needs conditions not too different from our own, thus I think it unlikely that there is life on Europa" I would have never given it a second thought. But from what you've stated, well... I just can't figure out where you're coming from.
 
outside looking in said:
This might be an odd definition, but I would define life as something that, on its own, can consume fuel, expel waste, and reproduce itself, and requires a fairly complex system to accomplish this task.
Click to expand...
That's actually a pretty good definition. Do you think viruses are alive? I could argue either side of that one myself.
outside looking in said:
Would your feelings change if we were to find life in lake Vostok in Antarctica
Click to expand...
Afraid my feelings wouldn't change either. If we had found life (or even evidence that there had been life) on the moon, that would be different. So far, we haven't found evidence of life anywhere else in the solar system. As I said, I need more evidence. I am, however, willing to be convinced. It would be the most exciting scientific discovery of all time.
 
Should have clarified, i don't think Europa holds life similar to Earth's.

Maybe it has life, but i don't think it matches your definition.
 
My definition was pretty broad, Luis.

Life must either replicate itself, die out, or live forever. If a life form lives forever but doesn't replicate, then it logically follows that it had an intelligent designer, since evolution is probably incapable of producing that form of life.

Life must consume fuel/resources/energy in order to live. Simply thermodynamics.

Life must expel waste, at least during some part of their lives (growth, construction, or whatever you want to call the early phase). Silicon/electrical based life might not expel visible waste matter, but they would produce waste heat as a byproduct.



That definition leaves a lot of room for wildly varying forms of life.

chcr, no, IMO viruses are not alive. However, were we to discover a virus like form on Europa, the discovery would be just as important. Viruses are an indicator of life - they can't survive without true life. Finding them would indicate that Europa did contain other forms of life.
 
this thread reminds me of something a teacher pointed out back in high school.
we watched a clip of an old "Buck Rogers" movie and he told us to listen to the sound that Buck's rocket made. it sounds like a propeller driven aircraft. his point was that the filmmakers had NO idea what a rocket sounded like, seeing as they hadn't been invented yet, so they used what they knew.
as far as the definition of life goes, we dont know anything else.
 
I think its possible.
Until only a few years ago, we believed that life needed to receive energy in one form or another from the Sun. We did not imagine life existing in the deepest depths of the oceans. Then oceanographers on Earth discovered a whole new world, deep under he ocean in the Mid Atlantic Ridge. The ridge is an area of spreading crust, and there are active volcanic vents all along the ridge. And all around the vents are fish, crabs, giant tube worms and other creatures. They feed on microorganisms in the fluids from the volcanoes. As strange as it is to believe, these organism, called thermophylic bacteria, literally thrive in temperatures of 130 degrees F. Life, it seems, can survive in one form or another in very bizarre circumstances!

Planetary scientists now began to be more open minded about where life could occur. Europa is a hostile place, with temperatures not reaching about -170 degrees F. Still, on Earth, there is a plenitude of bacterial life existing under ice sheets in the Arctic. This and the other information about Europa has sparked interest in the possibility of life there. Currently the Galileo spacecraft is orbiting Jupiter and studying the moons. NASA would like to plan future missions for more detailed studies
Click to expand...
 
There might be a few simple bacteria alive but that is enough to raise some heavy handed questions about space. The temperatures seem to cold for any other life to survive but then again i maybe looking at a perspective from Earth life point of view....There could be a whole new definition of simple life adapted to the harsh temps in Europa's ocean...a whole new evolved and adapted bacteria.

I think people xpect too much out of finding life in space...they expect Green men with UFO's parked outside their futuristic houses where it might just be simple bacteria on it's course to greatness like it was on earth 3.5 billion years ago.

Or it could be very well another civilization like ours or better lurking out there:confuse3:
 
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