Neil deGrasse Tyson says that it would be extremely egocentric of us to not believe there wasn't other forms of life in the Universe.

Imagine if there was life out there say in one of those galaxies, or any number of civilizations in just one of those galaxies. How many trillions of stories will never be told, or that we will never know about.

I wonder what a picture would look like if it was possible to see farther out in the dark parts of the photograph.

DoctorHelvetica

United States15034 Posts

October 04 2009 04:25 GMT

Yeah, considering the size and scope of the earth, evolution is bound to have happen on another planet. Have you read into the Draco equation and stuff like that? It's pretty interesting.

Carl Sagan is the man.

Licmyobelisk

Philippines3682 Posts

October 04 2009 04:30 GMT

I only hope that if there are other life forms out there, say that they are very intelligent..

madnessman

United States1581 Posts

October 04 2009 04:39 GMT

the scary thing about that photo is that its just a patch of "blank space". hubble took a photo of a blank ordinary patch of the night sky and this is what you get. NASA says there are about 10k galaxies in that photo. 1 galaxy has about 100-200 billion stars. theres no way that we are alone in this universe.

nofAcedAgent

United States952 Posts

October 04 2009 05:12 GMT

I love how you randomly post space photos every once and awhile haha..

I see a middle finger and a face screaming.. what do you see O_o?

EDIT:+ Show Spoiler +

Hyde

Australia14568 Posts

October 04 2009 05:16 GMT

Now that you mention it, I do see the middle finger in that picture hahahahahaha. I don't see the screaming face though.

All I remember from Carl Sagan is his narration of the pale blue dot.

Mickey

United States2606 Posts

October 04 2009 05:27 GMT

Krohm

Canada1857 Posts

October 04 2009 05:42 GMT

Ah the photo that changed everything. It really belittles me when I look at it. It's staggering how much is out there. It's also depressing knowing that I'll never know what all is out there. I really wish I was born a few thousands years from now. (Granted humanity even lasts that long.)

{CC}StealthBlue

United States41117 Posts

October 04 2009 05:55 GMT

I just find it fascinating that as humans are bodies are made up the tiniest of atoms and other elements which are all found in the universe. Sort of like we are all connected to any life out there and the universe as a whole.

EDIT: One should really look at the full size picture while listening to Thomas Newman -Road to Perdition.

meegrean

Thailand7699 Posts

October 04 2009 06:07 GMT

#10

I really wonder if there is a highly advanced alien civilization out there with technology far superior to our own.

funkie

Venezuela9376 Posts

October 04 2009 06:07 GMT

#11

I'd love for life in other planets.

Like, I don't buy for one second, that in this big fucking universe, there ins't another planet that has liveable conditions, and even then, there maybe are other planets out there, that have evolved more and are living the "future way" as we pictured it. Maybe?

I <3 this.

Divinek

Canada4045 Posts

October 04 2009 06:51 GMT

#12

On October 04 2009 13:25 DoctorHelvetica wrote:
Yeah, considering the size and scope of the earth, evolution is bound to have happen on another planet. Have you read into the Draco equation and stuff like that? It's pretty interesting.

Carl Sagan is the man.

It's actually called the Drake equation. Which is a fairly important difference in that case because the guy was named Drake and not Draco.

But stuff like this is quite awesome.

jello_biafra

United Kingdom6637 Posts

October 04 2009 13:01 GMT

#13

lol the Draco equation, you've got BW on the mind.

On October 04 2009 14:42 Krohm wrote:
Ah the photo that changed everything. It really belittles me when I look at it. It's staggering how much is out there. It's also depressing knowing that I'll never know what all is out there. I really wish I was born a few thousands years from now. (Granted humanity even lasts that long.)

Or that we ever develop space travel

The chances of there not being life out there are really, really small, that is surely undeniable. Also we're on one of the outer spirals of the miky way, there will be planets towards the centre that are billions of years older than earth and could potentially be home to advanced civilizations that have been around for millions of years.

ShoCkeyy

7815 Posts

October 04 2009 15:54 GMT

#14

I would love for other civilization to be out there, but I really don't stop to think about it because in our life time we won't know that yet. The picture is beautiful and it really expands your train of thought.

Machine leg

Sweden52 Posts

October 04 2009 17:16 GMT

#15

+ Show Spoiler +

On October 04 2009 14:12 nofAcedAgent wrote:
I love how you randomly post space photos every once and awhile haha..

EDIT:+ Show Spoiler +

I see a middle finger and a face screaming.. what do you see O_o?

I see an angel with one white wing and one black one.

I just saw "Alien planet" on youtube 1 hour ago based on the book "expedition". It's about humanity exploring the fictional planet "Darwin 4". The way they explore is probably the way it's going to be in the future.

ulszz

Jamaica1787 Posts

October 04 2009 19:09 GMT

#16

there is srsly a blog once a month with this pic

VorcePA

United States1102 Posts

October 04 2009 19:13 GMT

#17

On October 04 2009 22:01 jello_biafra wrote:
lol the Draco equation, you've got BW on the mind.

Show nested quote +

Or that we ever develop space travel

Maybe, but it's not as likely. The deeper in to a galaxy you go, the more ultraviolet radiation there is. Our planet is protected, first, by the heliosphere, which is the result of solar winds caused by our sun sending off hydrogen atoms at around 400 km/s in every direction. If cosmic radiation can get past that, our second line of defense, the stellar magnetic field, stops most of the rest. Mostly gamma rays can penetrate all the way to our planet, which are the worst kind, but there's so few of them that the radiation you get from just being out in the sun is worse than what may pass through you from beyond our solar system.

Systems that are in the thicker parts of the galaxy have many stars close by, if you're thinking on a cosmic scale. Our sun, being on the edges of the milky way galaxy, has an estimated 15,000 stars around it in a 100 lightyear radius. Considering our galaxy has a diameter of 100,000 light years, that's not much. I have been unable to find sources giving me the density distribution of stars the deeper you go in to the galaxy, but any individual with half-a-brain could probably guess that it gets more dense the deeper in to the galaxy you go. With that in mind, the heliospheres and magnetic fields are pushed harder, allowing more radiation to get to the inner planets, which means more radiation hits the habitable zone of a star system.

Also, our sun is slightly above average in size and mass compared to most stars in our galaxy. It doesn't compare to stars like Antares or Betelguese, but in the Milky Way as a whole, we have a bigger star than most systems. Smaller stars by mass have a weaker magnetic field and heliosphere, so that's just one more reason why life would be harder to evolve in the central part of the galaxy.

If there is life on other planets, we haven't heard or otherwise detected in our local cluster of stars. Life is more likely to form in to what we would call an intelligent form on the edges of our galaxy in between two spiral arms. Isolation from other stars is key. Given that, and the fact that we haven't heard anything from where we are, which is in between two spiral arms, the next two are tens of thousands of lightyears away. Anything we could hear would be the remnants of a civilization, or if we were lucky enough to be developing around the same time as another planet, there's still many thousands of years left for their signals to reach our planet, assuming it isn't blocked by all the matter and electromagnetic radiation along the way.