This week astronomers announced a newly discovered planet "that just may be able to support life in a nearby solar system." The scientists aren't saying that Gliese 581g currently supports life, but it is possible.
In many ways, this discovery only underscores to me the immense egocentrism of our species. Life is defined by our own narrow perceptions. We assume that, if conditions aren't just so to maintain life as we know it, then this means that no other way can exist.
What's so astounding about this type of belief is that none of us knows what life itself is! What caused the Big Bang? We may roughly know how some of the life forms came to be on this one planet, but where did the constituent elements originate? We can't answer this question and I strongly suspect we never will.
Without knowing what constitutes the underlying notion of existence -- is it "real" or illusion -- we can't even be sure if there aren't other life forms on our own planet in, say, a different dimension.
You know, some nights I lay awake staring in the dark at the ceiling in my bedroom. I wonder if in the space between my eyes and the wall there might not be other beings or a consciousness that I'm not aware of. Could there be whole other "worlds" that exist on this one planet in dimensions that a human cannot perceive? Could they be asking the same sort of questions?
According to a research that is set to be published in the Astrophysical Journal, the planet is "squarely in the middle of the habitable zone of the star" which offers a very compelling case for a potentially habitable planet around a very nearby star.Well, at least life as conceived of by human beings on Planet Earth!
When a planet falls in the "habitable zone" it means that it orbits the star at a distance that allows for the planet to have both liquid water and an atmosphere, two conditions that are considered important for life to exist...
In many ways, this discovery only underscores to me the immense egocentrism of our species. Life is defined by our own narrow perceptions. We assume that, if conditions aren't just so to maintain life as we know it, then this means that no other way can exist.
What's so astounding about this type of belief is that none of us knows what life itself is! What caused the Big Bang? We may roughly know how some of the life forms came to be on this one planet, but where did the constituent elements originate? We can't answer this question and I strongly suspect we never will.
Without knowing what constitutes the underlying notion of existence -- is it "real" or illusion -- we can't even be sure if there aren't other life forms on our own planet in, say, a different dimension.
You know, some nights I lay awake staring in the dark at the ceiling in my bedroom. I wonder if in the space between my eyes and the wall there might not be other beings or a consciousness that I'm not aware of. Could there be whole other "worlds" that exist on this one planet in dimensions that a human cannot perceive? Could they be asking the same sort of questions?
re: "Could there be whole other "worlds" that exist on this one planet in dimensions that a human cannot perceive? "
ReplyDeletehttp://dogobarrygraham.blogspot.com/2010/07/brightly-lit-but-invisible.html
Brightly Lit But Invisible
"While I was sitting one night with a poet friend watching a great opera performed in a tent under arc lights, the poet took my arm and pointed silently. Far up, blundering out of the night, a huge Cecropia moth swept past from light to light over the posturings of the actors. 'He doesn’t know,' my friend whispered excitedly. 'He’s passing through an alien universe brightly lit but invisible to him. He’s in another play; he doesn’t see us. He doesn’t know. Maybe it’s happening right now to us.'”
—Loren Eiseley, The Immense Journey
--sgl
This is just the first, of hopefully many,extrasolar planets that we have discovered that may be able to support life as we know it. The major requirement for life is liquid water. Planet Gliese 581g is the right size and distance from its parent star to have liquid water. Other forms of life may be possible, but we can only speculate on their requirements. So the scientists are doing the best they can with the technology they have.
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