Not alone in the visible universe, not even in our own galaxy

"AK" == Al Klein writes:

AK On Sat, 09 Jun 2007 11:01:04 -0700, Mike
AK wrote:
I also contemplate and speculate thusly. However, I stop short of
contending. The evolutionary sequence that led from primordial
slime to you and me COULD be so astronomically improbable that it
is unique in the galaxy or even the universe. On the other hand,
as Spock was wont to say: "It's life Jim, but not as we know it".

AK As Gould said, if we rolled evolution back a few billion years and
AK let it run again, it would almost definitely NOT lead to us again.
AK (Or even to dinosaurs.)

While almost certainly true, for exactly the same reason, we cannot
rule out the possibility that an intelligent civilization would not
have emerged. It's arguable that intelligence has evolved (at least)
twice, in primates and cetaceans.

Because we have only one outcome (us), we cannot know, or at best can
only modestly constrain, the possibilities as far as the evolution of
intelligence if we were to "replay the tape."

--
Lt. Lazio, HTML police | e-mail:
No means no, stop rape. | http://patriot.net/%7Ejlazio/
sci.astro FAQ at http://sciastro.astronomy.net/sci.astro.html