Life Before Fermi – Back to the Solar System. (arXiv:1811.06313v1 [astro-ph.EP])
<a href="http://arxiv.org/find/astro-ph/1/au:+Clements_D/0/1/0/all/0/1">David L Clements</a>
The existence of intelligent, interstellar traveling and colonising life is a
key assumption behind the Fermi Paradox. Until recently, detecting signs of
life elsewhere has been so technically challenging as to seem almost
impossible. However, new observational insights and other developments mean
that signs of life elsewhere might realistically be uncovered in the next
decade or two. We here review what are believed to be the basic requirements
for life, the history of life on Earth, and then apply this knowledge to
potential sites for life in our own Solar System. We conclude that the
necessities of life – liquid water and sources of energy – are in fact quite
common in the Solar System, but most potential sites are beneath the icy
surfaces of gas giant moons. If this is the case elsewhere in the Galaxy, life
may be quite common but, even if intelligence develops, is essentially sealed
in a finite environment, unable to communicate with the outside world.
The existence of intelligent, interstellar traveling and colonising life is a
key assumption behind the Fermi Paradox. Until recently, detecting signs of
life elsewhere has been so technically challenging as to seem almost
impossible. However, new observational insights and other developments mean
that signs of life elsewhere might realistically be uncovered in the next
decade or two. We here review what are believed to be the basic requirements
for life, the history of life on Earth, and then apply this knowledge to
potential sites for life in our own Solar System. We conclude that the
necessities of life – liquid water and sources of energy – are in fact quite
common in the Solar System, but most potential sites are beneath the icy
surfaces of gas giant moons. If this is the case elsewhere in the Galaxy, life
may be quite common but, even if intelligence develops, is essentially sealed
in a finite environment, unable to communicate with the outside world.
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