(Science, Mathematics and Religion Alert: What follows here was never intended to be a scientific paper; but merely light-hearted reasoning from a layman’s perspective, thus please refrain from developing an urge to pummel the author.)
Some people talk of an advancing planet supposedly inhabited by reptilian humanoids. Earthly humans love to question everything…so what are the chances of Alien life beyond Earth?
The odds of Alien life?! At this point in time, it remains impossible to attach a figure to this question, plain and simple. Nevertheless, instead of just abandoning the whole investigation, let us decide upon a figure ourselves and make some calculations from there. It should preferably be something quite preposterous.
Before we decide this, let us look at some everyday odds: The odds of dying from a flesh-eating disease is roughly 1 in 1,000,000 (1 Million) and the chance of winning a 6-ball, 49-number Lottery is around 1 in 14,000,000 (14 Million). How then would odds of 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 sound? Absolutely absurd? Good, let us use these odds then.
At the odds of 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (21 zeros) chance of Alien life beyond Earth, some amazing things materialize.
We do not yet possess a powerful enough telescope to see everything in our universe, yet scientists estimate the total amount of planets in our visible universe at around 6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (21 zeros). At our Alien odds, there should be at least 6 of these planets supporting some kind of humanoid life form. Our planet Earth currently supports around 7,000,000,000 (7 Billion) humans; a planet which is relatively young at 4,500,000,000 (4.5 Billion) years old compared to the estimate for the oldest planet in the visible universe at around 13,000,000,000 (13 Billion) years. After its 4.5 billion years of existence, Earth supports 6 billion humans, roughly working out to 1.5 persons per year. If we apply this to the oldest planet, then our Alien planets could well be supporting 20 billion inhabitants each, times 6, which gives us 120 billion Humanoid Aliens.
The earliest humanoid on Earth appeared around 3,200,000 (3.2 Million) years ago; however, some creatures made an even earlier entrance at around 570,000,000 (570 Million) years ago. Which allows our generalised calculations to convert our 120 billion humanoid Aliens into 21,000,000,000,000 (12 zeros) Alien Creatures.
Finally, on Earth there are an estimated 200,000,000 (200 Million) insects per every single human. Using the same formula on our Alien planets, the figure swells to about 4,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 (21 zeros) Insect-like Alien Creatures.
Thus, in conclusion, at the odds of 1 to 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (21 zeros), the universe could be hosting 4,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 (21 zeros) Insect-like Alien Creatures. If we bring the odds up to 1 to 1, or a 100% certainty, then there should be at least one family consisting of 4 adult Aliens and 1 Alien kid out there for sure.
So the next time someone asks you whether you “believe in Aliens”, you can explain to them how the chance of finding an Alien family, happily going about their business somewhere beyond Earth, is really 14 Million times better than winning the lottery!
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