One of the most important mysteries of modern astronomy is the question of the presence of intelligent aliens in the Universe.
About this information was reported by Forbes, reports URA-Inform.
Recently, researchers have proposed a new approach to this question. In their latest study, scientists said that on planets like Earth, life either starts and lasts for a long time, or does not appear at all. This indicates that either aliens are extremely rare, or the universe is overcrowded.
Researchers believe that in ecological systems, be it a vegetable garden or a galaxy, populations develop from an initial state (for example, zero) to a stable state when the number of births and deaths per unit time is balanced. This balance is determined by the level of birth and death rates, as well as the maximum capacity of the ecosystem itself.
“We are using a classical statistical method to study the question of life in the universe,” said lead author David Kipping, director of the Cool Worlds Lab and a professor at Columbia University in New York.
Lewis points out that if advanced civilizations existed, they would be visible in the infrared thanks to technostructures such as Dyson spheres. SETI searches for such technosignatures have not yet yielded concrete results. Despite this, SETI researchers work under the assumption that extraterrestrial life is rare, but not exceptionally rare. Lewis calls this the fine-tuning problem.
There are about a trillion galaxies in the observable universe, which makes SETI searches much more difficult. The absence of discovered highly developed civilizations indicates that they are very rare and located at a considerable distance from each other.
“If we are truly alone in the galaxy, this should make us appreciate life on Earth even more,” Lewis emphasized.
Recall that signs of life were discovered on Venus: scientists They said that they managed to find it.