To date, around 1700 planets have been discovered outside our solar system.

Richard Feynman

Richard Feynman

Considering how long we've been looking (not very) and the obtuseness of our detection methods/instruments until very recently, that is a LOT. I find this stuff indescribably moving.

Our blue dot is becoming paler by the minute.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140226153355.htm

NASA's Kepler mission announced Wednesday the discovery of 715 new planets. These newly-verified worlds orbit 305 stars, revealing multiple-planet systems much like our own solar system.

Nearly 95 percent of these planets are smaller than Neptune, which is almost four times the size of Earth. This discovery marks a significant increase in the number of known small-sized planets more akin to Earth than previously identified exoplanets, which are planets outside our solar system.

"The Kepler team continues to amaze and excite us with their planet hunting results," said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. "That these new planets and solar systems look somewhat like our own, portends a great future when we have the James Webb Space Telescope in space to characterize the new worlds."

.......

For more information about the Kepler space telescope, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/kepler
Click to expand...

And here's a graphic showing expolanet discoveries by over time. Love me a good exponential:

800px-Exoplanet_Discovery_Methods_Bar.png
 
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This type of thing dispels religion for me. Its impossible for us to be alone in this universe and not feasible for a mystical being in the clouds to have created life in multiple places.
 
I've found about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 independent reasons to dismiss the validity of each religion and its claims (though that's another topic).

This stuff's extremely exciting. Statistically, the probability that life has only ever evolved on one planet in the entire universe in its 13.7 billion year history is low, to say the least.

All these exoplanet discoveries mean we're getting firmer figures to plug into the Drake equation which is fun to tinker with:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation
 
There are some interesting theories that are consistent with BOTH science and religion.

I'd mention them but then I'd sound like a loony.
 
I'd like to hear them.

But not if they are "look at a sunset and say there is no god" type of theory I usually read on FB.
 
Hey Simon, have PM'd you. Let me know what you think.

As a teaser, they relate to the common themes in the creation stories of practically all major religions, all the unexplainable 'stuff' around the world and the Drake equation.
 
Richard Feynman said:
This stuff's extremely exciting. Statistically, the probability that life has only ever evolved on one planet in the entire universe in its 13.7 billion year history is low, to say the least.
Click to expand...


What about the chances of any of us even being here? For example, what are the chances that the millions of descendants of mine [yes, I'm going back before apes to the first mammals and even before] all survived until old enough to breed, and pass on their genes? So I'm the descendant of millions of survivers. Anyone of those being killed before passing on their genetics, and I wouldn't exist?

What were the chances that my grandmother met my grandfather, or once again any of my millions of descendants met each other? And then they made choices every day to do something different that would have put them in a different place or time so that they wouldn't have met?

But then there are millions of sperm. I'm only here because my sperm got to the egg before all the rest.

I could go on and on but you get the picture:D


See ya's.
 
All very interesting Richard but all this information has been put together by a bunch of self interested scientists, so it must be wrong. I reckon my microwave has been looking at me funny lately - I don't trust this science malarkey - I'm going to have to get rid of it. As for my wristwatch, that whole quartz oscillator thing just sounds dodgy. Not to mention this new electrickery stuff...

Whenever I look around the earth it looks flat to me and there are just pretty pictures in the sky at night, when I can see through the combination of smog and light pollution. My self belief is unassailable... we need to get rid of this science stuff - it's just bad for business.
 
25 years ago, in an another country, one old horoscope reader told my mum about our family's future. Almost, all major events happened. None of those events were 'common' at that time or even now.
That alone keeps me afraid of God :)
 
HiEquity said:
All very interesting Richard but all this information has been put together by a bunch of self interested scientists, so it must be wrong. I reckon my microwave has been looking at me funny lately - I don't trust this science malarkey - I'm going to have to get rid of it. As for my wristwatch, that whole quartz oscillator thing just sounds dodgy. Not to mention this new electrickery stuff...

Whenever I look around the earth it looks flat to me and there are just pretty pictures in the sky at night, when I can see through the combination of smog and light pollution. My self belief is unassailable... we need to get rid of this science stuff - it's just bad for business.
Click to expand...


Sounds like you and your pushbike got blown off the road by a coal truck this morning HE?


See ya's.
 
HE,

Maybe they should build bicycle lanes.....(oops wrong thread).Then again with the smoke from the Hazelwood pit fire I suppose its not going to really matter........

With respect to the OP there is a sticking point........

At what point did a combination of inorganic elements become organic??

ciao

Nor
 
Cassini satellite discovers evidence of ocean on Saturn?s moon Enceladus

Thought I'd post this here rather than start a new post...some Solar System news:

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/cassini-satellite-discovers-evidence-of-ocean-on-saturns-moon-enceladus/story-e6frf7jo-1226874215939- Marcia Dunn, AP - 04.04.2014

"...SCIENTISTS have uncovered a vast ocean beneath the icy surface of Saturn?s little moon Enceladus.

Italian and American researchers made the discovery using Cassini, a NASA-European spacecraft still exploring Saturn and its rings 17 years after its launch from Cape Canaveral.

This new ocean of liquid water ? as big as or even bigger than North America?s Lake Superior ? is centred at the south pole of Enceladus and could encompass much if not most of the moon. Enceladus is about 499 kilometres in diameter...Cassini, already exceeding its life expectancy, is to make three more fly-bys of Enceladus before the mission ends in 2017."
 
D.T. said:
This type of thing dispels religion for me. Its impossible for us to be alone in this universe and not feasible for a mystical being in the clouds to have created life in multiple places.
Click to expand...

Richard Feynman said:
I've found about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 independent reasons to dismiss the validity of each religion and its claims (though that's another topic).
Click to expand...

An infinite universe neither proves or dispels the presence of a divine being, but I will grant you that it does suggest that the various human interpretations of God from the entire history of humanity has obviously gotten a few things wrong (if there is actually a God).

Of course, if there is a divine being which has the ability to put the universe in place, humanities chances of fathoming it's motivations are like an ant theorizing successfully the combined behaviors real estate markets worldwide. You can't give a reason to a religious person that God doesn't exist any more than they can prove the existence of God. If people knew either way for an absolute certainly it wouldn't be called 'faith'.

I can't say if there is or there isn't a god, but I'm pretty sure it would be beyond the ability of any sane person to interpret; and not many listen to an insane person.

... or perhaps it's all simply what God had to put together to get a pretty sunset just right ...
 
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