Life Predates Earth?

Posted on April 21, 2013 by James Cross

In a new study Life Before Earth, Alexei A. Sharov and, Richard Gordon argue that the complexity of life grows exponentially over time in a manner similar to Moore’s Law. They “measure genetic complexity by the length of functional and non-redundant DNA sequence rather than by total DNA length.” When they plot this measure on a graph with representative types of organisms they find the greatest complexity found in life on Earth at any point in time doubles every 376 million years. If the line on the graph is extended backward, the beginning point of the line, the hypothetical beginning of life, is about 9.7 billion years ago. This is before Earth existed. From that, they conclude that life must not have originated not on Earth.

While I am not totally convinced of their argument, the authors certainly raise some provocative questions.

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Posted in Aliens, Consciousness, Origin of Life, Transhumanism | 14 Comments

Let’s Explore

Posted on April 13, 2013 by James Cross

In a recent book. Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife (1), Dr. Eben Alexander tells what he claims to have experienced while he was in a coma for seven days. The medical condition that caused his coma came on suddenly as a result of a virulent form of bacterial meningitis. During these seven days Alexander says his neocortex (the presumed source of consciousness) was shut down yet he had elaborate experiences in another world. He was “encountering the reality of a world of consciousness that existed completely free of the limitations of my physical brain.” (2) Prior to the illness, Alexander had the viewpoint of the scientifically trained doctor. He dismissed visions of people with near death experiences as fantasies of an oxygen deprived brain. After his recovery, Alexander believed he had seen heaven.

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Posted in Ayahuasca, Consciousness | 3 Comments

Does This Explain the Fermi Paradox?

Posted on April 7, 2013 by James Cross
Timeline_portrait-600x424

Timeline of the Universe Image credit: Rhys Taylor, Cardiff University.

The Fermi Paradox asks why our galaxy hasn’t already been colonized by alien civilizations. The argument goes like this. A lot of stars in the Milky Way are like our Sun. Many of them are a lot older than the Sun. Many of these stars would have habitable planets like Earth. If intelligent life developed on some these planets, a few would have developed a technological civilization capable of space travel. Therefore, the galaxy should have already been colonized.

Clearly, however, the galaxy hasn’t been colonized by an alien civilizations. We would have noticed them. For that matter, they would be here by now unless they are deliberately choosing to hide themselves from us. So something must be wrong with the arguments. The often drawn conclusion is that life or at least intelligent life may be very rare. Some go as far to say that we on Earth may be the only intelligent life in our galaxy, perhaps in the universe.

While I believe it is true that many stars in our galaxy will have habitable planets, most of them may not have hospitable to life until much more recently.

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Posted in Aliens, Fermi Paradox, Origin of Life | 15 Comments