/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.5481582]

Ok /sci/ this is a huge one.

Is there a possibility that space dwelling lifeforms could exist in our universe? As big as several medium-sized planets, roaming around the galaxy (or more likely a certain solar system), feeding off from cosmic dust or solar energy? Would it be possible that such a creature would be highly intelligent? Could there exist a community of such creatures somewhere within our universe?

[Anonymous No.5481585]

What would give incentive for a creature to leave it's planet?

[Anonymous No.5481588]

>>5481585
Perhaps it didn't evolve on a planet to begin with?

[Anonymous No.5481593]

No it's impossible, I'm afraid. And why planet size? There isn't enough energy anywhere to keep that amount of biomass working, let alone propel it.

[Anonymous No.5481600]

>>5481593
>not enough energy

[Anonymous No.5481618]

You mean like a creature made of energy or a creature with skin and organs?

[Anonymous No.5481626]

You're question doesn't have an answer, OP.

I would say this is a Biology question, which a Biologist would tell you that no organism could live in space. The problem is that the only Biology we know is with Carbon-based life (what's here on Earth). For all we know, life could exist in a non-Carbon-based form, which would change everything.

We just don't know.

[Anonymous No.5481632]

>>5481582

The only way I could see space dwelling life happening is if they are in fact artificial life originally created by an intelligent species evolved on a planet.

The sheer size you suggest just seems silly, though.

[Anonymous No.5481645]

>>5481600
no concentrated enough

[Anonymous No.5481647]

Space develling planet sized life
You might as well call earth alive and be done with it.

[Anonymous No.5481661]

>>5481585
>What would give incentive for a creature to leave it is planet?
Go back to 3rd grade.

[Anonymous No.5481663]

Here, OP, read this:
http://www.dapla.org/pdf/Tsytovich.pdf

>Our analysis shows that if helical dust structures are formed in space, they can have bifurcations as memory marks and duplicate each other, and they would reveal a faster evolution rate by competing for ‘food’ (surrounding plasma fluxes). These structures can have all necessary features to form ‘inorganic life’.

It's not a very famous journal, it's probably not the breakthrough they are adocating, but it is still very interesting. I don't know about the planet size thing though.

[Anonymous No.5481664]

>>5481618
>False dichotomy

[Anonymous No.5481665]

>>5481661
>correcting apostrophes
>2013
get out and meet a girl. it's great

[Anonymous No.5481666]

>>5481665
Ah, you said something that don't have a thing to do with the post you've quoted. That butthurt that someone called you out on it, eh?

[Anonymous No.5481668]

>>5481665
I've met quite a few, thanks. Felt like punching those bitches every time.

Also, why haven't you went back to 3rd grade yet, retard?

[Anonymous No.5481678]

I was reading a while back that dust clouds in nebulae can exhibit self organization and potentially natural selection. If there is life, it probably wouldn't be very smart though.

[Anonymous No.5481681]

>>5481664
>pointing out fallacies
>2013
try looking at something beautiful today

[Anonymous No.5481689]

>>5481666
It wasn't my post. It is a rewriting of an unnecessary apostrophe of contraction, mistakenly placed as an apostrophe of possession, so eminently to do with the post.

And I'm too happy to be butt hurt about the internet. I just want everyone to be happy.

>don't

I'm not falling fo that trap ;)

[Anonymous No.5481690]

>>5481626
>a Biologist would tell you that no organism could live in space
Not true. There are organisms that can survive space and that's just a step away from being alive.

[Anonymous No.5481691]

>>5481668
>went

[Anonymous No.5481695]

>>5481582
maybe: http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/97nov/space.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeman_Dyson#Dyson_tree

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrochicken
>>5481585
on an environment like Enceladus where geysers constantly shoot out water from an area that could be habitable, then a lifeform could evolve that could be resistant to radiation and hard vacuum for a bit while it navigates back to the habitable environment. As some of the output from Enceladus's geysers ends up in Saturn's rings, it wouldn't be surprising to see a ring dwelling organism evolve.

[Anonymous No.5481698]

>>5481585
you don't need an incentive really, it's not like dna is sentient.

[Anonymous No.5481719]

>>5481582
No, OP.
Space is to cold in order to produce "fast" evolution like on earth.

[Anonymous No.5481738]

biologist here

>>5481585

you're assuming it didnt come from space itself. also:http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130128151912.htm

>Significant Microorganism Populations Found in Middle and Upper Troposphere

>>5481593

and how the fuck would you know what is possible and what isnt? organic mollecules can form in space easily, and quantum tunneling allows for the creation of ANY mollecule, given enough time, and the right ingredients.

and what makes you think that space organisms would have a metabolism anything like that of terrestrial organisms?

>>5481632

what makes you think terrestrial life didnt originate in space, and slowly evolve to inhabit planetary objects?

>>5481668

i'd say he doesnt wanna be in the same class as you.

3edgy5me

>>5481695

if a species evolved to be able to survive such "trips to space" its possible that it could eventually evolve to survive permanently in space, using photosynthesis for energy and having an extremely stable chemical makeup

[Anonymous No.5481741]

>>5481738
This guy

[Anonymous No.5481742]

>>5481738
>what makes you think terrestrial life didnt originate in space, and slowly evolve to inhabit planetary objects
>how the fuck would you know what is possible and what isnt?
>it could eventually evolve to survive permanently in space, using photosynthesis for energy
Biologists these days.

[Anonymous No.5481859]

>>5481738
haha, biologists just cant do science

[Anonymous No.5481875]

>>5481738
And people wonder why biology isn't a hard science

[Anonymous No.5481897]

>>5481738
when your too stupid for science...

[Anonymous No.5481938]

>Is there a possibility that space dwelling lifeforms could exist in our universe?

Yes there is, there's a 50% probability that space dwelling lifeforms exists. Either they exist or they not.

[Anonymous No.5481941]

>>5481741
>>5481742
>>5481859
>>5481875
>>5481897

samefagging it up

u mad?

[Anonymous No.5481956]

If they do exist, the idea that they'd be fuckhuge isn't that out of the realm of possible, space is much more capable of supporting physically large organisms due to no gravity. Similarly to the ocean.

Although, again, if they do exist it would most likely just be a huge cluster of single celled organisms (if they even have cells, I dont know how space creatures work), similar to algae or bacterial cultures. Its already been shown that some single cell organisms can survive in space, but I dont know how they'd get energy.

[Lizerd No.5481968]

If they came from terrestrial creatures chances are they'd adapt an extreme way of keeping all their insides on the inside.

[Anonymous No.5481978]

I've always wondered why there aren't any animals that float around in the sky permanently on Earth.

[Anonymous No.5481979]

>>5481956

[Anonymous No.5481986]

>>5481978
>this is what biologists actually believe

[Anonymous No.5481988]

>>5481941
back 2 r3ddit newfriend

[Lizerd No.5481991]

>>5481978
Most food sources are on the ground, and flying uses up a lot of energy.

[Anonymous No.5481994]

>>5481991

I mean like, a gas float full of hydrogen or CO2 or something. I got the idea from pikmin. There's plenty of food up there.

[Lizerd No.5482001]

>>5481994
Then it'd have to live on a lighter planet with a thicker atmosphere.

[Anonymous No.5482000]

>>5481994
>CO2
Nigga, you just went full lead zeppelin.

Also, because winds, storms, sharp things and predators.

[Anonymous No.5482053]

>>5481986

>because biologists know more about the subject than you do
>closed minded samefag

>>5481988

not samefagging anymore?

ok.

>>5481994

im pretty sure its because an extra membrane in a cell and the mechanisms needed to produce and transfer a lighter-than-air gas to the inside of that membrane would require an enormous amount of genes to change. on earth there is no incremental path that leads to creatures having "swim bladders" which hold a lighter than air gas.

birds may eventually evolve to be bouyancy neutral in air, but the only rational situation where that could evolve, is one where there are absolutely no other bird species that can "pop" the zeppelin birds (they will inevitably be much slower and less manuverable than normal birds)

[Anonymous No.5482068]

>>5481647
/thread

[Anonymous No.5482076]

>>5482053
You are ruining the reputation of actual biologists jsut stop already.

[Anonymous No.5482079]

>>5481897
when you're too stupid for the English language

[Anonymous No.5482091]

>>5482079
thats the joke nignog

[Anonymous No.5482105]

First, it would have to be a colonial organism; as in, fully self-sufficient as an individual in recycling waste, as our universe is far too 'spread out' for it to travel from place to place in order to acquire more biomass.
Second, it would probably be at least initially capable of motion, but ultimately it.
Third, it would have to depend on consumption of a renewable resource, the most obvious of which would be sunlight.
Lastly, unless it were large enough to attract its own atmosphere, to prevent radiative heat loss, it would have to be ridiculously well-insulated.

It is possible such a thing could be engineered; a giant space-plant, essentially. But I seriously doubt it would be able to assemble naturally by coincidence.

If it were quite intelligent, perhaps it could take advantage of some exotic laws of physics and use wormholes for long-distance movement or something. Only thing is, it wouldn't have any incentive to waste energy travelling; once it found an optimal spot away from its star, it would be better off staying in one place virtually forever.

[Anonymous No.5482137]

>>5481600
How about constructing some additional pylons?
But seriously now, this thing would have to be super slow in doing anything, it would need to live for very long periods of time, how would this creature move about? Sounds to me like it's trapped around his home star and the energy he can get from it is barely enough to sustain itself with the whole surface area to mass ratio thing.

[Anonymous No.5482148]

>>5481738
>Quantum tunneling allows for the creation of any molec-
Did you get your Biology degree from the history channel?

[Anonymous No.5482157]

>>5482053
>birds may eventually evolve to be bouyancy neutral in air
Don't forget the part about gradual evolution of a twin-prop organ and landing-gear bladders.

[Anonymous No.5482159]

>>5481665
no its not, they are nice to look at but very hard to communicate with and it takes me too long to think of things to say and by the time i do they give me a funny look and leave and i never hear from them again

[Anonymous No.5482161]

>>5481582
lelelelrwel;jgeldfg

[Anonymous No.5482414]

>>5482105
Well given their huge size I'd suppose their life spans would be enormous as well. So to us it would maybe appear that they are extremely slow when in their own perspective they'd be zooming around. Kind of like snails in contrast with other, faster animals.

[Anonymous No.5482463]

The mars rover was able to pick up traces of organic substances and minerals, probably showed there was a possibility of inhabitance because life could have lived off those substances. Granted , the energy issue is a glaring piece of doubt against the idea. But think, planets die out eventually. Pollution, global warming, famine, war, etc. Who's to say the planet couldn't have become uninhabitable due to gradual corruption? That could have caused the evacuation or extinction of that species. If the idea of other intelligent life in our galaxy was plausible, think of how possible it is in other galaxies.

[Anonymous No.5482469]

>>5482148

were you born a pretensious faggot, or did you train your whole life to attain your level of pretensious faggotry?

>implying you know anything at all about quantum mechanics, or biology, or "how to not seem like a pretensious faggot when posting on the internet"

>>5482076

u mad?

[Anonymous No.5482534]

Space life is possible, but unlikely.

So far we seem to think water is necessary for life because of its interesting chemical properties.
In space it would be hard to have liquid water because of the lack of pressure and highly variable temperature.

Then there is all the radiation it would have to withstand.
Then there is the lack of chemical energy or specific chemicals because theres just not enough mass around.

It wouldn't be able to move without throwing off mass, but mass and energy would be scarce.
Depending on its size if it cant move then it will be pushed by the solar wind until the push is equal to the attraction by gravity which might not be in a habitable place for it.

Maybe at best you'll have sporing bacteria in asteroid belts though whether you count that as in space I dont know.

[Anonymous No.5482566]

>>5482534
>Then there is all the radiation it would have to withstand.
This wouldn't be a big problem if the creature was something other than carbon based. Maybe it could even feed off radiation of use it for something else.

>Then there is the lack of chemical energy or specific chemicals because theres just not enough mass around.
You don't need chemical energy when you have a redundancy of solar energy.

>It wouldn't be able to move without throwing off mass, but mass and energy would be scarce.
Untrue. It could use a clever mechanism, such as a solar sail.

[Anonymous No.5482580]

>>5481582
the best idea I can come up with is:
a very small asteroid with some biological substance on it evolves a measure against ionizing radiation and spreads to cover the surface of the asteroid eventually building up to be bigger and heaver the initial asteroid.

[Anonymous No.5482586]

>>5482580
Still a rock. An organism would, by any definition, need to be made entirely out of biomass.

[Anonymous No.5482592]

>>5482586
suppose a chunk of it breaks of for some reason and continues to live happily?

[Anonymous No.5482597]

>>5482586
>>5482592

or what if it completely absorbs the original asteroid and re distributes the materials into other parts of it's structure?

[Anonymous No.5482730]

>>5482469
>Were you born a pretensious (typo in source) faggot
Probably not, I train really hard just so I can laugh at people like you.
>Implying that even if I weren't a physics major I'd need more than a quick google search to call bullshit on your "quantum tunneling creates particles" nonsense.