Webb finds molecule only made by living things in another world::undefined

  • Chriszz@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    To me it’s not a matter of whether live exists anymore, but where it exists

    • ViewSonik@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      While I agree there is a very high probability of life out there, we truly do not know until we can prove it. This evidence JWT found may have another explanation that our scientists are unaware of yet.

    • scarabic@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I’m so excited to discover a totally different take on life because it will help us truly define what life is.

      Then again if we find a similar take on life (carbon based, compatible chemistry to life on earth) then that’s pretty interesting too, implying either panspermia or that there’s something special about this configuration. It also likely means we have more potential for useful discoveries from that life system, as well as threats.

    • Art35ian@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I’d be pretty happy to put $100 right now on life being found on almost every planet and moon throughout the galaxy where liquid water exists.

      • ShittyBeatlesFCPres@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Sigma is basically a representation of certainty that your result isn’t a statistical fluke. It comes from standard deviation in statistics but 1 sigma is 68% certain. 2 sigma is 95%. 3 sigma is 99.7%.

        By convention, astronomy uses 3 sigma for “significance,” meaning you almost definitely found something. Particle physics, since it’s usually done in controlled experiments, usually requires 5 sigma (99.99994%).

        It’s similar to margin of error in political polls.

      • FrostyCaveman@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        It’s a number that statistically represents how strong the result is in the data basically. As far as I understand it, with astronomy the typical sigma value expected is 3

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Technically, this is astrochemistry, not astronomy. I don’t know what the expected sigma value there is.

          • Womble@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Whats less than 0 sigma? I kid but only a little Astrochemistry is fantastically difficult, it involves large networks of reactions, many of which have multiple orders of magnitudes of uncertainty on their rates. Different groups can tey to model the same conditions and end up with over a factor of 1000 difference in the abundences of key tracer speices.

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              That’s why I’m positive but not excited yet. It’s a good sign. We need to see if detecting it can be replicated… although I’m not sure how to do that except with the Webb again.

  • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
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    1 year ago

    A chemical only produced by life on earth. But can it be produced by abiotic conditions on other planets? I’m not sure that has been ruled out at this point.

    • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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      1 year ago

      Yeah, this headline is bullshit. It’s indication of possible life, but it isn’t what the headline makes it sound. There’s always other possible methods, even if we aren’t aware of them yet. It’s interesting, but doesn’t confirm anything yet.

  • Bernie Ecclestoned@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    it picked up hints of a substance only made by living things — at least, that is, on Earth.

    What other process could theoretically produce it?

    • Dani551@discuss.tchncs.de
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      1 year ago

      Given the vast differences in atmospheres (or the lack thereof) and their conditions, I wouldn’t be surprised if those were the culprits

    • skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de
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      1 year ago

      if you have methanol, hydrogen sulfide and enough heat along with a specific rock, it will get formed. or probably methane, hydrogen sulfide and UV

      • skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de
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        1 year ago

        there are many ways, and what i’m saying it’s likely a massive clickbait

        t. organic chemist, currently working with sulfur compounds

        • Mossy Feathers (They/Them)@pawb.social
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          I would also hesitate to automatically rule anything out. The Fermi paradox exists for a reason, and it makes logical sense that if life can appear in one place, it can (and will) do it again. In a universe as large as ours, it’s basically inevitable that we will eventually discover some form of alien life, even if it’s just single-celled organisms (assume we as a species survive long enough).

          I just wanted to throw my 2 cents in because whenever anything like this comes up, you get a rush of two kinds of people: “omg aliens!” and “omg look at all the idiots who thinks it’s aliens; everyone knows aliens aren’t real”. It frustrates me because the existence of alien life shouldn’t be controversial. If anything, imo, the idea that alien life doesn’t exist should be controversial (the Fermi paradox exists for a reason). Just because we haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It’s honestly scarier imo if it doesn’t exist due to the implications of it.

          — someone who woulda probably been an astrophysicist if they’d been given a chance earlier in life

          • skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de
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            1 year ago

            i said nothing about aliens, all i say is that claim “dimethyl sulfide = definite sign of life” makes it a powerful clickbait, because there are processes that can provide it abiogenically from something similar to earth’s primordial soup

            your assumption seems overly optimistic

  • M500@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Sadly they cannot be communicated with in a single human life time; assuming they are intelligent and possess the capability to respond.

    • Zron@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Even if Webb were to basically spot earth 2 5 light years away, I’d caution about getting excited for a radio chat.

      Remember that life has existed on earth for something like 3 billion years, but multicellular life has only been around for 500 million or so years, humans in various forms have been around for about a million years, and we’ve only had radio for about a hundred years.

      The vast majority of life that has ever existed on our planet has been single called organisms. Finding evidence of any life on another planet is huge news, but we should temper our expectations.

      It’s way, way more likely for alien planets to have oceans full of plankton analogues as the dominant life. Considering the rest of this planet’s atmosphere is composed mostly of hydrogen, even their plankton would be weird by our standards.

      • postmateDumbass@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        We could irradiate Earth2 with so much RF radiation the crearures of the other planet all develop immune to cancer!

    • Asafum@feddit.nl
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      1 year ago

      It’s a planet 8x the mass of the earth with a heavy hydrogen atmosphere and is considered very hot, the water is in a super critical state. I think if we found anything it would just be bacterial life.

      My bet is on “previously unknown chemistry” creating the chemicals we found. It’s never aliens :(

    • scarabic@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      But the definition of a single human lifetime could very well change within one human lifetime from now.

  • Art35ian@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Time for a new version of the Bible. The Adam and Eve thing is about to look pretty silly.

    • Dave@lemmy.nz
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      1 year ago

      Just expand on the current one.

      God made humans, in his image, because God is a jealous God and wouldn’t want humans to be better looking than himself. He filled the world with animals for the humans to hug and eat. On the seventh day He rested.

      On the either day, he started on some new planets, then on the ninth day He populated them with more life so that humans might expand to fill the universe he created, and find the life he scattered around for the humans to hug and eat. On the tenth day, he created intelligent life on other planets, because he is all knowing and therefore knows humans won’t feel true camaraderie without attacking and wiping out other sentient life forms. On the eleventh day, He declared a public holiday, because He felt like resting but he already decided the Sabbath is every 7 days.

      The bible was written by a bunch of religious scholars, and assembled into a series of books. There’s no reason they can’t “discover” some more books.