[Shodan]

According to Google, there are an estimated 10^24 (that's a 1 with 24 zeroes behind it, for those of you who are rusty on their math) stars in the observable universe (not the whole universe, but I digress).

I'm not an astronomer, (exo- or regular) biologist, or someone with significant knowledge in the relevant areas, but:

Yes, I do believe that aliens exist. Life happened here, and apparently not long after conditions became favorable. While we don't have good values for each parameter in the Drake equation (or whatever similar equation you're using), the tremendous amount of places where life could arise makes it a near-certainty.

Whether these aliens are intelligent, or anything like humans, is another matter. It may be that chemistry, practically speaking, restricts life to forms relatively similar to humanity. It may also be that truly exotic, even incomprehensible, forms of life exist. As for intelligence, keep in mind that truly sentient lifeforms with high intelligence didn't emerge on Earth for billions of years. In fact, sometimes I wonder whether they've emerged at all.

If they do exist and have reached intelligence, they may be so different that we cannot communicate with them. They may be so much more advanced than we are as to have "ascended to a higher plane of existence," rendering them undetectable to us. They may exist in a completely different time frame, rendering their civilization extinct minutes after it began. And most life in the universe is probably primitive, not in the sense of "cavemen" but in the sense of "amoebae and bacteria."

But realistically, given the entire universe, there are probably at least a few we could hypothetically contact, given the travel time...

and they're probably way more advanced than we are, so be careful, you stupid fucks.

[Shodan]

According to Google, there are an estimated 10^24 (that's a 1 with 24 zeroes behind it, for those of you who are rusty on their math) stars in the observable universe (not the whole universe, but I digress).

I'm not an astronomer, (exo- or regular) biologist, or someone with significant knowledge in the relevant areas, but:

Yes, I do believe that aliens exist. Life happened here, and apparently not long after conditions became favorable. While we don't have good values for each parameter in the Drake equation (or whatever similar equation you're using), the tremendous amount of places where life could arise makes it a near-certainty.

Whether these aliens are intelligent, or anything like humans, is another matter. It may be that chemistry, practically speaking, restricts life to forms relatively similar to humanity. It may also be that truly exotic, even incomprehensible, forms of life exist. As for intelligence, keep in mind that truly sentient lifeforms with high intelligence didn't emerge on Earth for billions of years. In fact, sometimes I wonder whether they've emerged at all.

If they do exist and have reached intelligence, they may be so different that we cannot communicate with them. They may be so much more advanced than we are as to have "ascended to a higher plane of existence," rendering them undetectable to us. They may exist in a completely different time frame, rendering their civilization extinct minutes after it began. And most life in the universe is probably primitive, not in the sense of "cavemen" but in the sense of "amoebae and bacteria."

But realistically, given the entire universe, there are probably at least a few we could hypothetically contact, given the travel time...

and they're probably way more advanced than we are, so be careful, you stupid fucks.