At first thought I imagined that without sunlight there wouldn't be enough energy to sustain life, however, I then thought about the example of Europa.
It's too far from the sun to receive enough energy to be useful, however, there are some theories that suggest a magnetic interference from Jupiter could cause enough warming within the core of Europa to generate the necessary energy to sustain life.
So, while it's not likely we're going to find a lot of complex life on these rogue planets, a couple of large ones may have smaller moons in a similar configuration as Jupiter and Europa. It's becoming accepted that bacteria can survive under the most harsh conditions imaginable.
"A couple conceived their son in vitro, no big deal -- but they chose that particular embryo because its tissue type would provide a match for their dying 6-year-old daughter."
It's interesting that not very long ago in vitro fertilization was a HUGE deal. Huh... Now it's "no big deal" and no one in this discussion argued with that.
Give it 10 or 15 years and this will no longer be a big deal either. Everyone will be doing it and no one will be able to comprehend how we ever got by before genetic screening.
By this reasoning, any species that has become truly spacefaring understands the problems of becoming a 'mature species', and is almost by definition non-intervening
Oh, how I wish that could be true. As much as I'd like to think by the time we become full-fledged exporers of the galaxy we will have achieved a "mature civilization" I'm skeptical it could ever happen. You can take the humans away from their Neanderthal roots, but you can't take the Neanderthal roots out of the humans.
The bottom line is that when we're cornered and frightened (pretty much whenever we're faced with something new) we will come out guns blazing - every time.
Granted there can be much debate over the possibility of SETI@Home's success or failure, but one thing is for certain.
This is by far the most popular use of mass parallel computing to date and I think it is going to be just the beginning.
How many other scientific problems await the eager idle cycles of millions of PCs in the world?
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It's too far from the sun to receive enough energy to be useful, however, there are some theories that suggest a magnetic interference from Jupiter could cause enough warming within the core of Europa to generate the necessary energy to sustain life.
So, while it's not likely we're going to find a lot of complex life on these rogue planets, a couple of large ones may have smaller moons in a similar configuration as Jupiter and Europa. It's becoming accepted that bacteria can survive under the most harsh conditions imaginable.
It's interesting that not very long ago in vitro fertilization was a HUGE deal. Huh... Now it's "no big deal" and no one in this discussion argued with that.
Give it 10 or 15 years and this will no longer be a big deal either. Everyone will be doing it and no one will be able to comprehend how we ever got by before genetic screening.
Oh, how I wish that could be true. As much as I'd like to think by the time we become full-fledged exporers of the galaxy we will have achieved a "mature civilization" I'm skeptical it could ever happen. You can take the humans away from their Neanderthal roots, but you can't take the Neanderthal roots out of the humans.
The bottom line is that when we're cornered and frightened (pretty much whenever we're faced with something new) we will come out guns blazing - every time.
Granted there can be much debate over the possibility of SETI@Home's success or failure, but one thing is for certain. This is by far the most popular use of mass parallel computing to date and I think it is going to be just the beginning. How many other scientific problems await the eager idle cycles of millions of PCs in the world?