10 Reasons Why Intelligent Extraterrestrial Life Wouldn’t Be Like Us

Realizing how huge our Universe is, we can easily assume that somewhere in neighboring galaxies there is also life. Not necessarily intelligent, and certainly hardly identical in everything to our earthly one.

Who said that they are necessarily gray and short humanoids with huge eyes, which are often shown to us in various science fiction films and TV shows (as well as in popular science and pseudo-documentary films)?

Some scientists are 99% sure that by 2040 we will definitely discover this very extraterrestrial life (well, or it will “detect” us, the main thing is that this does not happen exactly as it has been shown to us many times in films about the megaapocalypse caused by attack of cruel aliens on our native mother Earth).

As for, so to speak, the appearance of this life, today there are at least 10 reasons to assume that it is not at all like us:

10 Planets have different gravity

One of the most important variables influencing the evolution and appearance of living organisms on a hypothetical planet is gravity. It is thanks to her that all living things adapt to various changes in the environment.

Why go far – let’s take the Earth as an example. Remember the theory of evolution: when the creatures that lived in the waters of the ancient world ocean first came to land, they had to grow limbs and develop a strong skeleton, because there was no more water around their bodies to compensate for the effects of Earth’s gravity.

And if the Earth’s gravity were, for example, twice the current one, then we would most likely be short, stocky and have thick bones. And vice versa: if it were half as much, then all animals on our planet, including humans, would be taller, thinner and more graceful. Therefore, we are unlikely to predict the appearance of the inhabitants of unknown planets.

9. Planets have different atmospheres

Another important factor for the emergence and development of any life forms is the presence of the atmosphere and its composition.

So, for example, again, remembering the most ancient history of the Earth, let’s delve into 300 million years ago. Then, in the Paleozoic (or rather, in its Carboniferous period), the concentration of oxygen in the air on the planet was not 21%, as it is now, but as much as 35%. And at that time, creatures lived on it that were much larger than many of the current ones: meganeuri (giant ancient dragonflies, the size of whose wings reached 75 cm), brontoscorpio – huge 70-centimeter scorpions, arthropleura – 2,5-meter centipedes and other monstrous arthropods .

By the way, on Earth, scientists have discovered several dozen species of multicellular organisms that, in principle, do not require oxygen for their existence. Then why can’t life originate on planets that have a qualitatively different atmosphere or do not have it at all?

8. Other chemical elements may become the basis of alien life

Those who remember at least the basics of organic chemistry are aware that carbon is necessarily present in the composition of any organic compounds (and, therefore, in the organisms of all living beings on Earth).

And experts in biology will tell you that life needs more water (which, as you know, consists of hydrogen and oxygen). Also, terrestrial living organisms have DNA that stores genetic information and passes it on to future generations (whose composition is also known to most of us).

But some very famous scientists (including Stephen Hawking and Carl Sagan) seriously argued that the most likely and quite conceivable alternative to terrestrial – “carbon” – life could be life, for example, silicon. And, of course, outwardly it will be very different from what we are used to (well, at least for the reason that silicon needs much higher temperatures than average earth temperatures to achieve a reactionary state).

7. Maybe alien life doesn’t need water

By the way, why not imagine that theoretically possible extraterrestrial beings do not need water to exist?

Yes, on Earth it is both a universal and very effective solvent, and a “transport mechanism”, and a catalyst for chemical reactions, etc.

But suddenly, somewhere in the universe, water is successfully replaced by some other liquid?

So, scientists offer such versions of alien “water substitutes” as ammonia and liquid methane. For example, several scientific papers prepared on the basis of data accumulated by the American-European unmanned vehicle Cassini suggested that methane-based life could one day be discovered even on Titan, the largest of Saturn’s moons. Moreover, both ammonia and methane can remain in a liquid state of aggregation when water would have frozen long ago.

Naturally, if life without water is still possible, then it will be completely different.

6. An alternative to DNA

Until recently, it was believed that only DNA could store and transmit genetic data.

But about 10 years ago, an international group of scientists (from the US, UK, Belgium and Denmark) synthesized molecules that could become an alternative to DNA and RNA.

And in 2012, 6 so-called xenonucleic acids (XNA) were created, which quite successfully performed this task. And, in fact, all earthly life consists of various combinations of only 22 amino acids, while there are actually hundreds of them in nature (and these are only those that are formed naturally, not counting those artificially created by scientists in scientific laboratories).

So why couldn’t alien life be based on other amino acids and proteins, and other variants of DNA?

5. What if alien life lives in a different environment?

On our Earth, which has a very complex relief, 5 large biomes (ecosystems) with their variations and sub-variations are conditionally distinguished: tundra, steppe, forest-steppe, desert and the oceans.

And in each of them live different creatures, adapted to live in this particular environment and, most often, not able to survive at all in another (on the same planet!).

For example, living organisms that live in the depths of the ocean feel great in the cold and without light at all (besides, under huge water pressure).

But in another ecosystem (on the surface), they will immediately die. And vice versa: bears do not survive underwater. Naturally, on a planet that has a different relief, different lighting, surface temperature, etc., etc. life will definitely be radically different from earthly.

4. They may be much “older” than us.

The age of our Universe, according to scientists, is approximately 13,8 billion years. And if somewhere in distant (or even in neighboring) systems there are intelligent life forms, this does not mean at all that they appeared at the same time as man appeared on Earth.

It is likely that they were technologically highly developed even when the terrestrial australopithecines first guessed to grab sticks and nail the “game” running past with them.

Perhaps they explored space a couple of billion years ago, when eukaryotes (cells with a nucleus) had just appeared on Earth. This means that during this time they (that is, intelligent aliens) could not only evolve significantly in a natural way, but also “adjust” and “correct” this process artificially: for example, adapt their own organisms for long space travel, increase life expectancy, get rid of “ uncomfortable restrictions” (the need to eat, breathe, remove “waste” from the body, etc.) or upgrade them even more radically – with artificial parts, etc.

Why not? After all, we have also practically learned to genetically change (in the direction we need) both plant seeds and animal embryos. Bioengineering is the future.

3. Life on rogue planets

Say what you like, but our planet is still very cozy (in the sense – favorable for the existence of diverse life on it). And most importantly, thanks for this we need to say to our Sun: it is thanks to him that all life on Earth does not freeze, and plants also have the ability to photosynthesize (and thus supply food to many animals).

If the Sun suddenly leaves us, then most of the terrestrial organisms will die out in a matter of days. But in fact, in the Universe there are a huge number of so-called “wandering” planets (there are about 200 billion of them in our galaxy alone). They do not have “their” stars, but simply fly through space.

And some scientists argue that they, in theory, life is possible (if only a suitable source of energy is found for it). For example, if the core of the planet turns out to be hot enough, then it can “warm up” its surface as well.

And planetary scientist David Stevens suggested that if a rogue planet has a very dense atmosphere, then it can not only store heat, but also keep the seas in liquid form. And that’s where life can start.

2. Non-biological forms of existence

Re-read point 4 again. And if the inhabitants of distant planets may well be much “older” and more technologically advanced than us, then why don’t they create some artificial, that is, non-biological, organisms by this moment?

For example, they have long been able to construct intelligent robots (or replace their biological bodies with mechanical ones for reasons of efficiency and convenience).

Yes, we ourselves are rapidly approaching the creation of artificial life, thanks to the shock progress of robotics, cybernetics and nanotechnology.

By the way, such famous people in the scientific world as Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk have been expressing serious concerns about artificial intelligence for quite some time. Like, no matter how everything on our planet happened according to the scenario of the cult “Terminator”, where Skynet rebelled, got out of control and destroyed humanity almost without exception.

Well, who can say for sure that extraterrestrial life cannot exist even without, so to speak, a “material carrier”? And what if aliens are just some kind of “energy entities” that communicate through telepathy or some other unknown (and incomprehensible) methods to us and move in space without special complex devices? Evolution is unpredictable…

1. The random factor

And now let’s get back to where we actually started: why did we decide that intelligent life must necessarily be of a humanoid type?

Again, evolution is unpredictable. And what if the dinosaurs suddenly did not die out at some point, but developed (over millions of years) a human-like intelligence? Or did not apes acquire intelligence, but, for example, representatives of the cat family?

Well, let’s limit the selection of “potentially intelligent” terrestrial creatures and imagine that dolphins or crows have “grown up” to an intellect comparable to ours. In any case, the result of this would be a completely different civilization.

As for the vast (practically infinite) Universe, life can evolve in it in just as many endless ways.

So the chances are that somewhere at the other end of the Milky Way (or on Alpha Centauri, in the Andromeda nebula, somewhere else in the vastness of space …) there are creatures that are at least very remotely similar to us – people, so small, that it is almost pointless to hope for an early contact with humanoids.