Any lives out there?

[De-Gen]

don't know if have been posted before but here goes.

"Is there intelligent life elsewhere in the universe? Can we begin to come up with an estimate of how many communicating civilisations there are in our galaxy? The Drake Equation attempts to do this":

N = R* x fp x ne x fl x fi x fc x L
where:

N = the number of communicating civilisations in the Milky Way galaxy

R* = rate of formation of 'suitable' stars like the sun

fp = the fraction of those stars with planets

ne = the number of Earth-like planets per planetary system

fl = fraction of those Earth-like planets where life actually develops

fi = the fraction of those planets with life where intelligent life evolves

fc = the fraction of planets where technological civilisations develop

L = the 'lifetime' of communicating civilisation

The current estimated solution for N is 10000 and we are one of them

http://www.activemind.com/Mysterious..._equation.html

[Vermin (Tom)]

I don't see how they can come up with any estimate considering range of values for fl and fi (0 - 100%).

Worst case scenario available for unknown variables gives, N= 2e-14

[De-Gen]

Originally posted by Vermin
I don't see how they can come up with any estimate considering range of values for fl and fi (0 - 100%).

why not?

[Striker (Tony)]

All I can say is: I'm glad you didn't put this in the beginner forums......I dont know what the hell your talking about.....sorry.

[De-Gen]

All I was saying is the equation attempts to solve the mystery of the universe

[ving (David)]

i doubt theres inellegent life here on earth... would intellegent lifeforms blow themselves up over religion or land?

[Vermin (Tom)]

Originally posted by De-Gen
why not?

Because they don't know where between 0 and 100% these two values are.

Saying "the best estimate" is N = 10000 when these two variables are completely unknown is misleading. They are only guessing.