Scientists say most likely number of contactable alien civilisations is 36

[FfFfFfFF 58,120]

“I think it is extremely important and exciting because for the first time we really have an estimate for this number of active intelligent, communicating civilisations that we potentially could contact and find out there is other life in the universe,” said Christopher Conselice, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Nottingham.

“Basically, we make the assumption that intelligent life would form on other [Earth-like] planets like it has on Earth, so within a few billion years life would automatically form as a natural part of evolution,” said Conselice.

The assumption, known as the Astrobiological Copernican Principle, is fair as everything from chemical reactions to star formation is known to occur if the conditions are right, he said. “[If intelligent life forms] in a scientific way, not just a random way or just a very unique way, then you would expect at least this many civilisations within our galaxy,” he said.

He added that, while it is a speculative theory, he believes alien life would have similarities in appearance to life on Earth. “We wouldn’t be super shocked by seeing them,” he said.

Under the strictest set of assumptions – where, as on Earth, life forms between 4.5bn and 5.5bn years after star formation – there are likely between four and 211 civilisations in the Milky Way today capable of communicating with others, with 36 the most likely figure.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/jun/15/scientists-say-most-likely-number-of-contactable-alien-civilisations-is-36

[KORG 4,756]

"Hey, did you mess up as bad as we did? What? Power mad dictators? Great, sounds fun. Wait til you have power mad tangerines"

[PunkTheFunk 125,703]

And that's just in the Milky Way. When you think of the billions of other galaxies in the Universe it really makes your head spin.

[Rifek 51,753]

Chromaticians are one of them 

 

[GregJA 5,531]

Seems like we can all be scientists and just say there’s likely 40.678 civilizations 

 

why?

 

well you can’t prove me wrong 

[GagaSine 7,464]

Idk I feel like speculative math like this has very little tangible value. Also maybe we should figure out life on earth before we try messing up other planets.

[Lucas 31,126]

And how many from them are close enough to actually contact us?
Distance will always be the main problem

[Maleficent 6]

all 36 of them will leave us on read

[SleepingSun 1,392]

While I do believe there to be many planets hosting life out there, this number is extremely hypothetical. And the crazy distances between star systems, let alone galaxies, will probably prevent us from ever directly communicating with any other intelligent life form that may be out there. The best we can hope for is picking up a random signal from far away, or finding some phenomenon that could only be explained by an intelligent life form manipulating their surroundings.

[voltron92 2,575]

19 minutes ago, GregJA said:

Seems like we can all be scientists and just say there’s likely 40.678 civilizations 

 

why?

 

well you can’t prove me wrong 

Guess who didn't read the article 

[Guest]

17 minutes ago, Lucas said:

And how many from them are close enough to actually contact us?
Distance will always be the main problem

Nobody wanna contact our ugly asses. Trust me, we might be the dumbest out of all the bunch. We are the Fox News and Trumps of the universe 

[JRCF29 8,230]

[Lucas 31,126]

27 minutes ago, KanyeWest said:

Nobody wanna contact our ugly asses. Trust me, we might be the dumbest out of all the bunch. We are the Fox News and Trumps of the universe 

Won't lie that's lowkey true lol, but we can think that any race had to go through **** like this at some point 

[River 127,451]

come and take me

I'm ready to leave this sh-thole

36 f-cking civilized planets and I was born in this barbaric place, so unlucky bleh

do you think they have magic there and unicorns? maybe dinos? I want dinos, please have dinos.

[TimisaMonster 31,073]

While I do believe there is life in other parts of the galaxy...i don't know if we currently have the capabilities with our technology to even communicate with them. They would have to appear or contact us in a more primitive way

Like trying to call someone from Bible times when nobody even knows what a cellphone is...