January 26, 1967

Life Probable On Other Planets

A young friend came in the other day — remembering I had written a column a few months ago on unidentified flying objects — to ask if flying saucers might be from another planet.

I do quite a bit of reading in scientific journals and have come to the conclusion that life on other planets is not only possible, but probable.  Also, flying saucers are not only probable, but real.

However, I DO NOT believe any of the reported UFO's are space visitors.

The questions of whether there is life elsewhere in the universe, and whether flying saucers are something more than mirages, seem to intrigue most people.  The scientific consensus is interesting if nothing else.

Biologists know in detail the conditions necessary for "life" which they define as the ability to reproduce.  First of all there must be an abundance of free carbon, hydrogen and oxygen — in various combinations with other elements — for these are the building blocks of all living things.  Theoretically, atoms of silicon might be substituted for carbon in a life-producing process but there would be no noticeable difference in the composition of living tissue.

The astronomer, as he examines the universe in his great light-gathering telescopes, sees countless galaxies containing countless stars each surrounded by countless planets.  Aside from the theological assertion that God could create life on any or all of these cosmic specks, the laws of chance alone make intelligent life as we know it almost inevitable on millions of planets.

Given the right proportion of essential elements, and an initiating spark, intelligent life would need certain refinements.  The most obvious one would be a gaseous atmosphere containing much oxygen so heat reactions could take place.  The formation of compounds from elements, and the fabrication of machinery from compounds, require heat many thousands of times more intense than the hottest liquid.

The envelope of air must be sufficiently thick to absorb killing streams of electrons that radiate from stars.  In addition there must be some method of renewing the atmosphere to replace that lost to larger celestial bodies and used up in life cycles.

There must be, also, a considerable quantity of relatively inert liquid.  It would contain the many different chemical reactions necessary to reproduce thousands of complex organisms from less than a hundred kinds of stable atoms.  The range of temperatures over most of the planet could not exceed the boiling or freezing point of its life liquid.

Finally, there must be enough gravity to hold everything together but permit mobility.

There are, of course, many more conditions necessary for intelligent life; but these are sufficient to construct a model of what other creatures on other worlds might look like.

If there is no serious quarrel with the above facts we would expect that intelligent beings on other planets would be similar to ourselves and live in a world very much like ours.

To be sure, the thinking creature of another world might have a different color skin and oddly placed sensory organs.  Most likely, however, he would have two legs, two arms, one head and two eyes easily recognizable by us as such.  These bodily parts are minimum to perform the functions of moving about, working and comprehending outside stimuli.

The planet he lived on would be a twin of Earth for only planets of that size would have the right amount of gravity.  Atmosphere of small celestial bodies would be pulled away, whereas larger planets would flatten out the delicate cells of living tissue into thin films.

This galactic neighbor would circle a small star at some distance permitting a temperature range not much colder or hotter than that of Earth.  Green plants and/or algae resembling at least a few of our species would provide food and oxygen through the familiar photosynthesis process.

It is well to remember at this point that Nature tends to eliminate organisms, or parts of them, that are not absolutely necessary.  Our own little toes and appendixes are disappearing for that reason.  Many living things become extinct when they fail to adapt to changes in life-cycle conditions.

Scientists believe that many planets elsewhere in the universe have life-like conditions,  that under these conditions life will begin, and that once life begins it will evolve to intelligent beings much like ourselves.  The laws of nature, they say, make the Earth experience typical rather than unique.

Though intelligent life on other planets is probable, the same logic that leads to that conclusion precludes any personal interplanetary contact.

Only Earth in the Sun's system has fully developed life conditions.  Rudimentary atmospheric and temperature levels on Mars and Venus might support algae or lichen, but recent rocket probes indicate even this is unlikely.

The nearest stars that might have life-supporting planets are four and a third light years away.  Light travels at a speed of 186,000 miles per second, and a light year is the distance covered in one year.  Our fastest rockets go about six miles per second.

Those who contend intelligent beings visit us from outer space bring them here in ships that travel at or near the speed of light.  Einstein's "theory of relativity" — proven correct in about three-fourths of its applications and awaiting verification of its remainder — holds that matter turns into energy, or light, as it moves at 186,000 miles a second.  Thus, a space ship would dematerialize at the speed of light and scatter into space as pure energy.

The fastest traveling objects in nature are meteors, but some of these celestial speed demons require centuries to make a trip wholly within our own solar system.  Even at meteoric speed, friction with star light is sufficient to wear away material objects.

A space ship traveling at top meteoric speed would require a few thousand years to reach Earth from the nearest star and an equal amount of time to return.  Even if we assume interplanetary visitors were immortal (as demonstrably impossible as perpetual motion) a physical trip to Earth would be useless.  There are no elemental compounds here that are not found in equal abundance in all other star systems.  Any scientific observations made of us would be outdated by many generations by the time the visitors had gotten back home.

The closest contact we can ever expect with other-world beings is laser-light communications with several years between messages, or possibly unmanned space ship probes guided to space destinations by several generations of scientists.

Flying saucers could be unmanned devices from other planets, but this possibility demands fantastic mastery of space technology and a warped sense of curiosity that is great enough to launch a probe yet fearful enough to avoid direct contact with us.  The technical feats of saucers — hovering, exceptional speed and sharp turns — are well within existing capabilities of man.  There is much less assault on reason in a man-made saucer than in strange people from outer space.

Author: Lindsey Williams