Having studied the posts in this thread I have to say I disagree. I think this is appropriate.

(I Married A) Monster From Outer Space

By John Cooper Clarke

The milky way she walks around
All feet firmly off the ground
Two worlds collide, two worlds collide
Here comes the future bride
Gimme a lift to the lunar base
I wanna marry a monster from outer space

I fell in love with an alien being
Whose skin was jelly, whose teeth were green
She had the big bug eyes and the death-ray glare
Feet like water-wings, purple hair
I was over the moon, I asked her back to my place
And then I married the monster from outer space

The days were numbered, the nights were spent
In a rent-free furnished oxygen tent
Where a cyborg chef served up moonbeams
Done super-rapid on a laser beam
I needed nutrition to keep up the pace
When I married the monster from outer space

But when we went walking tentacle in hand
You could sense that the earthlings would not understand
They'd go nudge nudge when we got on the bus
Saying "It's extra-terrestial, not like us;
And it's bad enough with another race,
But fuck me... a monster! from outer space?"

In this kind of atmosphere love went lame
She took a flare to from where she came
I read all the papers, looked up the stars
"Uranus is active and so is Mars"
My horoscope was horrible, told me to my face -
Avoid monsters from outer space

In a cybernetic fit of rage
She pissed off to another age
She lives in 1999
With her new boyfriend, a blob of slime
Each time I see a translucent face
I remember my monster from outer space.

I accept that 'life as we know it' has to have a planetary base to provide the necessary ingredents and enviornment for development.

However given that we are all 'star stuff' and that the higher atomic mass elements were all manufactured in novae as distinct from normal stellar fusion we are probably the result of at least three generations of stellar birth and death.

If 'life' here on earth came about as a result of contamination by intersellar debris there is a finite chance that life may exist and even evolve in non-planetary space by optimising itself to specific 'niches'.

I accept that 'life as we know it'

See that's exactly why i started this thread. WHY should all life be life "like we know it"?

Because its the only life we know? and can compare with?

For all we know...bacteria may have a chain of command. A hirarchical(sp?) society. Just cuz we dont know this doesnt make it a non-entity.

Bacreia may even have the ability of cognative thought and reasoning.


If 'life' here on earth came about as a result of contamination by intersellar debris there is a finite chance that life may exist and even evolve in non-planetary space by optimising itself to specific 'niches'.

I'll second that.

I don't think anyone is disputing the possibility that life may be more than just carbon based.

However if you are going to spend a lot of money trying to discover life elsewhere in the universe, do you spend that money on dead certainties (carbon based life) that we know has happened at least on one planet or do you dump your money on a long shot that we really know nothing about and have no way to verify or even the first idea of where or how to look?
In other words if I'm looking for a horse then I may start by looking in stables then in fields then on prairies etc. If there are any horses in existence then I'll probably find one. However if I'm looking for a fluggspaffnichtexistenz then I don't have a clue what to look for or where to start. If you approach it from that point of view then its easy to see why the "attitude" is the way it is.
Let's find a single example of carbon based life anywhere else in the universe before we start looking for the fluggspaffnichtexistenz or whatever.

John i KNOW you are right of course. I'm just a bit of a fantasist.

I like your horse analogy..................

BTW......i think i swallowed a fluggspaffnichtexistenz once. nasty tasting buggers.

Yes I too think the horse analogy is very good.

However my point is that it could be a shame to go looking for only horses when its the grass that might hold the clue.

More fundamental is the point made that the primary search is for carbon based life and we are confined to EM signals.

I guess until we find information carrying media other than EM waves we are stuck.

However I keep wishing another way might eventually be found.

However my point is that it could be a shame to go looking for only horses when its the grass that might hold the clue.

I see your point. Lots of animals eat grass..................and they aint all horses.

Not sure where that leaves us....................

Looking for a big sheep in the cosmos?

Wait we have one...............it's called Aries (ok it aint a sheep.............but close enough)

For all we know...bacteria may have a chain of command. A hirarchical(sp?) society.

Hardly, since they reproduce by binary fission.
So, unless additional free DNA is taken in, the organisms are essentially clones. The closest we get to that is ants bees and wasps, which are still more diverse genetically due to drones, but it's still not a hierarchical structure per se, it's based on keeping the egg-producer going, not on centralising power.
However, with regards to life in the universe, although we are may not be alone, in reality we may as well be.
If the light barrier isn't breached by space travel, it'll take too long to reach and communicate with other civilisations.
Think of shipwrecked sailors on small islands twenty miles or so apart with no boats. They can never reach each other, or even know that there are others nearby. That's essentially the situation we may be in here.