[ExI] Double-Earth (Was: kepler study says 8.8e9 earthlike planets)

[Tomaz Kristan]

Those extremophiles have a less extreme background to start.

A human may survive on Antarctica. But if there was no Africa (and no
Europe), the number of humans on Antarctica would be zero.




On Tue, Nov 26, 2013 at 11:40 AM, Anders Sandberg <anders at aleph.se> wrote:

>  On 2013-11-25 15:23, spike wrote:
>
>
>  >…There are other expanding liquids like beryllium difluoride, but most
> are elements like silicon, bismuth, antimony, gallium and plutonium…
>
>
>
> Ja.  I can’t think of any life forms that depend on that oddball
> characteristic of water ice.  Perhaps the remarkable thing here is that
> with all the ice on this planet, there are no known (to me) life forms that
> use it in its solid phase.  One would think there would be a snow eater
> somewhere.  Clearly it wouldn’t be to extract energy from the water (ground
> state compound) but rather some kind of life form that can plant itself in
> snow and use sunlight.
>
>
> There are algae that thrive not just on or under sea-ice, but in it:
> http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/essay_krembsdeming.html
> Also, some animals have adapted to freezing in order to (I assume) get a
> first shot at good locations:
> http://science.whoi.edu/labs/pinedalab/Subpages/larvaeinice.html
>
> But note that they do not eat snow - it would need to provide so much
> energy per volume eaten that it counteracts the energy required to melt it,
> and that is a pretty tall order.
>
>
>
>
>
> >… Even I agree that a planet with plutonium oceans is unlikely to be
> habitable for life. -- Dr Anders Sandberg
>
>
>
> I learned a new thing by thinking about this.  There is an isotope of
> plutonium which is non-fissile, 244.  Get a sphere of the stuff, heat it to
> 900 and some Kelvin, you have an ocean of plutonium, with radioactive
> particles up the kazoo but no fission.  Until Anders’ offhanded comment
> about an ocean of plutonium, I never knew there was such a critter.  Ain’t
> science kewallll?  {8-]
>
>
> Sounds like a great practical joke to do when re-engineering a solar
> system. A hot ecology based on plutonium as a solvent for some weird
> metal-oxide biochemistry/mechanochemistry.
>
>
>
> --
> Dr Anders Sandberg
> Future of Humanity Institute
> Oxford Martin School
> Oxford University
>
>
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>


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