Debra Fischer Quotes

What we expect to find, certainly in our own solar system, are probably simple single or multiple-cell forms of life. To get to intelligent life takes stability of conditions over huge, long periods of time.

We think that life develops spontaneously on Earth, so it must be possible for life to develop on suitable planets elsewhere in the universe. But we don't know the probability that a planet develops life.

If we do discover more than one type of life on Earth, we can be fairly certain that the universe is teeming with it, for it would be inconceivable that life started twice here but never on all the other earth-like planets.

We haven't yet found a speck of evidence for biology on another world, so we have no objective way to judge whether life is a onetime fluke or a near-inevitable phenomenon.

No planet is more earth-like than Earth itself, so if life really does pop up readily in earth-like conditions, then surely it should have arisen many times right here on our home planet? And how do we know it didn't? The truth is, nobody has looked.

I am absolutely certain that life can exist in outer space, move around, find a new aqueous environment.

I don't think we are the only planet that has life.

Theoretically, there are planets with an environment that can support life. As yet there is no evidence that there indeed is life on other planets. It's only a matter of time before we get to know.

Astrobiology is the science of life in the universe. It's an attempt to scientifically deal with the question of whether or not we're alone in the universe, looking at the past of life, the present of life, and the future of life. It's an interdisciplinary study incorporating astronomy, biology, and the Earth sciences.

I'm an astrobiologist, and I come from a planetary science background, so in a very broad sense, I study the evolution of planetary environments.

The discovery and investigation of life on other planets is likely to change many of our ideas about how life arose on the Earth and even what is life and its natural development.

Wonder if there is life on another planet? Let's suppose there is. Suppose further, that only one star in a trillion has a planet that could support life. If that were the case, then there would be at least 100 million planets that harbored life.

Should we find a second form of life right here on our doorstep, we could be confident that life is a truly cosmic phenomenon. If so, there may well be sentient beings somewhere in the galaxy wondering, as do we, if they are not alone in the universe.

I do definitely believe that there is life away from this planet. I mean, we've kind of established that with the fact that we found bacteria on meteorites, and we've kind of used that to backtrack and show how this Earth, this planet, could have formed the ability to sustain life in the first place.

I think there must be some other life forms, even if they're microscopic.

We're constantly re-evaluating the potential for life. We're finding it where we didn't think it could exist, such as volcanic vents and other extreme conditions like under arctic ice. We're finding life in these incredibly harsh and dynamic conditions, so we're having to re-evaluate our own ideas of what's possible on this planet alone.

The overwhelming bulk of the cosmos is deathly quiet. But here and there - on worlds where matter is thick and conditions are right - noises are commonplace. And in some cases, these noisy worlds may ring with the sounds of life - the bleats and bellows of creatures we have never seen, but may someday discover.

The universe is large and old, and the ingredients for life as we know it are everywhere, so there's no reason to think that Earth would be unique in that regard. Whether of not the life became intelligent is a different question, and we'll see if we find that.

There may be aliens in our Milky Way galaxy, and there are billions of other galaxies. The probability is almost certain that there is life somewhere in space.

People quite often think of the question 'Are we alone in the universe?' in terms of other civilizations out there: life forms that have reached at least our level of technological development.

The bottom line is, like, one in five stars has at least one planet where life might spring up. That's a fantastically large percentage. That means in our galaxy, there's on the order of tens of billions of Earth-like worlds.

Life outside of Earth is probably going to be really hard to find.

I think Pluto has to be considered among the places in the solar system that are possible homes for life.

Among the plausible niches for extraterrestrial life in our solar system, the clouds of Venus are among the most accessible and the least well explained.

There's no doubt that the search for planets is motivated by the search for life. Humans are interested in whether or not life evolves on other planets. We'd especially like to find communicating, technological life, and we look around our own solar system, and we see that of all the planets, there's only one that's inhabited.