A planet that can host life like ours is extremely rare. Gazing at the night sky, we can only speculate where else life appears. It is safe to assume that other stars surely have planets revolving in their gravitational field. 

For life, some necessities are liquid water, distance from a star that warms but doesn’t burn, a planet with a gravitational pull neither too small nor too large and possibly lightning.

The presence of the element carbon can also not be overstated. This building block has a valance of four that allows long and complex chains with tetrahedral backbones. Life on this planet also needs nitrogen, hydrogen and oxygen to start with. Our air, comprised of 78 percent nitrogen and 21 percent oxygen, allows us to “burn” carbohydrates and, in unusual circumstances, proteins for energy.

The one percent left in air is water vapor, halogens, noble gases, pollen, dust and (ideally) under 350 ppm carbon dioxide, which plants use to grow and we in turn eat. 

First to develop from primordial ooze is the blueprint for life: deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). The messenger molecule that carries instructions back and forth from DNA to other parts of cells is ribonucleic acid (RNA).

Silicon is closest to carbon chemically. Divine evolution may allow computers to reach self-awareness with a quantum leap in technology. This new life form may compete or collaborate with us. Its hardware and software in the non-space matrix would require energy, but very little space (if any).

David Ivan Piccioni

Eugene