Nope. The Drake Equation is complete bollocks [http://www.michaelcrichton.com/speech-alienscauseglobalwarming.html].Vanilla Gorilla said:The Drake equation allows for some educated guesses, there are a lot of variables which we don't know the answers to but even with a fairly pessimistic view on these the chance for life of some form (not necessarily anything intelligent, microorganisms etc) seems high.cuddly_tomato said:The problem is calculating chance is something that you can do with mathematics using known variables. For instance, the UK lottery has X numbers, of which you get to pick Y. If you pick all 6 you win. So the chances of winning are...
(x/y-y) = ? (that is wrong, I don't know how to write it properly, get Teleos!)
Fortunately, we know that X=49 and that y=6, so we can say that...
(49/6).(48/5)/(47/4).(46/3).(45/2).(44/1) = Teh Answer!!!
This is calculable only because we know the variables to fire into the calculator. In the absence of those we can't really determine the chances. The answer in this case is further complicated by the fact the result is either 0 (no life) or 1 (is life). We can't even make an educated guess, having zero information on how life starts.
Of course yes, we still don't understand the majority of the Universe so any conversation of this nature will have to involve some amount of conjecture.
http://www.astro-tom.com/technical_data/alien_life.htm
It relies on the following variables...
R* is the average rate of star formation in our galaxy = We don't really know, although we can estimate to within a million.
fp is the fraction of those stars that have planets = We have absolutely no idea.
ne is the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets = We have even less than no idea, as we keep finding life in areas we previously thought it was impossible to exist.
fℓ is the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point = This is something that is a total guess. It has happened at one place we know about - here. Taking that and applying it to the entire universe is silly.
fc is the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space = This is even more of a guess. He might as well ask "amount of bananas that got eaten last Tuesday", and put that in the equation.
L is the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space. = ....
How do we put any numbers into those figures? And even if we could find numbers, how do we test that equation? It is unscientific garbage until it can be tested.
