Pentagon study finds no sign of alien life in reported UFO sightings going back decades

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

41. Yes, our galaxies has at least 100 billion stars,

maybe a lot more.

Does anyone reading this know how many of those stars are like our sun?

Anyone?

6%. You might read up to 20% in various sources, but no, it's 6%. Over 70% of all stars in Milky Way are red dwarfs. Which isn't to say none of the planets around red dwarfs can have life, but it's going to be vastly different from what we see here. For one thing, the red dwarf planets we've discovered so far are typically a whole lot closer to their star and rotate VERY rapidly around said star.

Blithely assuming there are civilizations out there millions of years older than ours is a pretty shaky assumption. Species evolve, all the time. In fact, we homo sapiens are evolving faster than we ever have before. With (or without) evolution, a good run for any species is a million years. So no, don't count on civilizations millions (hundreds of millions is truly laughable) of years more advanced.

My Son The Astronomer tells me that most modern scientists think we are very probably the first intelligent, technological civilization in the galaxy.

It's important to understand just how vast our galaxy is. About 100,000 light years across. Perhaps there is, or has been, a technological civilization on the exact other side of the galaxy from us. There is essentially no possibility that we could communicate with them. Again, the speed of light determines a lot. It's a fundamental law of physics. There will be no getting around it. Oh, and don't then say, Let's use a Black Hole to go vast distances. Going into a Black Hole in the first place will kill you, so you'll already be dead coming out.

The Moon. Specifically, our relatively large moon. It stabilizes our axial tilt (23.5 degrees at present) and gives us tides, which would have been hugely important in the development of life in the first place.