 the First Astrobiology Science Conference, held at NASA’s Ames Research Centre, California,23 to evaluate the evidence on whether, biologically speaking, we are alone in the universe. The predominant mood of pessimism was encapsulated by British palenontologist Simon Conway Morris’s comment: “I don’t think there is anything out there at all except ourselves,” and Dan Cleese, a Mars program scientist at NASA’s Pasadena Jet Propulsion Laboratory, who said that it is time to “tone down expectations”.24
The fervent search to authenticate “astrobiology” has generated much data, but to date this has, if anything, strengthened the Genesis record of the creation of life on Earth. Contrary to the claims of evolutionists and the many imaginative Hollywood epics like ET, Star Wars, Independence Day, etc., the coming of aliens to Earth from outer space will always remain in the realm of science fiction.
Editorial note: As this article originally appeared in 2000, the section “Search for other planets” has been updated and relevant articles post-2000 have been included in the references. Also the box “Alien Visitors to Earth?” (below) has kindly been supplied by Dr Jonathan Sarfati.
Alien visitors to Earth?
Not with the huge energy shortage and megaton dust bombs
Films involving intelligent life on other planets have been some of the best box-office smashes, e.g. Avatar, the Star Wars and Star Trek films, Independence Day. All these are cultural icons. But as we have pointed out many times, intelligent life on other planets is contradicted by Scripture,25 and presupposes chemical evolution: that life evolved from non-living chemicals.26 And as will be shown, there are huge scientific problems for the idea of interstellar space travel as well, including a huge lack of energy.
Distances between stars are literally astronomical. The closest star system to ours is Alpha Centauri, 4.37 light years away. I.e. its light, although travelling at 300,000 km/s (186,000 mps), takes 4.37 years to get here. One light year is just under 10 trillion km (about 6 trillion miles). Furthermore, Einstein’s theory of Special Relativity teaches that any mass increases as it approaches the speed of light, thus requiring even more energy to accelerate it. But the problems for hypothetical aliens start well before this becomes an issue.27
Sand grains become bombs
A fleck of paint left this crater on the surface of Space Shuttle Challenger’ front window on STS-7.
Imagine an alien space craft with a mass of only 10 tonnes or 10,000 kg (about 22,000 lb)—the Apollo Lunar Module, which could take only two men, was about 15 tonnes. Then how much energy would it take to accelerate it to 100,000 km/s, or a third of the speed of light (c⁄3)? This is given closely enough by the formula in ordinary classical physics—no matter how gradually this speed is reached, this total energy must be supplied:
E = ½mv²
= ½ × 10,000 kg × (100,000,000 m/s)²
= 50 exajoules (5 × 1019 J).
This is equal to the entire world consumption of energy for over a month!28 What possible source could produce such an enormous output, as well as accelerate at takeoff the extra mass of this source?
Antimatter is the only real possibility, since it can annihilate ordinary matter with complete conversion to energy, according to Einstein’s famous formula, E = mc². If perfect annihilation were achieved (most unlikely), 500 kg each of antimatter and matter would produce: 1000 kg × (3 × 108 m/s)² = 90 exajoules. So this looks like enough. But not so fast! About the same amount of energy would be needed to slow the alien craft when it reaches Earth, and already they are running out of fuel. And this is just a small craft—powering the massive space-ships of the movies for many fast, intricate maneuvers … it’s not called science fiction for nothing. Consider also that we have not even produced anti-atoms yet, except for perhaps about a hundred thousand anti-hydrogen atoms, a sub-microscopic amount.29
This energy shortage is not the only thing for aliens to worry about. They need also to avoid tiny sand grains