Are we alone in the Universe?

People are asking –are we alone in the universe? What are the requirements for life to exist on a planet? Is there life on other planets? We can now reach moon, can we travel further and escape entirely?

Many instruments and telescopes have been sent into space to inform us of our surroundings in space. We are learning about our Solar System, our galaxy, and even the stars and galaxies in the Cosmos. Astronomers and people involved with science, fictional films of space and the future, UFOs and other aspects of space, are asking questions and expanding our knowledge of where we live –our surroundings. Some people think we should leave earth because of all the damage and pollution we have created here –we need a new home! (so that we can repeat this somewhere else!) The hunt for a new planet to call “ome”is on! We are like travellers to the New World of America.

So now, looking for habitable planets has become a craze among certain groups, and thousands of such planets have been found –but, unfortunately, so far, they all have one or more drawbacks which will harm life.

The requirements are for a rocky body with water, and that it should circulate the host sun in a habitable zone, the so-called “oldilocks Zone”–not too hot, not too cold. A further requirement is that the host sun is not violent.

Most suns are violent in some way or another. All suns shed their outer layers occasionally. These cataclysmic occurrences happen, varying between once a year, or just once in a ten thousand year cycle – we still are studying them.

All suns fling out hot rock and dust as Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) – killing those nearby. Luckily for us our sun is fairly stable. Our sun flings out large CMEs occasionally, (But look at planet Mercury –it has been thoroughly trashed!) However, our sun has allowed life to form, develop and become conscious of itself and the Solar system, and now, the Universe!

(As an aside, Emperor Constantine worshipped ‘olus Invictus’ – the Sun! – while all others had to worship God and Jesus in pain of death. What did he know that we do not?)

The truth is we see our sun as normal. But there are clues that it is special. Astronomers have categorized stars. Our sun has a ‘’occurring in 2.7 percent of all suns. It is unusually quiet. It flares rarely. Could our star be special?

Our orbit is in the Goldilocks Zone, and we have a moon that stabilizes our rotation. The moon is too large to have been captured, scientists say. Its rock and materials are different from the earth. It is the exact distance to eclipse the Sun –an almost impossible chance occurrence. Our planet has a long history!

PRIYANTHA HETTIGE