Contact theSOPAbout theSOPSupport theSOPWritersEditorsManaging Editors
theSOP logo
Published:March 27th, 2011 18:02 EST
Exoplanets and Extraterrestrial Life Are For Real: We Are Not Alone

Exoplanets and Extraterrestrial Life Are For Real: We Are Not Alone

By Ron G Anselm


Have you ever seen the series the Twilight Zone back in the 1970s? This could very well be a good plot for one of the episodes. NASA is now stating they discovered what is called exoplanets that are inhabited and are revolving around in our Milky Way.


"To be able to understand what an exoplanet is you first have to look at the definition. The definition of an exoplanet is an extra solar planet that orbits a star other than earth`s sun. Exoplanets were first discovered in the 1990s and belong to planetary systems that are outside of our solar system." (, 2007)


So, exoplanets are planets that are outside of our solar system. Our solar system consists of nine planets which are from the sun and in order, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. "Exoplanets are just any planets that really have no name that`s why they have the term exoplanet" or more like just common planets. We do not know a lot yet about these exoplanets so maybe once we study these planets more in the future we will have more concrete names for them like we do our planets in our solar system.

If you can imagine how many exoplanets could be out there to give you an idea of the possible number; our universe alone not including other undiscovered universes that may be floating out there in space that we don`t know about year, just our known universe has over one-hundred million galaxies in it. No wonder the night sky is so brightly lit when you are out in the middle of nowhere, like someone had a black piece of construction paper and covered the whole sky with it and stuck millions of little holes in the construction paper not any larger than the head of your normal sewing needle and then turn on a bright light behind the black construction paper.

With so many exoplanets out there the big question now becomes how many of those planets outside our solar system may have some kind of life living on it or even intelligent life living on it?

Makes you kinda wonder, huh? Well to answer this question we have to look at the equation by the Emeritus Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of California at Santa Cruz by the name of Frank Drake. Frank Drakes equation is known has the Drake Equation and is also sometimes known as the Green Bank or Green Bank Formula.

     In basic mathematical terms, the Drake Equation is formulated like this and states that:





fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets


f""" = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point




Alternative expression

The number of stars in the galaxy now, N*, is related to the star formation rate R* by where Tg = the age of the galaxy. Assuming for simplicity that R* is constant, then and the Drake equation can be rewritten into an alternate form phrased in terms of the more easily observable value, N*.  ( The Drake Equation, 2011)

Of course there are other astronomers and astrophysicist out there that question the validity and accuracy of the Drake Equation. If anyone has taken college math you know very well that there is more than one mathematical formula to get the right answer in mathematic equations. I am sure to some extent that the Drake Formula is accurate to some point.

To go even deeper and to add more creditability that there are exoplanets and life forms living on some of those exoplanets, British film Director, amateur astronomer, and is also an author, Chris Everard has made three in-depth documentary films which supposedly has proof and cites several former NASA and Pentagon employees; also former astronauts who have stated their opinion on film that they do believe there are life forms other than us that are out there somewhere in the universe.

Chris Everard has named the documentary "Secret Space" It is made up and consists of one-hundred clips that were filmed by NASA astronauts and even a Russian Cosmonaut that have gone on record stating this hypothesis of the existence of other life forms.

Some of the evidence of this in some of the one-hundred clips show other common life forms that deviate from our common life form that were near or hovering around the Space Shuttle, International Space Station, the Russian MIR, and even had some footage of the same thing that was filmed during the Apollo missions of the 1960s and 1970s.

Other NASA employees and astronauts have stated they have seen other life forms other than ours, I guess you can call those other life forms UFO`s. It seems NASA really does not have a policy in place for what to do to deal with the sightings of UFO`s and other life forms according to Chris Everards documentary. He goes on to state that you would think NASA would have some sort of policy in place to deal with these kinds of things but I can answer that question has to why they probably do not. If you think about it, we have never really seen in person an Alien as if you walked up to it and touched it; so of course NASA may be aware of these confirms sighting by astronauts and former NASA employees but they are not going to go public with it until they are one-hundred percent sure that these sighting are of extraterrestrial beings.

Chris Everards documentary also states that NASA is operating some sort of monopoly " on space research and that one of the employees that works at the European Space Agency facility located in South America sent Chris Everard some filmed footage of intercontinental Ballistic Missiles that are being launched from nuclear submarines targeting objects in space that are supposedly traveling at tremendous speeds through the Earth`s atmosphere. This has supposedly been caught on camera and filmed by NASA astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle. Not sure about this one, it sounds a little out there but you never know.

So, the next time you are looking through your backyard telescope stargazing and you see some sort of anomalous objects shooting across the night sky as if they were rain drops coming down from a summer shower don`t call NASA, just know that with the prediction by NASA of exoplanets and supposedly other life forms out there other than ours, those anomalous objects shooting across your telescope`s lens are probably just little green men coming home after a long day at work. 


 References:, Define Exoplanet (2007)  (   planet#ixzz1Hk58H8Ko) Retrieved 2011.


Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, The Drake Equation, ( Retrieved 2011