-Life is around but it's nowhere near our way of thinking and functioning. Maybe it's a gas cloud which takes a billion years to "think" a single thought. Who's to say that an alien lifeform's "neocortex" and utility function is going to be anything but incomprehensible to us? (Counter-argument: certain patterns repeat independently in nature, for instance I read somewhere that the design pattern for the eye has been created independently by evolution like 40 times).
-Life is around and we've already made contact with it (ie UFOs).
-Life is out there but it's consciously avoiding us (Prime Directive-style).
-Life is around but it's nowhere near our way of thinking and functioning. Maybe it's a gas cloud which takes a billion years to "think" a single thought. Who's to say that an alien lifeform's "neocortex" and utility function is going to be anything but incomprehensible to us? (Counter-argument: certain patterns repeat independently in nature, for instance I read somewhere that the design pattern for the eye has been created independently by evolution like 40 times).
-Life is around and we've already made contact with it (ie UFOs).
-Life is out there but it's consciously avoiding us (Prime Directive-style).