The idea of life elsewhere in the universe if one of my favorite topics. What kind of shapes would it take? What mechanisms for survival would it have evolved? I wonder how long if would be before we were able to communicate with other life in an effective manor?
I recently watched a pbs show about extraterrestrial life hosted by a guy named Timothy Ferris. The show was really good the way it gave a nice overview of all the relevant info and ideas. There is a scene involving an X-mas tree as a visual aid for the topic of communicating with ETs via radio waves. I hadnt ever thought about the subject in quite the same way before, theres a good chance that we may be listening and even talking to an empty universe given the time scales were dealing with. That idea is kind of a downer but just after they talked about the idea of finding the remains of a once advanced and far-reaching civilization. the idea was something like an interstelar internet system generating its own power, but just lying dormant for millenia after the demise of its creators.