Today I had a chance to once again watch this video and it got me to thinking, that as much as anything, this question, “Is there Life out there?,” is an example of the limitations the phrasing of our questions imposes upon learning potential.
The Earth’s tectonics is absolutely important to the processing and evolution of Earth’s mineral and climatic resources, not just in creating our atmosphere, but also changing rocks over time, and in fact incorporating biological elements into those rocks, subduction and volcanism, thus creating more mineral variety, for “Life” to utilize and exceed previous resource limited potentials.
Of course there’s also the impact of plate tectonics on ocean chemistry and atmospheric circulation patterns, again providing ever more resources for “Life” to exploit.
Among others . . .
Are you saying there’s nothing special about impact and aftermath of Theia impact, (or double impact)?
But the biggest bugaboo is in the question we’re asking: “Is there Life on the Planets?”
Because on this planet Life has learned to occur on so many levels,
The Life of microscopic prokaryote single cells;
The Life of microscopic eukaryotes single cells;
The Life of complex organization of multiple eukaryotes single cells;
The Life of bilateral bodies;
The Life of organisms that could survive on land;
The Life of remembering, introspective creatures;
The Life of human like beings;
The Life of hunter gather, eventual agrarian herder civilizations;
The Life of dominating nature, taking on the "power of the gods;
The Life of today’s moderns projecting themselves out into our galaxy?
For vast stretches of our planet’s existence no life is possible beyond the simplest of cells and such.
Evolution never stops, and it’s not always improving, because Evolution is totally dependent on what’s happening in the biosphere and the resource that are available.
Here on Earth we are currently on the way to making our global biosphere deadly inhospitable to our modern culture, and at current rates inhospitable to all humans and most mammals and quite a few [other creates] before the end of the century (40% of world’s plant species at risk of extinction | Plants | The Guardian)