Why Are There 300 Sextillion Stars?

I still don’t think y’all understand. Our biology is inherently limited. Our knowledge of physics is also pretty limited. We still don’t know stuff anti-matter and all of quantum mechanics. It logically is conceivable that life is based on other elements that do not require the same functions of humans such as respiration. There are so many possibilities out there that our limited scope makes it impossible to know. We can try all day but we can’t replicated exact conditions because there are infinite possibilities.

You're really describing though experimentation. I think that is very valid empiric testing, maybe not as good as a working model, because there may be variables we forget to track as we think through a solution, but further and more detailed repetitive thinking can improve the results.

It literally is not possible. Life requires energy, if you can find a way of having a functional lifeform without inputting energy then you just broke thermodynamics. Respiration is defined as the chemical process of creating that energy which is required.

Here is a challenge for you, next time you feel like making the statement "X might be possible" try instead making a statement closer to "X might be possible and here is why _______".

While physical experimentation would be ideal the theoretical aspect is just as important in many cases, particularly in cases where no direct physical experimentation is even possible such as is the case with silicon based life due to having no examples of it.

When the imperfect option is the only option you have available you take it.

I entirely agree.

Ilikepie5 is correct... You are assuming all that ngs regularly burn energy to tend to their fragile biological body that's tiring and burning energy as it functions in a straightforward manner.

To begin to display why ilikepie5 is correct rhat we have no clue of the limits and possibilities, if you knew the typical things about land-based mammals and respiration, you'd never ever believe that dolphins, whales and seals (plus walruses, sea lions etc) function healthily and without severe brain damage and cramps.

If you only knew mammals, the idea of how fish reproduce would be absurd as not only are they using eggs outside of their body but the insemination actually is done by the male directly to the eggs, no actual sex is involved unless we look into some shark species or some extreme exceptions.

We are in a world interpreted through ojr five senses and forms of life evolved to fit this planet's means of providing for life firms within it, with microbial entities as the basis of life here.

If the aliens evolved from non-microbial life in a way that operates extremely different (maybe they can rip their gody apart and reattach it with ease meaning they can teleport parts of themselvea at a time) as well as having something very different to blood, glucose etc as their way of fuelling their operations, it follows that what we consider respiration to be may be very different for them.

Respiration is linked to dependency on constant energy, some alien species may have the capacity to essentially store massive battery charges of energy that then lets them not respirate for a while. Salmon actually do this, it's done especially hy Canadian salmon amdnis how they famously leap out of water in the way they do that lets bears catch them. During this trip they suffocate themselges by essentially being on ansuicide mission to travel superfast without cramps so they reach the destination and are in a safer environment to have offspring and then die.

It's probably true that respiration, as in the conversion of energy into a form that the lifeform can use, is there for alien lfieforms hut if this battery charge mechanism is in place (for instance) it already is much more feasible for them to be suffocating naked in outer space (if they're able to stand the conditions) and remain alive. If this is actually viable it starts to change how dangerous and effective they can be at dominating other planets, especially if they aren't perceptible to our five senses (though I think they'll always be perceptible to touch). There's also the idea that rhey are demigods of sorts. Demigod aliens may genuinely be personalities that aren't respirating, just operating on immortal consciousness.

If either of you can show even theoretically how a lifeform could function without burning energy then you have just broken thermodynamics. Start writing a paper, your nobel prize and billions of dollars in licencing fees on the resulting perpetual motion machine await.

It is true that respiration (a.k.a. energy production) could take wildly different forms than what we have direct experience of but is must exist in some way and assuming the lifeform in question is based on matter that method is describable by chemical formulas and chemical formulas are something biologists have a very good understanding of. Furthermore energy production itself is far from the only basic universal requirement for an element to be a good building block for life. The ability to form a wide variety of complex chemical bonds is essential especially for a world populated by organisms in the first stages of evolution. Without a very versatile chemical base life is not possible. Silicon is the second best option we have in this department on the periodic table and yet is many many kilometers behind our best option, carbon.

The only assumptions being made here are that life is based on matter and that it requires energy. The first seems to be an assumption shared by ILikePie while the second is based on a basic understanding of the most solid law of physics we know of (entropy).

Keep in mind that I am not arguing that non-carbon life is impossible, I am merely arguing against 🥧's assertion that it is unreasonable for us to have a strong focus on carbon in such discussions and his apparent general mindset that "well, anything is possible because really we don't know anything".