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Civilization and space-faring require metals which need fire to make which takes oxygen.

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Just pop a couple Rad-X... good to go!

I’ve never seen a convincing alternative to carbon for chemical based life. Yeah you could use Sulfur, Boron, or silicon but they all are much worse and couldn’t form anywhere near the same amount of stable compounds or in borons case is just much rarer

Water and Oxygen both have alternatives but are probably the most likely compounds used by life because they are ubiquitous, usable at high temperatures, and/or have simpler mechanisms than their alternatives. I’d put complex chemical life at about 99% for carbon, 80% for water, 50% for oxygen.

Don’t drink the contaminated water bottles. You’ll be fine.

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Could we use Jupiter instead, or, is its focal point even farther away, since it bends light even less? Not sure how that works.

But binary teaches us there are actually 10 people. Those who understand binary.

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The hydrocarbon oceans are on top of the ice, which is in top of liquid water.

Earth background is .3uSv/hr = .00003rad/hr.... rads halved by 7cm of h2o shielding... Surface rads at 360 rads/hr... 360*(.5)^x = 3E-5 -> 3E-5/360=.5^x

Log(12E6^-1) / Log(.5) = x

x = ~23.5

23.5 * .07m = ~ 1.65 meters of ice.

So TLDM : If you stay under about 1.7 meters of ice (maybe a little more due to density concerns) you should only experience normal earth background radiation... on paper.

Oxygen and water (and to a lesser extent carbon) are very unique in the universe in terms of the convenience of reactions and processes that are easily cyclical. Water has some great properties that help with fundamental chemical processes that aren’t found often elsewhere.

Agreed. PBS SpaceTime posted a really excellent episode the other day outlining the challenges that silicon-based life would face in (most) natural environments. I, like OP, had long assumed that our preference for "life as we know it" was a bit of a blind spot -- I no longer think so. There are so many obstacles standing in the way of the organic evolution of silicon-based life that it wouldn't make sense (in most environments) for nature to favor silicon over carbon.

Given a) the goldilocks scenario that gave rise to life on Earth and b) the apparent dearth of life elsewhere, I think it is reasonable to suspect that it is very difficult for complex life to spring up just about anywhere. Silicon-based life would face an even steeper degree of difficulty. Environments without water (an ideal solvent for the mixture of molecules) might just render the appearance of complex life next to impossible. We can't know that for certain, of course, but I think it's completely reasonable to narrow our search (for the time being) to environments that seem conducive to life rather than expending energy and resources on locales where we have no reason to think that life is even possible.

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Sounds like Titan needs some liberatin'.

complex life most likely does. it’s not that arrogant really when u think about it. life needs to be able to create and preserve energy. it’s much harder to create energy when ur environment is incredibly cold. and much harder to preserve energy due to that reason as well.

It's clear sky's in Michigan tonight, but I don't see it. What gives?

Just need to find some cores for my power armor and we'll get right in there

Ganymede is not talked about enough. It possibly has more water than Europa. Certainly more than the earth.

The phrase should always be "life as we know it"

So... oil?