Quote:The absence of detectable acetylene on the Titan surface can very well have a non-biological explanation, said Mark Allen, principal investigator with the NASA Astrobiology Institute Titan team. Allen is based at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Allen said one possibility is that sunlight or cosmic rays are transforming the acetylene in icy aerosols in the atmosphere into more complex molecules that would fall to the ground with no acetylene signature.
"Scientific conservatism suggests that a biological explanation should be the last choice after all non-biological explanations are addressed," Allen said. "We have a lot of work to do to rule out possible non-biological explanations. It is more likely that a chemical process, without biology, can explain these results - for example, reactions involving mineral catalysts."
You! Wrote:That doesn't say they've found life, guys...it says that they've found conditions which could indicate the presence of life. They have yet to find Space Amoebas.
NASA Wrote:They have discovered that life forms have been breathing in the planets atmosphere and also feeding on its surfaces fuel.
People always have a tendency to find life forms similar to themselves or in fitting to what they can describe.
They are not looking for "tiny" intelligence which overwhelms them or "huge" lifeforms which are stupid.
I don't know when humans will find another life form to communicate with but I am sure that it will take LOTS of time for them to realize on an accepted basis that lifeforms shouldn't necessarily be carbon based or fitting to the description of "alive" as we want to tell.
Afterall, "alive" is just an English verb which is a human language.