I follow a blog called Dangerous Idea that often has interesting comment conversations on a range of topics, many of them dealing with God and Christianity. One comment provides a list of some reasons why Earth, the only planet know to us that supports life, is very special indeed. I list the first five below, but you can read the rest here.
1. A star not in the central galactic bulge (most of which are “metal poor”, meaning they are incapable of spawning Earthlike worlds) – ours in nicely tucked away in a spiral arm.
2. A star not in the path of sprays of lethal Gamma radiation from the galaxy’s central black hole (which disqualifies maybe 1/5th of the stars in the Milky Way)
3. A non-variable star (the majority of stars are variable).
4. A planetary system capable of supporting stable orbits (most aren’t).
5. A planetary system with no worlds of Jupiter mass near to the star (Most of the discovered systems have such worlds. Ours is a rarity in that it does not.).
6. …
Very interesting! Thanks for sharing.
Lynn
I thought so, too, Lynn. The crazy part is that this is just the stuff that has to do with macro-features of the universe like galaxies, stars, planets and moons. It even gets more interesting down at the nano-scale.