Aliens, could they be more bizarre than life here on Earth?

British spelling.

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The beginning of everything.

Photo by Bryan Goff on Unsplash.

Scientists believe that the Universe burst into existence around 13.8 billion years ago.

It was also the beginning of space and time, the infant Universe could now start on its long evolutionary path.

As the Universe expanded and cooled, there came a time called the cosmic dark ages, with no stars, galaxies, or any other celestial objects.

Imagine a sky that is pitch black, that's how it was for about 200 million years, then the first stars burst into life; lighting up space.

Go back 4.5 billion years. That is when our planet was being formed. Microorganisms have been living on the Earth for at least 3.5 billion years.

The evolutionary path for life has been long, but at last, we have arrived. Billions of species have existed here on Earth, but we are the only one that can question our existence.

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Poor Pluto was demoted to a dwarf planet.

Image credit, NASA

Pluto had its planet title taken away in 2006, leaving 8 planets in our Solar System.

Pluto is now known as a dwarf planet, with a diameter of 2,370 kilometres, which makes it smaller than our Moon. It takes an incredible 248 earth years to make one full journey around our local star, the Sun.

The space probe New Horizons had a close flyby of Pluto in 2015, giving us great images and a wealth of new information about this mysterious dwarf planet and its 5 moons.

What does it take to be a planet?

It must orbit a star.

It needs enough gravity to form a spherical shape.

It must be big enough to clear away other objects in its orbit around a star.

Pluto failed because of the last requirement.

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Could aliens look any stranger than us?

Image credit, Roksolana Zasiadko, Unsplash.

We speculate on what extra-terrestrials would look like; we've all seen Sci-Fi movies with strange-looking creatures, but we give little thought to the weird and diverse life that has evolved on our own planet.

Could aliens be any stranger looking than the complex life we see on Earth?

From the deepest oceans to the tallest mountains life can exist and flourish, one exception is the Atacama desert in Chile, some parts of the desert have seen no water for decades. Without that precious water, no life is possible.

What would visiting aliens think of all the different organisms that share our world? Even the nice-looking girl in the image would be just another curiosity, but of course, they would notice how we humans have shaped our world with technology.

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Absolute zero, it gets no colder.

Image credit, Francesca Hotchin, Unsplash.

We often talk about how cold or how hot something is  and very often it has to do with our weather.

Higher temperatures can be unbelievable and very difficult for us to comprehend. The core of the Sun can reach 15 million degrees Celsius, which is nothing compared to the higher temperature scale.

Cold temperatures are more understandable.

Arguably the lowest recorded temperature on the surface of the Earth was at the Soviet Vostok Station, Antarctica, at a very cold -89.2 degrees Celsius.

But it can get a lot colder in the far reaches of outer space. The dwarf planet Pluto is much farther away from the Sun than any of the planets in the solar system. Its surface temperature can be as low as -240 degrees Celsius.

But, it doesn't end there - absolute zero is the lowest temperature possible at -273.15 degrees Celsius or -459.67 degrees Fahrenheit.

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I hope you have gained a little knowledge by reading my article. Regards.