[troutman]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/1..._n_793671.html

Lately, a handful of new discoveries make it seem more likely that we are not alone – that there is life somewhere else in the universe.

In the past several days, scientists have reported there are three times as many stars as they previously thought. Another group of researchers discovered a microbe can live on arsenic, expanding our understanding of how life can thrive under the harshest environments. And earlier this year, astronomers for the first time said they'd found a potentially habitable planet.

"The evidence is just getting stronger and stronger," said Carl Pilcher, director of NASA's Astrobiology Institute, which studies the origins, evolution and possibilities of life in the universe. "I think anybody looking at this evidence is going to say, 'There's got to be life out there.'"

A caveat: Since much of this research is new, scientists are still debating how solid the conclusions are.

What last week's findings did was both increase the number of potential homes for life and broaden the definition of what life is. That means the probability for alien life is higher than ever before, agree 10 scientists interviewed by The Associated Press.

Scientists who looked for life were once dismissed as working on the fringes of science. Now, Shostak said, it's the other way around. He said that given the mounting evidence, to believe now that Earth is the only place harboring life is essentially like believing in miracles. "And astronomers tend not to believe in miracles."

Shostak puts his money behind his optimism. At his public lectures, Shostak bets a cup of coffee for everyone in the audience that scientists will find proof of alien life by about 2026. The odds, he figures, have never been more in his favor.