Quote Originally Posted by boost
why do you believe star trek had it right? I have read that its possible that non-carbon based life could be possible, and therefore the whole rule-set can be thrown out the window.
Yes there could be, but that life would be extremely primitive.

It's been a while since I've looked at it, but I think silicon-based is the next best to carbon-based life (doesn't really matter what it is, though). What does matter is that the next best chemical-based life form, according to theory, would evolve SUPER slow compared to carbon. And even if it didn't it would still be subject to the laws of evolution, gravity, atoms, etc, and so it would still evolve similarly to all other life.

Finding a different chemically based life form would be amazing though, but it's possible they don't even exist. I don't know exactly what the theory says, but I think that there is so much carbon in the universe that it would pretty much win over any natural selection battle with any other element. A silicon-based life form would have to be in a place where there is no carbon able to compete, and I don't think we have ever found a place like that. I know very little about atomic theory and chemistry, though. What I do know is that when I've seen the idea presented to scientists and enthusiasts, it's pretty much brushed away as a virtual impossibility or unfathomably unlikely