Scientist Discover Tens of billions of planets out there are like Earth

[secretzofwar]

I feel very unlikely that we'll ever deal with these folks, but it would be cool if we did. Maybe in a few hundred years... we've barely tapped the potential of stuff on Earth.

 

[bradless]

It really boils down the probability that life can form itself, even in the best of conditions.  What is going to be interesting is when we start analyzing atmospheres and finally find one with a make-up similar to ours, one where the primary gases are only known to form as a result of biological processes.  Unfortunately we may be stuck at that point for a long time as don't (and won't for a long time) have the ability to directly image one of these worlds. 

For anyone in this subject matter I recommend the book "Where is Everybody?".  It goes over the main theories about whether life is abundant in the galaxy and, if it is, we should be seeing cosmic traffic jams everywhere (formally known as the "Fermi Paradox".