Abstract
We come next to the factor \(f_{life}\) in the Drake equation. This is the most difficult factor to estimate, mainly because the detailed mechanism of the origin of life on earth is not known. A somewhat less obvious problem is that estimates of the factor \(f_{life}\) are very sensitive to the criteria which are used to identify the presence of life. Attempts to identify the essential features required to label a material system as ‘alive’ are numerous, and necessarily arbitrary because the word ‘life’ can be defined by its user in many ways.
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Halley, J.W. (2012). Biological Factors. In: How Likely is Extraterrestrial Life?. SpringerBriefs in Astronomy. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-22754-7_4
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