"Humility Is Virtuous" Is a Bad Argument for Super-Advanced Extraterrestrials

When I was a young man, when I knew very much less than I know now, I believed that our galaxy was filled with extraterrestrial civilizations that had arisen naturally. I can now look back at the two main arguments I used in my mind to support this belief, and I can understand why such arguments were fallacious. 

One of the two arguments I used was an argument that can be described as "many chances equals some successes." The argument can be stated like this:

• "There are billions of planets in our galaxy, so there must be some  planets on which life exists."
• "There are billions of planets in our galaxy, so there must be some planets with extraterrestrial civilizations."
• "There are a vast number of planets in our universe, so life must have arisen on some other planets."
• "There are a vast number of planets in our universe, so there must be some other civilizations on other planets."
• "There are a huge number of planets in our universe, so there must be some other extraterrestrial civilizations."

This argument is often used by those arguing for an abundance of extraterrestrial life.  For example,  astronomer Seth Shostak states this:

"But there are roughly a trillion planets in the Milky Way galaxy. Buy a trillion lottery tickets, you're going to win."

But such reasoning is completely fallacious. It is not at all true in general that "many chances equals many successes." It is also not at all true in general that "many chances equals some successes" or even that "many chances equals at least one success." If the probability of something happening is sufficiently low, then we should expect many chances to yield zero successes.  So "many chances" does not necessarily equal "many successes," and "many chances" does not necessarily equal "some successes" or even one success. For example:

• If everyone in the world threw a deck of cards into the air 1000 times, that would be almost 10 trillion chances for such flying cards to form into a house of cards, but we should not expect that in even one case would the flying deck of cards accidentally form into a house of cards. 
• If a billion computers around the world each made a thousand attempts to write an intelligible book by randomly generating 100,000 characters, that would be a total of a trillion chances for an  intelligible book to be accidentally generated, but we should not expect that even one of these attempts would result in the creation of an intelligible book. 
• If you buy a million tickets in a winner-take-all lottery in which the chance of winning is only 1 in 100 million, you should not expect that any one of those tickets will succeed in winning such a lottery. 

Below are some very general observations about probability:

• It is not necessarily true that many chances (also called trials) will yield many successes. 
• It is not necessarily true that many chances (also called trials) will yield some successes or even one success. 
• If the chance of success on any one trial multiplied by the number of trials gives a number less than 1, we should not expect that even one of the trials will produce a success.

How should we calculate the chance of extraterrestrial life accidentally arising on at least one planet revolving around any star in the universe? We should judge whether the chance of success on any one trial (the chance of life appearing accidentally on a random planet) multiplied by the estimated number of planets in the observable universe is a number greater than 1.  The number of stars in the observable universe has been estimated as a billion trillion. Given about 10 planets per star, we can estimate the number of planets in the observable universe as ten billion trillion (10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000). 

Roughly speaking, if the chance of life randomly appearing on the average planet is greater than 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, we should expect that life exists on at least one other planet. But if the chance of life randomly appearing on the average planet is less than 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, we should expect (given only chance) that no life exists outside of our solar system. 

Unfortunately for extraterrestrial life enthusiasts, there is every reason for suspecting that the chance of life appearing on any random planet (because of accidental chemical combinations) is very, very much less than 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.  Even the simplest microbe requires 300 or more types of functional protein molecules.  An average functional protein molecule consists of hundreds of amino acids arranged in just the right way to achieve a functional result.  It has been estimated that the probability of a functional protein molecule forming by chance is less than 1 in 10 to the hundredth power. 

A team of 9 scientists wrote a scientific paper entitled, “Essential genes of a minimal bacterium.” It analyzed a type of bacteria (Mycoplasma genitalium) that has “the smallest genome of any organism that can be grown in pure culture.” According to wikipedia's article, this bacteria has 525 genes consisting of 580,070 base pairs. The paper concluded that 382 of this bacteria's protein-coding genes (72 percent) are essential.  Similarly, a recent report from scientists long attempting to estimate the simplest possible microbe is a report estimating that such a microbe would have 473 genes with 531,000 base pairs. 

Here the math tells a decisive tale.  It seems that by chance that nowhere in the observable universe would there form even one of the functional protein molecules needed for life. But more than 300 types of such molecules would be needed for even the simplest thing to exist. Even the simplest microbe is a purposeful arrangement of about 90,000 amino acids parts, just as a 50-page instruction manual is a purposeful arrangement of about 50,000 letters. 

So "many chances equals some successes" fails as an argument for extraterrestrial life. But many scientists keep witlessly using the argument, just as many scientists keep witlessly using other fallacious arguments. 

There was another fallacious argument I would often use in my mind when I was a young man believing in the naturally occurring abundance of extraterrestrial civilizations in our galaxy. The argument was a kind of "humility is virtuous" argument.  The reasoning would go rather like this:

"We should not be be vain and egotistical; we should be humble. To maintain that man is the most advanced organism in our galaxy is to commit the sin of egotism and pride.  It's much better to have humility, and realize that we are very far from being the most advanced creatures in our galaxy."

I found this argument being used by an authority who made the argument the main focus of an article he wrote. The authority is a frequent liar who has repeatedly deceived the public by making untrue claims about weak evidence that he claims as evidence for extraterrestrials. Having failed in such clumsy and deceit-plagued attempts, the authority gave us the old "humility is virtuous" argument for extraterrestrials that I fallaciously used as a young man, as if this person had grown weary of his old BS. 

I can explain why the "humility is virtuous" argument fails as a logically compelling argument for extraterrestrials. The reason is that the argument is an example of circular reasoning. The "humility is virtuous" argument commits the logical fallacy known as begging the question. Begging the question is when you make an argument that starts out by assuming what it is trying to prove. 

The "humility is virtuous" argument starts out by assuming that mankind is an inferior species in our galaxy or our universe, and then proceeds to argue that it is egotism and conceit for someone to think that his species is the most advanced or the highest form of life, when it is not.  But that's begging the question, because you start out by assuming the existence of superior extraterrestrials. If there are no superior extraterrestrials in our galaxy or our universe, then no sin of pride is committed if someone thinks that mankind is the most advanced species in the galaxy or the universe. Similarly, if you are the richest man in your city, you commit no sin of pride by regarding yourself as the richest man in your city; and if you are the richest man in your country, you commit no sin of pride by regarding yourself as the richest man in your country. 

The authority writing the article I refer to tried a toxic variation on the "humility is virtuous" argument for extraterrestrials. He claimed that mankind must be really inferior because men have no free will.  He gave us the malignant nonsense of free will denialism, the senseless denying of the most obvious truth that humans have free will.  We should not be surprised that this authority told the lie that we have no free will, because he has often lied about a variety of things. 

The "humility is virtuous" argument for believing in extraterrestrials is not convincing, because it commits the fallacy of begging the question, assuming the existence of what it is trying to prove. The "many chances equals some successes" argument for extraterrestrials is a failure, because it simply isn't true that many chances equals some successes, in any case when we have reason to believe that the chance of success on each trial multiplied by the number of trials is a number less than 1. 

It is still very possible that there are many extraterrestrial civilizations in our galaxy or in our universe. Although the probability of life naturally appearing on a planet (by blind, accidental processes) seems to be close to zero, it is quite possible that life arises on many planets with the assistance of some superhuman agency interested in having life appear on more than one planet. There are powerful reasons for believing in the existence of such an agency. Also, it could be that observations of UFOs and reports of close encounters with extraterrestrials provide evidence for thinking that our planet has had extraterrestrial visitors.  Given some motivation, I could probably write a rather compelling essay arguing for the likelihood of extraterrestrials in our galaxy. But the essay would use reasoning very different from the fallacious armchair arguments I used for such an idea when I was a young man. 

Are there others in our galaxy?

"Humility is virtuous" arguments can easily be turned upside down, rather like in the conversation below:

John: Humility is virtuous! We should not be conceited! So we should believe we are like ants compared to godlike superminds that arose on other planets. 

Jim:  So if humility is so important, then we should regard ourselves as creatures with minds and powers very tiny compared to some all powerful infinite Mind we should thank for our existence. 

John:  No, no, I meant being humble in my way, not yours !