How probable is it that life exists on Enceladus?
Well, obviously it’s wildly speculative. But we know that life needs liquid water, at least the life we can imagine. We know it needs energy. And we’ve got both of those on Enceladus. Or at least we have some possibility of liquid water – I don’t think it is a done deal. It’s not impossible that there is life. But it’s an awfully small place. The area that’s active is less than a hundred miles across. For life to have developed and remained, you would have to have liquid water in that tiny area continually for possibly billions of years. So who knows? But it’s certainly going to get people very interested in trying to figure out whether life could survive there. The other place where we have been excited about the possibility of life has been Europa, a moon of Jupiter, which is a far bigger place. We think it has a thick liquid water ocean which is thousands of time more voluminous than any water on Enceladus. And so in that case you might not have as much energy – you don’t see it at
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