New life, and new life forms

Hi, Subbie.I'm a science fiction writer, and I hope to publish someday, so I'll keep the details of my trade secrets to myself until then.But, I did want to suggest that I consider it most likely that alien life will follow most of the same patterns that we see life follow here.There are two predominant trends in sci fi that I've seen: the Star Trek way, in which aliens are just humans with make-up or a mask on; and the new school, in which they try to make everything they can completely different from the way it is on Earth.For instance:I say carbon and water is what we'll find most life is made of (though some alternatives may be likely).
Life will generally have cells, or something like them.
Life will generally evolve in Darwinian fashion.
Broad divisions equivalent to plants and animals will be common.
We'll probably see a lot of general analogy with Earth life in terms of anatomical features (e.g., I think cephalization may be particularly common in "advanced" organisms; bilateral symmetry will be common in terrestrial organisms).

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Hi, Subbie. I tried to design a Lamarckian organism once. It was a large gel-based organism with one large genetic reservoir that grew by a replication-like process as the organism grew larger. It reproduced by budding off random small segments of its body, each containing a random single set of genetic molecules, so any somatic mutations that happened during the individual's lifetime might be passed on.

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Hi, Crash. I've dabbled in silicon-based life before too. I invented one that had a respiratory system with multiple pores along the underside that would periodically open to allow grains of silica to trickle out. Static forces generated in specialized organs would ensure that the grains clustered near the pores.

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Hi, Omnivorous. Actually, that's not what it says. The galactic habitable zone is a circular band of stars of the same age. The 8 kiloparsecs figure was the radius of the circular region enclosed by the band, and the 2 kiloparsecs is the width of the band.So, the area should be:(pi)*(8+2)² - (pi)*(8)² = 113.1 square kiloparsecsThat's a lot of space.

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Hi, Paul. I don't want to derail the thread, but, "stone babies"? Really?

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Hi, Paul. Maybe they would threaten to cut a baby in half, but only to settle a dispute about who the real mother is.But, not a baby made of stone, of course (which would constitute a new type of life, and thus, get us back to the topic).

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.