It is Probable that Europa Supports Life

Responses to criticisms:Con states: "To the best of our knowledge, there is nothing on Europa that is hospitable. We would call it a hostile environment. " Hostle to an unprotected human, maybe, but not to an organism that would be adapted to such an environment; but its hostile to us like the various habitats of extremophiles are hostile. An organism that would have developed on Europa would be inherently adapted to its habitat. If Europa has the things that I said are necessary for survival of lifeforms (a source of liquid water, protection from radiation, and enough energy, oxygen, and carbon for the moon to be hospitable), then Europa is hospitable for life. My opponent may, can, and will attack my points supporting this statement, but he must attack one of the statements supporting my assertion before attacking the assertion itself, otherwise, my statment stands. (To be fair, he does attack the statement that there is enough energy for Europa to support life later in his case. )Con states that I presume abiogenesis. Okay, maybe I didn't support my statement adequetly. However, due to the fact that things tend to begin in this universe, I felt like it was necessary to say that it was probable that there was a pathway for life to begin on Europa, in order to say that, in couplation with my statement that Europa is hospitable to life, that it was probable that life existed on Europa. If Europa didn't have a means for life to begin, it could be the most life-benevolent place in the galaxy (not saying that it is), it would be sterile. Con states that, due to Europa's distance from the sun, Europa doesn't have enough energy to support lifeIt is true that Europa is too far away for a photosynthesis-based ecosystem, and, according to Con's source, the energy available on Europa isn't conducive to produce organisms the size of a blue whale. Despite that, Con's own source says that it is plausible that microbial life could exist. Furthermore, the means of abiogenesis that would occur on Europa would happen to have hydrothermal vents in the process somewhere--basically, volcanoes, which is a method Con states that . Con states that we have no evidence of life on Europa, there is no life on EuropaWhile the lack of evidence of life makes us utilize words like "definite" less often than not, lack of evidence doen't mean evidence of lacking. Keep in mind that we haven't explored Europa like we have explored, say, Mars. (But it would be cool if we found life on Europa. Life-changing, actually. It would probably be one of the most major events in modern human history, comparable to landing on the moon. It would have deep scientific and philosophical impacts for us to answer. .. but that's a discussion and debate for another time. )Responding to Con's response to my first round closing statement:1. What I was saying is that there is liquid water, protection from radiation, and enough oxygen, carbon, and energy for life to exist. You can contest any of those points, but saying "Europa doesn't have a means for abiogenesis," doesn't necessarily mean that 2. The means of abiogenesis are by hydrothermal vents driven by tidal flexing. While the vents may not be detectable given our current level of exploration of Europa, and not as active as Io's glut of volcanos (also driven by tidal flexing). But, Io and Europa have similar orbital eccentricities, and orbiting speeds, and a roughly 1:2 ratio in orbital periods[1,2]; Europa most probably has 1/2 the energy pumped into it by tidal flexing as Io, the solar system's most geologically active celestial body. [2] Discovering geolgoic activity on Europa, while I don't want to say inevitable, is very close to certain. Also of note: while marine snow is a part of hydrothermal vents' ecosystems, the dependence on the snow is a pittance compared to the amount of energy dependent on chemosmosis--the density of life around hydrothermal vents is at least 10,000 times greater than of the surrounding sea floor, which is dependent on the snow. [3]3. We do not have any definitive proof that there is life elsewhere in the universe, but due to the factors that I have described, it is more probable than not that life exists there. Reconsidering the ResolutionI understand that, outside Earth, we have detected no life. Nothing. To create a debate so that a side must provide evidence that life exists elsewhere in the universe would be folly, so that's the way I worded the resolution the way I did. So that there would be something to debate. I look forward to my opponent's response. Sources [1] . http://en.wikipedia.org...[2] . http://en.wikipedia.org...[3] . http://en.wikipedia.org...