Expert: Harry Hayfield - 12/20/2007

Question
Hello,

      I am in the 8th grade. I was wondering what your thoughts were
on how the solar system was formed, like how ours was supposedly formed
from the solar nebulae. Also I was wondering, do you agree with me when
i saw that there is a possibility that here is another planet like
earth out there? I mean we formed out of ,for lack of a better word,
randomness. So who is to say that there is not another planet with these
conditions? I mean there might not be humans,etc. But maybe there are
plants and such. What do you think? Sorry from carrying on :)

Answer
Don't worry. You witter on!

Our solar system was indeed formed by a solar nebula (when the sun erupted into life 4.6 billion years ago.

There is actually a formula for estimating how many earth like planets there are in the universe which is referenced here http://www.cix.co.uk/~morven/worldkit/index.html as well as every little thing you need to create an earthlike planet