Hopefully, in the course of viewing this website, you have put a lot of thought into what the necessary components for life are, and perhaps you even learned something or caught a glimpse of a different perspective. With that being said, you may not have agreed with everything Pfeifer proposed, and maybe you formed your own opinion. That is exactly the process that Pfeifer went through when analyzing the Drake Equation along with quotes from astronomers and astrobiologists regarding other life in the universe. Questioning and challenging common ideas is what has driven humans and scientists to achieve out of this world feats that were at some point deemed improbable. So go on, now's your chance.
Now that you are familiar with the Pfeifer Equation, you are encouraged to make your own! This could mean coming up with your own estimates, or even adding your own factors. Perhaps you disagree with some of the factors Pfeifer selected, in which case you could remove them from the equation entirely. Just be careful to pay close attention to how adding or removing a factor could affect the units in your end result. How many life-inhabiting worlds do you estimate are lurking in the Milky Way galaxy?
Below you will find a calculator where you have the ability to implement your own factors and estimates. Buttons have been provided to add new factors to the equation. As a reminder, here is what each color is meant to represent:
There is also a button for removing factors. When clicked, delete icons will appear at the bottom of each factor. Once you have finished removing factors, make sure to click "cancel." Please note that if you remove all factors of one color, you will not be able to add factors of that color until refreshinging the page. To stay on the safe side, it is recommened to add new factors first prior to removing others. Alternatively, giving an input of 1 to orange and red factors and and input of 0 to green factors will render the same result as if they were not included. In any case, you can always refresh the page.
Lastly, all inputs should be entered as decimals (ex. 0.5), integers (ex. 1), or scientific notation (ex. 1e-7 which equates to 0.0000001 or 1e+7 which equates to 10,000,000). When entering large numbers, do not include commas. Leaving an input blank has the same effect as entering 0.
Once you are satisfied with your equation, hit the submit button to see the results!
Made by Nicholas Pfeifer