Cool but someone looking at our solar system could think the same thing - that there are three planets that have life.

But Venus and mars do not

I think NASA is overly optimistic in the way they characterize their finds- there is no way to know. Yet

Reminds me of when Sagan sent a signal into space despite knowing that where he sent it life would not develop.
Earth might indeed be a privilidged planet.

The concept of a privileged unique planet in the cosmos has diminished as knowledge increases concerning the nature of solar systems develops there is an increasing chance we are not privileged nor unique considering the vastness of time and space involved. Actually many stars that supported life have existed in the distant past and have become star dust for other stars.

Yes, by 'habitable" planets they mean planets that "could sustain oceans."

Evidence for this? Until the third generation stars there was not enough "heavy" enough matter to build rocky planets.

I mean our moon is the pergect size, we have enough oxygen to breath but not to much that it is dangerous, plenty of hydrogen and nitrogen for plants, the complex andwonderful water and hydrogen cycles. We have enough land and water to lubricate tectonic plates and help manage ecosystems and temperature across the globe. Really we do something that should not be we thrive in a universe that a small change in constants means death by stars burning out.

...and with generous fudge factors built in at that. Oceans are a prerequisite, but hardly the only one necessary for sustaining, let alone starting, life.

[Pedant mode]
Who called it Trappist-1 before NASA discovered it, and how did NASA know?
[/Pedant mode]

Also commenting that they don't think life may have evolved there, they only think Earth-like life is possible there.

cool-Carl-Sagan-universe-Jupiter-clouds.jpg

It's thought there may be evidence of microbial life on Mars, given the presence of liquid water, but this is yet to be confirmed.

Carl Sagan speculated millions of life-bearing exoplanets in the universe. Much of it would be microbial...as it was on Earth for millions of years...but a relatively small number would probably have developed intelligent life given the sheer numbers of them and the utter vastness of the universe.

'. . . may have evolved'='Earth-like life is possible there.'

The possibility of life is only possible through the natural processes of abiogenesis and evolution.

the key word is "speculated."

the evidence so far is that every planet and moon we have discovered so far is unique and not like any other. To me that indicates that the conditions for life might be unique also. or VERY rare. And the conditions for intelligent life is orders of magnitude rarer than that.

I have heard scientists say that having such a large moon is essential for life having developed on Earth, and surviving. And a strong magnetic field. and a hundred other chance parameters. so just finding a rocky planet in the Goldilocks zone probably doesnt mean anything. All of these planets are tidally locked, meaning they probably dont have a magnetic field, and no moons have been found. not to mention one side would always face the sun and be burning up while the other side would be frozen

It is all just guessing with no evidence whatsoever. Scientists cant even say why or how life developed here, much less elsewhere in the universe.

now I have nothing against extraterrestrial life existing, I just think scientists should be more realistic about it.

I don't think it follows that the conditions for life might be unique.
And when the three 'habitable' planets are in the same zone as "Venus, Earth, and Mars" - two of which are not remotely habitable - that's being pretty generous.

I also have no issues with the possibility of extraterrestrial life (I enjoy reading science fiction), but its likelihood is rather low IMO.

TRAPPIST is a Belgian led project that's searching nearby small stars for exoplanets. They have two small automated telescopes, one in each hemisphere (Chile and Morocco). TRAPPIST-1 is simply the first exosolar system they found. It was originally identified as having 3 planets, the most distant of which seemed to have a very odd orbit. With the new observations, they now know that one of the things they thought was a transit of that planet turned out to be the combined transit of 3 different planets. They sorted everything out using a few weeks of time on the Spitzer space telescope (which is why NASA is now involved), which identified the remaining 4 planets, bringing the system up to 7. Of course, there could still be more that are further out and haven't transited during observations yet.