Super Earths: More Surface Area to Evolve Life, but More Gravity to Keep You From Leaving

Super-Earths have more surface area and may be more likely to evolve life merely for this reason. But ironically those planets have higher gravity that makes them harder to get off of - and that life is therefore more likely to be trapped. This is similar to the idea that planets closer to the galactic center might be more likely to have life because they're older, but less likely to have life because those planets are more subject to bombardments triggered by more-frequently close-passing stars, supernovas or gamma ray bursts. When the same cause (larger terrestrial planet) can plausibly have two contradictory effects and we can't decide which one will dominate, that shows how little quantitative knowledge we have and how little we really know with any confidence.

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