7 Ways No Man’s Sky Gives Us A Science Boner

6. The Drake Equation

Something that a lot of science folk really like is this thing called the Drake Equation, and No Man's Sky is almost like the physical representation of the equation at its most optimistic. The Drake Equation is this: N = R* x fp x ne x fl x fi x fc x L

Make sense? Cool, let's move on.

Nah, kidding. This equation, depending on the values you input, can be used to predict the number of intelligent civilisations in the universe. It's an alien finder.

Surely, then, this equation practically gives us the home addresses of the friendly local aliens? Well, not quite, because unfortunately most of the values are currently unknown.

The first three values are easy enough: R* = The yearly rate of star formation in the galaxy, fp = the fraction of those stars with planets, ne = the number of planets in a solar system suitable for life. It's the last four values that are the problem: fl = is the number of planets with life, fi = the fraction of that life that develops intelligence, fc = the fraction of intelligent life that develops technology to send signals into space and L = the length of time those civilisations transmit those signals for.

Because of the huge variation in estimates for the values, we can get results of anything from 1 to 280,000,000, but the cool thing about NMS is that it completes its own version of the Drake Equation as we play it. We know it has 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 planets, and as everybody begins to play it, discovering new planets and life, the blanks get filled in. Obviously, there's no reason it should perfectly reflect the real universe, but it's still enough to make this nerd's science parts tingle with excitement.