THE SCIENCE IS NEVER SETTLED: New analysis casts doubt on ‘biosignatures’ found on planet K2-18b.

Jake Taylor of the University of Oxford, who studies the atmospheres of far-away planets with the James Webb Space Telescope, did a quick reanalysis of the starlight filtering through K2-18b’s atmosphere. He used a simple method to look for the tell-tale signals of gas molecules of any kind.

He was “agnostic” in his approach, and did not look specifically for the exciting sulfur-based gases that, on Earth, are primarily associated with life-forms such as marine microbes.

“I wanted to not ‘assume’ what molecules would be in the atmosphere,” Taylor told NPR in an email. “I directly analysed the transmission spectrum that they analysed, in order to have a similar comparison.”

The results he got suggested that there’s too much noise in the data to draw any conclusions.

“Agnostic” seems like the wise approach for pretty much any scientist to use, yes?