Statistically very likely. I don't think we can even know the odds as the universe is so massive and unknown.
I am puzzled as to why scientists generally think that life forms have to be carbon based and live in the "habitable zone". Is it not possible that we just do not know about alternatives?
The problem is that people confuse skepticism as being a curmudgeon rather than a process. Skepticism isn't simply nay-saying any idea, it's about keeping an open mind -- accepting the possibility that a claim is true without assuming it is until the evidence bears out. Scientists are skeptics by training, but they're human as well.
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