Hellene,
Yes, I do. Life in the galaxy, and all galaxies is as common as the grass, I believe.
There was a special space telescope put up that looked for planets around other stars by measuring the small ~1% decrease in the star's brightness when the planet passes between us and the star, eclipsing a small part of it.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kepler_(spacecraft)
It was discovered that almost all stars have systems of planets. Some of those planets will be at the right distance so oceans don't boil, too close, or freeze, too far. It is expected that on some fraction of those, life will arise spontaneously. On some fraction of those it will evolve to intelligent technological life.
If on a planet around a nearby star there was a civilization similar in technology to ours, the strong radars that are used at airports to guide the planes in during heavy weather would be detected at an observatory like Green Bank, if we were lined up correctly. About 1/3 of the Green Bank telescope time is used for just such searches. They are under the name SETI, Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence.
I am alert to see it in my data, though Andromeda is so far away, 2.5 million light years, that I don't expect Andromeda SETI, but might accidently be pointed in the right direction so stars in our own galaxy are being detected too.
I am an atheist and scientific rationalist. I explain this to Christian religious people like this: the universe is so much bigger than when the bible was written, it makes no sense that a creator would put life on only this planet. There is a mismatch of scale. To my mind the creator and creation are the same thing, recreating itself everywhere all the time. Physics is the pattern of that recreation, but quantum mechanics teaches us that we can not predict what will happen exactly. The universe can surprise us by what it becomes. As part of that universe, we can surprise ourselves! I ask Christians this, if God has created intelligent life in many places, then if God is merciful, God must have offered salvation from sin there too, because any sufficiently intelligent creative creature sins, that is does evil things, if not intentionally, then because they don't understand the consequences of their actions, or there is no path of action that doesn't do harm. So... I ask, what was the Sermon on the Mount there? But it is sort of a tease, a way to try to make that person think on a bigger scale.
The physicist Fermi asked "where are they?", to mean, if there is technological life on planets around other stars, wouldn't we have visitors? My answer is the distances are so great, there is no practical way to make the journey, but the science fiction writers think otherwise!
