which greatly diminishes the chances of one just like it, one orbiting a star directly but with enough of an iron rich liquid mantle around an iron-nickel solid core to generate a protective magnetic field to deflect much solar radiation, with a tiny co planet to stabilize its rotation. The speculation for some time is that small planets orbiting gas giants farther away from the star might be better places to look for life in general, so some out of the box thinking is starting to take place.
Then again, life seems to exist here wherever there is a source of food energy to exploit. Cases in point are bugs eating hydrogen sulfide in deep caves and bugs growing in radioactive waste water here and in the UK, cleaning up the waste. Eventually, when science figures out how to remove the "elephant's foot" deep inside Chernobyl #4, they might find bugs happily chowing down on it and making it much smaller than anticipated. The habitable zone is getting bigger and bigger.
However, the one thing all these organisms have in common is phosphorus.
Intelligence is a little tougher. We're in the infancy of looking for it, too, and have discovered even bacteria demonstrate degrees of self awareness and intelligent behavior. We know other species are likely intelligent at our own level, the problem is communication.
Consider the humble slime mold: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/slime-mold-smart-brainless-cognition/
= new reply since forum marked as read