any life near the surface would be starved of nutrients and you're probably not getting very far up the evolutionary ladder on deep sea hydrothermal vents alone.

@JonathanRay Because several orders of magnitude less bioavailable energy than photosynthesis

@JonathanRay Super-earths in general are poor candidates imo because their atmospheres are too thick for light to reach the surface and too thick for big diurnal swings in temperature that help copy RNA or whatever before it can copy itself. Also thicker atmosphere implies probably much more acidic surface which makes proteins and phospholipids etc unstable..

@JonathanRay My pet theory is that Earth, compared to similar-mass exoplanets in similar orbits around similar stars, has a very below average atmospheric density and an above average magnetic field strength due to tidal interactions (reducing the leakage rate). Both of these things being consequences of the giant impact that formed the moon and it’s probably pretty rare that two planets in the same orbit get that big before colliding. Both of these things being necessary for billions of years of photosynthesis.