  A wealth of Earth-sized exoplanets will be discovered in the coming years,
proving a large pool of candidates from which the targets for the search for
life beyond the Solar system will be chosen. The target selection process will
require the leveraging of all available information in order to maximise the
robustness of the target list and make the most productive use of follow-up
resources. Here, we present the results of a suite of $n$-body simulations that
demonstrate the degree to which the orbital architecture of the Solar system
impacts the variability of Earth's orbital elements. By varying the orbit of
Jupiter and keeping the initial orbits of the other planets constant, we
demonstrate how subtle changes in Solar system architecture could alter the
Earth's orbital evolution -- a key factor in the Milankovitch cycles that alter
the amount and distribution of solar insolation, thereby driving periodic
climate change on our planet. The amplitudes and frequencies of Earth's modern
orbital cycles fall in the middle of the range seen in our runs for all
parameters considered -- neither unusually fast nor slow, nor large nor small.
This finding runs counter to the `Rare Earth' hypothesis, which suggests that
conditions on Earth are so unusual that life elsewhere is essentially
impossible. Our results highlight how dynamical simulations of newly discovered
exoplanetary systems could be used as an additional means to assess the
potential targets of biosignature searches, and thereby help focus the search
for life to the most promising targets.
