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NASA's big announcement is…
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deadkennyFree Member
Aliens!
…
well, no. Bunch of exoplanets around a relatively nearby star which are around Earth-ish size and at a distance that maybe could support lift, although very close to the star but it’s quite dim so still makes it a habitable zone, possibly, maybe, they don’t know.
So the media of course are all over it saying 7 Earth like planets have been found, probable life, and plastered with NASA’s pure fantasy artists impressions based on data that does little more than confirm the positions and an estimate of mass of each. But that’s enough to suggest aliens.
40 light years. Sounds close. I’ll still be dead by then most likely even if someone could set off right now at the speed of life to get there (currently technology, impossible). Send a signal now in that direction and it will take about 40 years. Anyone at home, 40 years for the reply.
One report quotes someone saying they think they’ll discover life there within 10 years. Yeah, we can’t even discover life on Mars, which is a hell of a lot closer.
Oh and then there’s a catch – they’re tidally locked, i.e. faces permanently face the star (not sure how they conclude this, beyond estimating it from their orbits somehow). This means they are likely to be boiling hot one side and freezing cold the other. Kind of a spanner in the works for life.
km79Free MemberThis means they are likely to be boiling hot one side and freezing cold the other.
No more fighting over the office aircon thermostat! A side to suit everyone!
Rubber_BuccaneerFull MemberSend a signal now in that direction and it will take about 40 years
Maybe they set out to invade earth years ago and are nearly here 🙁
devashFree MemberThis means they are likely to be boiling hot one side and freezing cold the other.
So all the males work on one side and all the females on the other? A world without conflict over the office air con 😆
EDIT: km79 got there first.
johnx2Free Memberif someone could set off right now at the speed of
lifelight to get there… it will take about 40 years.Not if you’re on the ship because, erm, relativity <waves arms>
Maybe they set out to invade earth years ago and are nearly here
Excellent point. We’ve been broadcasting about long enough for some near light-speed vessel to be getting close (assuming it spends half the trip accelerating and the other half decelerating. No, I’ve not done the sums).
molgripsFree MemberOne report quotes someone saying they think they’ll discover life there within 10 years. Yeah, we can’t even discover life on Mars, which is a hell of a lot closer.
As usual, there’s more to it than that.
They can detect gasses in the atmosphere, so if they detect oxygen in there then there’s probably life. Not because oxygen creates life, but because life creates oxygen. If there were no plants here to replenish the oxygen eventually it would all react with stuff and disappear from the atmosphere.
However, on Mars there isn’t atmospheric oxygen, but they are still looking for the possibilities that a) there used to be life a long time ago and b) there’s some kind of rock-based bacteria still left.
So any Martian life would be really hard to find; but there might well be obvious life including trees, animals, Taco Bell, 50s hairstyles and all the rest of it on these planets. The presence of oxygen suggests this is likely; its absence does not rule life out.
tenfootFull Memberthey’re tidally locked, i.e. faces permanently face the star (
So, if they’re not spinning, would that mean no gravity then? Would that be right? Does that mean they wouldn’t have an atmosphere either? Or am I being a simpleton?
wwaswasFull MemberJust think, they’ve just got used to glam rock and now punk’s suddenly appeared and Margaret Thatcher’s leading the Tory party.
I’ll be dead before they find out about Trump. Which is good – I imagine alien laughter is really cutting.
whitestoneFree Member@tenfoot – no, gravity is due to the mass of an object not whether it spins or not.
beanumFull MemberThey can detect gasses in the atmosphere
How? Genuine question…
I get how they can identify a planet or planets due to the period dimming of a (very faint) star. In this case, as the orbits are so quick it didn’t take long. I just about get how they can estimate size of the planet and distance from the star by the “wobble” of the shadow that passed over the star.
What I totally don’t get is how they can determine the presence of gas in the atmosphere of the planet…?tenfootFull Member@tenfoot – no, gravity is due to the mass of an object not whether it spins or not.
Dim of me.
SammyCFree Memberhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absorption_spectroscopy
Tidally locked just means the nice temperature zone is in the twilight area, on the side between the sun facing side and space facing side.
thisisnotaspoonFree MemberWhat I totally don’t get is how they can determine the presence of gas in the atmosphere of the planet…?
Shine a light through the atmosphere and see which wavelengths are absorbed.
Everyday example: ‘microwaves’ are absorbed by hydrogen bonds in water.
molgripsFree MemberDoes that mean they wouldn’t have an atmosphere either?
Whether or not you have an atmosphere depends on whether or not you have a magnetic field. The stream of charged particles coming from the sun would strip away your atmosphere if you didn’t have a magnetic field to divert them. That’s what happened to Mars. It used to have a magnetic field, now doesn’t.
Our magnetic field is generated by our spinning molten iron core.
bikebouyFree MemberEarth-ish size and at a distance that maybe could support lift,
I could have done with that lift earlier when riding into a 40knt headwind.
&
f someone could set off right now at the speed of life
Whose life ? Mine, Yours, someone else’s ?
Is confusing
deadkennyFree MemberD’oh, (blames autocorrect 😀 )… but even then speed of life or light, it’s 40 years of my lifetime, and as a 40something already male I’m statistically not going to know anything about it.
jam bo – Member
I guess you’re a glass half empty kinda guy…And the above is why. I can’t get all that fired up over yet more exoplanets that we’ll hear little more about for 1000s of years and I’ll be long since dead.
Now more on discoveries in our own solar system, or otherwise a way to live for 1000s of years to see all this stuff in the future, then yeah I’m buzzing over that 😀
eemyFree Memberso if they detect oxygen in there then there’s probably life. Not because oxygen creates life, but because life creates oxygen
Says who? I reckon intelligent alien life breathes Hydrogen or something like Alienogen – an element unknown to puny man!
KlunkFree MemberThe planets may also be tidally locked to their star
so they don’t actually know one way or the other.
bikebouyFree MemberYeah, damn autouncorrectikles.
Still, the “find” is an interesting conundrum. Do we spend £b’s going out there to find a warm ring around each that “may” hold life, or do we wait for LGM to have a poke around our blue rock ?
Whose to say they already haven’t been here and left Nigel Farrage as an example to us all ?
KlunkFree MemberIt does tell us that any alien civilization, equal or more advanced than us, within 50 lightyears probably has a good idea we are here.
km79Free MemberIt does tell us that any alien civilization, equal or more advanced than us, within 50 lightyears probably has a good idea we are here.
Obviously, I mean someone sent us here in the first place didn’t they? They probably had it well documented back home. Although they must have found better planets, otherwise they would have came back for an update. Unless we were sent here as criminals like what we done with Austrialia.
bikebouyFree Memberyoive got a double post because the “option” menu didn’t load.
bikebouyFree MemberBinDun, droped here because we were problably not getting along on the previous planet.
crimsondynamoFree MemberIf a planet is tidally locked does the lack of spinning mean they won’t have a magnatic field, hence no atmos and no van allan belt? i.e chances of life even slimmer?
One sometimes wonders if NASA sensationalises these things to get a bit more research funding (not that that’s a bad thing).
CountZeroFull Memberif NASA sensationalises these things to get a bit more research funding (not that that’s a bad thing).
I think it’s more that the mainstream meeja likes to put a spin on things (snigger), the usual ‘well, if there’s life on other planets, why hasn’t it contacted us?’ bollocks is either deliberately or through wilfull ignorance skipping over the fact that life doesn’t have to have reached a level of sophistication that would enable it to get into space, or if it had, just decided that the effort isn’t worth the candle. There are human societies on Earth which are at a more-or-less stone-age level of sophistication, and probably have been for millennia.
Also sentient creature may well not have the means to gain a highly technical level of technology – crows are intelligent enough to be self-aware, to use tools and count, and have what appears to be a fairly sophisticated level of communication, but they’re hardly likey to be able to develop much further.
And I’m not ignoring the fact that birds are closely related to sauropods, but it’s still unlikely they could develop the toolmaking skills to build complicated machines, and the same is very likely true of the majority of alien species/races, but that doesn’t make for colourful newspaper headlines…deadkennyFree MemberNow for reality.
“With today’s technology, there’s no way that anyone alive right now could make it to TRAPPIST-1 in a lifetime. While discussing the new discovery at a news conference today (Feb. 22), NASA officials suggested that it would likely take at least 800,000 years to reach the TRAPPIST-1 system.”
Though Stephen Hawking has a crazy concept idea that might make it in 200 years.
sbobFree MemberThey can detect gasses in the atmosphere, so if they detect oxygen in there then there’s probably life. Not because oxygen creates life, but because life creates oxygen. If there were no plants here to replenish the oxygen eventually it would all react with stuff and disappear from the atmosphere.
Not wanting to start an argument, but isn’t that a bit arrogant? 😕
CharlieMungusFree MemberSays who? I reckon intelligent alien life breathes Hydrogen or something like Alienogen – an element unknown to puny man!
But they still obey the same laws, alienogen can not be something with which we are completely unfamiliar
jimdubleyouFull MemberI note the year (orbital period) of most of these planets is less than 13 days.
That’s going to make for some interesting weather if any of them do spin & have a tilt…
I reckon they will look like 75% of the planets in No Man’s Sky
JunkyardFree Memberalienogen can not be something with which we are completely unfamiliar
What exobiology would like is a nothing more than pure speculation
What we find will be both “familiar” and “unfamiliar” depending on what you want to look at
I agree its not likely[ or remotely probable] to be based on a new hitherto unknown element.
CharlieMungusFree MemberWhat exobiology would like is a nothing more than pure speculation
Sure, but not completely open or unbounded.
What we find will be both “familiar” and “unfamiliar” depending on what you want to look at
Alienogen was a suggestion about what they might breathe, which is what led to the following.
I agree its not likely[ or remotely probable] to be based on a new hitherto unknown element.
It might be a new element, but not one that we could not conceive of, nor be able to deduce some properties of.
molgripsFree MemberWhat exobiology would like is a nothing more than pure speculation
Speculation is neither guesswork or fantasy. It’s well informed speculation, as was covered recently on a similar thread (about exobiology.. I love STW…)
Chemistry is going to be the same everywhere in the universe.
JunkyardFree Memberyes chemistry will be the same everywhere but we are talking about life and biology and the reality is until we have some data is it is little more than speculation bereft of any evidence.
speculation
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noun
1.
the forming of a theory or conjecture without firm evidence.molgripsFree Memberyes chemistry will be the same everywhere but we are talking about life and biology and the reality is until we have some data is it is little more than speculation bereft of any evidence.
As I said, it’s informed speculation, based on lots of knowledge.
Biology is constrained by chemistry, and we understand a fair bit about that. So what we know won’t work for life on earth also won’t work on other planets.
The reason scientists speculate is to direct their research. So although they don’t have any firm evidence of life on them YET, the stuff we already know about them suggests it’s a good place to look. Otherwise we are simply searching in the dark. To dismiss this discovery because it’s also associated with speculation is.. well.. I’m not sure what your point is tbh.
CharlieMungusFree MemberAnd the idea of chemistry, biology, physics etc. being ‘different’ sciences is artificial and recent and now I wonder if it is a Western construct
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