Beam me up Scotty.... No intelligent life down here .
Voyager 1 and 2 still alive!!!! 38,000 mph!
- Thread starter Turboomni
- Start date
yup, only 700K years. right around the block
There's probably life (microbes, algae, simple things obviously) on THIS planet we haven't found yet.
Surely there is "life" in this solar system .. on Europa (a Jupiter moon) or Enceladas and Titan (Saturn Moons), Mars (i am betting a certainty .. because there is WATER ICE on Mars, and there' NO DOUBT it had an ocean).
ET's? the numbers (probability) say its virtually 100%. Connect with em in our lifetimes? Depends on how far away they are.
ET's been here before? I HIGHLY doubt it but that probability is NOT zero.
Last edited:
how do they find these planets? if interested, this a cool link below the pic.
Source: NASA. 5 Ways to Find a Planet
Source: NASA. 5 Ways to Find a Planet
Fratzog
Old Man with a Hat
View attachment 116624
Big NASA annoucement today.
COURTESY: AOL.
Seven Earth-sized planets have been discovered orbiting a nearby star, three of which appear to be warm enough to sustain life, according to astronomers from NASA and the European Southern Observatory.All around a red dwarf (a type of star smaller/cooler than our Sun), and 4 of 7 planets in the "Goldilocks Zone" (orbiting at a distance where water could exist on the surface as a liquid).
The newly discovered exoplanets are 40 light-years away and some may contain liquid water.
A Belgian-led team made the discovery using both space- and ground-based telescopes, spotting the planets as they passed in front of the red dwarf star known as TRAPPIST-1.
"This discovery gives us a hint that finding a second earth is not a matter of if but when," said Thomas Zurbuchen, Assoc. Admin., Science Mission Director at NASA.
No radio signals coming from it .. guess nobodies home OR they just started broadcasting less than 40 years ago and signal is not here yet
~ 3,500 planets found. Few hundred million left to discover in THIS quadrant of Milky Way, let alone the rest of the galaxy. Maybe "somebody" is out there.
My guess is that the majority of newly discovered planets in the Goldilocks band of their respective systems are likely like Mars or Venus. At best the life if it is there will be more like what we might find on Venus. No radio signals from bacteria.
Could Dark Streaks in Venus' Clouds Be Microbial Life? - Astrobiology Magazine
i'm with ya on Venus .. its 1,000 degrees on the surface, so no "life" there.
But yeah, up in the atmosphere there's a 'Goldilocks zone" with warm, liquid water droplets in which something could live.
When Venus' greenhouse runaway took place and boiled off the oceans, whatever was alive there MAY have rode the steam up into the atmosphere .. and stayed alive?
one these NEW planets .. they gotta do the oxygen, nitrogen, et. al spectral analysis, plus the other work, to see if anything is 'breathing" up there around TRAPPIST-1's satellites. As you said, they DONT appear to be broadcasting anything -- no bacterium on the radio
cool article! thanks.
Coming soon .. first pics of Sagittarius A, the black hole -- the event horizon of it that is, at the center of the Milky Way, are coming next month hopefully.
Predicted over 100 years ago by pure mathematic calculations, confirmed over and over with observations/experiments in the past 30 years, but NEVER photographed.
It took a telescope the size of the earth -- not a typo, but a real improvised solution -- to attempt this. A remarkable feat of engineering and computing.
It'll be on the news, whether successful or not this time .. and nobody but the "nerds" will care
Predicted over 100 years ago by pure mathematic calculations, confirmed over and over with observations/experiments in the past 30 years, but NEVER photographed.
It took a telescope the size of the earth -- not a typo, but a real improvised solution -- to attempt this. A remarkable feat of engineering and computing.
It'll be on the news, whether successful or not this time .. and nobody but the "nerds" will care
commando1
Old Man with a Hat
So who's paying for all this?
Me, you, and the other taxpayers (with a few Yen in loans) .. ultimately with our votes.
Tradeoffs by the folks we elect .. more guns, more butter, more moon shots, more Social security, more bridges, vs less of this, that, and the other stuff
Seriously, there was a "bit of a row" here about two years ago in another space thread. I voted for a manned Mars trip (about $5 Billion) over another aircraft carrier (also about $5 Billion).
Others? .. no frickin' way they make that deal. They take FOUR aircraft carriers and kill NASA to get that $20 billion.
Ain't no real money being spent on this space stuff -- one half of one percent of the Federal Budget. Loose change in the cushions of Uncle Sam's couch. Rounding errors.
BUT that's another thread and one in which I ultimately cannot participate very much
Tradeoffs by the folks we elect .. more guns, more butter, more moon shots, more Social security, more bridges, vs less of this, that, and the other stuff
Seriously, there was a "bit of a row" here about two years ago in another space thread. I voted for a manned Mars trip (about $5 Billion) over another aircraft carrier (also about $5 Billion).
Others? .. no frickin' way they make that deal. They take FOUR aircraft carriers and kill NASA to get that $20 billion.
Ain't no real money being spent on this space stuff -- one half of one percent of the Federal Budget. Loose change in the cushions of Uncle Sam's couch. Rounding errors.
BUT that's another thread and one in which I ultimately cannot participate very much
Last edited:
Fratzog
Old Man with a Hat
Yup the answer is obvious but I'll support pure science all day long compared to other kinds of waste...
Rand Paul Reveals $25 Million in Wasted Tax Dollars
Wind-sculpted sand dunes. Where on Earth?
Nowhere on Earth. This is Mars
Earthlike (with water) a few billion years ago. Smaller, so it cooled off faster, then Lost its most of its magnetic field, solar wind blows its atmosphere away, oceans evaporates (except for water-ice) into space .. still has weather and wind, therefore erosion shown above.
BTW .. those mesas look like "sedimentary" rocks (put down in layers). not very many ways known for you to get those formations..
Nowhere on Earth. This is Mars
Earthlike (with water) a few billion years ago. Smaller, so it cooled off faster, then Lost its most of its magnetic field, solar wind blows its atmosphere away, oceans evaporates (except for water-ice) into space .. still has weather and wind, therefore erosion shown above.
BTW .. those mesas look like "sedimentary" rocks (put down in layers). not very many ways known for you to get those formations..
we missed Voyager 2's 40th anniversary yesterday. Though I didnt see the launch, all the "space nerds" here like me may remember the day.
I was in high school .. sweatin' out a Saturday morning football practice while concluding at same time I was NEVER gonna be good enough to play that game past HS.
Fascinating machines.
Celebrating the 40th anniversaries of the Voyager launches
I was in high school .. sweatin' out a Saturday morning football practice while concluding at same time I was NEVER gonna be good enough to play that game past HS
.Fascinating machines.
Celebrating the 40th anniversaries of the Voyager launches
Cool! Thanks for the heads up. Sept 5th is the 40th for Voyager 1. Amazing isn't it they are still chugging along in fairly up and running condition.
A fun fact I remember reading it will take around 75,000 years for it to go one light year at a speed of around 38,000 mile an hour.
A fun fact I remember reading it will take around 75,000 years for it to go one light year at a speed of around 38,000 mile an hour.
gotta get that "warp drive" up and runnin' or we'll be in the same boat. unable to get anywhere without takin ' a 1,000 lifetimes.
Well Cassini tomorrow will exhaust it's fuel and fall into Saturn after a 20 year mission.
Scientists bereft over end of Cassini’s extraordinary mission
" Cassini has consumed 6,504 pounds of its original 6,565 pounds of propellant and is now running on fumes, says Earl Maize, Cassini’s program manager. There was just enough left for the probe to set a collision course."
How do they know how many pounds of fuel is consumed when the craft is weightless? I guess they know volume used and calculate it?
Scientists bereft over end of Cassini’s extraordinary mission
" Cassini has consumed 6,504 pounds of its original 6,565 pounds of propellant and is now running on fumes, says Earl Maize, Cassini’s program manager. There was just enough left for the probe to set a collision course."
How do they know how many pounds of fuel is consumed when the craft is weightless? I guess they know volume used and calculate it?
I have been waiting for this for 3-4 years or since since i first heard it discussed. Cassini has performed brilliantly btw.
on the weight thing .. you're right. in space its "weightless" but NOT "mass-less".
I think they meter the fuel as a liquid/solid volume (liters/gallons or pounds/kilo's etc.), they know the mass of the fuel in EARTH gravity conditions, so they just do the calculation of the "weight" on that basis.
good post. thanks.
on the weight thing .. you're right. in space its "weightless" but NOT "mass-less".
I think they meter the fuel as a liquid/solid volume (liters/gallons or pounds/kilo's etc.), they know the mass of the fuel in EARTH gravity conditions, so they just do the calculation of the "weight" on that basis.
good post. thanks.
yeah, i am diggin' Euclid too.
i am always stunned to know that 95% of the universe is made out of stuff we CANT SEE. dark matter and dark energy.
that stuff is all around us .. everywhere .. and we really dont know what it is since we ("normal matter) don't appear to interact with it.
the 5% "normal matter" (all of us and everything else we can see in the Universe) is the exception it turns out. frickin fascinating.
anyway i like the Mars 2020 mission too. i think because we obviously know there's water on Mars, we are gonna find something "alive" there ..for sure.
thanks for that list. all of it is really neat
Fratzog
Old Man with a Hat
For me this is the most compelling area of research in modern science. To date research has struck out in confirming the existence of dark matter and old theories are being dusted off and new theories being developed. As a science fan I'm grateful to live an era of cutting edge discovery. This article discusses some of the latest efforts in this area.
Erik Verlinde's Gravity Minus Dark Matter | Quanta Magazine
Verlinde's point is interesting .. no such thing as "dark matter".
hmm ... guess i gotta "believe in" at least two things that i do not currently.
1. a holographic universe. i don't even understand that concept as it applies to real life cosmology so i will use my complete ignorance as my defense against that one.
2. gravity behaves differently on a cosmic scale .. analogous i guess to matter behaving differently on a quantum scale.
thats a NEW idea to me. i will NOT understand the math, but the concept intrigues me. I guess i gotta read whatever Prof. Hawking says .
thanks.
hmm ... guess i gotta "believe in" at least two things that i do not currently.
1. a holographic universe. i don't even understand that concept as it applies to real life cosmology so i will use my complete ignorance as my defense against that one.
2. gravity behaves differently on a cosmic scale .. analogous i guess to matter behaving differently on a quantum scale.
thats a NEW idea to me. i will NOT understand the math, but the concept intrigues me. I guess i gotta read whatever Prof. Hawking says .
thanks.
Fratzog
Old Man with a Hat
Don't be too concerned about understanding this stuff since, as the article mentions, the leading experts have difficulty following it. I sucked at physics and math in school so I'll leave it to the experts to figure this stuff out. To my mind this is how science is supposed to work. If you find that you've been barking up the wrong tree it's time to rethink your approach.
Similar threads
- Locked
