Four Earth-sized planets detected orbiting the nearest sun-like star

Post by kuschku » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 9:21 PM UTC

ballade wrote: post #116

yohann305 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope Elon Musk reads your inquiry

I would incredibly surprised if he hasn't already thought about similar things. I remember in an interview last year he stated that the Interplanetary Transport System SpaceX is building for whisking humans to mars and other celestial objects in the solar system will be tiny in comparison to the spaceships that humanity will build in the latter half of this century. Bear in mind, the ITS has more than 3x the lift-off…

Post by hnau » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 9:22 PM UTC

spenczar5 wrote: post #129

ExactoKnight wrote: post #101

I am flabbergasted that as a society we aren't rushing to build a 100 metre wide telescope mirror large enough for us to directly image the spectra of the potentially habitable exoplanets around us. A telescope this large could tell us whether any of these potentially habitable planets contain oxygen, and thus, biological processes. Yet thanks to funding cuts in science the biggest telescope we have in the pipeline r…

Very large telescopes can achieve great resolving power, but they run up against atmospheric turbulence, particularly in many of the spectral regions we care about for checking out exoplanets. Radio light passes right through the atmosphere for the most part, which is why you see very large radio telescopes, but they're not very practical for infrared or visible light scopes. Space-based telescopes are a better avenu…

Post by kuschku » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 9:28 PM UTC

jogjayr wrote: post #113

svachalek wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

12 light years is actually very close as interstellar distances go. Such a mission could probably be launched in our lifetimes if the whole world got together behind it (which they won't but still...)

From a practical standpoint though (assuming that every nation decided to work together) how would such a mission work? We'd most likely need a generation ship, given that current estimates of max velocity is in the range of 0.5 to 0.8c. That means spending trillions of dollars and putting thousands of people in a ship in orbit, sending them off and most likely never seeing them again. But before that we'd want to se…

Post by function_seven » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 9:32 PM UTC

cetalingua wrote: post #133

ExactoKnight wrote: post #101

I am flabbergasted that as a society we aren't rushing to build a 100 metre wide telescope mirror large enough for us to directly image the spectra of the potentially habitable exoplanets around us. A telescope this large could tell us whether any of these potentially habitable planets contain oxygen, and thus, biological processes. Yet thanks to funding cuts in science the biggest telescope we have in the pipeline r…

>Why are we here, and are we alone How about we first at least try to understand life on Earth? We are definitely not alone, there are other conscious beings on this planet. After decades of studies we still have no idea what a humpback whale's song means. Bottlenose dolphins have at least 2 if not 3, sound generating mechanisms that could work simultaneously. The amount of information that can be encoded is enormous…

Post by theonething » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 9:42 PM UTC

function_seven wrote: post #147

cetalingua wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why are we here, and are we alone How about we first at least try to understand life on Earth? We are definitely not alone, there are other conscious beings on this planet. After decades of studies we still have no idea what a humpback whale's song means. Bottlenose dolphins have at least 2 if not 3, sound generating mechanisms that could work simultaneously. The amount of information that can be encoded is enormous…

I'd rather not have astronomers working on decoding dolphin calls. You imply there's a shortage of biologists, and if we just suspend space exploration and divert those minds to marine biology, things will get better.