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

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

#181

Post by ExactoKnight »

JCharante wrote: post #169
meric wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't believe you like the idea of discovering alien life so you can use the discovery to troll religions. Surely there's other reasons why this is exciting?!

I always thought the big deal of finding life on other planets would be to deal a major blow to creationism.

Even a negative finding holds important implications: if we successfully survey all of the exoplanets within 100 to 1000 light years and find no life or anything even close being habitable for humans, then it would gravely inform us of the ways in which we must preserve the Earth that we have.

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

#182

Post by aaronblohowiak »

ugh123 wrote: post #168
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…

I'm all in favor of science funding, especially projects that drive and give back technology capabilities to society. But I would like to see more balance and preference to solve hunger and poverty around the world. To me that question is high on the list as well. And preferably more so.

What would your target be for government funding of space as a percentage of all government spending?

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

#183

Post by ExactoKnight »

gnaritas wrote: post #178
redthrowaway wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is because most of society is still struggling with day-to-day tasks like getting housing, clean water, reliable food, healthcare and dealing with physical conflicts. It's been nearly 100 years since anyone struggled with that in the West. Nobody's expecting Eritrea to put a satellite in orbit.

> It's been nearly 100 years since anyone struggled with that in the West. You have go to be joking.

You can nitpick the exceptions, but his general point about affluent living standards existing for 100 years in the West for most people is true.

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

#184

Post by ExactoKnight »

function_seven wrote: post #179
cetalingua wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No,not exactly. There is a shortage of funding and also of creative approach. We cannot ask a question "are we alone" unless we know exactly what a whale sings about (if anything) or what crazy complicated dolphin or beluga chatter means. Besides, if we are ever to encounter any sort of alien life, how can we decode any signals or messages if we cannot even decode our own earthlings signals?

> We cannot ask a question "are we alone" unless we know exactly what a whale sings about (if anything) or what crazy complicated dolphin or beluga chatter means. I don't follow. You could say the same thing about any Earth-bound phenomena. There is an endless supply of interesting things to study on our planet. There's also an endless supply of space exploration waiting for us. To pick one to the exclusion of the ot…

I dream about the day where the U.S.'s spending on its military, and its spending on science research, are flipped.

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

#185

Post by gpderetta »

ant6n wrote: post #92
Tossrock wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The math is actually quite simple to do yourself, your dilation factor is just 1 / sqrt(1-x^2), where x is a percentage of c from 0 to 1. So at 0c, your factor is 1 (obviously), at .5c it's 1.15, and at .9c it's 2.294. Divide the elapsed time in the stationary reference frame by the dilation factor and you get values that roughly agree with yours.

Of course at 0.9c, the non dilated travel time is 22 years, brought down to less than 10 years due to time dilation.

oh, yes of course, going faster you would obviously arrive earlier even in earth frame of reference :)

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

#186

Post by SOLAR_FIELDS »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #167
redthrowaway wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is because most of society is still struggling with day-to-day tasks like getting housing, clean water, reliable food, healthcare and dealing with physical conflicts. It's been nearly 100 years since anyone struggled with that in the West. Nobody's expecting Eritrea to put a satellite in orbit.

Nobody's expecting Eritrea to put a satellite in orbit. Worth pointing out that Ghana just did. If we waited until we "solve all our problems here at home," as the GP suggests, we'd still be calling to each other from neighboring trees in a jungle somewhere.

Slightly pedantic but it's also worth pointing out that Ghana basically used Japanese technology, academic resources and equipment to launch the satellite.

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

#187

Post by mastazi »

WednesdayThrow1 wrote: post #172
BigChiefSmokem wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless they can explain to their shareholders what the benefit of that overwhelmingly long-term investment will be I don't see it happening. Maybe after SpaceX becomes a massively profitable company in the same vein as the tech giants, but not before. Bill Gates also made it painfully clear that he wants his money to go to issues we can resolve right now here on Earth like renewable energy, clean water, fighting dise…

I've yet to see a non emotional explanation for why diversity hiring is good over meritocracy, yet that is thrust upon shareholders.

I am afraid that you are being downvoted by people who didn't get your point at all.

Not everything a company does is always related to medium-short term returns and most shareholders probably get that.

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

#188

Post by bpodgursky »

hueving wrote: post #128
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…

>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. This is because most of society is still struggling with day-to-day tasks like getting housing, clean water, reliable food, healthcare and dealing with physical conflicts. Even people rich enough to not be stuck in the s…

The world had less reliable housing, less clean water, less reliable food, worse healthcare, and more physical conflicts in the 60s, and we still had the Apollo program put people on the moon.

Only the most pathetic hacks would argue that we are the worse for having invested that money to push the bounds of exploration.

At a point, there are 6 billion people on the earth, and there will always be _some_ problems unsolved, whether that is because a few countries are trying to collapse, or because we have found new first-world problems to agonize about in the US.

It's a question of whether we will spend 10x the cost to solve the last 10% of those problems, or spend that money moving forward as a civilization.

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

#189

Post by mbfg »

Would there be any value in putting a telescope on the moon? You wouldn't have the atmosphere problem, and i'd expect servicing it would be mildly easier than have it out at L2 or something.?

I suppose the fact that the moon was tidally locked would be something of a problem for full sky observation. Is that the main issue?

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

#190

Post by ExactoKnight »

Balgair wrote: post #132
saganus wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't building a 100m telescope incredibly hard? does that kind of technology exist already? (I genuinely don't know). Also, what would the effect of the atmosphere be in such a large telescope? would a bigger mirror increase or decrease the effects of Earth's atmosphere for these kind of observations?

Noise is noise. If you put gain on the signal in general, you'll put gain on the noise too. That's why James Webb is in space and the 30 Meter Telescope (TMT) is in Hawaii, less atmosphere and clear air means less noise inputted. Still, the TMT is pretty darn good. So yes, you are correct, bigger telescope means more noise (in gestalt) while in atmosphere. THe reason bigger is better is because you can resolve smalle…

> If the TMT costs X, then the 100-MT should cost about 11X, and with the 15% doubling factor, its ~15X for only a 3X increase in radius.

The Thirty Meter Telescope cost $1 billion. So the 100 Metre Overwhelmingly Large Telescope would cost ~$15 billion using your ~15x multiplier. That's large, but for perspective: The F-35 fighter jet program cost $168 billion.

Like with the Large Hadron Collider, if the extra cost means the difference between being able to crucially measure the atmospheric spectra of nearby exosolar planets and not being able to, then the extra cost is worth it.

I'll take getting definite answers to humanity's most pressing questions, over new tools for killing people, any day.

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