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Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#51

Post by happytoexplain »

IAmGraydon wrote: post #44

Read the last sentence of the article. Bias warps perception. This shouldn't even be posted here.

>Asked if there is a clear leading candidate explanation for 'Oumuamua's acceleration, Loeb referred Live Science to a not-yet-released book he authored called "Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth," due for publication in January.

I don't understand - is it unexpected that the person forming an argument for the alien hypothesis has written a book about it? That's not usually what people mean when they say "bias", and it's even further from being a good reason that the entire article "shouldn't be posted here". Or are you just making the assumption that the book's dumb "clickbaity" title must mean the author is full of shit?

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#52

Post by throwaw4y-plate »

dogma1138 wrote: post #26
rosstex wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have failed to account for the fact that we live in a simulation.

Background sprite object and a physics engine bug, can I haz noble prize now?

You stop that, no fun allowed!

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#53

Post by knob »

kentonv wrote: post #47

My pet theory (which is not intended to be taken too seriously) is that it is indeed a discarded light sail, and that light sail in particular was used to transport a Von Neumann probe which detached at some point after the object entered our solar system but before we first observed it. This detachment, in addition to leaving the sail tumbling, would have changed its trajectory, meaning our estimation of which direc…

That reminds me of the books We Are Legion, We Are Bob.

I really enjoyed those!

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#54

Post by [deleted] »

rendall wrote: post #28
bluedays wrote: post #2

This is pretty cool. I am constantly looking at current events and thinking to myself "what if aliens were watching this?". I feel like it sorta puts things in perspective for me. Seeing that this might be a possibility is sorta thrilling.

"what if aliens were watching this?" There is an archetype of the Mysterious Stranger, an innocent, naive observer of our culture, who finds us incomprehensible because we are Just Terrible. We make war, pollute, enslave, etc, while this archetype is pure. Examples: K-Pax, Powder, Dostoyevski's The Idiot, Crocodile Dundee all have elements of this archetype The thing is, the only reason this archetype has any meaning…

[deleted]

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#55

Post by kentonv »

jameshart wrote: post #49
kentonv wrote: post #47

My pet theory (which is not intended to be taken too seriously) is that it is indeed a discarded light sail, and that light sail in particular was used to transport a Von Neumann probe which detached at some point after the object entered our solar system but before we first observed it. This detachment, in addition to leaving the sail tumbling, would have changed its trajectory, meaning our estimation of which direc…

Which forces the logical conclusion that this isn't the first such probe, obviously.

That could only be true if they are intentionally hiding from us, rather than replicating and harvesting the solar system as fast as they can. But personally I have a hard time believing that hyper-intelligent devices would care about avoiding detection by lowly biological organisms like us.

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#56

Post by perl4ever »

_aky4 wrote: post #8
bluedays wrote: post #2

This is pretty cool. I am constantly looking at current events and thinking to myself "what if aliens were watching this?". I feel like it sorta puts things in perspective for me. Seeing that this might be a possibility is sorta thrilling.

Further we look into the void, further we see how vast it is in length of time and breadth of space. And in that void we're a tiny speck of dust on an already tiny speck of dust. For me, looking at zoomable deep space telescope imagery, it's a 50/50 proposition, either we have the only miracle of life in existence, or it's prolific. Deepest visible light image of 10,000 galaxies - https://www.spacetelescope.org/image…

>it's a 50/50 proposition, either we have the only miracle of life in existence, or it's prolific.

This seems like a false dichotomy. There could be 200 billion planets with life in the universe...but only about one per galaxy. Someone did a probabilistic analysis of the Drake equation, and found out that indeed, given the known facts (that we don't see any life yet, how life appears to have developed on earth) that a substantial likelihood exists that the density of life is right in the range where there are many instances but we will never see one. It's sad to never get closure, but it's irrational to deny it's a possibility.

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#57

Post by datameta »

happytoexplain wrote: post #51
IAmGraydon wrote: post #44

Read the last sentence of the article. Bias warps perception. This shouldn't even be posted here.

>Asked if there is a clear leading candidate explanation for 'Oumuamua's acceleration, Loeb referred Live Science to a not-yet-released book he authored called "Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth," due for publication in January. I don't understand - is it unexpected that the person forming an argument for the alien hypothesis has written a book about it? That's not usually what people…

It seems obvious to me that if one intends to make money from a theory it is in their best interest to champion said theory even in the face of conflicting research and alternate explanations.

Re: Mystery of interstellar visitor 'Oumuamua gets trickier

#58

Post by sdenton4 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #35
ekimekim wrote: post #23

> Asked if there is a clear leading candidate explanation for 'Oumuamua's acceleration, Loeb referred Live Science to a not-yet-released book he authored called "Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth," due for publication in January. I don't know enough about the science to have an informed opinion, but it seems to me that if the main skeptic is also selling a book based in their exciting…

First sign? The first was probably the irrigation canals spotted on mars. Then repeating radio signals. The face on mars. Tabby's star. Each had their day as the first sign . The first real detection won't be some slight variance that we debate for years but solid evidence. If Oumuamua was a triangle, that would be solid evidence. It isn't aliens until it is.

Well, even a 'giant triangle' may still not be enough... There is a giant hexagon on Saturn, after all. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn%27s_hexagon
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