Distance is 120 light years. So whatever we see is 120 years in the past. Getting there within a reasonable time frame is impossible with our current technology (an unmanned rocket will still needs 1000s of years). The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either.
NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
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Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#12Time to build a railgun in space and get some probes to K2-18 b.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#13If the presence of dimethyl sulphide is confirmed, what would the next steps be? Presumably sending a probe would not be feasible in any foreseeable timeframe?
Well... nothing? These kinds of news pop up from time to time, but that's the end of it. It's ridiculously far away, and there is little we can do, at least within any foreseeable time frame.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#14If the presence of dimethyl sulphide is confirmed, what would the next steps be? Presumably sending a probe would not be feasible in any foreseeable timeframe?
The problem is, when would we get an answer? Even in the best case, that would be 240 years. But we don't have the capability of building probes which approach the speed of light, so with current technology, it is probably hundreds of thousands of years.
So the short term solution (in the order of decades) is improve the observation capabilities. More observations with the JWST should give a better idea what the next iteration of a space telescope for this job should be and give some motivation of accelerating building such a telescope. JWST itself took decades to build and deploy. It would be remarkable, if an improved telescope could be deployed in a 10 year time frame. Of course, an operational Starship would help a lot with that, as a lot of effort for JWST was the complex deployment mechanism.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#15Distance is 120 light years. So whatever we see is 120 years in the past. Getting there within a reasonable time frame is impossible with our current technology (an unmanned rocket will still needs 1000s of years). The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either.
> The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either.
Unless 'it' left a long time ago and is already here.
I always feel the 'space is big haha no one can cross it' argument is weird due to always framing it in our own frame of reference. What if the hypothetical 'thing' is like a jellyfish and time isn't as big an issue, or an AI that definitely doesn't care about time. Or a bundle of fungus that doesn't necessarily care one way or another.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#16Distance is 120 light years. So whatever we see is 120 years in the past. Getting there within a reasonable time frame is impossible with our current technology (an unmanned rocket will still needs 1000s of years). The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either.
> The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either. Unless 'it' left a long time ago and is already here. I always feel the 'space is big haha no one can cross it' argument is weird due to always framing it in our own frame of reference. What if the hypothetical 'thing' is like a jellyfish and time isn't as big an issue, or an AI that definitely doesn't care about time. Or a bundle of fu…
If you have enough acceleration , you can travel 1000 light years in a human lifetime.
It’s just that when you return, at least 2000 years will have passed on earth.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#17We can expect these posibilities:
1. no life
2. simple life
3. advanced intelligent civilization
In the first two cases, we need to send a physical probe there. In the third case it might be enough, and much faster, to send communication signals there and get answers back. The third case is also arguably the most interesting.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#18If the presence of dimethyl sulphide is confirmed, what would the next steps be? Presumably sending a probe would not be feasible in any foreseeable timeframe?
The best time to send a probe to an exoplanet is 200 years ago. The second-best time to do it is now.
Perhaps not, if the speed you can drive a probe is increasing with technological development it might be a waste of time to send a probe that'll be overtaken by its newer sisters.
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#19Distance is 120 light years. So whatever we see is 120 years in the past. Getting there within a reasonable time frame is impossible with our current technology (an unmanned rocket will still needs 1000s of years). The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either.
> The good news: if there is intelligent life it will not easily get here either. Unless 'it' left a long time ago and is already here. I always feel the 'space is big haha no one can cross it' argument is weird due to always framing it in our own frame of reference. What if the hypothetical 'thing' is like a jellyfish and time isn't as big an issue, or an AI that definitely doesn't care about time. Or a bundle of fu…
Even simpler: you send out self-replicating AI drones in advance—to every star in the entire galaxy. That guarantees permanent security. The drones assess if alien intelligences have any potential to become a threat, and if so annihilates their planet, by autonomous decision.
Takes a few million years to set up... but that's just a blink of an eye on cosmic time scales; a brief era in the galactic-scale lifespan of an advanced civilization. (The civilizations that don't do something like this don't live that long).
Re: NASA says distant exoplanet could have rare water ocean, possible hint of life
#20We can expect these posibilities: 1. no life 2. simple life 3. advanced intelligent civilization In the first two cases, we need to send a physical probe there. In the third case it might be enough, and much faster, to send communication signals there and get answers back. The third case is also arguably the most interesting.
Why not aim an antenna at it, and download the answers to the questions of the universe?