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'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

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Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#101

Post by onetimeuse92304 »

I think the authors do not understand how planetary resonances work and how precise (or imprecise) the orbits need to be for the resonance to hold.

Resonances are very common. We have lots of resonances in our Solar system in all different places between bodies.

For the resonance to be stable, two bodies do not need to have mathematically precise orbits in relation to each other. There is quite a wide margin for error. Once two planets are close enough to the resonance, the resonance may become stable due to feedback. What happens is planets will exchange energy back and forth on each orbit in a way, that preserves the resonance. A substantial input needs to be provided to break up the resonance.

What is actually interesting about this particular system is the long chain of resonances. But that is also nothing super special -- once you know how resonances form you can see how all of the planets, when they are close enough to the resonance, will transfer energy between themselves to snap into it and then continue on their resonant orbits.

There is absolutely no reason to suggest that a resonance like this must have come from unnatural origin. It would be like saying that because the period of our Moons rotation is so precisely the same as period of its orbit around Earth that it always faces Earth with one side, that somebody must have put the Moon on the orbit. That's obviously false, these resonances form easily and naturally.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#102

Post by NegativeK »

swores wrote: post #89
tromp wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As detailed in the companion article [1], for every 54 orbits of planet 1, planets 2..6 orbit 36, 24, 16, 12, and 8 times respectively, giving successive ratios of 2/3, 2/3, 2/3, 3/4 and 3/4. After those 54 planet 1 orbits, all planets are in the same relative position. [1] https://www.space.com/six-sub-neptunes-found-100-light-years...

> After those 54 planet 1 orbits, all planets are in the same position. Could you please explain what you mean by this, as to my layman's ears that sounds like either a confusingly-worded sentence, or an impossibility (multiple planets in the same location at the same time). Do they just all pass through one specific same location once per orbit but at different times? Or something else I'm not imagining?

They're in the same position they started, at the beginning of the planet 1's 54 orbits.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#104

Post by swores »

NegativeK wrote: post #102
swores wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> After those 54 planet 1 orbits, all planets are in the same position. Could you please explain what you mean by this, as to my layman's ears that sounds like either a confusingly-worded sentence, or an impossibility (multiple planets in the same location at the same time). Do they just all pass through one specific same location once per orbit but at different times? Or something else I'm not imagining?

They're in the same position they started, at the beginning of the planet 1's 54 orbits.

Ahh, thanks

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#105

Post by arethuza »

rob74 wrote: post #26
hef19898 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or one with three planet sharing the same orbit, perfectly spaced!

Not convinced until they find a Dyson sphere...

I think Culture style Orbitals are more elegant - no need for shadow squares to create day/night cycles.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#106

Post by RheingoldRiver »

dkarl wrote: post #70
spacecadet wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LOL, better then them finding the industry 10 years ago.

I would love to see a movie where aliens show up to help us with the looming crisis that is about to destroy our civilization, and it's CSS.

It's the year 2200. The world's machines are now all AI-designed, prototyped, refined, produced, and distributed. The supply chain hasn't received human interference in over fifty years, and increasingly-accurate weather and tectonic predictions generated by computer algorithms have made supply chain errors obsolete.

But humanity is dissatisfied. With no existential threats arising, people cannot find value in life. AI-generated entertainment satisfies no one, and because no algorithm can quantify "originality," no machine would ever advise additional human involvement.

There is only one area of human civilization where AI is not involved, and that's designing the CSS specification. "But what if I want to position this element so that the ultraviolet radiation is displayed with variable additional intensity based on the size of the 3d projection on the latest gen virtual assistant, but only on Tuesdays? You can't possibly make me use javascript to account for something that common," bemoans one forum poster.

What follows is chaos. Everyone has an opinion, some thinking that the treatment infrared got in 2190 was unfair to people with unmodified vision, others believing that the accessibility option prefers-visible-spectrum more than makes up for it. Still others want more robustness than simply prefers-visible-spectrum; there should be a native way to specify the exact wavelengths of light that one can see. Minimalists argue that when experiences are delivered directly to your brain, none of this matters, but no one likes that argument.

The world hasn't experienced this large a conflict in hundreds of years, and it is unprepared. As people flock to the Great CSS Debate, they finally find a cause to believe in, even if they have no real opinion on the matter. Tempers escalate and battle lines are drawn. The AI don't possess enough training data to deal with the situation.

In the midst of the final collapse, a package is delivered late. Just one package, and just one hour late, but such a thing is unheard of. Distracted from the CSS Wars, people flock to real-time trackers of all mail delivery. Are the weather models breaking down? Did Moore's Law finally stop, and as a result the AI infrastructure cannot keep up with the power needed in today's world?

This new drama captivates the world's population so deeply that the apocalypse is avoided. And the scientific outpost of the Vrexon goes back to observation mode to await the next crisis.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#107

Post by qup »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #64
hef19898 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another question, is there something like a max. rotation speed for a planet in a certain distance to a sun of a certain size? Edit as a general response: Question answered, multiple times, thank you! Also, there my basic physics knowledge resurfaces, thank you for that as well!

There is only one stable speed at which a planet can orbit in a circle; any slower, and it'll start falling in toward the star, and any faster and it'll start to move away from the star. The only way to vary the speed is a powered orbit, and that's not likely to happen with a planet.

I respect that you reserved some room to be surprised.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#108

Post by jjk166 »

vonjuice wrote: post #24
madcaptenor wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're going to look into every resonant system shouldn't we start with the moons of Jupiter?

Are we not looking already?

We're under strict instructions to attempt no landing on Europa.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#109

Post by QuarterReptile »

swores wrote: post #89
tromp wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As detailed in the companion article [1], for every 54 orbits of planet 1, planets 2..6 orbit 36, 24, 16, 12, and 8 times respectively, giving successive ratios of 2/3, 2/3, 2/3, 3/4 and 3/4. After those 54 planet 1 orbits, all planets are in the same relative position. [1] https://www.space.com/six-sub-neptunes-found-100-light-years...

> After those 54 planet 1 orbits, all planets are in the same position. Could you please explain what you mean by this, as to my layman's ears that sounds like either a confusingly-worded sentence, or an impossibility (multiple planets in the same location at the same time). Do they just all pass through one specific same location once per orbit but at different times? Or something else I'm not imagining?

The planets have nice harmonics, so that rather than planet 1 and planet 2 having some irrational ratio (planet 1 goes around every 2.64782362 times for planet 2) it's round fraction like 1/2. When you string the whole thing, the lowest common multiple of revolutions is 54, so that only every 54 planet-1-years, realignment returns.

The researchers hypothesize that this is sufficiently improbable to point toward an embodied intelligence as the cause.

Re: 'Mathematically perfect' star system being investigated for potential alien tech

#110

Post by foofie »

jandrese wrote: post #86
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dyson spheres are probably really rare. It's just bad strategy, everyone within your galaxy knows you're there pretty much immediately when a star just up and disappears one day. Granted, the non-K2s just stare in awe maybe, but the other K2s will fuck your shit up. Can't exactly pack it up and run either, not with a medium-sized star in your suitcase.

I would assume it takes more than a day to build a Dyson sphere. But more to the point from a distant observer's viewpoint the star isn't going to just blink out. The Dyson sphere has to radiate just as much energy as the star produces, so it would probably appear just as a red dwarf. Unless the alien civilization has some way to destroy energy it will be in a constant battle to avoid cooking the inhabitants of the s…

> Unless the alien civilization has some way to destroy energy (...)

If the point of a Dyson sphere is to collect energy, wouldn't it be enough to just use it or store it?

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