[LibWhacker]

Okay, I think there probably are ETIs somewhere out there. But I'd say, just off the top of my head, the variables Isaac Newton "sent to zero" more than 300 years ago are no closer to it by now than the probability that aliens are manufacturing blue giants in the galactic bulge! That's a leap (over the shark) too far even for me. imho

[freedumb2003]

The galactic bulge:

[Uncle Miltie]

Haven’t we had enough Weiner posts today already?

Just say “NO!” to Galactic Bulge!

[BenKenobi]

Most likely there’s still some star formation going on. That’s the simplest explanation. If 95 percent fit the curve and 5 do not, it wouldn’t take very much star formation to account for the five percent. Especially given the ages of the globular cluster.

I used to do this back in the day, our models of stellar evolution are pretty good, but they are all statistical in nature.

Most of what we know about stars comes from the Hyades cluster. Back in the day we didn’t have good data on their distances, now we do.

http://www.rssd.esa.int/SA-general/Projects/Hipparcos/pstex/hyades_paper.pdf

Knowing the distance and the brightness means that we can refine the H-R diagram.

[Vince Ferrer]

gigantic astroengineering may be extremely difficult to tell apart from entirely natural phenomena, in which case Occam’s razor surely comes into play.

The old Design/Evolution debate again. How can we determine whether a space phenomena is designed by an intelligence, or the result of natural forces?

[null and void]

Sinkhole:

Diamond mine:

==================================================================

Volcano:

Pyramid:

[SatinDoll]

Attention: little blue stragglers in the Galactic Bulge. Ignore the fatties at post #2. (Not so cryptic when you see them!)