Posted on 10/14/2015 10:26:14 PM PDT by Krosan
The Kepler space telescope's job is to find faraway planets that could potentially support life. But as The Atlantic reports, scientists are exploring the possibility that the telescope may have detected something even more exciting.
[...]
When a planet passes in front of a star, the star dims only for a few hours or days, and on a regular basis-- every 365 days, for example. But, at irregular intervals, the star KIC 8462852 darkens by as much as 20 percent, and it stays dark for anywhere between 5 and 80 days.
What could cause the weird light fluctuations? The researchers who discovered the behavior call it "bizarre."
In a recent paper, researchers have ruled out the possibility of faulty data or telescope jostling. Something appears to be blocking out the light, but it's not a planet, and the star is too old to be surrounded by the rings of debris that tend to circle around younger stars. Neither do the scientists think it could be caused by a recent collision.
That leaves just a few hypotheses. One is a cloud of comets that got pulled into orbit by a migrating star--if the comets are breaking up as they revolve around the star, that could cause the irregular pattern of dimming. The paper notes that this is the most promising explanation.
There is one other hypothesis, however.
“Aliens should always be the very last hypothesis you consider," Penn State astronomer Jason Wright told The Atlantic, "but this looked like something you would expect an alien civilization to build.”
(Excerpt) Read more at popsci.com ...
Nailed it.
Isn’t that The Bird nebula?
And why would this deduction be suspected? Because so much about aliens is known? Is it also known that when these same aliens hang it up for the day they then relax over a few martinis and a handful of nuts before retiring. Please! I think not. Perhaps this phenomena was built by a higher Authority still (far above any alien life) Is there life out there. Life any crazier than that here?
Bfl
That’s funny right there. :)
It’s probably one of those “get your free phone” booths outside social services.
Types of Variable Stars: Cepheid, Pulsating and Cataclysmic
by SPACE.com Staff
(snip)
“Other pulsating variables include RR Lyrae stars, which are short period, older stars that are not as large as Cepheids; and RV Tauri stars, supergiants with greater light variations.
Long-period pulsating variables include the Mira class, which are cool red supergiants with large pulsations; and Semiregular, which are red giants or supergiants with longer periods that can range from 30 to 1000 days. One of the best-known Semiregular Variables is Betelgeuse. Irregular pulsating variables have also been identified. These are usually red supergiants, but very little study has been done on them.”
He must have an enormous schwanschtucker!
Maybe they’re starting to build a Dyson Sphere. Takes a while, ya know.
really? someone’s been reading too many bad scifi novels....just try to contemplate the amount of resources needed to make something like this...you’re talking about hundreds of entire planets, assuming each planet has the right material.
any culture with the technology to do this would have the intelligence not to waste it’s resources doing this when there are better, cheaper ways.
and yes, i’ve read ‘ringworld’. cute story, but how many solar system must be destroyed just to make it?
no
I haven’t read the “ringworld” and haven’t really done a calculation, but it seems very unintuitive that building a ring around the Sun would take materials worth of hundreds of planets.
Do you have some calculations handy?
I do admit that I have read bad sci-fi novels.
well.. what are you gonna make it out of? how much of that stuff is in the average planet - whatever that is. now think of a planetary orbit. somewhere in that orbit is a whole planet. how many of those planets would it take just to make a complete circle around a sun? doesn’t take rocket science. if one can imagine such a structure, one should also be able to contemplate the massive amounts of raw material to make it happen.
if you took all of the planets in the solar system and placed them end to end, you’d only get a very few segments of such a ring, even if you ironed them to flatten them out
I try my calculation.
This is for 50,000 meters wide and 100 meters deep ring around the Sun at Earth’s distance.
1.496e+11*2*3.14*50000*100 = 4697440000000000000 m^2
Volume of earth in cubic meters = 1.083×10^21
1.083×10^21 / 4697440000000000000 = ~230
If I didn’t err in my calculations then the material of earth can be used to build 230 such rings.
I already saw my error. I divided wrong way.
NO!! NO!!!
I take it back. I didn’t make a mistake! I divided the right way!
I am a bit drunk, sorry about that. I now maintain that my calculation was solid.
Do you have some calculations handy?
I do admit that I have read bad sci-fi novels.
Larry Niven's science fiction, including Ringworld is not "Bad" science fiction. In fact, he's probably one of the most authentic hard science fiction writers that actually tries to stick to real science and extrapolate forward.
That said, he claims he did the math and the stress on the "floor" of the Ringworld exceeds the capacity of any known substance to withstand the tidal forces. He simply labeled it "Scrith", a substance with some pretty amazing properties that simply can't exist, but has to for the story.
I took off my lazy hat and did some math myself. It is written out above in this thread. My math showed that dismantling Earth alone brings enough material to build 230 rings that are 50 km wide and 100m thick.
One of the cables came loose and drifted “down” onto the ringworld.
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