Posted on 12/20/2017 6:44:36 AM PST by blam
"To consider the Earth as the only populated world in infinite space is as absurd as to assert that in an entire field of millet, only one grain will grow." -- Metrodorus, 4th c BC Greek philosopher
"Heaven and earth are large, yet in the whole of space they are but as a small grain of rice. How unreasonable it would be to suppose that, besides the heaven and earth which we can see, there are no other heavens and no other earths." -- Teng Mu, 13th c AD Chinese philosopher
"But I am not really willing to accept your premise, because it may well be that the means of communications they have are of a kind that we do not know how to receive, and that they would not have the means of communicating with sufficiently powerful radio or optical signals. That is something which, technologically, is too difficult for them but they would have some other means we would not recognize." -- Thomas J. Gold, 'Communication with Extraterrestial Intelligence' (Sagan, ed)
Didn’t it pass pretty close to the sun???
Up here (Southeast Alaska) we pick up after our dogs, wrap the turds in little plastic bags and ship them to Seattle...
Yes. I'm serious.
Zindi?
Zindi?
The other angle was discussed in the postwar years — planting a probe on such an object would give our technology a nice boost out of the Solar System in a timeframe we can’t manage with available propulsion.
If we can land on it, then we’ve already boosted to the object’s velocity. Perhaps it would give us a source for raw materials, maybe even rocket fuel.
According to Wiki, some now believe that multiple interstellar objects pass through the Solar System every year. If that’s the case, then we should be able to land on one eventually.
Thanks, I mean the stuff about an ‘organic shell’
No, not close enough to the sun account for speed increase - it is just assumed it must have passed by a large body, but its path as calculated does not show anything ... unless it changed course ...
We only have to match its velociity for a short time, iow, a short burn — but would have to be waiting in its path, which means we’d need either a bunch of probes waiting around for such an event, or a better observational system, perhaps in solar orbit out by Neptune.
So you're a Starbucks supplier?
They have decided to rename the mysterious object "Monica-2017BJC"
This thing comes from outside the solar system. The real concern should be to ask if it is the first rock of a huge meteor storm coming towards us.
“No, not close enough to the sun account for speed increase...”
Passing inside the orbit of Mercury is not close enough for a gravity assist from the sun?
Just going by what the astronomer said.
I guess the secret's out...
Obviously a General Products hull.
ogan·ic
ADJECTIVE
of, relating to, or derived from living matter:
Who is “the astronomer” you’re talking about?
Thanks for posting.
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