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Searching For Extraterrestrial Life Like ‘Sherlock Holmes’
sciencefriday.com ^ | 1/21/2021 | kathleen davis

Posted on 01/22/2021 7:10:15 PM PST by bitt

“Some scientists find my hypothesis unfashionable, outside of mainstream science, even dangerously ill conceived,” writes Avi Loeb, an astrophysicist at Harvard. “But the most egregious error we can make, I believe, is not to take this possibility seriously enough.”

So begins Loeb’s new book, Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth. Loeb is the director of the school’s Institute for Theory and Computation, and founding director of Harvard’s Black Hole Initiative, and he wants you to take the possibility of aliens seriously.

Back in October 2017, our solar system received a strange visitor, unlike any seen before. Scientists couldn’t decide if it was an asteroid, a comet, or an ice chunk. To this day, it’s simply classified as an “interstellar object,” dubbed ‘Oumuamua.’

For his part, Loeb is pretty sure what it is. It’s so hard to classify, he reasons, because it’s a byproduct of intelligent life outside our solar system. But how it found its way here is anyone’s guess.

Loeb joins Ira to talk about his theory, how an early love of philosophy shaped his views as an astrophysicist, and why searching for extraterrestrial life is a little like being Sherlock Holmes.

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencefriday.com ...


TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: asteroid; aviloeb; extraterrestrial; harvard; interstellar; interstellarobject; oumuamua; yurimilner
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To: Dave Wright

Dude, they’re already here & they’re the majority in Congress.


21 posted on 01/22/2021 7:46:53 PM PST by Ruger1099
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To: Jamestown1630

Always assume the worst: if other more advanced forms of life are out there there is better than even chance that they’ll regard us a a disease.


22 posted on 01/22/2021 7:47:00 PM PST by Chainmail (Remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence)
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To: Chainmail

You’re thinking according to your own human condition, in its limited capacity.


23 posted on 01/22/2021 7:49:13 PM PST by Jamestown1630 ("A Republic, if you can keep it.")
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To: Dave Wright

However, there may be supercedent that allows one to go faster than light, without violating the laws of physics. We just aren’t yet aware of those laws.

Just like, before the Wright brothers,it used to be thought that heavier than air bodycraft was an impossibility for man. However,the Wright brothers figured out how to supercede the existing known laws of physics and we now have planes.


24 posted on 01/22/2021 7:51:30 PM PST by Jonty30 (What Islam and secularism have in common is that they are both death cults. )
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To: Jamestown1630

Speak for yourself.


25 posted on 01/22/2021 7:52:07 PM PST by Chainmail (Remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence)
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To: bitt

We’ve been trolled with this for so long, I’ll believe it when one walks (or slithers) up and shakes my hand.


26 posted on 01/22/2021 7:52:24 PM PST by Viking2002 (The revolution won't need to be televised. It'll be on your doorstep.)
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To: ZOOKER

The Twilight Zone Episode “To Serve Man” was a documentary.


27 posted on 01/22/2021 7:57:11 PM PST by Don W (When blacks riot, neighbourhoods and cities burn. When whites riot, nations and continents burn.)
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To: Chainmail
"if they find out where we are"

At some point, Elon Musk's Telsa Roadster will slingshot around the Sun and exit our solar system.

Should it enter a specific solar system, those who spot/find it may track the VIN back to Musk by way of their version of F Troop.

Earth will be found.

s/

28 posted on 01/22/2021 8:01:30 PM PST by Deaf Smith (When a Texan takes his chances, chances will be taken that's for sure.)
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To: bitt

There are no extraterrestrials. As I’ve said before:

• If there were extraterrestrials, President Trump would have known about them.
• Trump can’t keep his mouth shut about anything.
• Thus, Trump would have let the cat out of the bag at some point; he didn’t, so there are no extraterrestrials.


29 posted on 01/22/2021 8:16:29 PM PST by Brookhaven (Ghost the GOP in 2022)
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To: bitt

OK, here’s the cliff notes version...

Oumuamua was long, flat and thin, unlike the cartoon rocky cigar shape
we’ve been shown as the artist depictions. It was much more reflective
on one side than the other. It accelerated away from the sun at the rate
a seriously outgassing comet would, if it had shed 10% of its mass in the
process, yet there was zero evidence of any outgassing or cometary tail
whatsoever.

We’ve seen only one other extra solar object that behaved in this fashion.
It was being accelerated by light pressure alone. It was tracked back and discovered to be a shiny booster shell for a lunar landing surveyor mission
that is presently accelerating right on out of the system. It was ours.
Man Made.

Oumuamua didn’t come from here, and it isn’t coming back, either.

The scientist suggests the possibility that Oumuamua was extra-terrestrial
shiny, thin, flat, space junk, and that we would not be being scientific in
dismissing that possibility out of hand.

~Easy


30 posted on 01/22/2021 8:16:50 PM PST by EasySt (Say not this is the truth, but so it seems to me to be, as I see this thing I think I see #KAG)
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To: Chainmail

Very intelligent and effective response. Thanks.


31 posted on 01/22/2021 8:17:47 PM PST by Jamestown1630 ("Corn Pop was a bad dude. He ran a bunch of bad boys.")
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To: Candor7

“When the day comes that they display or capture the body of an alien being, it behooves us all to just yawn.”

...or when they start to capture us. Hmmm


32 posted on 01/22/2021 8:21:22 PM PST by Pirate Ragnar
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To: bitt

My husband and I think the DEMS are aliens and they are making their move. That brown burrito that the astrophysicist is calling a space ship looks like something a DEMOCRAT WOULD RIDE.


33 posted on 01/22/2021 8:34:10 PM PST by Toespi
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To: Candor7

They’ve already done that. I yawned:

http://www.livescience.com/742-story-alien-autopsy-hoax.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9lTaQMvDvs


34 posted on 01/22/2021 8:34:16 PM PST by Jamestown1630 ("Corn Pop was a bad dude. He ran a bunch of bad boys.")
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To: Don W

That was the first thing that came to mind for me, too.


35 posted on 01/22/2021 8:38:27 PM PST by octex
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To: Brookhaven

Trump has already hinted at stuff. However,it will be Joe Biden that cannot keep his mouth shut. He’ll robotically state, “Do not mention anything about what we know about aliens.”

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/509421-doctor-retweeted-by-trump-has-warned-of-alien-dna-sex-with


36 posted on 01/22/2021 10:11:15 PM PST by Jonty30 (What Islam and secularism have in common is that they are both death cults. )
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To: EasySt

#30. The oblong object was either a volcano plug sent into space from some distant planet or a giant space turd from some alien species who I would not want to meet. If we spot their outhouse, then we will know the truth because “The Truth Is Out There”!


37 posted on 01/22/2021 11:24:56 PM PST by MadMax, the Grinning Reaper
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To: bitt

Fire In The Sky.
Five men took a polygraph to attest
to whay they witnessed. All 5
passed.
Are there thousands out there
that will swear on a stack of
of bibles they’ve seen a UFO?
The answer is yes.
Aircraft pilots both commercial
and military, have reported
sightings, and we trust them by,
at times, putting our lives in
their hands. I don’t know about
you, but I trust those in those
positions to be of sound mind.
There’s reports of entire schools
of children, and sheriffs reporting
even seeing little green men and
strange silvery craft.
Do I believe? I don’t. But I
haven’t seen one. Yet.


38 posted on 01/23/2021 12:14:33 AM PST by Lean-Right (Eat More Moose)
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To: MNDude

why didn’t he? had plenty of time.


39 posted on 01/23/2021 1:20:30 AM PST by Impy (George Washington did not concede to King George.)
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To: bitt

how about someone find some intelligent life in Washington DC


40 posted on 01/23/2021 1:20:51 AM PST by Impy (George Washington did not concede to King George.)
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