Scientists find "possibly habitable" distant planet

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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,333
136
Originally posted by: angminas
"It's 20 lightyears away - but still close to Earth"

:laugh:

Story


Heh. I love the media. There is some REAL science in this discovery, I have no doubt, but obviously that doesn't carry enough sensationalism.
 

Kalmah

Diamond Member
Oct 2, 2003
3,692
1
76
That's an awesome discovery.. but if I signed up today to board an aircraft that can go the speed of light, I would be 64 when I got their. If such a craft was invented tomorrow.. you can bet your a$$ I'll be on it though. :D
 

Oscar1613

Golden Member
Jan 31, 2001
1,424
0
0
Originally posted by: So
Originally posted by: dman
I wonder what the scientists on that planet would calculate the temperature on MARS to be based on the size of our sun and it's perceived distance from it? I'm just guessing that Mars probably looks like a reasonably hospitable planet from 20LY away.

That said, It's still cool information. That is, until we see the colony and war ships heading towards us that left 19.9years ago at the speed of light. :p

Mars is pretty habitable. I mean, we could, with current technology build a self sustaining colony. The hard part is getting the stuff to build it over there. Same for Venus, which would be the perfect home for a "cloud city" but we can't afford to send people there...yet.

yeah and the temperatures that can melt lead and constant sulfuric acid rain... piece of cake to inhabit
 
Oct 25, 2006
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As we speak. The Inhabitants of the Planet are massing Zerglings, the US Air Force is sending Battleships to combat the threat, and the People who discovered the planet are being stalked by Snipers of the Government for knowing too much.
 

2Xtreme21

Diamond Member
Jun 13, 2004
7,044
0
0
Originally posted by: tenshodo13
As we speak. The Inhabitants of the Planet are massing Zerglings, the US Air Force is sending Battleships to combat the threat, and the People who discovered the planet are being stalked by Snipers of the Government for knowing too much.

Omg zerg rush?
 

Acanthus

Lifer
Aug 28, 2001
19,915
2
76
ostif.org
Originally posted by: Oscar1613
according to this site, the fastest exit velocity (of the solar system) is Voyager 1 at 38,600 mph, which means it would take 152,292,746 years to go 1 light year or 3,045,854,922 years to travel the 20 light years to this planet

edit: man i dont know what i was doing last night, but i must've missed a decimal or two... the actual number is 356,392 years for the 20.5 light years, not 3 billion :eek: or 17,385 years for one light year

We can significantly break that speed with current technology.

We cant, however, even come close to approach the speed of light.

The main problem being communications taking 20.5 years to reach earth, it would take incredible advances in AI tech for an unmanned craft to be able to explore it and send back information without catastrophic failure.
 

NanoStuff

Banned
Mar 23, 2006
2,981
1
0
Originally posted by: Acanthus
The main problem being communications taking 20.5 years to reach earth, it would take incredible advances in AI tech for an unmanned craft to be able to explore it and send back information without catastrophic failure.

Not really, we do it regularly within the solar system. The 'probes' perform all their necessary tasks without human intervention. No doubt AI advanced would help, but that's implied.
 

OS

Lifer
Oct 11, 1999
15,581
1
76

it just occurred to me, general relativity is almost 100 years old now and still not even a piss in the wind chance of going faster than light.

a probe would be doable, just we wouldn't see results in our lifetimes.

 

NanoStuff

Banned
Mar 23, 2006
2,981
1
0
Originally posted by: OS
a probe would be doable, just we wouldn't see results in our lifetimes.

Do you really think in the 100+ years it would take, there is no hope for developing a technology that would allow you to live past your expiration date?

Artificial Intelligence far beyond human capabilities, autonomous machines the size of a blood cell, but we won't be able to get a stem cell to differentiate in the body? Not a very realistic proposition. I for one intend to be here when the aliens arrive, and perhaps go there for an interstellar game of chess.
 

nboy22

Diamond Member
Jul 18, 2002
3,304
1
81
I just did a little crunching of numbers. that would be 3,494 lifetimes away, considering if you would be riding on a spacecraft that could go 38,000 mph, and also assuming the average length of a lifetime is 100 years
 

angminas

Diamond Member
Dec 17, 2006
3,331
26
91
That's a lot of words you're putting in his mouth. Besides, in the 1950s they thought we'd all be wearing rocket underwear by now.
 

NanoStuff

Banned
Mar 23, 2006
2,981
1
0
Originally posted by: angminas
That's a lot of words you're putting in his mouth. Besides, in the 1950s they thought we'd all be wearing rocket underwear by now.

In the 1950s they also thought we would take one day to run an angular frequency fourier transform on a computer the size of a city block. Times change incredibly, just not like anyone expects it.
 

sao123

Lifer
May 27, 2002
12,650
203
106
Originally posted by: Oscar1613
Originally posted by: Oscar1613
according to this site, the fastest exit velocity (of the solar system) is Voyager 1 at 38,600 mph, which means it would take 152,292,746 years to go 1 light year or 3,045,854,922 years to travel the 20 light years to this planet

man i dont know what i was doing last night, but i must've missed a decimal or two... the actual number is 356,392 years for the 20.5 light years, not 3 billion :eek: or 17,385 years for one light year


??? check your math

I get 17386.5 for years to go 1 light year at 38,600mph...

1 Lt Yr = 5,879,000,000,000 Miles
5,879,000,000,000 / 38,600mph = 152305699.5 hours
152305699.5 hours = 6346070.8 days
6346070.8 days = 17386.5 years

17386.5 years * 4 = 69546 Years to get to the closest star 4 light years away.
17386.5 years * 20.5 = 356423.2 years to get there.
 

gerwen

Senior member
Nov 24, 2006
312
0
0
Originally posted by: Kalmah
That's an awesome discovery.. but if I signed up today to board an aircraft that can go the speed of light, I would be 64 when I got their. If such a craft was invented tomorrow.. you can bet your a$$ I'll be on it though. :D

Actually, with time dilation from relativity, you'd age less than 10 years during the trip there on a ship that could accelerate the whole time at 1g. Almost 22 years would pass on earth.
 

Oscar1613

Golden Member
Jan 31, 2001
1,424
0
0
Originally posted by: sao123
Originally posted by: Oscar1613
Originally posted by: Oscar1613
according to this site, the fastest exit velocity (of the solar system) is Voyager 1 at 38,600 mph, which means it would take 152,292,746 years to go 1 light year or 3,045,854,922 years to travel the 20 light years to this planet

man i dont know what i was doing last night, but i must've missed a decimal or two... the actual number is 356,392 years for the 20.5 light years, not 3 billion :eek: or 17,385 years for one light year


??? check your math

I get 17386.5 for years to go 1 light year at 38,600mph...

1 Lt Yr = 5,879,000,000,000 Miles
5,879,000,000,000 / 38,600mph = 152305699.5 hours
152305699.5 hours = 6346070.8 days
6346070.8 days = 17386.5 years

17386.5 years * 4 = 69546 Years to get to the closest star 4 light years away.
17386.5 years * 20.5 = 356423.2 years to get there.

yeah thats what i got, just rounded a bit :p
 

911paramedic

Diamond Member
Jan 7, 2002
9,448
1
76
Since our space travel sucks, lets just shoot them an email and ask them to come here. Who has the best wireless setup?

Problem solved.

[SoupNazi]Next![/SoupNazi]
 

StrangerGuy

Diamond Member
May 9, 2004
8,443
124
106
Originally posted by: 911paramedic
Since our space travel sucks, lets just shoot them an email and ask them to come here. Who has the best wireless setup?

Problem solved.

[SoupNazi]Next![/SoupNazi]

It will take 20.4 years for our signal to reach the aliens and another 20.4 years for us to receive a "FVCK OFF" from them.
 

OS

Lifer
Oct 11, 1999
15,581
1
76
Originally posted by: NanoStuff
Originally posted by: OS
a probe would be doable, just we wouldn't see results in our lifetimes.

Do you really think in the 100+ years it would take, there is no hope for developing a technology that would allow you to live past your expiration date?

Artificial Intelligence far beyond human capabilities, autonomous machines the size of a blood cell, but we won't be able to get a stem cell to differentiate in the body? Not a very realistic proposition. I for one intend to be here when the aliens arrive, and perhaps go there for an interstellar game of chess.


aging is harder to reverse than pop media is lately painting it out to be, i asked my cuz who is a doc about this. People get old because there is damage everywhere and the body is worn out, down to the cellular level.

As for your nanomachines, I have actually taken a class on micromechanical systems and two of the biggest problems with those is how you are going to power them, and then how are you going to make them all communicate together. They are not big enough to use traditional radio technologies, you need a certain physical size to build antennas.

I am not holding my breath for eternal life in my lifetime.

Besides, none of those points really address general relativity and how we are going to get around it if we plan to realistically send people there. As our understanding is now, it is physical law, it's like saying that with all the technology in the world/future you're going to physically bend space from LA to NY to make the trip shorter instead of a always actually travelling a couple thousand miles. That's the implication of saying we will somehow get around relativity. Not holding my breath again.

Like I say, sending a robot is doable, the only thing is the data sent back would be for future generations.
 

exdeath

Lifer
Jan 29, 2004
13,679
10
81
All this talk about FTL probes and everyone is forgetting that once the probe gets there it will take over 20 years for the signals to get back to us anyway...

Unless everyone is simply assuming that FTL travel implies that FTL communications would be trivial.

I just hope they don't use Sony batteries. Would be a shame to see the thing explode into a fireball 38 years after launch when it only had 1 year left to get to the planet (19 years in flight + 19 years for the flames to be seen on Earth)
 

sdifox

No Lifer
Sep 30, 2005
96,908
16,174
126
Originally posted by: Jgtdragon
my question is how many years is one light year?!?!

Your question is actually how many years will it take us to travel 1 light year. Answer is "A lot more than 1 year" since we got nothing that will go that fast.
 

OS

Lifer
Oct 11, 1999
15,581
1
76
Originally posted by: exdeath
All this talk about FTL probes and everyone is forgetting that once the probe gets there it will take over 20 years for the signals to get back to us anyway...

Unless everyone is simply assuming that FTL travel implies that FTL communications would be trivial.

I just hope they don't use Sony batteries. Would be a shame to see the thing explode into a fireball 38 years after launch when it only had 1 year left to get to the planet (19 years in flight + 19 years for the flames to be seen on Earth)


if you used a robot probe with something near todays technologies, you might be lucky to get one there in a couple hundred years, after which, 20 years for a signal is not really all that much longer.

if you had a robot probe that could go FTL, you wouldn't need to wait for a signal, just build it to travel back.

it would have to be nuclear powered, some material with a long half life.

 

ShadowOfMyself

Diamond Member
Jun 22, 2006
4,227
2
0
Originally posted by: OS
Originally posted by: exdeath
All this talk about FTL probes and everyone is forgetting that once the probe gets there it will take over 20 years for the signals to get back to us anyway...

Unless everyone is simply assuming that FTL travel implies that FTL communications would be trivial.

I just hope they don't use Sony batteries. Would be a shame to see the thing explode into a fireball 38 years after launch when it only had 1 year left to get to the planet (19 years in flight + 19 years for the flames to be seen on Earth)


if you used a robot probe with something near todays technologies, you might be lucky to get one there in a couple hundred years, after which, 20 years for a signal is not really all that much longer.

if you had a robot probe that could go FTL, you wouldn't need to wait for a signal, just build it to travel back.

it would have to be nuclear powered, some material with a long half life.

This is quite ironic I think... I mean, by the time the probe was back, we would have advanced so much that we could have sent a much faster one :p
 

Acanthus

Lifer
Aug 28, 2001
19,915
2
76
ostif.org
Originally posted by: Oscar1613
Originally posted by: So
Originally posted by: dman
I wonder what the scientists on that planet would calculate the temperature on MARS to be based on the size of our sun and it's perceived distance from it? I'm just guessing that Mars probably looks like a reasonably hospitable planet from 20LY away.

That said, It's still cool information. That is, until we see the colony and war ships heading towards us that left 19.9years ago at the speed of light. :p

Mars is pretty habitable. I mean, we could, with current technology build a self sustaining colony. The hard part is getting the stuff to build it over there. Same for Venus, which would be the perfect home for a "cloud city" but we can't afford to send people there...yet.

yeah and the temperatures that can melt lead and constant sulfuric acid rain... piece of cake to inhabit

Yeah im not getting the venus assertion, mars is much more habitable.