First Habitable Planet Confirmed by French Scientists

[matrix3509]

Wow this is old sauce. Granted I follow astronomy news, but JEEEZ guys, way to be behind.

Assuming the article is actually true (which it is not), none of the planets in the Gliese 581 system have even a slim chance of supporting human life. Take for instance the fact the star in question is a red dwarf and that the planet in question orbits its star at .146 AU. That is WAY close enough to be tidally locked to the star. We know what that means: Blazing hot day side and freezing nightside. Thanks to its proximity to its star, every bit of its possible atmosphere will either be frozen to the ground on the nightside, or already boiled off into space.

Also, all of this is beside the fact that Gliese 581g doesn't really exist, its discovery was based upon both erroneous math and erroneous data collection.

See, this is why sci-fi nerds have no business in actual science, always ready to announce something to the world only to be reeled back in by the people who actually matter, and have their shitty math corrected by people who actually do proper investigation of the facts.

 

[-Dragmire-]

Luckily, a group of astronomers from the National Centre for Scientific Research in France believe that the fourth planet - unimaginatively labeled Gliese 581d - is just right.

You know, I wonder if a far off planet with intelligent life and similar space observation tech as us came out with a similar article referring our planet with an equally stupid name...

 

[RedDeadFred]

ok I just read another article on this and it says that "g" (the one that seems to be perfectly positioned in the picture) is the one that would be suitable for sustaining life. "d" would be too cold and would need to have a really thick carbon atmosphere to keep the planet heated, as mentioned in this article.
The article I will link to says "g" is the planet that will have the eternal sunrise because the planet does not rotate and the best are for living would be between the light and dark areas of the planet. This is because it would have a more temperate climate.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/100930-new-planet-discovered-first-habitable-earthike-water-gliese-581g-science-goldilocks/

This isn't considered advertising right? I'm just trying to give people some more information.

 

[punksnotdead]

I think this is kinda old...

 

[matrix3509]

I think the bigger news is that if it could support life, it could have evolved it. The bad news: With twice Earth gravity, our future alien overlords would be built like friggin' tanks. The good news: Presumably, they wouldn't be able to breathe our atmosphere if they invade before we turn it into theirs.

Actually, thinking logically, (not scientifically; I am not sure about the science behind this claim) one would think that beings on such a planet would be built smaller. Muscle mass is heavy and in large quantities inefficient. Why do you think animals have been evolving SMALLER rather than LARGER.

With double the gravity to worry about, I'd imagine everything would be about twice as small as what we have to compensate for being twice as heavy for their size. I would have to wonder how flying animals would fare there too, by that logic -- if at all.

I'm sure there is an escapist that can chime in better than me on this.

Its actually the opposite of that. In a high gravity environment, less muscle mass means less mobility (This is assuming organisms on a high gravity world need mobility, and are not anemone analogs) . It is in low or null gravity environments where large muscle mass is inefficient. All one needs to do is look at an astronaut who has spent an extended period of time in low-earth orbit. Often, they need to be hospitalized because their bones have lost tons of mass and their muscles have atrophied, add to this the incredible strain the return to gravity puts on the heart, and you have the makings of a not pretty sight.

 

[ShadowKatt]

First Habitable Planet Confirmed by French Scientists

French scientists believe that a planet orbiting the red dwarf star Gliese 581 could sustain life similar to Earth.

The title says they confirmed it.

The subtext says it could support life.

Either it will or it won't. You can't have it both ways.

 

[matrix3509]

First Habitable Planet Confirmed by French Scientists

French scientists believe that a planet orbiting the red dwarf star Gliese 581 could sustain life similar to Earth.

The title says they confirmed it.

The subtext says it could support life.

Either it will or it won't. You can't have it both ways.

The planet doesn't actually exist. Its "discovery" was based off faulty data. Honestly Steven Vogt, the scientist behind this should be fired for his retarded sensationalizing of a complete hoax. Not even bothering to confirm his findings with new measurements and then blabbing to the media is just unprofessional in the extreme.

 

[The Random One]

If my name was Zarmina, I wouldn't want anything named after me. Ever.

On a more serious note, so, what kind of technology do we need to see if it actually has clouds? (Or, um had them twenty years ago?)

Several of these planets fall within the star's "Goldilocks" zone, neither too hot from proximity to the star nor too cold from being too far. If a planet is too hot, all water would be steam but if its too cold then it would be ice, neither of which can support life.

It should read human life, people should stop assuming that because life evolved on Earth, this exact set up is the only way life can thrive, instead the thought process should be life evolved in this particular way because of these particular set up

The thing is, either life on the universe follows the parameters we know, and so we can tell how likely a planet is to have life by looking at things that are elemental to Earth life such as water, or it doesn't, and it could be just about anything and we gain nothing of scientific value in trying to guess what it's like. So it's better to assume that life requires things such as liquid life then to imagine the entire planet Mars is covered in dusty silicon beetles.

At any rate, experts can't think of any way life can happen without those parameters, so if they were outside we might not even recognize that as life, Jim.

 

[CalPal]

Eden Prime?

Hey, if no one's given it an official name, that's what I'm going to start calling it. In fact, I think we should petition NASA or other scientific communities and whatnot to name Gliese 581d "Eden Prime".

 

[rayen020]

The bad news is that even though the Gliese 581 is fairly close to Earth, cosmically speaking, it would still take a very long time for us to get there. Even if we could travel at light speed, which last I checked was still technically impossible due to Einstein's little theory, it would still take us 20 years to reach the Gliese 581 system. If we used the same technology that was used to launch the shuttle Endeavor this week, the journey to Gliese would take almost 300,000 years.

Actually, given our current physics theories, if we were traveling at near light speed, it would probably just take a couple weeks to get there.

That is, assuming we can find a way to do that and keep it going for 20 years. But if we did, it wouldn't take much time at all.

...well, it would seem like a few weeks but by the time we got back to earth your children would have prostate cancer. also communication lag would be a *****.

 

[Compatriot Block]

It can't support us...
Launch all nuclear weapons!
If we cant have it then no one can!

a group from Australia announced the discovery of a sixth plant in the Gliese 581 system

Wait! We've only discovered 6 plants so far? We're pretty oblivious to our surroundings, no?

you...
you have no idea how hard this is do you?

a group from Australia announced the discovery of a sixth plant in the Gliese 581 system

Wait! We've only discovered 6 plants so far? We're pretty oblivious to our surroundings, no?

Only 6 in the Gliese 581 system, we are actually better at this than you would think.

WOOOSH

He's pointing at the typo. "Plant" should be "Planet." Just a joke, not a jab at our space-faring prowess.

 

[Escapefromwhatever]

Now to get working on the light speed, if not faster-than-light, travel. Because we could actually get there even with just the light speed stuff, which is nifty.

 

[ZombieGenesis]

SIMPLE QUESTION.

If it were possible to maintain civilised life in a space environment over the 300,000 years of travel it would take to get there... Why would we NEED PLANETS?

 

[Escapefromwhatever]

SIMPLE QUESTION.

If it were possible to maintain civilised life in a space environment over the 300,000 years of travel it would take to get there... Why would we NEED PLANETS?

That was just a fun fact, dude. He wasn't saying it was a viable option.

 

[ZombieGenesis]

SIMPLE QUESTION.

If it were possible to maintain civilised life in a space environment over the 300,000 years of travel it would take to get there... Why would we NEED PLANETS?

That was just a fun fact, dude. He wasn't saying it was a viable option.

I know, but isn't it an interesting consideration?
After all the work into maintaining a stable living environment for inter-planetary travel, suddenly people notice we don't even need planets anymore.
And then what?

... Space Colonies.

Commence daydreaming.

 

[Canid117]

It can't support us...
Launch all nuclear weapons!
If we cant have it then no one can!

a group from Australia announced the discovery of a sixth plant in the Gliese 581 system

Wait! We've only discovered 6 plants so far? We're pretty oblivious to our surroundings, no?

you...
you have no idea how hard this is do you?

a group from Australia announced the discovery of a sixth plant in the Gliese 581 system

Wait! We've only discovered 6 plants so far? We're pretty oblivious to our surroundings, no?

Only 6 in the Gliese 581 system, we are actually better at this than you would think.

WOOOSH

He's pointing at the typo. "Plant" should be "Planet." Just a joke, not a jab at our space-faring prowess.

Damn speed reading foils me again.

 

[Googooguru]

Post Should read

"Hypothetically ,based on random observations that may not have relevance, French Scientists Jump the gun and take A wild Guess that can never be Disproved"

 

[Escapefromwhatever]

SIMPLE QUESTION.

If it were possible to maintain civilised life in a space environment over the 300,000 years of travel it would take to get there... Why would we NEED PLANETS?

That was just a fun fact, dude. He wasn't saying it was a viable option.

I know, but isn't it an interesting consideration?
After all the work into maintaining a stable living environment for inter-planetary travel, suddenly people notice we don't even need planets anymore.
And then what?

... Space Colonies.

Commence daydreaming.

Now you've got me thinking of the Doctor Who episode "The Beast Below.". To Netflix!

 

[deckai]

Dense CO2? Not very habitable after all.:/

Well the earth had at some point in time also a dense carbon dioxide atmosphere, when all the other factors are right, the density of CO2 should be no problem.

The gravitation on the other hand.. imagine everything weighting twice as much. While maybe no problem for short time visitors, in the long run, we would have to face some serious problems like pregnancy issues or back trouble.