problem is a planet with significantly higher gravity isn't really "habitable," at least not in the traditional sense. the other difficulty is that no matter how advanced telescope technology is, it's still hard to see an Earth-size planet from any significant distance. The method astronomers most commonly use to find extrasolar planets is looking at a star with a wonky orbit- that usually means that, in the absence of another star, a planet is probably causing the interference, giving scientists a place to look. The problem is that for this to be detectable, the star has to be small and the planet has to be big, especially if there's going to be a reasonable chance that the planet is in a habitable zone. this means that most discovered extrasolar planets are huge, and orbiting red dwarfs, meaning their surface gravity tends to be ridiculous.
First Habitable Planet Confirmed by French Scientists
- Thread starter Greg Tito
- Start date
Well technically, intelligence requires something similar to a human body. We know any intelligent life form will have opposable fingers. We know alien organisms would require a liquid similar to our blood in order to transport whatever they use for breathing to their major organs. The skull would be as big as ours, if not bigger, in order to house a large brain. They'd have skin, obviously, to protect against UV radiation. They'd have all the organs we humans have for obvious reasons. By the way, this does not necesarelly mean those organs would look like ours. What I'm saying is that their organs would have to perform the functions of our heart, kidneys, liver etc.Deathfyre said:
Still, in the end, the only true similarities intelligent life forms would share would be opposable thumbs, bipedal movement and a large skull to house the brain. Whilst we'd have similar organs that would perform functions similar to ours that does not mean they'd look like ours do.
I just fucking LOVE this. Too bad our governments have their thumbs up their asses as far as any space travel is concerned these days.
Economically it may make "sense" but theres prolly a few worlds out their with dead civilizations that made the economical choice of cutting space travel.
Economically it may make "sense" but theres prolly a few worlds out their with dead civilizations that made the economical choice of cutting space travel.
They've found many possibly habitable worlds. Oddly I do remember another Gliese one from a different system. Well not that it matters since theres no way we're getting there soon. xD
You know, what really is the guarantee that this planet can even support life? What if it doesn't even have an oxygen atmosphere, or what if all the plant life is poisonous or something? What happens if we spend trillions on a colonizing mission and the ship gets there and the planet has been destroyed by a meteorite? Sheesh, call me when we actually get tangible proof.
[link]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13423085[/link]Racecarlock said:
TL;DR: The planet was discovered years ago, but originally thought to be incapable of supporting life. New research has since show this initial assumption to be wrong, hence the news story.
OT: If this planet can support life, but is 20 light years away, how can they have heard the word of our Lord? To the Jehovah-mobile!
"perpetual murky red twilight"
Red dwarfs do not produce red light, while they are not as bright as our sun they are still hot enough to appear white. Our sun is a yellow dwarf and we don't live under yellow light.
Brown dwarfs give off significant heat but not significant light and this probably would be a dim red glow from a human perspective. But red dwarfs are hotter than your average light-bulb and they don't look red.
Red dwarfs do not produce red light, while they are not as bright as our sun they are still hot enough to appear white. Our sun is a yellow dwarf and we don't live under yellow light.
Brown dwarfs give off significant heat but not significant light and this probably would be a dim red glow from a human perspective. But red dwarfs are hotter than your average light-bulb and they don't look red.
Exactly. The planet seems to lie in an orbital region for liquid water on its surface. That does not equate to "habitable". Mars is in an orbit where liquid water is possible, and we don't call that habitable.Darth_Dude said:
The conditions on Earth have changed quite alot over the years, including a few different ways of being what we would call "uninhabitable" (including once when the planet was frozen over, without its orbit being any different, mind).
Am I the only one getting tired of these things pretending to be massively exciting news?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Valkyrie
^ Would cost us a decade of income of the entire planet, but it would get us there in, what, 22 years? And it would feel much shorter for the crew!
But no, it's not the most hospitable place I can imagine. Our cardiovascular systems wouldn't last a month. Imagine spending 22 years in a can, and then dying on a 2G planet of an aneurysm...
EDIT: Oh, sorry, the craft would have to accelerate and decelerate from 0.92c, so... it would take more than 22 years, probably a lot more. But still orders of magnitude less than a space shuttle would take!
^ Would cost us a decade of income of the entire planet, but it would get us there in, what, 22 years? And it would feel much shorter for the crew!
But no, it's not the most hospitable place I can imagine. Our cardiovascular systems wouldn't last a month. Imagine spending 22 years in a can, and then dying on a 2G planet of an aneurysm...
EDIT: Oh, sorry, the craft would have to accelerate and decelerate from 0.92c, so... it would take more than 22 years, probably a lot more. But still orders of magnitude less than a space shuttle would take!
Let's start colonizing! Remember, name it Eden Prime so that when the Reapers attack, we can act like we fucking called it.
