Mysterious planet-sized object spotted near mercury

[Cali0602]

Wasn't this the opening premise to Independence Day?

Yes, and Independence Day was on a few hours ago on FX.

I see a connection.

So, FX staged a "ship" near Mercury as part of a pre-show for Independence Day? They're really pushing the limit of what networks will do for their movies/shows.

I wonder if they'll actually punch a hole in the moon when they air Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.

 

[Something Amyss]

this is the story (from yahoo)
"Is a giant, cloaked spaceship orbiting around Mercury?

this is ******** until you reference it. sorry the internet is simply not realiable enough to just believe people. lol especially whilst the daily mail is online.

To be fair, Yahoo kind of sucks and could very well have put that up as news.

 

[winter2]

I like it how he offhandedly not only determines it's a ship, but is also able to determine their technology. ("clearly cloaked")

This man is a genius.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

...that's no moon...that's a....ON GOSH NO! IT'S OBVIOUSLY A TERROR STAR!

It's coming to blow up our Sun! Run for the hiiiiills!!!

(I shall give a cookie to the man who gets the "terror star blowing up sun" reference!)

 

[Voodoomancer]

THERE IS A LARGE PLANET SIZED OBJECT CLOSE TO MERCURY. IT IS BLUE-GREEN AND APPEARS TO SUPPORT RUDIMENTARY CARBON-BASED LIFE.

Hah, as if you could have a life-supporting planet that close to the sun.

OT: Obviously it's just a space whale getting some tan.

 

[James Oden]

I like it how he offhandedly not only determines it's a ship, but is also able to determine their technology. ("clearly cloaked")

This man is a genius.

Let me play devil's advocate for a moment: We actually have a fabric here on earth that can bend light around it, and radar, cloaking tech is not all that far-fetched. (Source info: http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-meta-flex-brand-invisibility.html )

So there is that, plus, I have to point this out, in theory is a species could make it here from another system, odds are that they could handle a few CMEs to their hull. So maybe they just don't care. They would have to protect themselves from a myriad of known and unknown (to us) dangers, for example, gamma ray bursts.

Now, there is something a silly about the official explanation, and just hear me out on it, again, I'm not making up my mind, just gathering info. The explanation tells us how they process images, and they use images from the previous day to do so. This leaves dark spots in the final images where objects were, which you can see directly to the right of Mercury, but the unknown object is actually further than that, and the only way that could have happened is if they had used images from the previous TWO days to process them, which they explicitly contradict by stating they use images from the previous day. Follow me on this?

TL;DR: Basically I'm saying that the explanation given doesn't explain the image, but it could still be some sort of strange image artifact rather than an alien ship.

 

[Something Amyss]

THERE IS A LARGE PLANET SIZED OBJECT CLOSE TO MERCURY. IT IS BLUE-GREEN AND APPEARS TO SUPPORT RUDIMENTARY CARBON-BASED LIFE.

Hah, as if you could have a life-supporting planet that close to the sun.

OT: Obviously it's just a space whale getting some tan.

Space whales don't tan.

Let me play devil's advocate for a moment: We actually have a fabric here on earth that can bend light around it, and radar, cloaking tech is not all that far-fetched. (Source info: http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-meta-flex-brand-invisibility.html )

That's not what he was saying, though. He was noting the notion that it was "clearly cloaked."

CLEARLY cloaked. Not that the notion of cloaking technology is ridiculous, but the method of determination. Both that it's a ship AND that it's clearly using a cloaking device.

 

[Voodoomancer]

THERE IS A LARGE PLANET SIZED OBJECT CLOSE TO MERCURY. IT IS BLUE-GREEN AND APPEARS TO SUPPORT RUDIMENTARY CARBON-BASED LIFE.

Hah, as if you could have a life-supporting planet that close to the sun.

OT: Obviously it's just a space whale getting some tan.

Space whales don't tan.

Let me play devil's advocate for a moment: We actually have a fabric here on earth that can bend light around it, and radar, cloaking tech is not all that far-fetched. (Source info: http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-meta-flex-brand-invisibility.html )

That's not what he was saying, though. He was noting the notion that it was "clearly cloaked."

CLEARLY cloaked. Not that the notion of cloaking technology is ridiculous, but the method of determination. Both that it's a ship AND that it's clearly using a cloaking device.

Isn't "clearly cloaked" kind of an oxymoron?

[small]Captcha: ´optimus 1.08´. Lets call the Space whale/ship/other that![/small]

 

[Something Amyss]

Isn't "clearly cloaked" kind of an oxymoron?

[small]Captcha: ´optimus 1.08´. Lets call the Space whale/ship/other that![/small]

Oh, sure, but space whales can tan?

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

Arblus, look! It's Unicron!

 

[Zenkem]

Looks like an obvious shadow image to me, as explained by NASA, who took the picture and know the technology behind it.

Funny how someone takes "cloaked ship" as an obvious answer, considering we don't know anything about aliens nor cloaking.

 

[gbemery]

Holy galactic anomalies Batman, it's the Joker...I mean obviously it's the Babylon 4 station and the Minbari simply cloaked it and placed it in orbit around Mercury after they were done using it as a base of operations in their war against the Shadows.

Great, now we're an intergalactic dumping ground for crap people in sci fi shows don't need anymore. That would explain why Saturns rings are now made up of broken Borg cubes and bits of broken Death Star.

Well it was just a misunderstanding. They saw all of the space debris in orbit around Earth and assumed we were opening a junkyard.

 

[Zeraki]

Looks like the Reapers are starting earlier than March.

In all seriousness... I love that since we don't know what it is, that automatically means it's aliens.

 

[newwiseman]

I'm going with the official explanation on this one

 

[James Oden]

@Zachary: I see exactly where you are coming from, I just thought that was pertinent.

@Voodoomancer: And yeah, you are right, I wasn't arguing that at all. lol

 

[winter2]

Wasn't this the opening premise to Independence Day?

Yes, and Independence Day was on a few hours ago on FX.

I see a connection.

So, FX staged a "ship" near Mercury as part of a pre-show for Independence Day? They're really pushing the limit of what networks will do for their movies/shows.

I wonder if they'll actually punch a hole in the moon when they air Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.

Not sure if you are being deliberately obtuse or not here..

 

[spartan231490]

It's not a ship. The Nasa explanation looks reasonable, and there is no reason for a ship to be orbiting mercury.

You can't possibly know that. If (and I stress if) it was as ship then it could be there for any number of reasons. Just because we can't survive in those temperatures maybe they can. They could be mining resources from the surface. Planning an invasion of Earth. Or even harvesting the suns energy for fuel.

Just because Mercury is a lump of useless rock to us doesn't mean it is to "them". You're thinking like it's a ship full of humans.

No, actually I'm thinking that it's a lump of rock over 4 light years from them, at least. There have to be larger or closer sources of what they need, as mercury is both small and aforementioned really fucking far away, even from our closest galactic neighbors.

And there is no planning an invasion. If they can get here, they can kick our asses.

 

[winter2]

I like it how he offhandedly not only determines it's a ship, but is also able to determine their technology. ("clearly cloaked")

This man is a genius.

Let me play devil's advocate for a moment: We actually have a fabric here on earth that can bend light around it, and radar, cloaking tech is not all that far-fetched. (Source info: http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-meta-flex-brand-invisibility.html )

So there is that, plus, I have to point this out, in theory is a species could make it here from another system, odds are that they could handle a few CMEs to their hull. So maybe they just don't care. They would have to protect themselves from a myriad of known and unknown (to us) dangers, for example, gamma ray bursts.

Now, there is something a silly about the official explanation, and just hear me out on it, again, I'm not making up my mind, just gathering info. The explanation tells us how they process images, and they use images from the previous day to do so. This leaves dark spots in the final images where objects were, which you can see directly to the right of Mercury, but the unknown object is actually further than that, and the only way that could have happened is if they had used images from the previous TWO days to process them, which they explicitly contradict by stating they use images from the previous day. Follow me on this?

TL;DR: Basically I'm saying that the explanation given doesn't explain the image, but it could still be some sort of strange image artifact rather than an alien ship.

I'm not disputing the possibility of true cloak technology. I'm simply commenting on how he so offhandedly determines that the ship that HE sees is CLEARLY cloaked. It's just ridiculous.

And from what I have read about it, I'm believing that it is an imaging artifact. If you want it to be something else, then that is clearly within your rights. Just don't expect me to automatically subscribe to that theory.

 

[AMMO Kid]

well that makes sense. More people jumping to random conclusions again...

 

[teqrevisited]

Clearly this is the extraterrestrial equivalent to driving through a bad neighbourhood. Whenever aliens travel through our system they roll the windows up and avoid making eye contact for fear that their ship will end up on bricks if they stop to use the services.

But really this is probably nothing interesting.