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Planet Found in Double Star System

Posted by timothy on from the probably-just-some-vapor-farmers dept.

Daniel Dvorkin writes "CNN is reporting that a planet has been found in a double star system. I know, another extrasolar planet -- whoopee! But this one is different since it is in a double star system, and because given the size of the stars (the larger one is about 1.6 times as big as the Sun), the orbit (a little bigger than that of Mars), and the planet (somewhat bigger than Jupiter) it seems very possible that the planet might have a moon of roughly Earth's size and climate. I believe this is the first discovery that comes close to matching those criteria."

10 of 50 comments (clear)

  1. This might sound kinda crazy by Apreche · · Score: 4, Insightful

    But I think it's sort of pointless to look for earth-ish planets. I know that we're looking for existing life or possible places to live, but isn't it very possible there is some sort of life that lives in a drastically different environment than we do? There could very well be some crazy lifeform that lives on gas giants.
    Not only that, but all of the plaets outside our solar system are many light-years away. It takes way too long to get to them. I think time would be much better spent on figuring out how to live in unfavorable places, or change their climate to be favorable to our life. A moon colony seems a lot more likely, possible, and useful in the near future than some planet a google light years away.

    --
    The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
    1. Re:This might sound kinda crazy by WeaponOfChoice · · Score: 3, Insightful

      or change their climate to be favorable to our life

      Or we could just change ourselves to match the climate. Has to be easier than developing terraforming technology capable of dealing with all the environments we may encounter...

      --


      It's not that I'm Anti-American - I'm Pro-Freedom
    2. Re:This might sound kinda crazy by Graymalkin · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Who is talking short term besides you? Planet hunters are well aware they're not likely to set foot on a planet they discover orbiting a distant star. They're not thinking they are going to find Earth 2 and fly there. They don't look because of that. They look because they just want to see if we're really as unique as we think we are. We've gone from thinking the Earth was flat and at the center of the universe to knowing it is shaped sort of like a pear and is housed inside of a normal galaxy which turned out to not even look like we originally thought it did. Now we're seeing that not only are we not at the center which the universe revolves but there are planets orbiting stars other than our own. The next step is to find out that we're not the only intelligent group of amino acids and sugar molecules putzing around our galaxy. Hell, we're probably not the only group of self organizing amino acids and sugars putzing around our solar system.

      A moon colony has nothing to do with looking for extra solar planets. Compared to the cost of sending a bunch of stuff into space to crash into the moon in order to build stuff on it building stuff on Earth to look up at light coming from the sky is much more likely, possible, and useful in the near future.

      --
      I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
    3. Re:This might sound kinda crazy by f97tosc · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I know that we're looking for existing life or possible places to live, but isn't it very possible there is some sort of life that lives in a drastically different environment than we do? There could very well be some crazy lifeform that lives on gas giants.

      Yes there could, but that would be pure speculation. Since we know of only one planet with life, it makes perfect sence to start our search for alien life on similar planets. And it is not like we are throwing away all information on gas giants, on the contrary those are the ones that are most often discovered because of their size.

      I don't see how moon colonies (exploitation of nearby systems) should be exclusive of extra-solar planet research (distant exploration). If it is a cost issue, it is worth mentioning that the former is many orders of magnitude more expensive than the latter.

      Tor

    4. Re:This might sound kinda crazy by Tsar · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Or we could just change ourselves to match the climate. Has to be easier than developing terraforming technology capable of dealing with all the environments we may encounter...

      Why would you assume this? AFAIK, the only seriously-proposed near-term genetic engineering techniques have been the equivalent of cutting and pasting, or commenting and uncommenting, lines of programming code. What you're describing would require the ability to design whole new capabilities (methane-breathing, for example) into the genome. Of course, that would require the redesign of the entire system, so even if we can eventually pull it off, you've simply created a new species loosely based on homo sapiens, and essentially left all those "new worlds" closed to the rest of us. What's the point?

      Why would we take such a tack on other worlds when we don't even attempt it with mildly inhospitable Earth environments? Is your air conditioner or heater on right now? Is your tap water purified and chlorinated? It would be easier to simply adapt to your local climate and water supply than to develop refrigeration and water purification technologies, but the former limits you to living somewhat comfortably in one climate only, while the latter allows you to travel to any climate without harmful exposure to the elements.

      You may be a bit more adventurous than I, but if spaceflight were cheap and fast, I'd have to be pretty convinced that Planet X3141 was the one before I'd submit my progeny to be genetically engineered for its environment. Call me a Luddite, I guess.

    5. Re:This might sound kinda crazy by WeaponOfChoice · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It comes down to the ethics of terraforming (ignoring for a moment what we have done to earth). We have no real idea of the likely occurance of life in the universe or even whether we will actually be able to recognise it when we run across it. Terraforming is an inherently violent action and will almost certainly result in the destruction of whatever native life existed there.
      Done properly gen-enging people will be much less intrusive to a native ecosystem though I am fully aware that cheap, fast, accurate and reliable genetic rewriting may be much more difficult than just getting there in the first place.

      --


      It's not that I'm Anti-American - I'm Pro-Freedom
  2. Could take a while to get used to... by The_Guv'na · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If humans were to find an inhabitable moon there, and set up camp, things could be a whole lot more confusing than on Earth, with or without global warming. It was sunny and fairly temperate today. It's fscking October!!!

    Ah, anyway, the point of my post: Being on a moon around a planet that is orbiting a double star would likely make things a lot more complicated than day-night-day-night and spring-summer-autumn-winter! Not to mention the possible extremes caused by eclipses, orbit, gravity, tides, etc.

    Just a thought.

    Ali

    --
    Ph33r m3!!!
    1. Re:Could take a while to get used to... by f97tosc · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The main conditions for humans to thrive aught to be size (and thus gravity), temperature, and atmosphere.

      Sure, being on a moon around a bigger planet would make for funny (i.e., not like on Earth) day cycles, tides, eclipses, seasons and so on. But those are secondary considerations.

      Where would you prefer to live, on Mars on on Endor (given that Endor has say no seasonal variations, a 100 hour day cycle, and a spectacular eclipse twice a year).

      /Tor

    2. Re:Could take a while to get used to... by Goldsmith · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's been warm and temperate for me every October. But then again, I live in southern California... is it supposed to be cold in October?

      But back to topic... there are even more crazy things that could go on. For instance, if this planet had a vocanically active, inhabitable moon, you might see something like you have between Jupiter and Io; a large electric potential just sitting there. Couple that with the strange solar wind conditions that you would find there, and you might never have dark, the sky might always glow like the Aurora Borealis.

  3. Think so? by waltc · · Score: 2, Insightful

    It strikes me that most current thinking on the viability of intelligent life other than humanity is exceedingly anthropomorphic. Note that while some of the very same people who find the notion of starfaring sentience crowding the galaxy to be a very rational notion, they find the notion of God to be irrational. If that isn't the same old humanist-centered thinking that's dominated mankind since the flat worlders, I don't know what it is.

    When you get right down to it the only notion of extraterrestrial life most can stomach, or imagine, even, is the kind we could defeat in a face to face confrontation if it came down to that. I doubt we are anywhere near as progressed as you imagine in the sense of our ability to live in a non-man-centered universe.