Slashdot Mirror
Most Stars Are Single
An anonymous reader writes to tell us Space.com is reporting that 'for more than 200 years, astronomers thought that most of the stars in our galaxy had stellar companions. But a new study suggests the bulk of them are born alone and never have stellar company.' The key difference seems to come from the difference between the highly turbulent clouds that produce massive stars in groups and the less active smaller clouds that produce red dwarfs."
Since when does the slashdot community care about Bradiffer?
I bet these lonely stars spend most of their time hanging around myspace.com.
Uncensored Google results requested and delivered by email
What? RTFA? Huh, you're new here.
Anyway, where was I, oh yeah, Stars and their divorce rate...
And CmdrTaco is still happily married
Yes, but are you? Has unfettered capitalism helped?
...how often we have to unlearn what we've been taught for so long by scientists. This has been one of the more basic tenets of astronomy, something almost always mentioned when discussing extrasolar planets at any length. And now we're being told that two hundred years of teaching was wrong?
The longer I live, the less enamored I am with science. I was always taught that it's this great infallible thing, that science only knows fact. This is a prime example of just how wrong science can be. I suppose I'm just going to have to become a creationist now, at least they never change their stories.
(that last part was a joke)
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
The majority of stars and the majority of Slashdotters have something in common?
Chances I can get together with Natalie grately rise this way! Now, should I start the conversation by interesting her in multithreaded C programming, or stick with the tried and true oldies of PEEK and POKE...
So does this mean that the big two-for-one sale at http://www.starregistry.com/ will have to be rethought?
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Natalie, here I come with a bucket of hot grits!!! .....huh?..Oh, those stars... ;)
Rats!!!
I knew it was too good to be true!
That's the beauty of science, update your theories when new data is recieved.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
"Most slashdot users as well..."
We all realized how far down in quality Slashdot has sunk when the first thought on everyone's mind when they saw this title was, "I can think of way more married stars than single ones."
In astronomy class 4 years ago I learned that most solar systems were binary or more complex, so this is very interesting news indeed. I wonder if this improves the chances of more solar systems having planetary companions, since I'd think it less likely for binary or trinary systems to have planets since more matter in the system is taken up in star mass.
This might also increase the calculable possibility for habitible planets in our galzaxy too.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
my current girl problems, when put in perspective, arent that bad, seeing as how i've only been trying for 5 or so out of my 16 years and stars have been trying for billions :P heh suddenly all the crap last weekend and week has been put into perspective, thanks slashdot :)
I mean, have you ever been around any big stars, movie or rock? They're mostly huge assholes. Imagine two of them trying to have a relationship.
Oh, wait...
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
And here I thought I was going to learn how I might have a shot at Kate Beckinsale or Lucy Liu, but instead it's only some lame story about astronomy. Thanks for getting my hopes up once again slashdot!!!
sheesh!
While the results of the star survey do not disprove the nemesis theory, they do seem to lessen the chance of it being correct. With red dwarves being being the most likely suspect for nemesis (see http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/ nemesis_010320-1.html/
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nemesis_(star)/) and at the same time not likely to be a companion star, I guess they'll have to look for different astrological suspects.
Then again, I could be wrong.
Not real scientists huh? Well we'll see what you say when we take another one of your labs and lock you people out of the bathroom on the 3rd floor!!!!
Ha HAA!!
It's been here a while. Are you new here? Because well, a bunch of tech geeks finding humor in headlines, especially with regards to sex & dating, is not a recent trend. With the proper choice of words and phrasing, it's still funny, too!
Yes, we understand these tags always apply: fud, dupe, typo, slashdotted, topic name
The article goes on to explain that red dwarfs (tiny stars, much smaller than the sun) are much more common that sun-like and larger stars, and that red dwarfs are much less likely to be binaries. So, in total stars are more likely to be single.
However, from my reading it seems that the conventional wisdom that most sun-like stars are binaries is still true. I once learned the humorous mnemonic "Three out of every two stars is a binary".
I thought most of the stars were divorced at least once.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
That counts. Ummm um ummm um um!!!
For those who care about the background, the binary frequency has been shown pretty clearly to depend on mass. Solar-mass stars have binary frequencies of at least 60%, stars of 0.5 solar masses have binary frequencies of ~35%, and very low-mass stars and brown dwarfs (under 0.2 solar masses) have binary frequencies of around 10-20%. The binary frequency among more massive stars appears to be even higher than for solar-mass stars.
The popular reason to care about binary frequencies is to determine the frequency with which planetary systems could occur. If you're interested in habitable planets around solar-type stars, the higher binary frequency is one to care about. The frequency with which planets could form around lower-mass stars is intrinsically interesting since they're so common, but they're also much harder to detect any of these planets using existing indirect methods, so it's a harder question to actually answer. Once we have the ability to directly image planets, the problem will invert itself since it's easier to see planetary companions to faint stars than bright stars.
Microsoft delenda est!
You're right. The longer I live, the less confident I am that science provides the answers human beans wielding it say it does, too.
Problem is, the longer I live, the even less confident I am that { religion | philosophy | technology | love | sex | games | sailboats | witty dialogue | et cetera } provides any reliable answers, either. I'm almost beginning to suspect the problem is not with the tools but with the tool-users...
But anyway, it's a question of relative rates. I think if you live long enough, you find you get disillusioned with science slower than any other branch of human endeavor. So...science wins!
Me too me too!
The popular reason to care about binary frequencies is to determine the frequency with which planetary systems could occur.
And this is probably because it impacts the probability of intelligent life elsewhere, yes?
But the thing is, I have my doubts about the formation of habitable planets being the rate-limiting step, the key term in the Drake Equation, so to speak. I'm thinking the rate of spontaneous creation of life could be the really tough step. Maybe the rate of habitable planet formation isn't awfully important to SETI.
You see why most Stars keep single is , that ones that have recently suffered a tough break up seem to Join Scientology .
Others who have had relationships with Black holes have said "Once you've gone Black , there is no going back, especially once you cross the event horizon"
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
The longer I live, the less enamored I am with science. I was always taught that it's this great infallible thing, that science only knows fact. This is a prime example of just how wrong science can be.
Science has theories and theorems. Theorems are proven; theorems are fact. On the other hand, theories are probably true, but not proven yet. The theory that most stars are binary was ...a theory, i.e. not yet established with any scientific proof. So it is hardly disappointing for me that there was a change. In fact, I am glad there is this change, proving that science is the only way to go. And I think you or anyone else should not be disappointed as well.
Holly: Look, we're travelling faster than the speed of light. That means, by the time we see something, we've already passed through it. Even with an IQ of 6000, it's still brown trousers time.
At least someone understands.
That should be: "You must be new here"
IIRC, it's essentially impossible for any planet to have an orbit that passes between the two stars, so the only way for a binary system to have planets is for the stars to be close enough together and the planetary orbit far enough out that the planet(s) orbit the center of mass of the pair. That nearly precludes life-as-we-know-it since you're looking at very cold orbits. Based on my memory of lectures some years ago, though, fwiw.
--Parity
'Card carrying' member of the EFF.