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More on the Waterworld Goldilocks Planet
goldilocksmission writes with this snippet from Goldilocks Mission: "News spread recently about a super-earth-sized planet that has been recently discovered to contain one of the most essential compounds for life to exist in the universe: water. ... GJ1214b is a massive planet that can house about six earths and is about forty light-years away from us. ... The significant discovery leap of detecting Gliese 581d to the more goldilocks planet oriented GJ1214b is a testament to the advances in the technology of detecting earth-like exoplanets."
I thought it was going to say beer.
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
How did they get fuel for the fricking jet skis?
As a serious answer, the Goldilocks zone is the orbital distance that lends itself to an earth-like amount of incident solar energy and (potentially) a higher likelihood of life friendly conditions existing.
The porridge isn't too hot or too cold... it's just right.
If you RTFA there is nothing new here. In fact this is more of an advertisement for some wackjob organization called Goldilocks Mission. "The Goldilocks Mission is sending an open invitation to men and women around the globe between 18 and 34 years of age, healthy in every way and in top physical and psychological condition, and who have read the book, GOLDILOCKS MISSION: Man’s Next Migration." They are looking for "Skydets" who will live in a "Space Center" "in a corner of Southwestern New Mexico" to research humanities next migration to the stars. It has the feel of a new cult.
Contrary to what the article states, MEarth is not an amateur astronomy group. MEarth is headed by the former Discover Magazine's Scientist of the Year, Harvard professor David Charbonneau. The business of identifying tiny changes in the brightness in the star from among an ensemble of thousands of carefully selected targets is no easy task. That being said, many amateur scientists have been able to follow-up and confirm transiting planets. I say amateur, but many have telescope rigs and detectors costing upwards of $50k (USD). In that sense, the amateur community has contributed greatly to the follow-up of transiting planets. Also, the article mentions GJ 1214 to be 300 times "cooler" than the Sun. It's 300 times less luminous, not cooler (although the stellar surface is cooler by a factor of a few). I will wait for the confirmation of water from transit transmission and absorption spectroscopy.
Surface gravity isn't just determined by density either - there's also the distance from the center of mass to be considered. I got the impression that the planet's mass was measured at 6 times earth, but it's actual diameter was not determined. Technically, it could be anything from a ball of Uranium half the diameter of earth to a loose saturn-like cloud collection the size of Neptune. (Saturn's average density is less than that of water.) The surface gravity of the Uranium-ball planet would be much higher than that of the cloud, mainly because of the distance from the center of mass, since gravity falls off fast with greater distance. With a mass of 6x earth, there technically _should_ be a diameter at which the planet actually has a surface gravity similar to earth.
The real question on everyone's mind is when can we start having sex with the exotic natives?