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Gliese 581d Confirmed as 'Habitable' Exoplanet
An anonymous reader writes "A rocky world orbiting a nearby star was confirmed (PDF) as the first planet outside our Solar System to meet key requirements for sustaining life." The "key requirement" was actually a Starbucks — astronomers were pretty surprised to find out that they like their coffee burnt on Gliese 581d too.
From TFA:
However, humanity has already tried to make contact with the new planet. During Australia's National Science Week in August 2009, Cosmos magazine partnered with the Australian government, NASA and the CSIRO to run a 13-day campaign to collect goodwill messages from the public to be sent to Gliese 581d.
The initiative, known as Hello From Earth, collected 26,000 messages, which were transmitted by NASA's Tidbinbilla facility. The signal is not due to arrive until January 2030.
At which time it will be returned because we failed to include sufficient postage.
Since it's within the Goldilocks zone, I'm guessing that the Starbucks serves oatmeal not too hot, and not too cold.
Get off my launchpad!
When you get readey to go, don't forget the pox laden blankets.
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Has it only been 16 years since we discovered the first exoplanet?
I remember before I graduated university, the astronomy geeks were excited about this as something that was being worked on and the concept of finding a planet by detecting transit in front of the star made my brain hurt.
Now we can tell all of this ... of course, if it would take 300,000 years to get there with current technology, it's still unimaginably far. Still, it's hard not to believe that if there's one that might be habitable "only" 20 light years away ... the universe must simply be teeming with life.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I call dibs on the tall blue chick with the hot body and prehensile tail. ...hmm..after reading the article, it seems that she'd probably be a short , squat woman with reddish tinged skin. ..oh well, I'd still hit it,
D
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Then start Earth 2 on Gliese 581d.
It's the only way to be sure.
(We'd put all the telephone sanitizers on the 3rd ship, right?)
The importance of this isn't that we can now send a team to colonize it. The importance of this is that we now have actual evidence that there are other planets that are theoretically habitable (Gliese581d doesn't sound like a good vacation spot, but it sounds comparable to some parts of Siberia or Antartica). We just one of the lower bounds in the Drake Equation.
Given that there are very scientifically sound and obvious limitations on chemical processes involved in known or postulated life, that doesn't seem to outrageously presumptuous.
300,000 years would be longer than there have been anatomically modern humans on Earth. If we make it, by the time we get there, we'll be a whole new species.
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According to TFA it looks to be habitable in principle (using Earth-centric assumptions about complex life, of course) but toxic to humans, so perhaps not a prime candidate for humanity's first extrasolar excursion.
Sounds great for skiing!
Well since we understand the chemistry of life we classify habitable as having the ability to support that Chemistry. Liquide water is the number one requirement. Since our planet is habitable then by sheer definition any other planet that is habitable will be more or less like earth. It would be illogical to classify a planet that is totally unlike earth as habitable.
Even if it turns out that a planet like Jupiter can support life it will then be kind of like Earth because like Earth it will be habitable.
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It should get better. The Doppler planets and early Kepler results are biased toward extreme planets. By 3rd year Kepler should be seeing 1 A.U. planets.
It's a pretty loose definition of "habitable" to include only "You probably won't burst immediately into flame or turn into an instant icecube upon stepping off the ship." Methinks it might also be good to include little things like "oxygen," "survivable air pressure," "water," "soil that can support some form of planet life," "enough atmosphere to protect against cosmic radiation," etc.
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Sir,
We do not even have a self-sustaining colony on Antarctica, which is warmer than mars, and has unlimited air and water. Our colonies on Antarctica are nowhere near self-sustaining. Mars is colder than Antarctica, water is scarce, and there's NO oxygen and barely any atmosphere.
In other words, calling Mars "habitable" is like calling rocks "edible". The rocks might become edible if you ground them down to dust, added plants, and then ate the plants.
--PeterM
Antarctica is not a good comparison. The reason why we do not have a self-sustaining colony there is not primarily technical, but rather economical. It is way simpler to fly in supplies to the few research stations we have there than to setup a whole economy there. Technically - set up a nuclear reactor, use waste heat to heat some greenhouses and off you go.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
No, it confirms what was suspected, not known.
Well, NOW it's known.
And this is huge and exciting, I'm not sure why you are blase about finding a planet where life as we know it could exist.
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Maybe. It's entirely possible that whatever evolves there, if it even uses anything similar to DNA, will not have as robust of a damage repair mechanism as life on Earth. We really don't know. It's basically impossible to speculate at what "life" might be like on other planets, because we have literally only one example to go on at the moment.
I read the internet for the articles.
No, it's completely impossible, unless you've created a nuclear reactor that'll last that long? Remember we'd need energy from the sun; life rots planets, and plants use solar energy to produce sugar from CO2 + H2O. Without that energy input, the entire earth would find itself in a CO2 atmosphere, with not enough oxygen to sustain life. Other life would flourish, mostly sulfur-consuming bacteria using a thermal process in volcanic vents; surface life would die, and eventually the core of the earth will cool.
Design a nuclear reactor that will output 50% greater than operational power requirements continuously for 450,000 years. I suspect it will produce an abundance of heat; you may need to run thermocouples on it, and use an alternating duty cycle on a thermal engine. Venting the heat to space won't work very well: only heat by radiation escapes. Heat thus needs to vent back into the heating system, into power generation duty cycles, and into a huge radiative array. When the load handling capacity of the system increases, reduce the output of the nuclear reactor by thrusting in control rods (pebble bed reactors won't work here, too bulky and impossible to reclaim fuel from efficiently): as long as the system stays hot, you'll produce enough power from other things to balance the reduced operating level of the nuclear reactor. If the load on the system increases, open up the nuke some more. Otherwise, equilibrium is reached internally.
Not easy, is it?
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Well, NOW it's known.
Actually, now it is MODELED. Given that we have no direct experience with planets like this, none of the models can be directly verified, and the authors had to invent a new model just to reach their conclusion, I think it is poor scientific practice to say that is it "confirmed" to be habitable. Instead, it is confirmed that there is a possible path by which it could be habitable, but that just doesn't have the same zing to it, so instead we make wild assertions and let the sci-fi geeks salivate over what amounts to a plausible, but completely unproven, explanation for how things work. While we're at it, I have this model for how the universe was created. We have no way to verify it, but it is at least plausible. I guess we should just call it confirmed and shout down anyone who objects as unscientific.
Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
The verb I just was "doubled". My bad.
We could send all the middlemen.
On the other hand, who would sanitize the phones?
300,000 years would be longer than there have been anatomically modern humans on Earth. If we make it, by the time we get there, we'll be a whole new species.
That can work for the colonists. Consider a generational ship that slowly changes the onboard environment from something resembling earth to something resembling the destination over the trip. Gravity, temperature, chemical composition of atmosphere, etc. There would also need to be some mechanism to implement natural selection.
Of course this is most likely somewhat academic. When scientists use the word "habitable" they are generally referring to some place habitable by something other than humans, maybe something closer to algae. Humans would require sufficient technology to manipulate raw materials to create artificial environments for themselves.
My understanding as to why we are no longer evolving is that the Human population is so greatly out-bred. That is to say, the population is too large for slight genetic variations to assert themselves. Variations are quickly 'lost' in the background noise.
Your point on stimuli is valid though, but I propose that there could be a different set of stimuli entirely. A small 'closed loop' population, a scientifically 'inbred' population, (not the other form of inbred) could foster the genetic variations to take hold. They could be selective for smaller stature and better adapted for reduced/limited nutrition.
That's just a guess, there could be other factors as well.
It wouldn't make much difference. Time dilation due to relativistic effects is asymptotic at c, and only significant close to it. Even if you hit 50% of c, over the course of a 300,000 year journey, 300,000 years is still an accurate estimate. However it does not matter at all, because they are talking about 300,000 years to travel only 20 light years, or significantly less than 1% of c.
I fear we may have only 40 years left before the invasion fleet (or planet busters) arrive.
Don't you people read any (bad?) science fiction? One solution to the "Fermi Paradox" is that there ARE aliens but they are definitely NOT friendly. Once they detect another civilization they move to wipe it out. In fact maybe they do so out of prudence thinking that if they don't, the new civilization will wipe THEM out! Sort of like an intergalactic version of the MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) policy that STILL underpins the basic relationship between the superpowers.
In fact the first civilization to think this way doesn't even need to be around anymore Just start making some self replicating probes and within a very short (geologically speaking) period of time the entire galaxy will be filled with automated systems capable of snuffing out a fledgling civilization (us). (This is the plot of Greg Bear's "The Forge of God"). So instead of telling everyone "We're here, we're here!", we should be as quiet as possible like a lamb all alone in the deep dark woods filled with wolves. I didn't mind the Arecibo transmission sent out in the 70s (and used as the plot device for the movie "Species") because it was aimed at one of the Magellanic clouds; hundreds of thousands of light years away. But Gliese 581? Cosmically speaking, that isn't just next door it's on our door mat!
So great an intellect as Stephen Hawkings has expressed his concern on this so it bears thinking about! Anyway, it's too late now so let's hope that if anyone's there it's E.T. or the Vulcans rather than Predators or Aliens!
Reaction mass doesn't have to come from within the craft itself. See airplanes, where air is used. It's conceivable that we can find a way to harness all that junk out there in space. Plus, keep in mind that once you've reached a comfortable velocity, the only change in momentum you'll need is for navigational purposes. And considering there isn't really all that much junk out in space (the universe is mostly empty), navigation might not be as necessary as you might think.
Count me as one of those coffee-haters. I can't stand any coffee. I love the smell, but never got used to the taste.
Tea snob here. Gives me all the caffeine I need.
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It's preposterous to state that human evolution is over. Here's a short list of evolutionary changes from just the last 10,000 years:
* Blue, green, and gray eye variants
* Ability to process lactose as adults
* Ability to process high-starch diets without developing diabetes (the prevalence of which is much lower in populations with older histories of farming)
* Wider variety of skin tones
* Differently shaped and sized teeth and skulls from the past
And those are just surface traits that are easy to see/detect in everyday life.
More info here: http://discovermagazine.com/2009/mar/09-they-dont-make-homo-sapiens-like-they-used-to
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Evolution works with thousands and millions of years, and thousands of generations.
Not decades. And 50 years is barely enough for 2 generations.
Heck... Knock it down to the bare physical/physiological minimum (lower mark of the puberty age for girls) and even then it is only 5 generations.
Only FIVE generations. IF we accept the "eleven-year-old mother with two point five kids" option.
Rats reach five generations in about 11 months. That's 100 generations about every 18 years. Seen many rats evolve into another species during your life?
It would take about 2500 years for humans to reach even those 100 generations. And guess what? NOTHING WOULD CHANGE!
Oh... you might BREED a slightly different subset of the species in that time - but not evolve it.
Let it go for a generation or two and all those traits you tried so hard to breed out would rear their ugly head once again.
Oh and BTW... IQ has actually been going up over the last century or so.
And most of it on the "dumber" side of the scale.
In the future, try not to give too much credit to "science" you pick up from Hollywood comedies.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
You are assuming without lack of new stimuli in the closed environment of a space craft that humans would still evolve
Right, because completely changing virtually every aspect of the environment by locking a small number of humans in a closed, artificially-maintained ecosystem for generations won't introduce any additional selective pressure of any kind whatsoever. And you're forgetting the role of sexual selection in driving evolution independently of external environmental change.
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Are you familiar with the Biosphere 2 experiment? They attempted to set up an enclosed self-sustaining environment...
...and ignored all the most important advice from their scientific advisors, particularly with regard to soil bacteria, instead doing what "felt right", which was directly responsible for the disastrous results.
Biosphere 2 was an experiment that asked the question, "Can humans who ignore facts and empirically established relationships between environmental factors but instead trust their intuition and feelings create a closed, stable, habitable environment."
The answer was... and I'm sure everyone here will be shocked by this... "No."
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
10,000 years ago things were not the same as they are today. Today whether you survive to breed or not has more to do with what part of the world you were born in than any genetic advantages you might have. Evolution isn't a mystical force slowly improving life over time. Without natural selection there can be no evolution. Human evolution stopped when societies began supporting members who would not have survived on their own.
There's still sexual selection. People don't all breed and reproduce at the same rate.
The 700 Club is already building a spaceship so a Missionary can be started there.
That's just your $0.02
This is all, of couse, the inevitable consquence of "to each accoring to his need". Anyone who spends 5 minutes thinking about this realizes this: a class of people will, well, evolve, that have "appearing needy" as their core survival skill.
Hope things turn around for you!
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Fascinating!!! That's exactly what I was trying to get at, but couldn't have summarized it as succintly as you did!
Seriously, employers, banks all go on what I've done and how I've done it, and judge me "worthy", but once I'm unemployed and homeless I'm no longer "worthy" with that track record: priority does go to drug abusers, "learning difficulties" (I know loads of people with made-up problems before you start - they play doctors, psychiatrists, and benefits system), prostitutes, etc... and I am left waiting in a dangerous hostel environment, having my equipment slowly stolen (don't say "don't go out with my computer"; I game and make websites and can't have a landline here!) watching them come, stay a while and wreck themselves o drugs (being a woman I hear a new life story every day cos they all wanna tell me their stories, so don't say I don't know because I do), and they get re-housed stat.
And before anybody says "Why not find your own property?" I have no deposit and refuse to sell my few capital items that seperate me from the intellectual gutter (computers) to gain something I am supposed have a human right to (housing).
And before anybody else says "Just get a job" bear in mind I've been unemployed for a year, and the card-electric meter costs £20 per week and the rent is £150 per week, effectively imprisoning me until the Council decides to offer me a property not in demand (ie in a slum! I'd rather "black" moss side than "white" collyhurst, too - so don't go throwing accusations of racism around either!).
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Yes, and the best existing lasers can, if you're lucky, make one of those pulses in a day. Not to mention that you couldn't get a symmetric compression with 5 targets. You gotta go with one, and it has to be precisely located. Moving target? I don't think so. The laser is huge, the size of a building, tens of thousands of tons. It would have to be built in space, with actuators to move each piece of laser substrate to within microns, which means precise temperature control over the whole structure. A single piece of dust will blow a crater the size of dime in one of the optics. A fingerprint would probably destroy the optic entirely. And it has to last for 450k years? I don't think so.
You're better off building the ship out of a huge block of ice or a large comet and using a simple uranium primed thorium or pure uranium fission reactor to generate steam for thrust and electricity. Much lower tolerances needed. Fewer moving parts. Lower mass of spares, etc.
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The desire to improve my life, and the willingness to observe how the choices of others worked out for them. Have you really ever lived in a poverty (by American standards) neighborhood? You'll see both hard-working people on their way up and not-even-trying people on their way down, and the difference is obvious and the contrast stark. There are very few people in America who are so trapped by poverty that they have no reasonable way out or avenue for self-improvement (mostly the traped are kids with a strong desire for self-improvement, but too young to work legally, so the only option visible to them is the trap of illegal/drug work).
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.