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NASA Concludes That Comets, Not Alien Megastructures Orbit KIC 8462852 (examiner.com)
MarkWhittington writes: Back in October, findings from the Kepler Space Telescope suggested that something strange was going on around a star called KIC 8462852. Kepler was built to detect exoplanets by measuring the cycles of dimming light from other stars, indicating that a large object was passing between them and Earth. But the dimming light cycle from KIC 8462852 seemed to suggest a lot of smaller objects swarming around it. Scientists narrowed down the explanations to either a swarm of comets or alien megastructures. NASA announced evidence garnered by two other telescopes that pointed to the comet explanation.
22%. Something obscures 22% of the whole side of a star larger than the sun just in our specific direction. Given that obscuration of the star in ALL directions, at 22%, is likely for long periods of time (unless some divine hand is just trying to wink this star just for us).
Anything that is in the same system of that star (and effectively angularly the same distance to us) would have to be 22% of the size of the star in almost all directions from any point of view. So unless the "cloud" or object is right "up against" the star (like a Dyson sphere, or the beginnings of one) how could a few comets create this sort of thing unless the "clouds" they create are sucked into the star almost immediately? (Otherwise an orbiting cloud would create a predictable if irregular pattern)
Sure comets are "more likely" if you just don't want to look into things with Occam's razor combined with Sherlock's favourite! The simplest explanations are the most likely ones unless they become so complex that what is left must be true.