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Scientists Predict Star Collision Visible To The Naked Eye In 2022 (npr.org)
Scientists predict that a pair of stars in the constellation Cygnus will collide in 2022, give or take a year, creating an explosion in the night sky so bright that it will be visible to the naked eye. From a report on NPR: If it happens, it would be the first time such an event was predicted by scientists. Calvin College professor Larry Molnar and his team said in a statement that two stars are orbiting each other now and "share a common atmosphere, like two peanuts sharing a single shell." They predict those two stars, jointly called KIC 9832227, will eventually "merge and explode ... at which time the star will increase its brightness ten thousand fold becoming one of the brighter stars in the heavens for a time." That extra-bright star is called a red nova. They recently presented their research at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Grapevine, Texas.
aren't they really predicting that the light from the stars colliding will reach us in 2022?
then it must have already happened
Speed of light and all that.
NO. They collided long, long ago, and we are only seeing the light that finally has reached us.
Msmash you are garbage and need to go.
They recently presented their research at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Grapevine, Texas.
I think you mean "they leaked their finding."
During daylight hours? If so, I'll be excited enough to mark my calendar for the year 2023. Otherwise, meh.
While MOST stars you see at night are actually very close, these stars are about 1800 light-years away. So, yeah, the collision happened long ago and we are only soon able to see it.
-- these are only opinions and they might not be mine.
Asteroid miss last Monday... n asteroid flew by relatively close to Earth on Monday morning.
Data from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) revealed that the space rock made its closest approach to our planet about 7:50 a.m. EST at a time when people at the U.S. east coast were busy making coffee, or preparing themselves for work and school.
Dubbed 2017 AG3, the near-Earth object (NEO) came close to our planet flying at a proximity equivalent to about half the distance between the Earth and the moon at a speed of 9.9 miles per second.
"This is moving very quickly, very nearby to us," Slooh astronomer Eric Feldman said during a live broadcast of the flyby. "It actually crosses the orbits of two planets, Venus and Earth."
http://www.techtimes.com/articles/191952/20170110/asteroid-barely-missed-earth-when-it-flew-by-closer-than-the-moon-on-monday.htm
Goddamn scientists, always predictin' shit and figurin' stuff out.
Selfish bastards, at this rate there won't be any new discoveries left for the next generation of scientists to make.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Three wise men will go on a journey and follow the start to the place our Lord will be born (again? what happened to his 2000 year old body?). They will bring gifts of myrrh, frankincense and gold.
I guess the tribulations aren't going to happen with all this move to live in peace with each other instead of going to war for the most puerile insult towards another power holder, so he said "OK, you missed the point. Let's try again. Satan, WTF? You had one job."
This one actually explains that the expected explosion occurred sometime in the third century since the star is 1800 light years away. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sci...
Yes we here do in fact understand that the collision did happen long long ago and it's just now the light will be reaching us. Now stop pointing it out. Any normal person would not care the difference so they don't' point it out, but for those that know how it works you should already know so don't need it spelled out.
When I fold a piece of paper, I get two sheets. When I fold it twice, I get four. Thrice folded yields eight layers.
10 000 fold is a huge number!!!
Maybe you mean "increase its brightness by a factor of ten thousand" or "ten thousand times" instead of "ten thousand fold"?
There's no provable or usable mechanism by which we can travel to any part of the Universe faster than the speed of light, so trying to make a distinction between the "light of an event reaching us" vs. "the event being observed as it happens" is semantically meaningless.
Information can't travel faster than light, and you can't currently get anywhere fast enough to prove otherwise.
Yes, but since they can't please normal people and pedants, they've gone with the description that both can easily understand.
Exactly. The idea that something 1800 light years away "happened" at time X is kind of meaningless anyway, because our colloquial measurements of time (things like "1800 years ago" or "the third century") are dependent on being stuck in our local gravity well. It's like you get a call from the White House and your kid says "Don't you really mean you got a call from the first floor?"
Well, sure. The first floor of not-your-house. It's a categorization that doesn't make sense in the context of the real universe.
Real lawyers write in C++
What Einstein already figured out is that as you approach the speed of light, in your reference, time slows down. If you reach the speed of light, time stands still.
What Einstein already figured out is what the post you replied to is alluding to. For a photon, all time is now. To the photons reaching us from this event, it is exactly the same time as when they were created. To a photon, no time passes between when it is emitted and when it is absorbed. This is one of the most spectacular implications of relativity.
Q: What is a photon's favorite song?
A: The Smiths; 'How Soon Is Now?"
Meh, I just saw Glenn Close crash the other night.
They can take my LifeAlert pendant when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
There we go... blue star Kachina will dance in the plaza.
So, basically, a question: did something happen in AD 222 (or so) to celebrate the end of Trumpdom?
it would happen in 2112, and worked in the name Rocinante somehow - I might pay more attention.
Have gnu, will travel.
When you fold a sheet of paper, you don't get two sheets. You still have one sheet.
So, it's 1800 light years away, not exactly a close neighbor, but it will be an extraordinarily energetic event, no? So how bright is it expected to be -- just another dot in the sky, or are we talking Biblical night-into-day territory? Thanks.
When that collision happened, they weren't 1800 light years away, since the universe expanded over that time, so we should use THAT measure!
For bonus points, you have to ask "And we don't know within 10 years when that happened, so we can't say what DAY it happened on, can we!??!
Which is 100% why we put when it happens in OUR FRAME OF REFERENCE. Because, like it or not, we're here in this frame of reference.
Between pedantic jackasses and failed comedians, the comments on /. have gone seriously downhill of late. Time to reevaluate the modding system?
Drill baby drill - on Mars
So we know we can observe gravitational waves from black holes colliding, would a collision of stars produce observable gravitational waves?
All Relativity theory is a mass of contradictions (see what I did there?) that no physicists actually address when brought to their attention.
Instead they wave their hands and say things about ignore this and accept that, etc. etc. etc.
Even the supposedly simplest explanations are fallacious; ironically they typically invoke metaphors that are basically a version of the motte and bailey fallacy.
...and this is why we are so dumb as a species... instead of getting our asses out there and trying to figure out if there is a way around the speed of light to travel the universe, we'd rather stay here believing we already know it can't be done, and be, as a species, as irrelevant as a whiff of smoke.
development of large ships to mine asteroid resources for use in future development.
colonization of mars and other possible solar system bodies to advance our technology and set up a human presence.
generational ships, if that's what it takes at first, to further study some of the more questionable phenomenon that might give us clues
longevity methods so that we can actually get to where we are going alive, if possible.
all things we should be doing as soon as possible, but aren't. we're too dumb. no we'd rather watch tv reruns and watch everyone we care for die as we do the same, because hell since we KNOW this is all there is to this life... why live forever?
too dumb.