NASA Finds Earth-size Planet Candidates in Habitable Zone, Six Planet System

[Posteritatis]

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. -- NASA's Kepler mission has discovered its first Earth-size planet candidates and its first candidates in the habitable zone, a region where liquid water could exist on a planet's surface. Five of the potential planets are near Earth-size and orbit in the habitable zone of smaller, cooler stars than our sun.

Candidates require follow-up observations to verify they are actual planets. Kepler also found six confirmed planets orbiting a sun-like star, Kepler-11. This is the largest group of transiting planets orbiting a single star yet discovered outside our solar system.

"In one generation we have gone from extraterrestrial planets being a mainstay of science fiction, to the present, where Kepler has helped turn science fiction into today's reality," said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden. "These discoveries underscore the importance of NASA's science missions, which consistently increase understanding of our place in the cosmos."

The discoveries are part of several hundred new planet candidates identified in new Kepler mission science data, released on Tuesday, Feb. 1. The findings increase the number of planet candidates identified by Kepler to-date to 1,235. Of these, 68 are approximately Earth-size; 288 are super-Earth-size; 662 are Neptune-size; 165 are the size of Jupiter and 19 are larger than Jupiter. Of the 54 new planet candidates found in the habitable zone, five are near Earth-sized. The remaining 49 habitable zone candidates range from super-Earth size -- up to twice the size of Earth -- to larger than Jupiter.

http://kepler.nasa.gov/news/nasakeplernews/index.cfm?FuseAction=ShowNews&NewsID=98

That's a lot of planets, and bear in mind that's only ones found by that particular probe. Yow.

[Taverner]

1. You ever get the feeling they're watching our TV shows and saying...

"Hell NO I Ain't going there! They're crazy!"

[qazplm]

5. nah

because odds are they have their own jerry springereque folks, their own trailer parks, their own crazies to deal with.

Heck, we could be tame by comparison.

[Taverner]

6. ZOMG! REDNECK ALIENS!!!!!!

Run for your lives!

[stuntcat]

73. yah

they have a few more generations to wait before we're worthing dealing with.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. We are NOT alone, repeat this after me, we are NOT alone

we will find a world capable of life in the next five years, WORST CASE.

[drm604]

4. I believe it.

Maybe we'll even find one emanating radio waves. Wouldn't that be something?

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Yes, yes it would

[Confusious]

24. They've been looking for radio waves for 50 years

Ain't gonna happen.

Even we're looking at communication via Quantum Entanglement.

I think radio communication is going to be a fleeting thing. 300+ years out of 5,500 of history. It could, best case, be over by 2200.

[lumberjack_jeff]

7. We've already found two or three worlds *capable* of life.

We've only found one equipped with it.

We are alone.

[Posteritatis]

9. Good sample size for that sweeping a conclusion. (nt)

[lumberjack_jeff]

10. How big is the sample size indicating I'm wrong?

All that is needed to prove ET is one, single, extraterrestrial radio signal. All that is required to prove life is single planet with an oxygen rich atmosphere.

Absent a single piece of evidence to the contrary, it is not my prediction that needs extraordinary proof.

[drm604]

14. You're assuming that the existence of extraterrestrial life is an extraordinary claim.

I would say that the claim that life has evolved in only one place is the extraordinary one.

Of course, the existence of another technological civilization near enough in space and time for us to detect it would be pretty extraordinary, but I find the idea of some form of life relatively nearby to be pretty unremarkable.

[lumberjack_jeff]

17. ET is an unremarkable leap of faith. It is an extraordinary claim.

There's no evidence to suggest it.

"but the universe is really big, so there must be someone out there" is the modern form of the watchmaker's analogy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Earth_hypothesis

[drm604]

21. We see evidence of the evolution of life all around us.

It strikes me as remarkable if it hasn't occurred elsewhere. I didn't say must. You put that word in my mouth. But I am saying it's very very likely. Given what we see around us on this planet and given the apparent universality of natural law, it seems almost a given that the same chemical processes will go on elsewhere. If those processes are not going on elsewhere, it seems like there must be something we do not yet understand about the universe that is preventing it. Our current understanding would seem to predict that it will and has occurred elsewhere.

You've lost me with the watchmaker analogy. That's usually used as a defense of creationism. I'm not sure I understand its relevance here.

[lumberjack_jeff]

26. The watchmaker analogy was used to defend a theory which was failing scientific scrutiny.

It basically said; "we don't understand how this could happen naturally, therefore it must be magic." In other words, our ignorance is evidence, if not proof, that I'm right.

The hypothesis of extraterrestrials (or for that matter extraterrestrial life) could be proven fairly simply. But the hypothesis has failed all tests so far.

Anyone confident in the presence of extraterrestrial life is basing that confidence on faith.

Fermi was right.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox

[Confusious]

30. Well, maybe we were visited

According to this account, he then concluded that Earth should have been visited long ago and many times over.<14><15>

We weren't the first on the planet. The reptiles were. Maybe we got marked as a dangerous planet.

I'm half joking. The part I'm not joking about is the history of the planet. We've only been here 100,000 to 500,000 years.

The last few seconds of the life of the planet up 'til now.

We could be a backwater part of the galaxy or the universe also. :)

[lumberjack_jeff]

33. Maybe. I guess.

Given what we know about the universe, it's unlikely that any visitors in the last 600 million years would have found the earth an uninteresting place to set up shop.

[Confusious]

55. With all the hostile life here

I would think not many would. There would be better pickings out there.

[drm604]

39. I don't agree that it's based on faith. Just the opposite, actually.

Science assumes that natural laws are universal. They assume that the same physical processes can and do occur throughout the universe. But for some reason many reject that principle when we start talking about life. They assume, for some reason, that that one particular physical process is unusual, perhaps even unique. They assume that, in spite of the fact that they assume that all other physical and chemical processes are universal.

I know of no reason to assume that there is anything unique about the processes of abiogenesis and evolution. Assuming that those things are special and unique is an act of faith.

[Warren DeMontague]

42. One: There is no difference between extraterrestrials and extraterrestrial life.

You are, again, conflating several different assertions:

One, that life exists other places in the Universe

Two, that intelligent life exists other places in the Universe

Three, that intelligent extraterrestrial life has visited planet Earth.


I think 1) is so incredibly likely as to be a 100% sure bet. I if life was so unlikely that it would ONLY develop on one of the trillions upon trillions of potentially habitable environments in the universe, it wouldn't happen at all, ever. This is, of course (speaking of magical hypotheses) discounting any sort of invisible-man-in-the-sky mojo whereby Earth is "created special" and that's why we must be alone. :eyes:

2) I think, is likely, too, but that doesn't mean that we're likely to communicate -or even be able to communicate- with said life. We may share THIS planet with other intelligent life (like Whales) doesn't mean we can understand them. We might not recognize intelligence, even if we encountered it.

3) I think is pretty unlikely, but should not be confused with 1) and 2)



As for "has failed all tests so far" --- either you don't understand the actual size and scope of the Universe and the amount (read:none) of it that we've actually explored so far, or you're being deliberately silly.

[lumberjack_jeff]

46. If you plug numbers into the Drake equation consistent with the big hugeness of our universe

The galaxy should be one big ancient hyperintelligent society. Shuttles to Trantor should be departing daily.

It isn't. Therefore one or more of the variables in the equation must be very close to zero.

I think that Fred Ward is right about this. Complex life is exceedingly uncommon. The earth has had life for 3.5 billion of its 4 billion year existence. The bacterial mats which produced stromatolites generated an oxygen rich atmosphere. An interstellar observer could see that life existed here, but could not assume that it is more than the most rudimentary kind. On a 24 hour clock, life has been here for 21 hours. Multicellular life has only existed for about two. It should be comparatively easy, statistically speaking, to find a planet with an oxygen rich atmosphere, because earth had that for most of its history. But any visitor expecting forests and fields of green would have been terribly disappointed.

If my observation is flawed because I don't understand how really, really, big the universe is (and how hard it will be to prove your hypothesis right) then you're arguing from a position of faith.

I acknowledge that proving your hypothesis right (and me wrong) is difficult. But that doesn't make you right.

So far, the observations support me.

The idea that we're as good as it gets really pisses off the misanthropists.

On the other hand, if earth is the universe's experiment with life, it might be prudent to treat it respectfully.

[Warren DeMontague]

47. "Complex life is exceedingly uncommon" is NOT the same as saying "there is no extraterrestrial life"

Look, I agree with you on that point. I think that the fact that over most of Earth's history, life was bacterial, means that most of the life- if not all- that we're likely to ever find, will be bacterial.

But bacteria IS life.

The thing about the Drake equation is, almost ALL of the variables are unknowns. One variable we HAVE cracked in recent decades is how many stars are likely have planetary systems; and we know, now, that's a good high number.

As far as the shuttles to Trantor; it may be that even with a large number of intelligent, long-lived civilizations in the galaxy, none can overcome Einstein. You're not going to get "shuttles to Trantor" if we're all effectively locked off from each other by relativity.

I think it's entirely possible that "we're as good as it gets", at least so far, in this galaxy. The universe hasn't been around that long, and for life to develop (at least as we understand it) you need elements generated via the death of 1st or 2nd generation stars. So maybe more advanced life will be showing up, but we may be among the first. That's totally possible, maybe even likely.

Your argument about "so far the observations support me"-- honestly? Okay, first, you honestly believe that there is NO LIFE -not little green men, mind you- no bacteria, no nothing- anywhere else in the entire Universe besides Earth? That's your hypothesis? Just so we're clear.

I actually don't think it is that 'hard' to prove my hypothesis- what you don't seem to get is that we've barely begun to look. We haven't even done anything close to an exhaustive search of our own solar system. That's not even a speck of our section of the galaxy. The support for your hypothesis- again, if that's really what you're saying- is really like someone saying they have support for the hypothesis that Zebras don't exist because they haven't found one in their refrigerator. I encourage you- HEARTILY- to do a little research on how big the Universe actually is. I don't think you're getting it.

I agree with treating life respectfully, although it's worth noting that what life does- expands, survives, reproduces- is sort of it's job, whether we like it or not. Life isn't hard-wired to treat anything "respectfully" but it is hard wired to fill up every available nook and crevice, to colonize whatever new frontiers it finds. All the more impetus for us to do things like terraform Mars (presuming, of course, there aren't "Martians"- meaning microbes, mind you- there already, and as such bypassing any ethical questions pertaining to such) and move humanity- move LIFE- out into the cosmos.

But as far as believing that Earth is somehow "special" enough to the The Universe's one and only expirement with life; c'mon. That's a religious viewpoint. There's no other way to frame it.

[lumberjack_jeff]

49. One in a gagillion is "exceedingly uncommon".For all practical purposes, unique.

re: your point about life expanding to fill every niche. It absolutely does that... here.

We're a few decades away from creating nanomachines capable of self replication and converting the earth to gray goo. We could also build self directed self repairing ai probes to explore space.

If the drake equation resolves to any number greater than one, those artifacts should be omnipresent.

The likelihood of me being wrong about the presence of ET is near zero. The likelihood of bacterial life being present at some distance in which we could find it via spectroscopic examination of extrasolar planets is less than 10% imo. Good enough for a betting man.

Here's an alternate explanation: we're an ancestor simulation. ET is extraneous to that simulation.

http://www.simulation-argument.com/matrix.html

[Warren DeMontague]

56. I think you may have exited the rails, here.

Look; "we're a few decades away from... gray goo".. Well, maybe.

Okay- let's just chew on the Gray goo and omnipresent ai exploring probes; again- take into account not just the cold hard wall of relativity, but also the sheer IMMENSITY of space... how long would it take self-replicating artificially intelligent ai probes or gray goo to colonize any corner of the galaxy; again, at sub-light speeds. Crunch those numbers, and see how they look.

Now remember, you are taking one potentiality, and assuming it's an inevitability. There's no basis for saying that gray goo or anything else is the logical outgrowth of intelligent technological civilization. We don't know, yet, what nanomachines or AI will mean. They MIGHT mean Skynet kills us all, they MIGHT mean self-replicating virus-size robots, they might not. There may be other physical limitations on those things we haven't encountered.

And again, space is BIG. I don't get how you can argue that anything should be omnipresent unless the Drake equation resolves to a huge number.

I'll say it again: I don't think you grok how big space actually is.

As for the holy-shit-I-could-just-be-a-head-in-a-jar solipsism argument; been there, done that. I'm operating on several axiomatic assumptions and I fully accept that they are assumptions: One, that the information conveyed to me by my senses about external "reality" is more or less accurate and not, say, the dream of Shiva, that "I" exist inside something akin to this external "reality" which exists more-or-less as it has been described through centuries of scientific observation.

Anything beyond that makes for fascinating dorm room acid-land navel gazing, but it's not really relevant to the topic.

Lastly, why do you think "here" is somehow not part of the rest of the universe? (Life will move off this planet. In fact, it already has) There's nothing magically different about Earth vs. the rest of the Universe. Are you somehow invested in the idea that there is? I ask that seriously, because that seems to be the crux of what you're getting at, here. That somehow Earth, and Earth alone, is vastly, intrinsically and fundamentally different- for whatever reason you may think :shrug:- than the entire rest of the Universe. Is that what you believe? What processes on early Earth that couldn't happen elsewhere do you believe caused life to form from basic chemistry?

Or---- do you have a different explanation for how life came to be here, maybe? Is that it?

And- I also think we'll have the answer to that spectroscopic analysis of extrasolar planets sooner rather than later. I suspect a lot of people may not believe the results, but I think we will find evidence of life beyond Earth in my lifetime.

[lumberjack_jeff]

60. My objections have nothing to do with belief.

Stop with the psychoanalysis.

For all we know - in fact for all we have any reason to suspect except Gene Roddenberry-esque optimism - this planet is the only place with life.

If I'm forced to deeply analyze my conclusions, and that is what they are - not "belief", there's a big part of me who hopes to be wrong. Consider it a dare.

If everyone assumes that "the grays" are out there somewhere, just waiting until we are enlightened enough to merit a phone call, then there's little reason to search. They've got it all figured out, you know, in their heart.

Read Rare Earth. The basic chemistry is anything but basic. The conditions enabling complex life on earth are unusual.

[Warren DeMontague]

61. Okay. One, stop conflating "life exists elsewhere" with "The Grays anally probed me", okay?

They're not the same thing, and what you seem to be trying to do is conflate a patently ridiculously argument with a statistically very likely one.

And I notice that you put "complex life" in your last sentence. Remember, that's not your argument. Your argument, at least the point I'm debating here, is that life -ANY life- is unlikely to exist anywhere in the entire Universe, besides Earth. Not complex life, not "Grays", but life. Period.


I will check out "rare Earth". But undoubtedly you understand that "Rare" doesn't mean "singular", certainly not in a universe as big as ours.

Let me just ask you one simple question: Do you believe that life arose on Earth as a result of chemical reactions (complex or not)? Yes, or No?

If the answer is "yes"- then no matter how complex or unlikely those chemical reactions are, it's absurd to think they wouldn't take place anywhere else in the Universe. Ever. Again (Dead Horse. Beat.) the Universe is BIG.

If the answer is "no", what you're making- no matter how hard you may be trying to conceal it- is essentially a religious argument. No psychoanalysis, I just think you should admit it already.

[lumberjack_jeff]

63. What's the likelihood that there are other Warren DeMontagues out there?

Infinitesimally small?
Okay, what's the likelihood that there are other people out there? Less small?
Your stated belief that the probability that there's life out there is really huge, in fact a certainty, on account of the universe is so big.

If the universe is incomprehensibly huge, why no more Warrens?

Given an infinite number of iterations, even the most improbable outcome will occur an infinite number of times.

Yes, I believe that life arose here as a result of a chemical reaction. Just like chemical processes created you. We can argue at which point in that process the improbability occurs, but I don't see a compelling reason to believe that planetary conditions create life (let alone complex life) is more probable than life creating Warren.

Arguing that there's no life in the universe is pointless, because it is impossible for you to fulfill your obligation to prove that there is. "But we haven't looked at galaxy UDFj-39546284 yet!". Doubt will always exist.

But it's not my job as a skeptic to remove that doubt. It's your hypothesis to prove.

[Warren DeMontague]

64. I'm going to quote you: "The earth has had life for 3.5 billion of its 4 billion year existence."

Actually, the age of the Earth is estimated at something like 4.5 Billion years, but not to quibble. The point is, we both agree that Earth had simple life for a very long time before that life evolved into complex life... right?

And you agree that said simple life arose via chemical reactions... right?

So simple life not only arose spontaneously on Earth- an Earth ("Rare" or not) whose conditions were VASTLY different than they are today- but it also arose, spontaneously, via chemical reactions, extremely rapidly, in a geologic sense, on the early Earth. In half a billion years, or less.

See where I'm going with this? If the chemical reactions took place fairly quickly on early Earth, it doesn't take a great leap of credulity to believe that they must be occuring elsewhere in the cosmos. By the way, it's not a matter of us "having looked everywhere except galaxy UDFj-39546284" :eyes:... We haven't really looked anywhere, except maybe the Moon. I give even odds that we discover other life in our own solar system- maybe not in my lifetime, but in my kids'. Now, again, you keep going back to "we haven't found it yet". Really. Really. Really. Really.

I. JUST. DON'T. THINK. YOU. UNDERSTAND. HOW. BIG. SPACE. IS.



Now I haven't said anywhere that any of this is "proven". I think it's entirely reasonable, however, given that organic chemicals are plentiful in the cosmos, planets are apparently plentiful in the cosmos, and like I said, life developed almost immediately on early Earth, that the chemical process which led to life here has very likely occurred elsewhere in the Universe. Very likely.

[lumberjack_jeff]

65. "Now I haven't said anywhere that any of this is "proven""

There you go.

Do so.

Your unique understanding of how bigly, hugely, vastly, ginormous the universe is is laudable. But it doesn't change anything.

Until you find an oxygen rich atmosphere, bacteria on Europa or three-toed footprints on the moon, only one of us is right.

The quarter under my childhood pillow is evidence for the tooth fairy. "The universe is really big" isn't evidence of anything - at best it is an observation which created a hypothesis.

There's little difference between the argument for extraterrestrial life and that for God. Neither has been proven, but supporters of the latter have basically given up trying. Theists say "Look at the wondrous universe? Did it happen by chance?" Astrobiologists say "Look at the huge universe! Surely we're not alone!"

The theists concede that they'll never be able to prove their belief. The others claim that they'll be able to prove their belief, someday... but until then, they want people to assume they're right. Who is engaging in the greater self-deception?

Some of the factors that made this planet tolerable to complex life;
The right kind of star, long lived enough for complex life to take root, yet not so small that the planets are tide-locked.
The right mass of planet
The presence of water
The right distance from the star
The big moon creating tides
Far enough from the galactic center that we're not constantly bombarded by ionizing radiation
Not so far from the galactic center that minerals become rare
A planetary system which attracts asteroids and comets away from the earth

[Warren DeMontague]

66. Is English not your first language? "Likely" and "Proven" mean different things.

Here's a number for you:

300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000

That's a low estimate of approx. how many stars there are in the observable universe. You honestly believe that none of those other stars might have an orbiting planet that meets the following conditions?

The right kind of star, long lived enough for complex life to take root, yet not so small that the planets are tide-locked.
The right mass of planet
The presence of water
The right distance from the star
The big moon creating tides
Far enough from the galactic center that we're not constantly bombarded by ionizing radiation
Not so far from the galactic center that minerals become rare
A planetary system which attracts asteroids and comets away from the earth

Leaving aside the fact that, for all we know, life may be perfectly capable of developing, for instance, on planets (or moons) that don't have one or more of those conditions. Let's get a probe under the ice on Europa, for instance, and see what's down there.

And leaving aside the dizzying speed with which you're moving goalposts ("proven", "complex life") ... again, it is reasonable to make a statistical guess that, since life developed through a natural process rather rapidly on the Early Earth, from readily available chemicals that are abundant throughout the Universe, it probably has happened elsewhere.

It will be an exciting day if and when we have definitive proof- but a firm understanding of the numbers makes it totally reasonable to make an educated guess that it is likely. Being angry about that fact, or the size of the universe, or what I can only imagine is a perceived threat to the "specialness" of Earth, doesn't change the raw numbers.

[lumberjack_jeff]

67. Sure is. Are we reading the same subthread? e.g."We are NOT alone!"?

I've forgotten a fair amount since school, but this thread is fairly recent history.

It's ridiculous to argue about the frequency of anything which has only been observed once.

Give us another datapoint then we'll debate again.

Despite the evidence to the contrary, I'm confident that the tooth fairy doesn't exist... although I welcome believers to continue searching. "What? Do you think that currency finds its way under children's pillows by magic? Do you realize how much currency and how many pillows we're talking about??"

The belief in extraterrestrial life lacks even this evidence. "What? Do you think that money only occurred under this pillow? Granted, it's never materialized under any other pillows as far as we know, but there are soooo many pillows we have't yet examined!"

If there are no pictures, it never happened.

We'll never find advanced extraterrestrial life. Ever. We'll never find life of any sort in my lifetime. For purposes of this argument, it's all the same. We're alone.

[Warren DeMontague]

68. Why don't you argue with the person who actually said those words, then?

I'll keep it simple, because you keep trying to have arguments with statements I haven't made, then moving the goalposts, then bringing in red herrings to try to make this about things it isn't- like the tooth fairy.

So I'll just start with the tooth fairy. What is the logical, scientific pathway by which one could extrapolate the existence of the tooth fairy, or santa claus (or "God", for that matter)? There ISN'T one. There is no logical, scientific basis by which one could envision a magical fairy or bearded man in a sleigh with the capability (much less desire) to fly around the world exchanging teeth for money, or bringing presents down chimneys, etc.

This is completely different from extrapolating the likelihood that life very well probably has arisen elsewhere beyond this Earth. You claim you accept that life arose on Earth via natural, chemical processes, and it did so- in geologic terms- relatively rapidly. We know that the raw materials for life are present throughout the universe. We know that stars with planets are extremely common. The scientific, logical pathway via which life would occur in other places beyond earth takes no supernatural, extra-logical leap, it merely says we figure that conditions throughout the universe- at least in some places- are statistically almost certain to be close to those of the Early Earth; given the size of the universe, really, inevitably.

Rather, it takes a tooth-fairy like suspension of disbelief to believe (barring some supernatural explanation, like "God Made Earth Special!!!! He DID!!!!") that Earth- and Earth alone- is the only place in a 14.5 Billion Light Year wide Universe that had conditions upon which chemicals that are abundant, everywhere- would rapidly follow a process leading to simple life forms.


You're right, there's only one data point. You seem to be operating under the assumption that that is significant because we've had all this opportunity to look elsewhere. Like I said, the only place we've really looked is the Moon; that does't "prove" diddly jack about the likelihood of life elsewhere, either way. All it proves is life probably never formed on the moon.

And I disagree with your last sentence, actually. I think we will find evidence of microbial extraterrestrial life in my lifetime. Even if we don't, I have a reasonable, scientific basis for being pretty sure it's out there. There is an easily logical scientific path by which it would occur. If you accept that life on Earth is the result of natural chemical processes, that happened rather quickly, I don't see how anyone could compare saying "odds are it's happened elsewhere too" to the tooth fairy. Unless someone actually thinks there was a magical, Earth-is-Special supernatural aspect to the story. Speaking of the tooth fairy.

It's really nice of you to "welcome believers to keep searching"- really, I'm sure NASA and the exobiology community are relieved to get your permission- but maybe you should ask yourself what it is that is so threatening to your worldview about this topic in the first place? :shrug:

[lumberjack_jeff]

72. The length of this thread suggests it's not my world view which is threatened.

The galactic habitable zone is relatively narrow.
G type stars represent only 9% of stars.

The conditions are rare.

We got lucky, but don't appreciate how lucky.

[Warren DeMontague]

78. And what is 9% of 3 x 10 to the 22nd power?

I think it's entirely possible that we "got lucky", but "lucky" in a universe as big as ours does NOT equal "there is nowhere else, anywhere, with any kind of life". "Rare" is still "a lot", certainly "more than one".

You, yourself, seem at times to acknowledge that- at the very least- microbial life is likely elsewhere in the Universe, so I'm not sure what point you're trying to make.

My point is, given the sheer numbers, it takes a tremendous amount of faith to assume -which is what you seem to be doing- that the conditions and the chemistry which rapidly produced life on early Earth happened once, and only once, and never, anywhere else.

Also, whenever you're ready to explain to me how a logical, scientific extrapolation of the likelihood of the tooth fairy is the same as a logical, scientific extrapolation of the likelihood of life developing elsewhere in the Universe, I'm all ears. Really.

[cliffordu]

70. Yeah, prolly all true -

But your posit suggests that our ability to view the field is equal to the task.

Our ability to view the detail way out there is that of a fruit fly trying to organize a flash mob with my Iphone..

Or some equally insane observation.

We are deaf and blind in this universe.

All the bragging by the scientists aside.

[lumberjack_jeff]

71. Then "there's a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow" is a perfectly valid belief.

If the difficulty of proving ones self right is a legitimate excuse for "scientific-y belief", then one is free to claim absolute certainty about most anything; including God and ET.

[cliffordu]

75. Well....

I don't have a dog in this fight, but the idea that we are the only critters smart enough to extinct themselves completely in this whole universe somehow fails to satisfy the question:

"Why are we here??"

Or even

"WTF?"

And, yeah, there are sound arguments against it, but as anyone who's opened a mystery container from the fridge can tell you, life will out.

Most of it is basic, disgusting and has nothing to do with Charismatic Megafauna.....

Our fantasies of ET be damned.


As far as I know, Nature (or, the Universe) doesn't DO one-off experiments, Does she??

[Warren DeMontague]

40. From a purely statistical standpoint, I think you're wrong.

The sheer number of stars in the universe- combined with the fact that we now know planets are common- make it incredibly unlikely that life only arose once. Yes, we don't have any evidence, because we haven't really started to look.

Must? No. Highly likely? Yes.

[Confusious]

54. "Found" is a relative word in this case

We're just looking for, and can only look for, worlds orbiting other stars right now. We can't tell much about them besides their mass.

The next 20 years should see observatories created so we can say if there is life there or not.

You're the guy in the cave saying "It doesn't get any better then this"

[joshcryer]

19. I think in 15 years we'll find a planet with an oxygen atmosphere.

And signs of life.

Just give those ultra big telescopes something to look at.

[drm604]

36. If I'm not mistaken

an oxygen atmosphere would itself be a sign of life.

[lumberjack_jeff]

37. It would.

Love to see it. Doubt we will.

[Occulus]

44. Why doubt a near certainty? n/t

[lumberjack_jeff]

45. Some people think that the rapture is a near certainty. For the same reason.

"Near certainties" in the non-religious sense have some evidence to support them.

[Occulus]

50. Three pieces of evidence for my near certainty are readily available.

1) life as we know it requires heat and liquid water.
2) two observable bodies possessing vastly different surface conditions have liquid water.
3) there are a vast number of planets in the universe (and many moons, given our own system's makeup), based on what we've found thus far. Keep in mind, these exist in very small portions of the sky from where we sit.

There is no evidence at all for the Rapture or in fact any supernatural Christian dogma. That's why it's called faith instead of science.

You know better than to equate the two. Why did you even bring it up?

[yellowcanine]

3. "Earth sized planet candidates". Are they going to interview them as possible replacements for

Earth? Sorry, I could not resist.

[rfranklin]

8. Here's a thought: We market it as a conservo-libertarian paradise...

and sell the wingnuts tickets on the next spaceship. Of course we won't tell them that it takes 200 light years to get there.

[drm604]

15. I apologize for nitpicking,

but "light years" is a unit of distance not time.

[rfranklin]

29. Well it will take them more than 200 years to get there...

So much the better.

[Motown_Johnny]

12. it means they may or may not be earth sized

[yellowcanine]

13. I got that. Just being a smartass.

[Countdown_3_2_1]

16. Humans need to colonize these planets.

If humanity can colonize space, then no mater what calamity befalls any one planet, humanity will survive.

THIS IS OUR DESTINY. WE MUST GO, OR DIE.

[cliffordu]

77. Maybe we're proof that not all species should make it.,

no matter how cool our electronic toys.

[jakeXT]

18. they named them b c d e f and g

I wonder what will happen when they find new ones in between them? Kepler 11b.2 or Kepler 11 bb


http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/news/new_planetary_system.html

All of the planets orbiting Kepler-11 are larger than Earth, with the largest ones being comparable in size to Uranus and Neptune. The innermost planet, Kepler-11b, is ten times closer to its star than Earth is to the sun. Moving outward, the other planets are Kepler-11c, Kepler-11d, Kepler-11e, Kepler-11f, and the outermost planet, Kepler-11g, which is half as far from its star as Earth is from the sun.

The planets Kepler-11d, Kepler-11e and Kepler-11f have a significant amount of light gas, which indicates that they formed within a few million years of the system's formation.
http://kepler.nasa.gov/news/nasakeplernews/index.cfm?FuseAction=ShowNews&NewsID=98

[Posteritatis]

59. They assign letters in order of discovery

So if we were around some other star and discovered Jupiter, Earth and Mars in that order, they'd be called Sol a, Sol b and Sol c respectively, even though they're actually Sol V, III and IV in that order.

A good chunk of the reason is that it avoids having to shuffle numbers and sequences around all the time if they find additional planets later. I think there's one or two systems where they're confident enough about the configuration to get away from worrying about that, but most of the rest are in flux.

[sufrommich]

20. I say we name it "Texas" and invite all the teabaggers to

colonize their new paradise.

[jakeXT]

22. Cowboys vs Aliens

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdmupNxobP0

[treestar]

28. Yep then when Jesus returns to Earth

Only we libruls will be here!

[jakeXT]

23. So this thing observes 1/400th of the sky and only can see planets passing their stars

more slides and pictures
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/multimedia/images/kepler11_images.html

[Occulus]

43. Someone at NASA played EA's PC game "Spore", I see. n/t

[Kingofalldems]

25. The inhabitants have a new book out:

To Serve Man

[Spike89]

27. 2000 light years away...

Even if our radio/television waves were detectable at that distance (highly unlikely) it'd be a couple millenium (give or take a few decades or so) for life there to notice. Of course, it they are like us and have roughly the same level of technology--in 2,000 years when the radio waves arrive, they will be about 2,000 years beyond using radio waves as analog communications technology. Already, we've moved most of our powerful broadcasting to tightbeam microwave and low-powered digitally encoded signals that probably can't be reliably detected/decoded even on the edges of our solar system.
The point is that we had a very small window of being a "noisy" radio civilization and even during its heyday, most people (yes, scientists too) over estimated how far away that radio noise would maintain coherency. Some estimates now figure a sphere of only 20-30 light years, seriously limiting the number of likely ET civilizations that might stumble on our old "I Love Lucy" shows. It also explains why we've had so little success in listening for ET radio signals--the technology window is barely a blink of the eye in relation to cosmic time--its a blip even in historical human time. Furthermore, our antennas aren't likely to be able to hear any but the loudest shouts from our nearest neighbors.
It's totally unclear whether we're alone or in a universe teeming with life. We have so little data at this point that staking a position is simply a statement of faith not science or even probability.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

48. Even less likelihood of colonizing any distant planet

The speed of light is about 6 million miles an hour.

Even at that speed, it would take 4 years to reach the nearest star, and we currently have nothing that even comes close to a fraction of that speed.

[EOTE]

76. I think you're off by a few orders of magnitude.

Light travels at around 186,000 miles per second. According to my math, that's around 670 million miles per hour.

But yes, Proxima Centauri is around 4 light years away from us. While I believe the laws of relativity are fixed, I think we might find out in the future that there are ways around them. Wormholes have always interested me.

[Blue-Jay]

31. That's where those crop circles are coming from!

[Gold Metal Flake]

32. Clearly the work of Satan.

[librechik]

34. Great, so they can go ahead and trash this one, see. They have a replacement. Or six.

[Warren DeMontague]

58. It'd be nice if we could learn about the Universe without people having a tantrum.

Read up on Einstein's theory of Relativity. No one is going to be going to any of these planets any time soon, so relax.

[librechik]

62. uhh--it was a joke n/t

[Leithan]

35. Which one is Michele Bachmann from?

I'm guessing the one with the most unstable orbit.

[Canuckistanian]

38. I find it amazing that they're discovering so many planets so fast

Considering that many planets may lie in the "habitable zone" around some larger stars, their orbits may take many decades. And we've only been able to view the known ones for 15 years or so.

There could be THOUSANDS of habitable and life-sustaining planets in our "local area" of a hundred light-years.

The possibilities are astounding to me.

[stuntcat]

74. yes

what you said :)

[malaise]

41. And they're all begging people on earth to

stay the fuck away.

[AsahinaKimi]

53. unless they are Klingons!

Kaplah!

[defendandprotect]

51. Well, good, cause we've destroyed this one ... so we can just hop on over to the others ...!!

Meanwhile, humans are not fit for space travel -- Van Allen Radiation Belts --

when they invent time travel, let us know!

They should let NASA get back to watching the environment -- Ozone Hole, etal --

Global Warming!

[Warren DeMontague]

57. "humans are not fit for space travel -- Van Allen Radiation Belts --"

:eyes:

Yes, last thing we would want to do is learn any facts about our Universe. Knowledge is dangerous, and can lead to headaches!



We certainly wouldn't want to point those telescopes at the moon, and see that the landings weren't a hoax, would we?

[Lorien]

52. We've nearly destroyed this one for greed. Now on to Pandora! nt

[TheMightyFavog]

69. Life here began out there...

All of this has happened before, and it will happen again...