Not a Drill: SETI Is Investigating a Possible Extraterrestrial Signal From Deep Space

[63splitwindow]

source: MSN News



" An international team of scientists from the Search For Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) are investigating mysterious signal spikes emitting from a 65 billion year-old star in the constellation Hercules–95 light years away from Earth. The implications are extraordinary and point to the possibility of a civilization far more advanced than our own.

The unusual signal was originally detected on May 15, 2015 by the Russian Academy of Science-operated RATAN-600 radio telescope in Zelenchukskaya, Russia but was kept secret from the international community. Interstellar space reporter Paul Gilster broke the story after the researchers quietly circulated a paper announcing the detection of “a strong signal in the direction of HD164595.”

The mysterious star’s designation is HD164595 and it’s considered to be sun-like in nature with a nearly identical metallic composition to our own star. So far, a single Neptune-like (but warmer) planet has been discovered in its orbit–HD 164595 b. But as Gilster explained, “there could, of course, be other planets still undetected in this system.”
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more at: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/not-a-drill-seti-is-investigating-a-possible-extraterrestrial-signal-from-deep-space/ar-AAid9oY?OCID=ansmsnnews11

[VMA131Marine]

1. Something got lost in translation

The Universe is only about 13.8 billion years old so there is no way this star can be 65 billion years old. 6.5 billion, maybe, which would make it 2 billion years older than our own sun.

Update: the original source article quotes the age of the star as 6.3 billion years:

http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=36248

[63splitwindow]

4. Oops, my bad. Don't know what the problem is.

[rurallib]

2. exciting!

[BadgerKid]

5. 6.3B years old, not 65B

https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/29/et-is-that-you-astronomers-detect-intriguing-signal-95-light-years-away/

[Warren DeMontague]

18. also 95 LY away is fairly close, in terms of our galactic neighborhood.

Interesting.

[pscot]

30. if i pack in a hurry

I can be there in time for my 171st birthday

[TheDebbieDee]

6. Shhhhhhh! Don't say this too loudly! The religious people might lose their $hit!

I believe that they've talked themselves into believing that any extra-terrestrials that turn up are demons cast out of heaven... And these demons, if found, need to be EXORCISED!

[63splitwindow]

7. The ironic thing is that one of those extraterrestial beings MIGHT be their God.

There are more things in heaven and on earth Horatio...

[TheDebbieDee]

8. The REAL irony for Christians is that if Jesus has returned...

he's been shut away in a mental health facility somewhere.

[63splitwindow]

9. He would be branded a Lib and shunned. If he had ertraterrestial powers their asses would be grass.

[HereSince1628]

11. R U say'n Kolob is orbiting HD164595?

For those who don't know... from Wiki: Kolob is a star or planet described in Mormon scripture. Reference to Kolob is found in the Book of Abraham, a work that is traditionally held by adherents of the Mormon faith as having been translated from an Egyptian papyrus scroll by Joseph Smith, the founder of the Latter Day Saint movement. According to this work, Kolob is the heavenly body nearest to the throne of God.

[63splitwindow]

12. I'm say'n the possibilities are infinite and beyond our limited comprehension.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

10. Detected in Russia, eh?

I hope it proves to be legitimate this time.

[GoDawgs]

13. Disliking that the Russians sat on this for a year

Seth Shostak blistered them a bit, but there needs to be more of an outcry.


Side note: is the SKA in South Africa operating yet or are they still completing it- this would be a great project

[63splitwindow]

14. Looks like it they are not operating. Here is link to their website.

https://www.ska.ac.za/

[GoDawgs]

15. Too bad. China's FAST is finished but still shakedown & commissioning

Altho one wonders if they would share what they found (like the Russians, apparently).

[Binkie The Clown]

16. The obligatory...

[Warren DeMontague]

17. Yeah, I had to stop at 65 Billion year old star, too.

The story is interesting but it's hard to take seriously when the MSM fucks up "inconsequential" details like that decimal point.

Anyone with even a basic working knowledge of cosmology understands that the known Universe is only about 14 or so billion years old.

[63splitwindow]

19. Go to the source story where the age is correctly stated...

http://observer.com/2016/08/not-a-drill-seti-is-investigating-a-possible-extraterrestrial-signal-from-deep-space/

It appears the 65 is a dropped decimal and typo for 6.3.

[Warren DeMontague]

23. Yeah, I got that. Just find mainstream science reporting exasperating, that's all.

I agree it's fascinating, and 95 LY is pretty close, in galactic terms. My hunch it will be found to be something else, more mundane--- but that doesn't mean it isn't worth investigating!

[Kennah]

20. So is "Independence Day: Resurgence" about to hit streaming? (n/t)

[63splitwindow]

21. Well, let's see. It was estimated in 2014 that there were roughly 70 billion trillion

stars in a universe 13.8 billion years old ( http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-resources/how-many-stars-are-there/ ) Anyone in DU actually believe we are the only intelligent beings in the universe and/or that we are the most advanced?

[PJMcK]

29. Look around

What makes you think humankind is intelligent? (wink)

[longship]

22. A 6.5 billion old Sol would not be a good star to be home for life.

Presuming that life developed earlier, like on Earth.

Our solar system is a little over 4.5 billion years old. In another billion years or so the sun will be a lot hotter. (That's how stellar evolution happens.) Life on Earth will be pretty much be toasted.

I find the claims in this article to be cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. It just doesn't add up from what we know about stellar evolution. And that is ignoring the misplaced decimal point in the claim of a 65 billion year old star!

[Warren DeMontague]

24. we only have a sample size of one for life to go on, at this point, so we can't really say.

We don't have a full idea of where life might be, or might not be possible yet, not even close. We only have hunches, and even those have had to be revised in recent decades, like with the discovery of large liquid oceans under the ice of many moons in the outer solar system.

The bottom line is, we don't know. But a civilization that evolved well past the point of our own might very well have come up with technological adaptations to survive the increased brightness of their home star.

[longship]

25. Well, stellar evolution is more than a hunch.

For that, we have some hundreds of billions of possible data points in our galaxy alone. I think that it is safe to say that a G-type star that is 6.5 billion years old is going to be a lot hotter than it was when it was 4.5 billion years old. This is basic astronomy, taught in the first semester.

Stellar Evolution

Not a hunch! We've got this one.

OBAFGKM!

[Warren DeMontague]

26. I'm not suggesting that we don't have enough data to know what happens to stars.

I'm suggesting that we don't have enough data to know what happens to life and what happens to civilizations.

[forgotmylogin]

27. Or, could the signal be a billion years old

and just now reach us? If a civilization produced it, they could be long gone by now.

[Warren DeMontague]

28. According to the article, no, assuming they've got the right star as the source.

If it really came from the star they think, it's only 95 light years away, so it took 95 years to get here.

Which also makes it a bit too far for it to be a "response" to any of our Earthly radio transmissions, if I can go on a "Contact"- (the book/movie) based digression for a moment. For a civilization to pick up, say, our earliest radio broadcasts - nearly 100 years ago, so lets say 100 years for the sake of a nice round # - only star systems within 100 LY of sol would have "heard" the broadcasts by now, and only ones within half of that would have had time for an immediately broadcast response to get back to us.

[daleo]

39. An advanced civilization might move as its star brightened

Terra forming planets as needed.

[longship]

40. But not likely.

[magicnpoetry]

31. I Wonder Why

the Russian scientists would want to keep this to themselves. It seems like all hands on deck would be an obvious response to such an exciting find.

[bananas]

44. They get a lot of false positives, so they try to rule out a much a they can

These are very sensitive instruments, they pick up signals from everything, from leaky microwave ovens to secret military satellites.

So even though it was detected a year ago, they couldn't announce it until they ruled out all these other possibilities.

[Thor_MN]

32. IF they could pick up our radio...

and that's more unlikely than if a "they" exists, it's 1921 to them. They could have been congratulating Warren G. Harding on his inauguration.

The power needed to produce that signal omnidirectionally is immense - scary amounts of power. To tightly focus it at us is even huge. But why would they? We still can't put that kind of power together and they would only have the weak radio signals of 1921 getting there now.

[63splitwindow]

33. Don't you believe it is somewhat naive to rule out anything about "them" or their capabilities?

[Thor_MN]

35. I think it's naive to believe that physics can somehow work differently.

KDKA, the first commercially licensed radio station, TODAY, operates at 50,000 watts. Remember that at 95 light years away, it would take radio waves 95 years to get there. In 1921,KDKA started broadcasting at 100 watts.

Compare that with the signal. Estimates put it at 100 billion billion watts to generate, if it is truly from that star system.

100,000,000,000,000,000,000 watts which allowed us to detect it with our most sensitive radio systems. Versus our 1921 best signals at 100 watts. Even if it were aimed directly at us, and I think it would be naive to believe they would have a reason to aim it at us, it would take on the order of the total power generated by the United States to produce that signal.

If we were to turn off every device that can generate radio waves, every vehicle, computer, fan, refrigerator, air conditioner, anything with an electric motor of any sort, turned the entire planet into an antenna - it would not be possible to detect a 100 watt radio station from 95 light years away.


They were going to spend two nights looking at that system, ending at about now. First night showed nothing. We will know later today if this is WOW2, or something else.

[63splitwindow]

36. We no more understand the capabilities of beings millions of years more advanced than us

than an ant walking across your keyboard understands your computer. Here was state of the art human flight a little over 100 years ago...

[Thor_MN]

37. Trying to argue that you don't understand physics is hardly a winning tactic....

[63splitwindow]

38. Claiming no know all there is to know about what we call physics and how it can be

manipulated is beyond a losing game. Quantum entanglement--- does it imply that some form of "communication" is, literally, instantaneous? See, I fully understand and appreciate that we know more about physics today than we did 10,000 years ago. You don't seem to understand that what we will know 10,000 years from now (if we still exist as a species) will make what we know today look child-like. One million years from now--- completely beyond our wildest imagination.

[Thor_MN]

41. "Claiming no know all there is to know" Huh?

You are not demonstrating knowledge of much at all...

[63splitwindow]

42. I am done with you.

[Thor_MN]

43. Sounds good.

Have a nice life.

[63splitwindow]

34. It is on CNN frontpage now

Hear me now? 'Strong signal' from sun-like star sparks alien speculation

[Thor_MN]

45. We can't possibly imagine.. that a Russian Military satellite could confuse a Russian observatory

for over a year.