Welcome to the family, Planet X.

[kevyn]

Well, it's FINALLY happened.

Scientists today announce Earth-like planet discovered 20.5 light years away.

Planet X orbits Gliese 581, a red star relatively close to us. And the planet may be the first truly Earth-like planet to have been found outside our Solar System.

And get this: It may have a relatively similar climate, and even be covered by water.

Could there be life? Or potential for colonisation?

One thing's for sure: were I to live long enough for homo sapiens to travel there, I could not go. It's 1.5 times the Earth's diameter, and has a mass 5 times greater. The gravity would be double... and I would weigh almost 800 pounds! A human body couldn't handle that.

But for life that evolved there, it would be a completely different story.

I sure hope this holds up under scientific scrutiny. Another Earthlike planet. Incredible.

Comments

[canismajor3.livejournal.com]

I just read about that! OMG! *dies of excitement*

Ex Astris Scientia!

[kevynjacobs.livejournal.com]

20.5 years at c. A round-trip is completely doable within a human lifespan if we could get going fast enough.

If there's life there... yay!

If there's not life there, oh well... yay!

I think homo sapiens has some of its best days ahead of it, if we can just outgrow this adolescent self-destructiveness.

To colonise other worlds... Gene Roddenberry would have loved this.

Re: Ex Astris Scientia!

[canismajor3.livejournal.com]

lol. It's only the matter of getting up to those speeds. Hell, at 20.5 ly, the person travelling only ages like 4 years or something like that. If you can get going the speed of light. ^__^


If.


^_^

Science certainly has some great days ahead of itself. I hope the rest of us do too! :DD

*dances in excitement!!!*

Re: Ex Astris Scientia!

[kevynjacobs.livejournal.com]

Let's say they only have to fly .75 c. A round trip would still probably be possible within a human lifespan. Young scientists sent in their teens, for sure. Be a hell of a life's work.

Re: Ex Astris Scientia!

[canismajor3.livejournal.com]

OOh! Oooh!! MEEEEEE! Pick me!!!!!

Re: Ex Astris Scientia!

[kevynjacobs.livejournal.com]

You know, there's always cryogenics, too...

Re: Ex Astris Scientia!

[kadyg.livejournal.com]

Or. If you picked some very bright grad students andshipped them off, they would be middle aged when they landed. According to my Ph.D father-in-law, those are the most productive years of all. And they would have the trip to study and what not.

Ooooo the excitement!

Re: Ex Astris Scientia!

[canismajor3.livejournal.com]

....definately. :D

[that-dang-otter.livejournal.com]

E = 1/2 MV^2. Accelerating 1 kilogram to something close to c takes 9e18 joules. Annual world energy production is about 1e18 joules. Cut the speed to 1/2 c and you're down to only all the world's energy production for two years. Not even Al Gore can buy that many carbon credits!

(* These numbers subject to influence by alcohol, reader is responsible for checking all calculations.)

[kevynjacobs.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's a big amount of energy needed, but 2x the world's annual energy production per kg doesn't seem insurmountable. Nuclear fusion would be able to produce that kind of energy, and hey! We have a fusion reactor going on right next door -- the sun. The amount of solar energy that reaches the Earth every minute is greater than the world's total annual fossil fuel energy production. It doesn't seem unreasonable for that kind of energy to be harnessed for fast travel, at some point in the future.