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Space Science

Looking For Intelligence 269

Posted by Hemos from the pinpointining-possibilites dept.
Calgacus writes "We've all read stories about extra-solar planets being found by gravitational wobbles. The Scotsman has a story here about a planet in the Fomalhaut system being discovered because of its wake through a dust cloud. It's further out than other recently discovered planets and astronomers are saying it means there's an odds-on chance of intelligent life being out there. If only there was more on Earth..."
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Looking For Intelligence More

Looking For Intelligence

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  • Looking for intelligence (Score:3, Funny)

    by z-man ( 103297 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:10AM (#4431762)
    Move along, nothing to see here :).

  • Intelligent Life (Score:5, Funny)

    by RPoet ( 20693 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:12AM (#4431774) Journal
    I think Hobbes said it best [quoteserver.ca]: "The surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that it has never tried to contact us."
    • Amen to that. They probably considered waging war on us, and taking over, but then they probably noticed that we are always at war with ourselves, sat back and laughed at us.

      • Re:Intelligent Life (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Steve Franklin ( 142698 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:15AM (#4432212) Homepage Journal
        The simple answer is relativity. Despite worm holes, warp drive, hyper drive, tachyon fields, and all the other SF solutions, nobody has ever come up with a mathematically viable solution to Einstein's limitation on travel speeds in the universe. To put it country simple, if they could have gotten here, we'd be living on a reservation already. The only other obvious answer is that habitable water covered planets are a dime a dozen in the cosmos.

        • Re:Intelligent Life (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Vulturejoe ( 570401 ) <[vulturejoe] [at] [gmail.com]> on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:41AM (#4432373) Homepage
          I think Einstein actually said, that given a fair race, light would always win. So theoretically, wormholes and warp drive is possible, because we would be making it an unfair race by taking a shortcut.
          • Having read a bit of Einstein in my youth, I would suspect that what he meant by "fair" was "within the confines of physical law" and not "without cheating." How does one go about cheating in this regard? A coherent answer to THAT truly would be a major scientific advancement.
        • Despite worm holes, warp drive, hyper drive, tachyon fields, and all the other SF solutions, nobody has ever come up with a mathematically viable solution to Einstein's limitation on travel speeds in the universe.
          Oh, really [cf.ac.uk]?
          • "exotic matter will be needed in order to generate a distortion of spacetime like the one discussed here."

            I'll just run down to my local discount store and buy a quart of exotic matter. Oh, sorry, I'd expect exotic matter would be sold by the liter. ;-)

            Ya gotta read the posting as a whole! My point was that the lack of aliens on our doorstep tends to reinforce Einstein. Given that such fabulous (the real definition thereof) theories as the one you reference allow anybody anywhere to travel at unlimited speeds, my point is only reinforced further, that since there are no aliens on our doorstep, there must not be any practical way to impliment them.

            Oh wait, a UFO just landed in my backyard. Nevermind. ;-)

            Let me clarify by making a simple analogy. An American Native of the mid-15th Century hypothesizes that earthwide teleportation should be possible using "exotic beads." These consist of a particular variation on the pattern of beads woven into a beaver shirt. All that is necessary is that the proper pattern be found. One can imagine that a discussion develops about whether such a thing is really possible. I won't get into the various arguments that could be presented. Suffice to say that a few years later the Europeans show up in wooden sail boats. Draw your own conclusions.

        • Re:Intelligent Life (Score:5, Insightful)

          by dasunt ( 249686 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @12:10PM (#4433219)

          Er, wormholes aren't a SF solutions. Look up "Einstein-Rosen Bridge". The problem with such a bridge is that matter won't survive the trip.

          Digging deeper into the hat of theoretical physics, we have a possible solution. What needs to be done is to thread the wormhole with something that sounds a lot like antigravity. This sounds like a SF solution, but there is no theoretical reason why a negative gravitational force shouldn't exist. Its a mathematically viable solution.

          OTOH, this could be a pretty expensive solution. First you need to find or create a bridge and then stabilize it. If your race has perfected suspended animation, it might be the cheaper way to go from one system to another. Or maybe there's some other reason.

          Its flawed reasoning to think "There's no ETs visiting us, thus FTL travel is impossible." Maybe we're living in the cosmic equivalent of a natural preserve. Maybe intelligence evolves beyond the need for physical bodies. Maybe there are intersteller laws against messing with the locals. Maybe hydrogen based life is the norm. Or life that can live in a vacuum. Or maybe we've just been overlooked.

          Just my $.02

          • All your technical workarounds ignore the fundamental reason for the necessity of Relativity. Light in Einstein's theory is really just a physical stand-in for communication. What Einstein is really saying is that you can't know what's going to happen before it happens. THAT foundation of relativity is not physical. It's logical. It goes to the heart of the logical system upon which science is based. It simply says that things must make sense. If things don't make sense, then science is a chimera and you might as well learn spells and pray to the corn god.
        • To put it country simple, if they could have gotten here, we'd be living on a reservation already.

          So you're talking about Fermi's Paradox [space.com]?
        • Assuming most aliens would require a water covered planet (or oxygen).

    • Guess that shows how smart humans are - we ARE trying to find THEM. A new project starting up along this line is at TransitSearch [transitsearch.org], where they're trying to recruit amateur astronomers to hlep look for extrasolar planets using 8 inch scopes and CCD cameras to take light curve measurements of target stars. If you're an amateur astronomer, check it out...

  • Poor Write-Up (Sensationalism) (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:15AM (#4431797)
    As far as I can tell, the article has nothing specifically to do with the search for life, much less the search for intelligent life. All it is really about is the detection of a planet with a much larger orbital radius than previous extrasolar planets. According to the team in the article, this makes it "much more likely that other solar systems exist." Well, duh. The only bearing this has on life is as more confirmation that there are indeed extrasolar planets. Which I think we already knew. So, yes, it's an interesting detection technique, but life? Intelligence? Including these references is sensationalistic and dumb.
    • Honestly, and with the whole gravity wobble thing and, with currently technology, for the most part we can only detect large Jupiter sized or similiar moons, which tend to be giant gas planet unsuitable for life as we know it. So, in other words, big whoop, what's it to me?

    • Re:Poor Write-Up (Sensationalism) (Score:5, Funny)

      by scott1853 ( 194884 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:31AM (#4431912)
      From what I hear, there may be a new SETI@Home client that will also scan slashdot stories for traces of intelligent life. Early beta testing has not found anything yet. It is being assumed that several petahertz of computational power will be required to detect such anomalies.

    • Re:Poor Write-Up (Sensationalism) (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:37AM (#4431955)
      One of the big disappointments of all the planets detected thus far is how closely they orbit their stars, making it quite unlikely that enough material was left when those systems were formed for smaller planets to form within the habitable zone of those systems.

      If the big gasgiants are further away from the center of a solar system, then there is more chance that planets resembling Earth (or Mars, or Venus) will have formed.
      With this discovery, it's become more likely that there is a significant amount of systems out there resembling our own solar system, and thus that we might some day discover the existance of recognizable life within those systems.
      • The only reason most of the planets found (over 100 now) so far are very close to their stars is because of our observational bias. It's much easier to detect a massive planet that it close to the star since these cause the biggest "wobbles" from the star.

        As planet hunting is in its relatively early days at the moment we are finding all the ones that are easiest to find, and looking at current stats they are now detecting planets out to 2 or 3 AU.

        Also, because this has only been going on a few years we haven't been able to see the "wobbles" for planets that have orbital periods of more than a couple of years.

        Basically, within the next few years we should start to find more stars with planets further out.

    • Re:Poor Write-Up (Sensationalism) (Score:5, Informative)

      by dpp ( 585742 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:59AM (#4432098)

      That spin on it seems to have come from the newspaper. I work for one of the organisations involved, and you can see the original press release on [hawaii.edu] our website. [hawaii.edu]

    • This news article is definitely the most Scottish News and the most 'direct from Scotland' I have ever read.

    • Re:Poor Write-Up (Sensationalism) (Score:5, Informative)

      by sabinm ( 447146 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:34AM (#4432327) Homepage Journal
      Sorry that you think this is sensationalism, but this planet is sort of like what we've been looking for in the matters of even basic live existing in other locations of the universe. A large gas giant creating a debris-sink is exactly what jupiter and saturn do for our planet. They are the saftey net so to speak. Let me explain. There are thousands of roaming celestial bodies in our solar vicinity. Many of these are destined for the largest gravity well in the system, namely the sun. Well, there are planets in direct linear obstruction of these bodies and they usually just fall into the nearest gravity well they can find, usually eachother or another planet. The ONLY REASON that we haven't been wiped out is because most of these bodies tend to fall into jupiter or saturn and not reach little old earth at all. Without thos e two planets acting as graitivistic scape-goats, we'd be bombarded by every roaming rock in the heading toward Sol. (Excuse the hyperbole)

      What the scientists are stating is that if a planet, surrounded by debris far a way from the Folmahouth system exists, it will act as a buffer to those planets that we cannot detect. If it exists in two systems, Sol, and Folmahouth, then the "odds" are that it exists in many, (as you know, the universe is either infinite, or close enough to infinite, that only Marvin the Paranoid Android can count all the suns in it.) :)

      So I don't think this is too sensationalist- for these reasons.
      1. this wasn't printed on the front page of NYT
      2. slashdot isn't much of a sensation
      3. this is on the science section from the science department. If jerry springer was reporting on it, i'd buy the sensation part
      4. Finding a gas giant *far_from* the sun with lots of debris around it means that there are likely smaller planets closer to the sun made up of heavy elements (like our planet) and life is likely to be present in many parts of the universe/galaxy.
      • 2. slashdot isn't much of a sensation

        <melodrama>What are you saying! Are you trying to tell me that all of the countless hours I've spent reading Slashdot have been a waste fo time? That I've shot my productivity at work in the foot for nothing? Please, say it isn't so!</melodrama>

  • Intelligent Life? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Eureka!

    If the inhabitants have learnt how to leave a trail of noxious chemicals behind their planet then they MUST be intelligent!

  • Odds on chance? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by pmasters ( 222241 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:17AM (#4431813)
    This may be a stupid question, but how can they say there's a likely chance, when they haven't actually proved there's any life anywhere off-earth yet? Is this more astronomers trying to fund their projects again by mentioning the L-word?

    • Re:Odds on chance? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by nanojath ( 265940 )
      It gets into the reality that we really don't know the first thing, thermodynamically, about what it takes for life of any sort to exist, let alone "intelligent" life (whatever that means...)


      It boils down to the assumption that if the physical conditions are judged to be similar to Earth's, the genesis of life and its subsequent evolution will follow a similar track. Suggesting that some scientists don't completely get the difference between necessary and sufficient conditions and need to take a remedial course in logic immediately.


      All the statistics that float around about the prevalence (or absence) of life and/or intelligence in the universe are sheer guesswork based on untestable rules of thumb. Maybe we'll get to some of these places, or get a signal from somewhere, maybe we'll get some good samples of non-terrestrial life from our own solar system and will come to a better understanding of evolution and genetics to the extent that we can make a better educated guess... at the moment it's almost 100% fluff, color for the astronomy/cosmology set.

    • Based on the most conservative estimates for variables in the Drake Equation [seti.org], odds are we're not alone.

      That's no proof, but it's not like astronomers are asking people to believe there's an invisible pink unicorn listening to their prayers. It's the best estimate we have. Without an ftl jet or a working dimensional transfuctioner or whatever the gyroscope thing was in Conact [google.com], in this case absence of evidence is not strong evidence of absence.

      • Re:Numbers Game (Score:2, Insightful)

        by f97tosc ( 578893 )
        Based on the most conservative estimates for variables in the Drake Equation [seti.org], odds are we're not alone.

        This is not quite true. In particular, nobody has been able to build life from scratch in a lab and nobody knows the exact reaction that needs to happen.

        This means, that the probability of life arising on a suitable planet (f_l) is completely unknown. For all we know, it could be so low, that it is bound to happen at the most once in the entire universe.

        Personally, I don't think that this is the case, and I am eagerly awaiting the results of future trips to Mars and Europa. If they find primitive life there, then that changes a lot.

        Tor
      • But is the Drake Equation itself conservative enough? The rare earth hypothesis [amazon.com] makes a credible argument for adding a whole lot of additional fractions on the right side of the equation making N (number of civilizations) vanishingly small. Or I suppose you could factor that all in to the Drake equation as part of R* (rate of formation of stars suitable for the development of life) making it a very very low number.
  • "A specially-cooled camera called SCUBA was used to detect the dust because it is too cold and emitted insufficient light to be visible to optical telescopes such as the Hubble Space Telescope.

    SCUBA operates in the "submillimetre" region of the electromagnetic spectrum, which lies between infrared light and radio waves. Its detectors are cooled to just 0.1C above absolute zero, -273C. "

    they're talking about a camera that can see this dust because it's really cold, and that can see this light that they can't even see from telescopes in space.

    i thought that space was absolute zero for temperature, or at least something remarkably close. how in the world are they able to get something colder on earth than they can in space?

    anyone know anything at all about telescopes and the like as to why Hubble wasn't able to see this before?

    • Re:One part I don't get... (Score:5, Informative)

      by mikeplokta ( 223052 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:23AM (#4431860)
      i thought that space was absolute zero for temperature, or at least something remarkably close. how in the world are they able to get something colder on earth than they can in space?

      You thought wrong. "Space" doesn't have a temperature in any very meaningful sense, but if it did it would be 3K, from the cosmic microwave background radiation. In the vicinity of a star, however, objects will reach a thermal equilibrium where the energy they absorb from solar radiation matches the infrared they radiate away. This is a lot higher in the neighbourhood of Earth orbit -- the Earth, for example, has reached a thermal equilibrium of around 285K (complicated slightly by extra heat produced by radioactive decay).
      • For those that don't know 3 K is not 3000 degrees whatever, its 3 Kelvin. 285 K is 285 Kelvin which is about 12C. 0 K is said to be absolute zero.
    • space is filled with moving matter: therefore the temperature is not absolutely zero. I think it is somewhere around -100K (absolute zero being about -273K)

    • Re:One part I don't get... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Mannerism ( 188292 ) <keith-slashdot@spotsoftwar e . c om> on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:51AM (#4432043)
      The answers to your questions are there in the article, really...it's just that the language the authors use is imprecise and hence confusing.

      In simplest terms, Hubble can't "see" it because it's too dark. Optical telescopes just scoop up light in the visible spectrum; if the object you're interested in doesn't produce enough such light, then you won't see it.

      SCUBA isn't looking for visible light, though; it's looking for electromagnetic radiation in a different area of the spectrum (different frequencies/wavelengths) than visible light. Since the object produces significant radiation at these frequencies, SCUBA can "see" it.

      Regarding temperature: yes, it's cold where Hubble is (in the shade; it's very hot if you're in the sun), but that doesn't affect its ability to detect visible light. What matters is whether there's other visible light to interfere with the visible light it's interested in. In other words, if you're an optical telescope, you want it to be DARK around you...in an ideal world, the only source of light would be from the object you're trying to observe. Optical telescopes are looking for the difference between "absolutely dark" and "not quite absolutely dark". SCUBA, on the other hand, doesn't care about darkness, because it's not interested in visible light, but it does care very much about temperature, because at the wavelengths it deals with, heat energy affects its ability to "see", so it wants it to be COLD all around it; it's looking for the difference between "absolute zero" temperature and "not quite absolute zero".

      It might help to: instead of "see", think "detect"; instead of "light", think "electromagnetic radiation"; and, consider temperature, wavelength, and frequency to all be ways of describing which part of the spectrum you're interested in.
    • They're cooling the detector of the telescope to reduce the dark current, in other words to reduce noise.

      I suspect that the important difference between SCUBA and Hubble in this case is not the temperature of the detectors, but the method in which light is collected and what regions of the spectrum they choose to collect. The "A" in SCUBA stands for array - This means that SCUBA is actually a collection of telescopes spread out to form the equivalent of a very large telescope.

      Also, many molecules in space are really "hot" - they have a lot of energy, but there aren't many of them around. Space is cold, however, it's possible for molecules to remain in highly energetic states for long periods of time. Temperature begins to become ill-defined.

      • Re:One part I don't get... (Score:5, Informative)

        by dpp ( 585742 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:06AM (#4432156)

        I work for the organisation [hawaii.edu] that operates SCUBA and the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope.

        The "A" in SCUBA stands for array - This means that SCUBA is actually a collection of telescopes spread out to form the equivalent of a very large telescope.

        No - you're thinking of interferometer arrays. In this case SCUBA stands for Submillimetre Common-User Bolometer Array:

        • Submillimetre: the wavelength of the light we detect.
        • Common-User: open to the general research community
        • Bolometer Array: has multiple bolometers, which are the detector elements, in the same way that a CCD is an array of individual pixel detectors. Each bolometer is (if I remember correctly) a tiny chip of neutron transmutation doped germanium on a bismuth/sapphire substrate. They work a bit like very sensitive thermistors.

    • Re:One part I don't get... (Score:4, Informative)

      by dpp ( 585742 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:16AM (#4432216)
      i thought that space was absolute zero for temperature, or at least something remarkably close. how in the world are they able to get something colder on earth than they can in space?

      Low temperature physicists make things colder than this all the time - the same way that we can make things colder than the ambient temperature on Earth.

      From memory, so might be wrong: In SCUBA's case, we use a vacuum jacket, then liquid nitrogen, then liquid helium, and then what's known as a dilution refrigerator (which I won't even pretend to understand!). It involves a mixture of liquid He3 and He4 I think. Gets us down to under 100mK.

      Although experiments do go quite a bit colder, in terms of its size and the fact that it runs for extended periods at this temperature, SCUBA is one of the coldest fridges in the world.

      (I work for the Joint Astronomy Centre [hawaii.edu] who operate SCUBA and the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope.)

    • Re:One part I don't get... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by dpp ( 585742 )
      anyone know anything at all about telescopes and the like as to why Hubble wasn't able to see this before?

      I work for the Joint Astronomy Centre [hawaii.edu], who operate both SCUBA and the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope. Hubble is a telescope that operates in an entirely different wavelength range (optical, infrared), whilst the JCMT and SCUBA work at submillimetre wavelengths. SCUBA's looking at interstellar dust particles. At Hubble's wavelengths this dust just has an absorbing and obscuring effect, so you can't see it properly. However, SCUBA sees the heat glow from it.

      If you go out on a clear night and look at Sagittarius, you're looking towards the centre of the Milky Way. You'll see lots of dark patches among the brightness, which are caused by the extinction of starlight by this interstellar dust. Because it's dark, you can't properly see it. However, if you could see with SCUBA's eyes you'd see this stuff glowing brightly!

    • Actually the background temperature of the universe is 2.7K (look here [eso.org] about a quarter of the way down).

      The theory is that leftover radiation from the Big Bang makes the universe that temperature.

  • Only Here.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by RobotRunAmok ( 595286 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:18AM (#4431821)
    "We've all read stories about extra-solar planets being found by gravitational wobbles...

    I think that's why I keep coming back to SlashDot; only here does a story begin like that and nobody blinks an eye...

    God luv yuz...

  • Too much Intelligence (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Custard ( 587661 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:19AM (#4431832) Homepage Journal
    If only there was more on Earth...
    Intelligent human says: "I believe you mean, 'If only there WERE more on Earth....' You see, the use of the future subjunctive ---"

    Bigger, dumber human says: "And now, for the severe beating of an intelligent human..."

  • I'm confused (Score:4, Funny)

    by wunderhorn1 ( 114559 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:21AM (#4431846)
    ASTRONOMERS said there was an "odds-on" chance of intelligent life in space after new observations produced the best evidence yet of planets circling stars outside our solar system.
    ...
    However, he said there was little chance of finding life on the planet because it was under constant bombardment from a surrounding belt of comets.

    So in other words, don't believe the hype?
    Let me get this straight -- now that we've found conclusive (?) evidence of another planet that most likely wouldn't support life, this increases the chance of finding intelligent life in outer space. Makes sense.

    • Re:I'm confused (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Mnemia ( 218659 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:32AM (#4431925)
      I think it does make sense because it's more evidence that there are planets in other star systems in great abundance. It shows that there are possibly other solar systems similar to our own, which also contains large gas giants. The Earth wouldn't be detectable either with current technology at that range, but Jupiter might be. Basically this discovery provides evidence that our own solar system is not completely unique in its very existence; you have to have planets to have life (as far as we know). So while this isn't direct evidence of life, it is another piece of evidence to support the hypothesis that there are other solar systems like our own that may contain life.
    • Yea, i agree with you. People act as if this is any real indicator of life outside our solar system. Honestly, lets look at the facts: we have billions of galaxies (for arguments sake, ill assme the universe if finite), and in each of those galaxies millions of stars. The very fact that we're here typing this demonstates that life is not impossible, so why is it so absolutely hard to believe it could happen elsewhere, though not nessessarily with the same results. Whenever people try to impress their 'laws of biology' as being the end all of proof that life is hard to beget. I find this ironic, as we have a hard time leaving our planet surface without blowing millions/billions, let alone actually visiting other planets. So I would put our 'Universe Experience' at pretty much a low ass number. Before we all get giddy trying to create laws & theories about all this stuff, why not think about the possiblity for life to form in environments that would not be hospital towards us. I am all for debate, but people who act as if we really know anything in this respect and apply the 'rules' of our evolution with religous strictness to other planets are being a little rediculous and closed minded. Just because it happened one way does not mean that is THE way.

  • Intelligent Life (Score:4, Funny)

    by DeadSea ( 69598 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:21AM (#4431848) Homepage Journal
    If only there was more on Earth...
    As long as they don't visit the US or browse slashdot with a -1 threshold they should be fine.
    • As long as they don't visit the US

      That's a funny crack at the US, but it's simply not true. The US holds more Nobel Prizes for sciences than any other country. The secondary school test scores could use some improvement, but University-level education is considered one of the highest in the world.

      On the other hand, if your crack was some sort of political snipe at the US, then fine-- but it's funny how most people are really trying hard to get to the US.
      • That's a funny crack at the US, but it's simply not true. The US holds more Nobel Prizes for sciences than any other country. The secondary school test scores could use some improvement, but University-level education is considered one of the highest in the world.

        When you have 250 million people, you are bound to spit out a few intellegent deviants.

        But have you been driving or grocery shopping lately? Have you seen the news? Do you ever wonder where News of the Wierd and the Darwin Awards get their material?

        We *are* a nation of idiots. We've got some smart people here, but with so many carbon lifeforms bumping around this continent thats bound to happen.

      • Re:Intelligent Life (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Malcontent ( 40834 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:47AM (#4432420)
        Last I checked a very small percentage of americans ever graduated from collage (under 20% I think).

        Most grad schools are full of foreigners.

        If you want to measure the intelligence of the US public don't look at school.

      • Re:Intelligent Life (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Reality Master 101 ( 179095 ) <`moc.liamg' `ta' `101retsaMytilaeR'> on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:59AM (#4432524) Homepage Journal

        but it's funny how most people are really trying hard to get to the US.

        Nothing new. Particularly Europe, but most of the rest of the world feels a lot of frustration that their opinions are basically irrelevent in what happens in the world. They take this frustration out in foolish (one might say childish) criticisms of anything the US does.

        But you know what really galls them? That the US cares so little what the rest of the world thinks. This particularly irritates countries like France who still want to think of themselves as a world power.

        Then you factor in the fact that Europe enjoys what freedom they have through the power and defense of the US (they would be speaking Russian right now without the US, and probably would have had several more world wars by now) -- not to mention that we rebuilt the place after WW/II -- and it's inevitable that resentment builds up in many people. Particularly younger people who don't have any historical perspective.

  • Search for Terrestrial Intelligence (STI project) (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:23AM (#4431861)
    You might want to visit the STI website [totl.net] then ?

    They're planning to use the 90% unused brain power in every person out there, with the STI@Home project, but their Antartica station is still under construction...

  • That's not talking about the find... (Score:5, Informative)

    by ISPTech ( 76854 ) <(moc.oooooooohay) (ta) (151hcetpsi)> on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:25AM (#4431874) Homepage
    Ok. Now reread the article for what it actually says.

    "However, [Dr Holland ,who led the team,] said there was little chance of finding life on the planet because it was under constant bombardment from a surrounding belt of comets. "

    before that his unrelated comment to the finding was...

    "Personally speaking, I think it must be odds-on that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, and I think one day we will find it - or they will find us."

    Please read the article all the way through before you jump to conclusions.
  • The article doesn't say that this planet itself is in any way relevant to the odds of alien life. And given it was found because of it's signature in a dust cloud (which means that firstly it's very young, and secondly it's likely to be getting a constant bombardment of metors), I don't thing there is likely to be any there right now. Life may develop there (or at least, in that system) in the future, of course, but not yet, and certainly not intelligence.

  • We like the stars and all, but... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Gruneun ( 261463 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:28AM (#4431894)
    Dr Mark Wyatt, another team member, said the dust showed evidence of comet activity.

    Something tells me my wife won't be excited by this and I'll still get yelled at for not doing a better job of cleaning up the living room.
  • It's further out than other recently discovered planets and astronomers are saying it means there's an odds-on chance of intelligent life being out there

    Let's face it folks ... looking for E.T. might be a cool idea, but we are assuming that E.T. is friendly ....

    Consider this: If we are able to communicate with extra terrestrials, odds are that they are more advanced technologicaly than we are. That being said, what if these aliens are aggressive beings that are looking for a conquest? Do we really want to make their job of finding a planet of slaves any easier?

    Has anyone considered the possibility that we might be putting a big red target on our planet?

    Just some food for thought ...
    • There is a theory that says the chances of discovering intelligent life approaches 1 the less intelligent they get, and approaches 0 the more intelligent they get, when compared to humans.

      That is to say it is guaranteed that life exists with no intelligence, and is guaranteed that life does -not- exist with infinate intelligence

      All life is on a scale somewhere between no intelligence and infinate intelligence. Hence the odds are that if/when we find extra terrestrial life they will, in fact, be less intelligent.
      • That is a dangerous assumption you are making.

        I agree with:
        the chances of discovering intelligent life approaches 1 the less intelligent they get, and approaches 0 the more intelligent they get


        but using humans as a standard is somewhat close minded (although I guess we don't have any other standard at this time) ... In all honesty, I don't believe the human race is really all that intelligent. We don't even know (100%) how our own bodies function and everything about our own planet, let alone the universe! I think as our evolution progesses, we'll eventually see just how stupid we really are at this point in our existance.

        Honestly, I believe the odds are closer to 1 than they are 0 that we'll find life more intelligent than us .... how likely is it that less evolved beings would be able to send us back a signal or visit our planet. We've only been able to do it for the last 50 years or so ... and our ability to transmit or decrypt a transmission is still quite basic. Hell, some alien race could be sending us a signal right now in some other medium, and we're so stupid that we'd most likely fail to recognize it .....

        Some additional food for thought ....

    • Re:Do we REALLY want to find them??? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Big_Breaker ( 190457 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:02AM (#4432115)
      Isn't it more likely that they would be fantasically interested in us given the apparent dirth of intelligent life in the universe?

      This whole "evil" alien thing is ridiculous. To make an analogy- imagine you are an explorer and scientist in a vast sandy desert. You have traveled thousands of miles on foot only to stumble on a TINY oasis. In that oasis is a fantastic looking insect that you are the first to discover in the universe. Would you smash it and move on? or study it and attempt to disturb it as little as possible?

      People forget the any alien species sufficently advanced to contact us will have implicitly passed the test of its adolesence. What is the test of adolesence? It occurs when a species technology is sufficently advanced that it can easily destroy itself and the millions of years of evolutionary and cultural development it took to reach the test. Humans began there adolesence with the development of the atomic bomb (more so with fusion based bombs) and probably won't emerge from that adolesence for generations to come.

      Interstellar travel and communication is a level of technolgy that is reached after adolesence (atleast the way we understand the universe). First you split the atom then you develop faster than light communication, etc. This is an assumption based on one data point (ourselves) but seems reasonable. How could an alien species exit the gravity well of its own solar system without understanding the process that fuels that star, ie fusion.

      Therefore, any alien contact will be a member of a self selected group from the universe of intelligent alien beings that have existed in the universe - the ones that did not destroy themselves.

      This post is already getting kind of long be the other thing we know about aliens willing to contact us is that implicitly they want to conact other beings in the universe. Once agin implicitly they are explorers and scientists with respect for other beings.

      The last point I'd like to make is that aliens aren't going to mine the earth for its resources or enslave the human race. That is the dumbest idea I have ever heard. Why would an alien species come all this way for matter that is spread all over the universe? Why would they need it anyhow? They will have fusion reactors that can make any element. Their ship will use anti-matter or something we haven't dreamed of yet. Why do they need slaves? Won't they have robots 100 times smarter than humans to do everything?

      Aliens that can contact us MUST be peaceful. It would be disruptive but not violent. These aliens would likely have practice making contact. Read some Carl Sagan books and turn off the 50s B movies please!

      • Assumptions (Score:3, Insightful)

        by PineHall ( 206441 )
        You are assuming that since we are becoming more technologically advanced, we also are becoming more morally advanced. I don't see that in history. We are not any less likely to kill one another than before. We just have more effective weapons.

        So if an Alien species finds earth, that explorer and scientist crew might see money to be made by exploiting us.
      • Here is another counter argument. Imagine it is not an explorer that comes across the tiny oasis with the interesting bugs but a construction crew. Perhaps they don't find the bugs very interesting. They're just paving a few systems to build a parking garage for a nearby ringworld. ET: "damn another intelligent species, the environmentalists are going to freak... quick... wipe out that little nest of them on the third rock out before that EPA guy shows up."

        Perhaps they have developed an ethos or instinct that ensures they are not *self* destructive but that is no guarantee they are not *other* destructive or care that much about *others* at all.
      • There is one credible threat I can think of from alien civilizations. If I were an alien, I'd be concerned about the prospect of a violent race getting Faster Than Light capability. I'd keep an eye on this immature race. As long as they stay confined to their planet/solar system, they're no problem, but if they get FTL technology without curbing their violent nature, it would make sense to stop them before they become a threat.
    • ... and many of them have already been voiced, so I won't delve into them...

      Except this one: The idea of contacting ET is predicated on the idea that, in all the universe, life would happen in both an accessable region of space, and during a time in history when the two species are actually BOTH ALIVE.

      Time seems to always be left out of the equation.

      The human race, in one form or another, has been on Earth for, what, tens- to hundreds of thousands of years? That's not even a molecule of a drop in the bucket of eternity. The chance that, right NOW (or even in the forseeable future -- let's be generous and suppose that humans will last another, oh, 500,000 years) there is some alien race out there evolved at least to the point that we can contact or that would contact us... well, it's laughable. The chances of historic overlap are worse than astronomical. You'd be better off predicting that a Dilophisaurus will be seen touring around New York City, barring Michael Criton's interference.

      I think if we ever have contact with aliens, it will not be through living representatives. From one direction or the other, it will be through artefacts or other long-dead signals in the noise. Theirs or ours.

      In short: Overcoming the gulfs of space isn't the only problem. There's just too much time for things to happen in. History on the cosmic scale is a pretty spread-out resource.
      GMFTatsujin

  • Also on space.com (Score:3, Informative)

    by Sn4xx0r ( 613157 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:31AM (#4431909) Homepage
    This was also featured on space.com [space.com]. Don't know if it's the same story since we seem to have slashdotted the Scotsman.

  • The MP boys said it best (Score:5, Funny)

    by iworm ( 132527 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:31AM (#4431916)
    So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
    How amazingly unlikely is your birth,
    And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,
    'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.

    -- The last lines from The Galaxy Song - Monty Python's The Meaning of Life

  • flamebait now acceptable in /. stories? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    If only there was more on Earth...

    6 billion isn't enough for you? grow some respect, kid.

  • Bombardment of the third kind! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by coryboehne ( 244614 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:42AM (#4431978)
    So, if this planet is located in a comet-dust-other-space-junk belt/disk then you can imagine the devastation that planet must endure every day! We saw what happened to Jupiter when the Shoemaker-Levy comet bombarded the planet, in the system around this newly discovered planet this would most likely be a daily event, so to say that the chance of life is low is like saying that living through having an h-bomb inserted in your anus and detonated is low.

  • The intelligence of the discovery (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Ektanoor ( 9949 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:42AM (#4431983) Journal
    So according to this article, we have bigger chances to see intelligence through the fact that there's a planet "eating" up a whole mess of dust and comets... That's VERY interesting. Now /.-ters, just close your eyes and imagine - a planet roaming around a whole mess of dust and comets. Every second millions of tons fall into this world, from time to time we see Comet-Shoemaker-like fireworks shining from its surface. WELL, THAT'S A VERY GOOD CHANCE TO FIND INTELLIGENCE!

    That's a whole lot of intelligence to look into one of the last places capable to harbour Life and state that "we can find some intelligence"... Couldn't they count yellow stars and say we have lot of chances to find intelligence?

    Or maybe there is some intelligence out there? Exactly on that star system? So I hope that the dust will cover Earth from their view. We are a paradise compared to these Armageddonians...

  • Earthly conceptions of life may be wrong? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by phorm ( 591458 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:44AM (#4431996) Journal
    One of the large problems in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is the preconception that any "intelligent lifeforms" would conform to the human concept of what qualifies:
    a) Life
    b) Intelligence

    he said there was little chance of finding life on the planet because it was under constant bombardment from a surrounding belt of comets.

    In the case of (a), for the most-part we are looking for carbon-based lifeforms that function in a similar way to human beings. This isn't to say that were looking for a bipedal species with human characteristics, but that we ignore other possiblities. There could be lifeforms that are not carbon-based, as is life on earth. Indeed, a planet that is completely inhospitable to earthly life may provide what another race/species needs to exist, but is overlooked due to the fact that "we" couldn't live on it.

    If that is the case, then why shouldn't there be planetary systems like our own that contain Earth-like planets?

    In the case of (b), we qualify intelligence as matching a particular set of humanistic functions. Among these would be the ability to manufacture tools, buildings, monuments, etc that are recognisable to us as such.
    There's no reason why (possible) life on other planets should conform to these classifications. Indeed, there could be lifeforms that are not x-pedal (have feet, etc) in nature, are .5 or 3.5 times the size of humans, and life in subterranean caves and achieved energy/sustainence from lava-flows or something similar as opposed to a solar source.
    Outworldly life is greatly unknown. There's nothing to say that such life would be in any way similar to our own, and to us may resemble a rock more than a human being.

    We're all limited by our own sense of being - phorm
    • A "Horta" you mean?

      Scotty, beam me down some cement so I can make a bandage for the silicon rock creature....

    • Somehow I think that these are not the main difficulties standing in our way of finding extraterrestrial life.
      • Possibly not. But it's not something we'll ever know until we meet a few new races from out among the stars. Until then, everything is just more-or-less conjecture and to a certain extent educated opinion.

        By then it will be all retrospect - phorm

  • life and probability (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bhny ( 97647 ) <bh AT usa DOT net> on Friday October 11, 2002 @09:48AM (#4432026) Homepage
    I get anoyed by people talking about the probability of intelligent life on other planets. Frank Drake's 1961 equation, [susx.ac.uk] is the most famous example.

    We have a sample group of 1 so far. You can't predict anything from a sample of 1. Its basic math.

    • Re:life and probability (Score:4, Informative)

      by adb ( 31105 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:08AM (#4432164)
      If you think the Drake equation is about "predict[ing] anything from a sample of 1", you don't understand it. The Drake equation lets us estimate the probability that we will run into intelligent life based on several other numbers that are easier to estimate well. That's the whole point: right now, we have only one world that we've explored thoroughly, so we want to figure out what else besides that sample of 1 we can use to predict things.

      • Re:life and probability (Score:4, Insightful)

        by bhny ( 97647 ) <bh AT usa DOT net> on Friday October 11, 2002 @12:19PM (#4433305) Homepage
        its impossible to estimate at least 4 of the numbers in the equation-

        Fl = The fraction of hospitable planets on which life actually arises
        Fi = The fraction of arisen life where intelligence develops
        Fc = The fraction of intelligent life which develops communications technology
        L = The 'lifetime' of intelligent life possessing such technology

        The Drake equation doesn't give us a probability of anything. It just kind of states what we would need to know before we could take a guess.
  • Ok, I know that we have found microbial bacteria in Antarctica... but take the temperatures there, and quintuple it... and you've got Pluto. Where, arguably, no life could survive past the microbial stage.

    Now, go out a few million more miles, and your on one of these planets, who's temperatures make Pluto look like the Bahamas... NOW what are your odds?

    The one thing that amuses me... is that the astronomers know the odds of finding life in the universe... infinitesimal, but life is out there. Yet, even when knowing this, they still hold hope of finding that life HERE in our own solar system.

    Heres to the infinitely optimistic astronomer... Cheers!!!
  • According to the article:
    Dr Wayne Holland, who led the team, which is based at the Royal Observatory of Edinburgh, said the discovery provided the strongest evidence so far that other solar systems existed.


    He said: "If that is the case, then why shouldn't there be planetary systems like our own that contain Earth-like planets?

    "Personally speaking, I think it must be odds-on that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, and I think one day we will find it - or they will find us."
    I find it very interesting that they make the point that this offers evidence that other solar systems exist! I had thought that was as forgone conclusion, and we were just looking for specifica planets.

    And then to take this proof, and amek the jump, if there are solar systems, then there should be earth like planets - that is a huge assumption. And finally, to go from solar system to intelligent life, that just took it from huge assumption, to science fiction. Not that I don't like science fiction, but not is a scientific article!
  • Is already known to dwell somewhere near the star Fomalhaut. No, not the oscilloscope for your mp3 player; an unspeakable great old one who gibbers and meeps unspeakably beyond the dimensions we know.

    Now that we have located intelligent life, all we need to do is contact it (which, under the new rules [wizards.com], will cost us a permanent wisdom point.)

  • An artist's rendering (Score:4, Informative)

    by johnlenin1 ( 140093 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:40AM (#4432369)

    of the Fomalhaut system and planet is today's Astronomy Picture of the Day [nasa.gov].

  • lame article (Score:3, Informative)

    by master_p ( 608214 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:41AM (#4432378)
    Please this is not flamebait. The presented article was very bad and if Internet-based journalism is continued in such a way, there will be no more intelligence on this planet indeed.

    What the article meant to say is that the existence of a huge planet in a far orbit from its star increases the probability of finding Earth-like planets in the habitable zone.

    Life exists on this planet because it is protected by the big ones (Jupiter, Saturn) that attract comets and asteroids. So, scientists assume that a solar-like system will also have big planets orbing its outter rings.

    The article is so bad that it says "other solar systems". There is only one solar system, and that is the one with the 'Sun' in it.

    Maybe "planetary system" is a better term.

  • Our methods are too crude yet (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ianscot ( 591483 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @10:43AM (#4432391)
    The idea that discovering this planet means it's more (or less) likely there's intelligent life out there is pretty speculative.

    It's right up there with the (earlier) idea that because we were finding supergiant planets so close to stars, it must mean there aren't many Jupiter-sized planets out there in mid-range orbits to suck up comets in their gravity wells -- so there must be less chance of life, right, 'cause all those comets would scour inner planets clean? That one got floated when they were first finding the big whoppers that caused stars' images to wobble. 'Course, it was based on assumptions about the fundamental role of comets in planetary life -- the whole dinosaur thing was in the news then -- and about how every star system must look like ours, and so on.

    We're still in the data collection stage of figuring out extrasolar planets. Our means of seeing them are dependent on flaky situations -- planets that travel through dust trails, planets that are so huge they cause stars to spin funny, stuff like that. We can't say anything really solid about the frequency of different types of planets, because our methods of looking for them are still picking around the edges, seeing the outliers rather than getting any sense of the norm.

    (Personally I think some of the outrageously adaptive bacterial life on earth argues pretty strongly for life wherever there's the slightest opening. If you wanna argue the likelihood of extraterrestrial forms, take a look at the conditions bacteria can get by in. Life can get by.)

  • For all the easily disappointed posters blaring on about how this has nothing to do with the chances of extra-terrestrial intelligence, it's not that hard to decipher the science from the hyperbolic headline. This observation just allows us to infer higher values for the f p and n e terms of Drake's equation [seti.org]. It improves the odds a little.

    (OT, but didn't we used to have <sub> tags here?)

    • Drake's equation has nothing to do with this. Drake's equation is a mess of "suppose" + "suppose" +"suppose"... It is a very pretty funny formula for someone who knows nothing about what's happening out there. However it is broken from the very start because it doesn't count the dynamics of the evolution of planetary systems, it doesn't count the chances for the appearence of Life, it doesn't count the Evolution of Species, it doesn't count the chances for the formation of Civilisation and most it doesn't count at all the chances of a civilisation going out of its home planet. Drake's equation is just useful when you know nothing about anything and you are playing only with suppositions. Besides, it is too strightforward - it should count probability densities and not raw numbers. Even on what concerns humans, it is not appliable since 1957...

      • You know, the thing I love best about Slashdot is being told I know nothing about a subject by a poster that provides no links, no references, no details, no indication of their own level of competence and no alternative solution.

        For the record, I'm an astrophysics graduate, and I'm well aware that Drake's Equation is a back-of-the-envelope toy that you fill in with any suppositions you like to arrive at the conclusion that you were looking for in the first place. But (as you'll probably realise when you calm down) this sort of data is exactly what we need to quantify Drake's Equation (or any other you care to name).

        By the way, if you have a better method, perhaps you'd like to share it with us.

        • Cool, and while I am not a graduate I have three years on Astronomy at University, some practice in Geology and several small courses on several fields of Natural Sciences, including Paleontology and Biology. Besides I studied for several years Mars landscape and for three years the Jovian and Saturnian satellites based on Voyager results. I know that I can't get to your graduate level. But is it good enough? Ok.

          Now about Drake's equation. This thing is just a combination of simple assumptions without considering that these things are related to each other. The problem is not in that we lack the data but how the equation is written. You cannot just go by, ignore time, the relations and laws between the equation factors and consider you have some number giving you a fair idea of what is going around. The biggest problem is that even from start, Drake's equation does not go well with star ages. That that's already some level of error to find other worlds. An error that may go up to 1-2 billions of years.

          And most. After studying some things on the Solar System, not only I but other people who is much more serious, consider that Drake's equation is a failure because it treats simple probability numbers and not probability density as I said. Imagine an alien coming to our Solar System. Where he would look for:

          Energy acceptable levels
          Life building blocks
          Life
          Civilisation

          You think the result is Earth? I don't think so. I wouldn't be admired if a more serious approach would give Mars the first place, with Earth laying on the edge of the chances. Why? Because of the Moon...

  • RIAA, MPAA and ALIENS... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Eric_Cartman_South_P ( 594330 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @11:11AM (#4432650)
    If aliens get our first strong siglans to leave earth atmosphere (TV and Radio siglans) and send them back to earth as a way to say Hello (ala movie "Contact") does that mean the RIAA and MPAA can sue the aliens for unlawfull duplication of copyright material?

  • Intelligence elsewhere (Score:4, Funny)

    by CrystalFalcon ( 233559 ) on Friday October 11, 2002 @11:31AM (#4432838) Homepage
    Shouldn't we look for intelligence on this planet before we start looking elsewhere?

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