Potentially habitable planet found

[fgfuyfyuiuy0]

A potentially habitable planet has been found, but the problem is it is 120 trillion miles away from Earth, meaning I don't think we will be able to explore it any time soon. Our Earth is the perfect number of miles away from the sun to be "Habitable", which this new planet (named Gliese 581 c), is in this area. The sun it orbits is a red dwarf star, which is cooler than our sun. Scientists believe it has liquid (Meaning oceans and lakes), meaning it can support life.

 

 

 

Link:

 

 

 

Yahoo: New planet

 

 

 

I was watching this on "ABC News; Good Morning America", when they did a thing on this planet. I think it is so cool that we can "see" a planet that could have life on it. Soon, we will be able to invite Gliesians over for dinner, if we can get future spaceships that can make it over there.

[Adam007]

The article says that Mars also fits the description for a hospitable planet, but obviously isn't. Given that the planet in question goes around a sun so much smaller than ours, I don't think it would be warm enough. But what do I know, it's not like I can just counter all of this news like that. Personally though, I'm doubting it's of any significance as cool as it'd be.

[Defender2516]

Personally I say we are extreemly lucky. Everything on earth supports life to the smallest elements of degree.

 

 

 

Any other planet, while it may "look" inhabital, its most likely not.

 

 

 

It might get far too cold at night, the sun may not close enough to support life. Is water there? Can water be there?

 

 

 

Its just not a place we can live. Trust me, they will be something wrong with it. The chances of finding another "earth" is very very slim.

 

 

 

~Defender~

[warren211]

The world beyond ours is interesting. there's a cloud of alcohol with enough to fill several trillion glasses of beer. Its free for the taking -- but it's 10 billion (or million?) light years from earth.

[Vashinred]

Now about getting to the said planet...

 

 

 

 

 

Even if its vulnerable to terraforming, it would take a huge push for such a long way and the huge amount of planning that would need to be put to use once (if) we got their. I would choose mars as a better choice, now that they found some kind of ice.

[Star_Fox]

it orbits a very cool star so the water there might not be as pure as ours, or itll contain another element (possibly intoxicated to our species).

 

 

 

we will eventually need to move on to other worlds, the earth will be engulfed by the sun in less then 5 billion years, considering technologys improving fast, we just might find a sudden shift to other habitable planets! :twisted:

[Nadril]

The article says that Mars also fits the description for a hospitable planet, but obviously isn't. Given that the planet in question goes around a sun so much smaller than ours, I don't think it would be warm enough. But what do I know, it's not like I can just counter all of this news like that. Personally though, I'm doubting it's of any significance as cool as it'd be.

 

 

 

It also goes around the sun a lot closer. A year on that planet will be something like ~14 earth days. (around there at least).

 

 

 

 

 

I read about this morning and its kind of exciting, hopefully theres some follow up on it.

[bonzeben23]

think about it, it's not like humans are the only intelligant lifeform on the galaxy, i mean if these planets are like 10 million light years away then couldn't a whole species already be there and we're seeing what's happening 10 million light years in the past right so these planets could be full of life and there could be a species that could come to earth right :-k

[Kewl_Sabre]

think about it, it's not like humans are the only intelligant lifeform on the galaxy, i mean if these planets are like 10 million light years away then couldn't a whole species already be there and we're seeing what's happening 10 million light years in the past right so these planets could be full of life and there could be a species that could come to earth right :-k

 

 

 

Well, if this particular planet is only (used lightly) 120 trillion miles away it's not quite as far into the past. We're probably looking at, on a cosmic scale, recent events.

 

 

 

But yea, things that are 10 million light years away we're looking at 10 million years ago.

 

 

 

Anyway... while the discovery is intriguing, the chances of us being able to settle down there are extremely slim. It's a long, long ways away and we still know next to nothing about it. I think that our best bet is still Mars and terraforming. And at the rate Earth is going, we'd best get started on Mars pretty soon.

[hellbellz]

I agree with Adam.

 

 

 

The planet is just the right size, might have water in liquid form

 

 

 

The Moon might have water, but we don't know that :? If we havn't found out if the Moon does, what makes us think that we could find out that's something 120 trillion lightyears? :-k

[yomom1919]

If you really think about it, of all the billions of planets out there, they'res bound to be thousands of inhabitable ones.

[indy500fan]

If you really think about it, of all the billions of planets out there, they'res bound to be thousands of inhabitable ones.

 

 

 

The chances of there being another habitable planet are very very high, but the chances of finding it is very very low.

[The Dark Lord]

I'm just wondering... Would it be possible with advanced technology to take advantage of wormholes there? I mean seriously I don't think it's even to be considered traveling there via conventional methods...Even with a spacecraft of some sort.

 

 

 

But will we ever be able to create and maintain wormholes?

[The Dark Lord]

By the way how many miles can light travel in a year again? 120 trillion doesn't sound like many light years...So every light-year it is away, that's how many years in the past we're seeing of the planet because the light reflecting from the planet would take that long to reach us. (Allowing us to see it.)

 

 

 

Say like something was 150 light-years away from Earth. If we see the object that's 150 light-years away, we'd be seeing it as it was 150 years ago.

[magekillr]

this is very interesting, however, there are more things than just climate and atmospheric conditions that make a planet "habitable". for instance, if it has plates like the earth, then the crust needs to be a certain thickness. if it's too thin, then there would be too much volcanic activity, and then if it's too think then too much oxygen would be trapped inside. though the only other planet thought to have had plates thus far other than Earth has been Mars :-k (with Venus and Jupiter under speculation)

 

 

 

nonetheless, this is an amazing discovery...and if technology continues to increase at the exponential rate that it has been...then i don't think we're very far off from reaching distances such as these.

 

 

 

we can currently reach .003C...and scientists in the article believe they can reach .1C...and that's pretty incredible in itself

[Stilev]

most likely this plant isn't worth anything in the long run, since we really dont know that much about it. its the fact that we found something so relavity close to earth which is the leap forward.

 

 

 

like the said mars is listed on under the same branch as this, but also as the said until only a few years ago they couldn't even detetact earth sized planets.

 

 

 

on a side note i read an article on the way the detect these planets and its by measuring the wobble of the sun due to the planets pulling on the sun. well its alot easier with gases gaints pulling on the sun since it wobbles more. rocky planets like earth bearly do anything, and im actully surprized that we have come so far since i read about this kinna stuff maybe 2-3 years ago :?

 

 

 

just a side note the planet is 60 sec per min x 60 min per hour x 24 hours per day x 365.2 days in a year x 20.5 years away x 299,792,458 m/s (speed of light in meters per second) = how many meters away it is 193,918,425,067,825,920m

 

 

 

193 trillion kilometer

 

 

 

doesn't sound far, but it probaly is lol, if anyone finds something wrong with my math, your welcome to fix it

[willysp]

The world beyond ours is interesting. there's a cloud of alcohol with enough to fill several trillion glasses of beer. Its free for the taking -- but it's 10 billion (or million?) light years from earth.

 

 

 

 

 

theres another problem with your free beer for life theory :P

 

 

 

its not the drinking kind of alcohal, it would be more readily used as rubbing alcohol then as vodka :P

 

 

 

 

 

 

Its just not a place we can live. Trust me, they will be something wrong with it. The chances of finding another "earth" is very very slim.

 

 

 

~Defender~

 

 

 

 

 

Very slim of finding another planet like earth yes, but id say the odds of there being another planet like earth out there to be very high. I mean if you can slightly grasp the size of the universe, then it shouldnt be that hard to believe that the odds of 2 planets being very similar in characteristics is quite high.

 

 

 

But I doubt we would be able to find it, like you have said :P

[Barihawk]

Actually, the planet is only 22.7 light years away. That's not too far :P.

 

 

 

Mars would be hospitable if we could terraform it. But no, we have more important things to spend our money on than NASA research! :(

[Defender2516]

I think you guys better start researching the fountain of youth before teraforming anything or moving to another planet light years away, because last time I checked, we don't have light speed capabilities, and our space technology is very low.

 

 

 

Maybe 500 years from now, but definatly not today. Just enjoy your lifes and stop worrying, you'll be dead before you hit another planet :P

 

 

 

~Defender~

[magekillr]

I think you guys better start researching the fountain of youth before teraforming anything or moving to another planet light years away, because last time I checked, we don't have light speed capabilities, and our space technology is very low.

 

 

 

Maybe 500 years from now, but definatly not today. Just enjoy your lifes and stop worrying, you'll be dead before you hit another planet :P

 

 

 

~Defender~

 

 

 

you never know:

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

[Defender2516]

I think you guys better start researching the fountain of youth before teraforming anything or moving to another planet light years away, because last time I checked, we don't have light speed capabilities, and our space technology is very low.

 

 

 

Maybe 500 years from now, but definatly not today. Just enjoy your lifes and stop worrying, you'll be dead before you hit another planet :P

 

 

 

~Defender~

 

 

 

you never know:

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

 

what the hell..

 

 

 

~Defender~

[magekillr]

what? have you never heard of that proposal before and it seems quite interesting? or does it just seem too fantasy

 

 

 

personally i really don't know lol...especially considering it requires substantial amounts of a specific type of energy..

 

 

 

however, at the exponential rate that technology has been increasing..who knows anymore

 

 

 

hence the:

[Mercifull]

Its interesting to read about and id like to see some more research done on the planet. It does lie in the goldilocks zone so its got the potential but its a bit too far away for our current technology to reach it in anyway. Id be interested to hear about developments in light based communication though as its only 22.7 away. Would it be possible to send some kind of message?

[jemathonical]

Seems pretty awesome :thumbsup:

 

But lets say that scientists discover that it is ok to live...What will happen then? Will we send a shuttle there or something full of astronauts?

 

Will we eventually send 100's of people there so we can make new life?

[Zonorhc]

It's not that we don't have the technology, it's just that we don't have the infrastructure to implement the tech base we have to send a probe to check out the planet in a sane period of time. Note - a probe. We're not about to send a manned mission without knowing if there's actually any point in doing so.

 

 

 

Also, where we are now, it may take about three hundred years for a probe to reach the planet. Maybe in a hundred years or so, we could have the technology to build a probe that will reach it in a hundred, or maybe even fifty. It's worth a wait.

 

 

 

Oh, and also, since it's a potentially habitable planet, this is sort of obligatory...

 

 

 

For the glory of the Imperium, claim it in the name of the Emperor!