Discover Gliese 581g - Just 20 Light-Years Away!

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Gliese 581g, located just 20 light-years away, has been identified as a potentially habitable Earth-sized exoplanet in its star's habitable zone, where conditions could support liquid water. This discovery has generated excitement in the scientific community, with implications for the existence of life beyond Earth. The planet's unique characteristics include being tidally locked, which may create stable environments conducive to life. Discussions also touch on the potential for advanced life forms and the implications of sending signals to this distant world. If confirmed, Gliese 581g could represent a significant milestone in the search for extraterrestrial life.
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Amazing discovery. Carl Sagan would be thrilled to read this article. Gliese 581g is only 20 light-years away. It would make a nice weekend getaway spot.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/earth-like-exoplanet-possibly-habitable-100929.html

An Earth-size planet has been spotted orbiting a nearby star at a distance that would makes it not too hot and not too cold — comfortable enough for life to exist, researchers announced today (Sept. 29).

If confirmed, the exoplanet, named Gliese 581g, would be the first Earth-like world found residing in a star's habitable zone — a region where a planet's temperature could sustain liquid water on its surface
 
Astronomy news on Phys.org
Wow!
 
So do we aim some big antennas and start transmitting? CQ, CQ, ...

Or do we heed Hawking's warning, and stay silent...
 
Can we send Hawking there, as a probe?
 
berkeman said:
So do we aim some big antennas and start transmitting? CQ, CQ, ...

? Don't you mean, ET, ET...?

Or do we heed Hawking's warning, and stay silent...

If there is anything to worry about, which is highly unlikely even under the most exotic scenarios one can imagine, they already know we're here. Right about now they should be watching Cheers, Roseanne, and Cosby.
 
cronxeh said:
Can we send Hawking there, as a probe?

:biggrin: OMG, you owe me a new keyboard! :biggrin:
 
If there are intelligent aliens on that planet then they are probably watching George H. Bush's inauguration by now.
 
waht said:
If there are intelligent aliens on that planet then they are probably watching George H. Bush's inauguration by now.

Aren't you off by a decade or so?

Edit: Oh, H!
 
g?

G?

I haven't heard anything about e or f!

I'm going to have to update my "[URL 581 Primer
Gliese-planets.gif

[/URL]
 
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  • #10
Ivan Seeking said:
Edit: Oh, H!

Basically an equivalent Arecibo sized dish located 20 light-years away could easily pick up lots of leakage signals from earth.
 
  • #11
DaveC426913 said:
g?

G?

I haven't heard anything about e or f!

Gliese is now a six planet system.
 
  • #12
Ivan Seeking said:
? Don't you mean, ET, ET...?



If there is anything to worry about, which is highly unlikely even under the most exotic scenarios one can imagine, they already know we're here. Right about now they should be watching Cheers, Roseanne, and Cosby.

Cable theft will not be tolerated. Time Warner is already on it.
 
  • #13
waht said:
Gliese is now a six planet system.

Huh. Well, it hasn't hit http://exoplanet.eu/ yet...
 
  • #14
g will be a one-face planet. It will bake on its eternal day side, freeze on its eternal night side and be toasty warm in a band between the two.
 
  • #15
waht said:
Basically an equivalent Arecibo sized dish located 20 light-years away could easily pick up lots of leakage signals from earth.

Poor buggers, I cringe at 90's TV shows all the time. They'd have it all to come...
 
  • #16
Hm. Not going to be a pleasant place to vaykay.

3-4x the mass, 1.2-1.4x the radius.

So gravity there will be about 2x Earth's, with a margin of error either way.
 
  • #17
waht said:
Basically an equivalent Arecibo sized dish located 20 light-years away could easily pick up lots of leakage signals from earth.

I thought you meant GWB for a moment. I was questioning the year.
 
  • #18
jarednjames said:
Poor buggers, I cringe at 90's TV shows all the time. They'd have it all to come...

Although, we might get better programming from their side. I suppose there might be broadcasts they'd be equally embarrassed by.
 
  • #19
Newai said:
Although, we might get better programming from their side. I suppose there might be broadcasts they'd be equally embarrassed by.

Or they've progressed to the point where they choose to remain hidden and we can't detect them.

I've considered writing a zoo hypothesis short story about aliens, ~100 l.y. distant, ~5000 years more advanced than we currently are. I'd focus on their internal debates over the few thousand years of observations - whether to intervene, to send probes, the best ways to observe without being detected...
 
  • #20
waht said:
Basically an equivalent Arecibo sized dish located 20 light-years away could easily pick up lots of leakage signals from earth.

But Arecibo is side-looking, isn't it? Do we have anything big that can orient on our polar axis?

I wonder which way this new planet's polar axis points...
 
  • #21
DaveC426913 said:
g will be a one-face planet. It will bake on its eternal day side, freeze on its eternal night side and be toasty warm in a band between the two.
Yeah. Calling this an Earth-like planet is a bit like the joke about the two statisticians who went duck hunting.
 
  • #22
D H said:
Yeah. Calling this an Earth-like planet is a bit like the joke about the two statisticians who went duck hunting.

Thank goodness for Google!

http://www.wildbirds.com/dnn/AboutUs/BirdJokes/tabid/692/Default.aspx

Two statisticians went duck hunting. A mallard flew overhead and one statistician fired just to the right of the bird. The other statistician fired just to the left of the bird. They turned to each other in glee, and congratulated each other... "On average, he's dead!", they cried!
 
  • #23
Let's call it Earthesque.

:biggrin:
 
  • #24
bele_and_lokai_star_trek.jpg
 
  • #25
Just because an environment is condusive to carbon based life (which can't possibly be the only type of life out there in such a massive universe) doesn't mean that
1. It has evolved
2. It is more intelligent than simple bacteria or even something as complex as a rabbit
3. It hasn't become so advanced it has effectively wiped itself out

The universe is approximately 14 billion years old, and this particular planet is surely a few billion years old at least, so even if it did have life at one stage it's not a certainty that life still exists there.
 
  • #26
I can't imagine any significant life existing on this planet. If the planet has any sort of atmosphere, then temperature fluctuations would vary wildly with the wind.
 
  • #27
Getting there in a decent time frame will be quite a trick. Need to dig out my trusty Bussard Ramscoop and proton-fusion reactor I've stashed in the backyard shed...
 
  • #28
The planet being discussed is actually Gliese c, however according to http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1005/1005.5098v1.pdf we ought to be looking at Gliese d!

With larger than Earth masses we can expect thick atmospheres on both planets and a substantial green house effect. This would make Gliese c too hot and put Gilese d into the 'Goldilocks zone'. But note it has an eccentricity of 0.38 so the temperature would vary widely.

Garth
 
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  • #29
Garth said:
The planet being discussed is actually Gliese c, however according to http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1005/1005.5098v1.pdf we ought to be looking at Gliese d!

Garth

Garth you missed the news! There's two new planets in the system and one is right between planets c & d. Thus it's Gliese 581 g we're talking about.
 
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  • #30
That explains the confusion - it was all mine!

My bad - sorry I'll keep out of it in future,

Garth
 

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