If humans were able to find an earth-like planet on which to live, it would be best that there were no inhabitants there with whom we would be forced to coexist. We are the most impatient, confrontational, bicker-prone and immature lot conceivable. Who would want us much less welcome us? Heck, we don't even have a consensus on God.
12
Finding a new planet to call home is a very understandable desire. We do know at some point in the future, earth will essentially disappear when our star blows up. However, for several reasons, it may disappear as a home for humans long before that.
At this point we are talking about building rockets for almost 8 billion people. By the time we figure that out and do it, there will probably be a few billion more seats needed. If the plan to leave involves less than all of us, I really can't see the people left out letting the others get away.
If humans are still on this planet when the Sun explodes, there will be suffering on an almost unimaginable scale. So, we do need to work on a plan.
The catch is, at the same time, we need to get serious about surviving on this planet for at least as long as it takes to pick up and move.
I can't say I am really optimistic about the future of either project, but hopefully that's just me.
2
Is there intelligent life on Earth?
16
Yes it's great that some science has not been perverted and infected with creationalism and this is a fascinating find , but sorry about raining on your parade Paul it's difficult not to be cynical . If ever mankind ever is able to reach for the stars it will be the entitled and wealthy not me and thou who get to inhabit the new world . Then they will reap all it's resources and move on like locusts to the next one.
1
I'm always amazed at man's achievements in science and technology and reaching out into space. But while we must continue such exploration, the planet around Ross 128, nor Mars for that matter, is not "Plan B" for human habitation. We need to clean up our home planet rather than trashing it and then thinking we can move on to another. Besides, unless we learn how to fold space, it would take centuries, perhaps millennia to reach Ross 128. Mars is another matter but while developing technology to terra-form Mars, we should use that same technology to re-vitalize the Earth.
11
First of all, there is the parochial fallacy that life requires water. It's our own bias based on life on Earth. Possibly not true in space where, for starters e we have Dark Matter (which we know nothing about except that it occupies most of the known (that's a joke) universe. There may be forms of life that are not carbon based and we would not recognize as life if we stepped on it. Secondly, by definition all the images we are seeing from this "near by" planet are 40 years old. The planet could have blown up yesterday and we would not know it for 40 more years. And unless we learn to control (compress or bend) Space Time we will never be able to reach any objet 40 light years away. This entire story sounds like a PR job for more public funding.
3
11 light years away, not 40.
4
On a clear night, if you live in a part of the planet not engulfed in light pollution, go outside and look up. See the immensity of the sky that stares back at you. You are literally looking at the underbelly of infinity. All the myriad stars and galactic systems you see in that twinkling firmament, it goes on forever. It's God's sandbox; and our bequeathed playground.
Would that we all come together as a species, stop monkey back-biting each other over frivolous irrelevancies and start the serious fun of playing in that sandbox. We have been endowed with the gifts necessary to do this, the intelligence, the curiosity. We only need the wisdom and the strength of moral character (as a species) to pursue it.
Such research and discovery as this is indicative that we very well might be on our way to developing those characteristics. We just need to do more of it. So, shall we take advantage of our gifts and go play? It beats the alternative doesn't it?
John~
American Net'Zen
18
Some very disappointing comments here. I expected better from NYT readers.
Yes, yes I get the need that we have to look after own planet, of course we have to but why let this get in the way of celebrating this wonderful science?
Congratulations to the scientists behind this discovery and all of the scientists who are making amazing discoveries every day. You are our heroes!
36
Paul:
Honestly, I'm tired of insipid adulation of the scientists. When you've worked with these people, it brings it down to Earth (so to speak).
They're just like everyone else, simply with their own particular skill sets. I'm reluctant to put them on pedestals. And don't think they've got any big answers for the rest of us. We need their knowledge and abilities, for sure, but we're all in this together, and we all have our parts to play.
3
"...don't think they've got any big answers for the rest of us"
Sure, just small, inconsequential stuff, such as how the Universe, life and everything actually works. We have our gut feelings to figure out the really big answers.
9
Kenneth Chang: You duly report the star-wobble inference of the hypothetical existence of a planet orbiting another star. Thus, as reported, such a planet would be easily within the planet-scorching distance of several million miles easily encompassed by that star's routine geomagnetic storms and other solar mass ejections; This hypothetical planet would be scorched to a cinder by such inevitable events. While, at a distance of 93M miles, we only experience electric grid and electronic interference like satellite, and radio transmission and reception (the last time being March 9, 1989).
2
"11 lights years" may not sound like much, but it's worth noting that in practical terms it's a distance far, far beyond anything we can hope to travel in the foreseeable future.
Voyager 1, launched 40 years ago, doesn't have even the barest trace of facilities needed to accommodate human passengers. in 40 years it has traveled a distance of roughly 2e+10 km. the planet described in this article, which "may have conditions for human life", is roughly 1e+14 km from earth. given its rate of progress so far, Voyager 1 would require a total of 200,000 years to reach that planet. even assuming that a modern spacecraft, constructed using today's technology & capable of carrying human passengers, could travel at 10 times Voyager's speed over an inter-stellar distance -- likely an over-estimate -- it would still take it 20,000 years to reach that "nearby" planet.
given our present space flight capability, the possibility that the planet orbiting Ross 128 could support human life might be of theoretical interest, but is of absolutely no practical significance with respect to our ability to get there.
3
Good for the planet we cannot reach it. One G.O.P. friend stated that, should conditions deteriorate on Earth, we can move to that new world. Great - trash that one, too.
And who is saying that the bacteria that might or might not be there are not potentially the precursors of future highly-developped life? Read Andrew Knoll: Life on A Young Planet: The first three billion years. Stay on Earth and clean up your mess.
2
Hi Shirley. You are evidently unaware of the fact that Zefram Cochrane will invent warp drive in 2063 and that the first warp test flight will take place as a Vulcan ship is passing near earth, leading to the creation of the United Federation of Planets. Hopefully, the Romulans are not also curious about the planet orbiting Ross 128.
6
The planet is also likely to be tidally locked to Ross 128, which could affect its ability to harbor life. Regardless, I'm sure it would be an interesting place to visit if its crushing gravity doesn't bring you down a bit.
If you were to stand in a doorway and look out at the whole Universe, this planet would be right there in the doorway with you. If it has even primitive life (bacteria), then such life is ubiquitous -- it's everywhere. But we are the only "intelligent" sentient beings in the cosmos?
Makes one wonder: "Where are they?" (I wonder if anyone ever asked that before ...?)
Do you really think they have no idea we're here, and it will be up to us to "find" them? Or we're simply alone, surrounded by all these bacteria? If that's really the case, give us maybe a century before we invent AI that will subsume us -- because we will want it to -- so we can improve ourselves! Either way, it looks bleak for us and our "curiosity."
4
Some possible answers to "Where are they?":
https://www.space.com/37157-possible-reasons-we-havent-found-aliens.html
2
The star Ross 128 collapsed to become a red dwarf some 0.5-5 billion years before our solar system formed. The little planet circling so close to Ross 128 would have experienced something we don`t expect life on earth to survive when our star turns red and earth is so much farther away from it`s star, We do not think there is life on Mercury , molten lead is more possible, so if life was able to start on this planet after existing in a non-life possible environment plus experiencing the collapse to a red dwarf that would be astounding even if it took 4 billion years.
I hope we get the answer some day.
2
Dear Duncan Lennox,
Actually our sun and a red dwarf are extremely different, primarily a red dwarf is far less massive. While our sun will first grow outward into a red giant phase (immersing the earth in the process) and then fall into a white dwarf stage (where collapse stops due to electrons keeping atoms apart), the red dwarfs were never any larger, and never will get larger. They burn at a lower temperature, and can last for trillions of years, longer than the universe as a whole, in all likelihood.
So lead would not be liquid on the surface of this planet, because the star is far cooler than ours, and it was never immersed within the star itself.
6
NASA would be delighted with any kind of chemical reaction on any planet because it would be regarded as "life." Yet many of these same people do not regard a 20-week-plus embryo as life.
Some see NASA's involvement in movies, music and books as an attempt to not-so-subtly shape public opinion about its programs.
"Getting a message across embedded in a narrative rather than as an overt ad or press release is a subtle way of trying to influence people's minds," says Charles Seife, author of "Decoding the Universe," who has written about NASA's efforts to rebrand itself. "It makes me worry about propaganda."
Not at the cost of human suffering and deaths—like the pyramids or the Versailles palace.
NASA R.I.P.
This reminds me of a small country that had grandiose ideas: they would land a man on the sun.
In answer to the question of how they would do that, they replied,
“That's easy. We go at night."
What a waste of taxpayers money.
1
Taking a wild guess here what you like and don’t like: Still much better a NASA branding effort than the gun industry propaganda - witness the machine guns in Thor Ragnarok (!) and spongebob square pants movie (!!!).
1
We are not alone; the question is, are we looking in the right direction? And do we have the know-how already? Supposing that 'beings' in other galaxies know about our behavior towards violence and graft, would they be willing to risk their lives and treasure to call on us? Or even worse, to pay us a visit?
3
Dear Manfred M.,
It's certain that beings in other galaxies know nothing about us, far too far away. Beings within, say, 75 light years (very close by) may have had the chance to pick up on our broadcasts, if they were watching the skies extremely closely.
But so far we have done nothing interesting, and certainly we are no threat to any other intelligent civilization anywhere. It'd be nearly impossible to spot us, but totally impossible to fear us.
3
Absolutely true; no fear here for any contact, as the distance of stars (with it's planets) in the Universe (or multiverse) is expanding at ever faster speeds, making it virtually impossible to join hands (get together), no matter our efforts and any ultra-advanced technology. I was simply stating our violent tendencies towards 'the other' to dissuade 'them' from any wish to make contact with us. My questions were hypothetical and relegated to science fiction at best.
1
If they were picking up broadcasts it would be from 75 years ago. They still would not detect the first nuclear test.
2
We've not gone an inch beyond the moon. To suggest that people may somehow venture to the stars is ludicrous. (Yes, yes, I've heard it all before about "who could have anticipated the marvels of flight before airplanes?") And to think that we would go and corrupt another planet, IF it has its own form of life, particularly after trashing our own, is profoundly disturbing.
2
The bug-eyed creatures that live on this other planet are going to consider us and anything we send to be infectious agents, and will undoubtedly try to stick whatever we send into an autoclave.
2
Shouldn't we be first focusing on making Alabama more livable?
21
yea - I heard all about this planet. It appears everyone there is named Wally.
3
Is there any way NASA could inform on the mineral makeup of this planet?
Maybe there's lots of gold there, and with this information, Trump would elbow his way into the next rocket ship leaving earth and try to steer it towards this planet in order to increase his wealth?
9
It also would need to show the presence of marble. Also welcome: trace amounts of orange color, hair gel or spray, and tape (to fix one’s tie when being unable to properly tie it).
1
Lame’? Lame
11 light years away! All these scientists want us to believe that there might be life on an unseen planet that far away. How about we explore in our neighborhood a bit more, i.e. Mars? Mars is close enough, not very hot as Venus or Mercury, a bit cold but we can deal with that with heaters etc. Better yet, how about we first ensure that we keep our space ship earth, the planet we know has life and we are alive on it, a bit safe and not try to blow it up with nuclear weapons or destroy it with green house gases.
I have serious doubts we will EVER reach a planet 11 light years away any time soon or even within the next millennia. The distance is so far that it is unimaginable. Let's try to make a round trip to Mars for humanity along with all of the other species that we share this planet with and see how we fare on that project and then plan for traveling a bit further. It is a technological feat that we can calculate the presence of planets that far, let's keep it up so we can improve our ability to see further in our universe but at the same time lets learn more about worlds nearer to us.
Life on other planets is the astronomer's holy grail. They are believers. With no actual facts or proof. But that doesn't matter. Because there just has to be life on other planets. Can't just be our planet right? No way, according to these omniscient astronomers.
Sure. There might be 10000000000000000000000 planets in the universe but we're the only magical one.
3
Near by sun my foot!!!
A mere 10 light years is 58 trillion miles. Assuming that we create transportation 1000 times faster that we now have to pass by the moon on our way to Mars (not land on the moon that takes 3 days to accomplish or 9 times slower) it would take 47 million years get to Ross 128. Do the math!
A 47 million years near by planet is contradiction in terms.
Of course given that the furthest star visible with naked eye is V762 Cas in Cassiopeia at 16,308 light-years, then Ross 128 is 1630 time closer, but still millions of human life times away with transportation orders of magnitude greater that what is available today. Not exactly near by.
NASA is already working on nano spacecraft that would be propelled by lasers to 20% the speed of light. I believe the purpose would be to take pictures and collect data that would then be sent back to us. Maybe humans will not physically go anytime soon but it seems that we will soon be able to send probes to explore other star systems.
4
I am so there. I am so anywhere...else.
10
I’m certain that when humankind may be able to confirm whether even the simplest form of life exists on this exoplanet, all life on Earth will be extinct due to humanity’s greed, violence, and murderous disregard for all other fauna and flora that still grace Earth.
6
"Dr. Bonfils said Ross 128 appears to be at least 5 billion years old — older than our solar system — and perhaps as old as 10 billion years"
The most difficult concept to grasp isn't the impossible distance scale of the universe (a close start being 11 light years away), but the time scale (a planet being 5.5 billion years older than earth). This planet may have harbored advanced life billions of years ago, life that has since perished or moved on to other planets.
8
Pack up the democrats and send them off now to their new, triggerfree world. It only takes 37,200 years, with our current technology to go 1 light year.
So, after 409,200, 37,200 x 11, Earth will be purified.
Interstellar exploration is certainly ego affirming and perhaps even comforting to scientists but I fear it continues to encourage a lack of concern for the lovely planet that we do live on. Our history reveals a wanton disregard for the place where we are as long as we suspect there is somewhere else to go when it is used up. I appreciate that the technological outgrowth from space exploration has enriched our lives in a number of ways but I wonder what those economic resources could have yielded were they spent on research to help solve existing problems on Earth. Constantly searching for a better - or even equal - place to be ignores the basic human problems of greed, exploitation, over consumption, profligacy; which need to be solved first. We have known for quite long, as Shakespeare instructed, "the fault is not in the stars, Dear Brutus, but in ourselves." And sadly, that is where the solution lies as well.
1
Seriously? Do you really think that anyone now living believes that we will be capable of reaching a habitable world in time for there to be "somewhere else to go"? Yes, people speculate about it, but for all except perhaps a tiny handful, they are well aware that escape from earth's problems will not come--if it EVER does--in time to save even our many, many generations away descendants. Studying and learning about the universe is not what causes humans to ignore "the basic human problems of greed, exploitation, over consumption, profligacy; which need to be solved...." Do you really believe that if we ceased all space exploration tomorrow that the resources devoted to it would go toward solving our problems on earth? Seriously? We have more than enough resources now, but we're not using them in a way that benefits us all.
Only 11 light years? How far is that with warp-drive...
3
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/12/us/spring-forward-daylight-savings-ti... suggests people are considering leaving US Eastern Time to use the Atlantic time zone without the former's daylight saving time.
If we ever colonize a "new Earth" and hope to stay in touch and sync with the old, the answer is obviously "neither—let's all dump DST and go UTC, then step not a second back!" We can reorganize our schedules around the new clock, but we can't continue to maintain the noon-is-highest-sun time zone mess on multiple planets. Think of it as SCTFA, a Single-Clock Timezone For All.
Just something to ponder once we on this Pale Blue Dot survive covfefe and renaissance to figure out the whole faster-than-light or cryosleep thing...
1
If it's inhabitable, it may already be inhabited. And if they've been watching Earth television, we will probably be extremely unwelcome, except maybe for Kim Kardsahian.
1
Sure!
Now that we have polluted the heck out of this planet and set climate change into action, let's go to another planet and destroy it too.
2
Fascinating stuff, but I must point out an error in the article, as it is an anthropocentric error that keeps coming up. It says, "liquid water, one of the requisite ingredients for life", but this is viewing things through human eyes, as if the universe were constructed for us.
We have plenty of life on earth that does not rely on liquid water at all, although most of it is bacteria, it's still life. We have absolutely no idea what life might be based on elsewhere, because we have never been past the moon, and in fact we can't even get back to our moon today.
There are plenty of options for life without liquid water involved, like life in methane seas, or the atmosphere of gas giants, or on the surface of Venus amongst the liquid lead.
Nonetheless, this finding is more proof that earth-like planets are fairly abundant in the universe, and thus an anthropocentric view of the universe is completely unwarranted. There's nothing that unique about this planet, and probably not about our species either. As we explore the universe further, we should plan to be humbled by it.
Lastly, the notion that we might abandon this planet to establish ourselves on others is, unfortunately, ludicrous. We could start colonies elsewhere, someday, but there is no chance of us offloading the billions of humans here now and transporting them elsewhere. We had better learn to live with this planet, or we'll die on it.
8
I too keep wondering if some other option than water wouldn't be able to sustain life on another planet, but such a possibility seldom seems to get mentioned--maybe methane or supercritical CO2 could do the trick.
However, all the evidence so far is that all life on earth must have access to water. Bacteria as metabolically active cells cannot survive in the absence of water. They do produce spores that can lie dormant in the absolute absence of water but it's arguable that that can be considered "life" since they can neither grow nor reproduce.
An interesting essay on the topic can be found at http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2014/11/nasa-could-alien-life-forms.... It seems that the amount of water needed for microbial life may be smaller than most of us can even imagine, but that small amount is crucial.
OTOH, we used to believe that life could not exist in the absence of sunlight or at least without access to other creatures that required sunlight. Now we know better.
1
There is no organism on earth which can survive with no water. But all life on earth is based on DNA and RNA. It may be possible that there are things on other planets which could qualify as "living" which have developed from another molecular basis. One we couldn't even conceive of here on earth. But who knows?
The only thing which is certain is that the vastness of the universe is so great that it seems to contain almost infinite possibilities. Yet as far as we know the laws of physics and chemistry are universal and do not vary due to time or space.
2
Let's give Trump and his people the planet with, say, 20 years of food. Seems like a win-win-win all around. Just stay off my planet.
2
The offer to sync my calendar with heavenly events in the middle of this article seemed like a great idea. That is until NYT wanted permission to manage my calendar. No thank you.
"The star, Ross 128, is not the closest with a planet similar in size to ours. "
Actually, Sol is the closest star. . . and besides Earth it has a planet that is approximately the size of Earth: Venus.
1
The author is referring to the "other" closest star with a planet, Proxima Centauri. It is the closest star to the Sun and it has an Earth-size planet.
1
All right, let us know when you get something solid.
Amazing -- comments about travelling to and inhabiting this new planet. Not doable in any way shape or form given our current tech and our physics tells us quite clearly that we can't attain the speed of light let along approach it. The only way that we could possibly travel 11 light years in distance -- even if we made huge advances in the speed our space ships could achieve -- would require some sort of massively large space ship with the inhabitants committed to living generation after generation within the confines of the ship.
Then there is the issue of -- oops -- this planet isn't really all that great. We thought it might be habitable. Our bad. Then what do you do? On to the next planet?
I think we should savor the information for what it tells us about the universe. But unless we make massive leaps in technology, the practical value is limited.
1
We could approach the speed of light, from the standpoint of physics.
The amount of energy needed to attain the speed of light becomes infinite as it approaches the speed of light, but it is an exponential process. It is far, far easier to go 50% the speed of light than it is to go 99.9% of the speed of light.
Half the speed of light is still pretty darn fast.
I'm not saying we have anywhere close to the technological capacity, but it is theoretically possible if we can make it to that point as a civilization.
i feel there is an element of evolutionary adaptation , at least on a preliminary, inquisitive level, going on here. Pre-agrarian, paleolithic humans left the security of the cave, tentatively, to find sources of sustenance - eventually making tools and technologies to farm, creating rituals and myths to explain the collective awareness. Then walked across continents and exploring the "unknown" for more fertile , hospitable environments.
This is a evolutionary leap but still an adaptation to a changing, less hospitable environment on earth,
Japan has said they will be on the Moon by 2030 ( i believe them). not long after that will be another international space station orbiting in the Moon's orbit to be a staging ground for Mars exploration. Like lily pads on a galactic pond to jump across , one by one. The universe beckons..
2
Yes, it beckons ... so that we can begin our march to ruin another entire planet.
1
probably. or maybe a small human colony on a distant star will reset common time as pre and post Earth and evolve in a more tempered way before of.... Nah, we'll just ruin another planet..lol
Even if this planet has the right component gases in the atmosphere, it might not have a magnetic field that protects it from cosmic radiation. That might be another important feature if a planet is to support life.
4
Good point Mr. Gundel, but it might not be important to life either. We have bacteria right on earth that survives in radioactive toxic waste. Quite possible that increased radioactivity would not prevent hardier lifeforms from existing, maybe ones with less fragile DNA type structures than our own.
2
The cataloging and search for exoplanets are at least laying the landscape of our universe. Our solar system is in the exurbs far from screaming red stars and evil dwarfs. Not much activity here but that is a good thing. Where Ross 128 was discovered is the high radiation low-chances of finding habitable planets, except that this planet is ridiculously close but survives because the star is so old. Perhaps a fate that our sun would undergo a few billion years from now. And an artist impression is just that: it gives us earthlings to imagine what life there may look/feel/smell/sound like
1
My 11-year-old son (born about the time these light particles left Ross 128 and reached scientists here) and I figured out that Ross 128 is 1 sextillion, 75 quintillion, 182 quadrillion, 944 trillion miles away... give or take (I mean, hey, we're no rocket scientists). We are amazed by the information that continues to be gathered about what's out there.
17
You are way off.. check your calculations.. 11 light years is between 64 trillion and 65 trillion miles.
2
Great. Finally clean coal gets a break. Burn on.
1
Finally!
1
"The star may have been more turbulent in its youth." Just as we all were.
6
Yet more evidence that our solar system is quite remarkable and unique.
5
Ha, rather more evidence that there is nothing special about our solar system or our planet. This planet we live on is replicated millions of times in just our own galaxy. It is nothing special, and humanity is even less special.
3
Remarkable, perhaps. Unique? Probably not. Based on various astronomical observations of recent years, the estimate is that in our Milky Way galaxy alone, there are tens of billions of potentially habitable planets.
From Hubble Deep Field images taken in the mid-1990s and subsequent images and studies, scientists estimated that the observable universe contained about 200 billion galaxies. More recent studies led NASA to announce just last year that they now believe there are ten times the number of galaxies than previously believed. We're talking BIG numbers here and it's hard to believe that among all the richness of the universe that this planet is truly unique.
1
The only thing missing are human beings: human beings to appreciate the beauty, human beings to deface the beauty. ‘Deface’ may be the pivotal word, as beauty doesn’t need a face. The human species would be wise to improve upon its custodianship of the beautiful planet it already inhabits before venturing out to inhabit another. God or no God, the process is tiresome to the nature of all things.
16
Perhaps we could send the Trump/Kushner family to develop it for us
24
Sadly, but inevitably, when discoveries such as this are made, there is talk of a massive evacuation of human beings from a ravaged earth to some other planet which then human beings, none the wiser, can then ravage.
Utter foolishness.
Earth is our planet and it belongs to everything that lives, not just human beings, but, in the homoscene, human beings are responsible for preserving it and, in the process, ourselves.
15
If a society could organize and survive intact the generations-long effort to emigrate to another planet, then I believe by definition it would be wiser.
2
Habitable planet circling a red star-could it be Krypton?
4
No, because Krypton the planet is completely fictitious. Krypton the element can't be formed into a planet, but on the other hand, it does exist.
This may be the ultimate evolution. That a living being on one planet can manage to detect, evaluate and perhaps eventually inhabit another planet fascinates beyond reason.
I am in awe of humans and still hold on to a belief that despite the negative effects our presence may have on this Earth there is a deeper explanation for all we have done and will eventually achieve.
11
So humanity can go and destroy another planet in the universe?
10
If future us makes the trip, it would not be like anything else we've done - enduring a month or so of hardship on a ship that, while difficult, isn't necessarily life or perspective changing. Those arriving would be a generation born in transit, and born to generations that spent their entire lifetimes in transit. It would not be the same society that left.
1
No worries, we cannot. We've gotten as far as our own moon, but that's it, and we can't even get back to it right now. Humanity is a long, long way from getting outside of the solar system, so we have no chance of destroying anything that isn't immediately adjacent to us.
2
If there is no life in the universe except us, then the cosmos is a desolate cosmic desert. However, if there is life in the universe besides us, given the immensity of time and space, the chances of life thousands, millions, even billions of years more advanced then us is...astronomical! In which case th.e cosmos is not an empty desert, but rather a competitive hungry predatory jungle where we would be the most helpless...tastiest...of prey! Best then for us to keep the head down, quit, hiding "up-wind" in the cosmic "tall grass"! Only way to survive!!!!!!
1
Good point that we'd be helpless against civilizations millions of years older than us, but not that we'd be tasty. In all likelihood, we have nothing such a civilization would want, if they can travel interstellar distances they don't need a food supply, and they'd ignore us about as much as we ignore tardigrades, and for much the same reason. We're not even visible to such an advanced civilization.
2
If the universe is so massive and the chances of intelligent life "millions, even billions of years more advanced than us" is true...where are they? Cosmologists are always out of their area of expertise in discussing these things. Intellectual giants like biologist Ernst Mayr considered SETI a waste of time - if you know anything about the way natural selection works.
Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying. --Arthur C. Clarke
4
I suppose people can dream or imagine things so why not at least be pragmatic about it. We would likely be far better off thinking of making a whole new world rather than "finding" one. In fact, it would be far more doable to work on a building a perfect and self-sustaining Earth if only we could adhere to something like a 500-1,000 year plan for our species progress and survival. The problem is the one plan that is actually possible for us to achieve seems apparently to be out of the question which speaks loudly of our actual inability. Think about this, any REAL ideas of exploring the universe would actually require us to preserve and advance the world we live it.
It would also require we move far, far past any primitive noitions of the fat greedy Trumps of the world.
25
The work only work useful for creating a new Earth in 500 years is basic science. Any basic science. We have no idea what the state of engineering will be in 50 years, much less 500, nor which science will be useful. The "hard" science fiction of my youth remains fiction while some of the more fanciful stories are reality. A 500 year plan is absurd.
Let's take incremental steps to avoid destroying our planet in the few decades, rather than trying to adhere to a plan that would be out of date in 5 years.
2
Hopefully we can also leave behind those annoying individuals who can't resist forcing their political ideas into totally unrelated conversations. Grow up.
1
All living creatures on earth share DNA. Humans are life of our planet Earth, as are all other living creatures. In galactic terms the important thing about our existence is not our humanity, but our DNA. Life. Evolution will in all cases shape life into something else, so the essential element is not *people* because people are temporary--we will inevitably, and always, become something else.
Since it will remain impractical to send actual people to this other planet for the foreseeable future, we should instead send DNA and simple organisms to seed other planets--assuming we decide we want to overrun other worlds with Earth DNA. It might not take a lot of material to seed a planet and so it may be possible to send smaller packets where sending humans could be impractical.
7
Dear Hooey,
Interesting but seems a little pointless. How do you know there isn't some alternative to DNA living on that planet right now? Probably a hardier one that can withstand more radiation than our fragile, weak self-replicating structure.
Also, if we managed to send seed packages interstellar distances, while keeping them alive, and landing them safely thousands of years later, and they survived whatever they encountered there, then our species probably wouldn't last long enough to find out what became of our seeds.
Either we get there ourselves, or we shouldn't think so highly of our species to spread our DNA around. If we never get out of this solar system, we're worthless and completely unimportant, and our DNA is not worth saving.
1
An artist's impression of a newly discovered planet whose presence is not actually seen but only inferred? Then what's the value of the impression?
While ginning up support for this line of interstellar life searching -- surely a most interesting thing -- let's not forget that not everyone believes in the hop-skip-jump of science fiction where a light-year is reduced to a child's first step.
Relativity theory is over 100 years old. Maybe it's time we saw "only" 4.2 light-years as the appreciable distance it is.
9
Not all science fiction. L. Sprague deCamp rigorously excluded faster-than-light travel. His travellers (to near stars) took advantage of relativistic time dilation to make a several-light-year journey in subjective months, but if they returned home it would be decades later. It made for some weird plots. Note that I'm not saying (and I don't think he would realistically say) such travel would be economically feasible; he postulated it so he could write interstellar stories.
2
Bar humans from it. They just ruin things.
66
We are rapidly debasing and fouling this planet we're on - when the tipping point comes, it might be quite sudden.
A "Plan B" would be a good idea.
8
No Chaser:
Even if this planet could support life, it is 11 light years away, or a mere 64,566,849,600,000 miles (approximately).
That is about 64 TRILLION miles. None of us would live long enough to traverse that distance using any current technology. At 100,000 miles per hour, you are talking about a 64 million hour trip, or about 7305 YEARS.
10
Joe from Boston is right, also it is completely unfeasible to move the entire population of earth anyway. Someday, a few centuries hence, if we're lucky, we could send a few hundred humans to colonize another planet. We will never have the ability to offload our whole population.
Never say never. History is full of eminent scientists saying "never" only to be proved wrong. We cannot imagine what kinds of technologies our descendants may develop. Anything not prohibited by the laws of physics is possible.
1
Can we send the Trumps et al to explore this planet for strategic reasons....like the survival of our own planet.
40
Dang! Beat me to it.
4
I hope there’s no coal or oil on that planet. If what we’ve done with this one is a guide to how we do things the place is bound to become a dump once we’re done with it.
4
So humans are going to go trash that planet since we are well on our way to ruining Earth for so many of our fellow species, and likely including ourselves? Why exactly can't we take care of THIS beautiful, irreplaceable planet???
45
Dear LB,
People keep bringing this up, but no, there is no chance humans will reach this planet in our current state. When we've advanced a few more centuries, we might manage to get there, but at that point we'll have reigned in our destructive ways, or have been destroyed by them.
5
Sounds like someone's budget is up for review.
2
It doesn't matter how much like earth it is There is no way we can get there.
11
If we survive here on Earth, that will change.
1
Yes, but you could die on the trip there. A lot can happen in eleven years, even if they're light years.
A light year is a measure of distance, not time. Even if you could get a space ship filled with people up to one million miles an hour, a feat no one has yet accomplished, it would still take 670 years to get there.
Think about how far that is -- one million miles, every hour, for 670 years.
14
@ Hooey,
You should study up on your special relativity and the distance/time equivalence implied by Lorentz.
1
And then there's the speeding up and slowing down phases....
What are we waiting for? LET'S GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
4
Now, if we could just get there at warp speed...I am doing the time warp dance just in case.
4
And neither me nor my fellow beings from these other systems have ever noticed nor recognized any signs of intelligent ancient life as we know it other than the social insects on the planet you call Earth. Ants and termites have been around for tens of millions of years. And they have more biomass than all other fauna combined. You are not welcome to any of our systems. And we will not return your calls. Other than to contact a pest extermination firm.
See "The Insect Societies" by Edward O. Wilson along with "The Ants" and "The Superorganism" Edward O. Wilson and Burt Holldobler
20
Until the scientists develop "warp drive"
1. There is no way to prove these observations or, more appropriately, suppositions; and
2. It doesn't really matter anyway.
With current technology, it would probably take 400,000 years or more to travel there. So even if earth still existed as we know it and this alleged planet existed as we know it, everything would have changed and probably nobody would even remember that we sent a probe or whatever there.
8
Imagine if, indeed, at some point in time, or now (11 light years away), there was some sort of "life" on this planet. Now imagine that this "life" included some sort of "sentient beings." For those "sentient beings," their world, as our world is to us, would have consisted only of their one planet, floating in an immense, incomprehensibly large universe. If sentient beings are there, or were there, or will be there, I hope they manage or managed their affairs in a way that recognizes how small our respective planets are, because we on Earth don't yet seem to have absorbed the concept.
80
Traveling 11 light year away is beyond our current technology, but not un-plausibly so. Sending a probe there before 2100 is entirely do-able.
11
The fastest spacecraft ever sent out by humans is the New Horizons probe, traveling at 36,000 mph. If we were to send a probe to Ross 128 at that speed, it would take roughly 200,000 years to for the probe reach it. People just do not understand the distances involved when you talk about light-years.
And unless the are utterly profound advances in technology (not just in propulsion, but in things like autonomy of the spacecraft since management at such distances isn't practical) this is completely unrealistic.
Perhaps we should expend our time and energy ensuring our survival on this planet instead of dreaming about places no one alive today will ever see.
33
With a (big) fusion rocket, we could get there in about 900 years. That said, it would represent a massive investment of resources and I'm certainly not advocating that we spend resources on interstellar travel at this point; setting up colonies throughout our solar system would be far more practical than a 900-year journey.
2
We could send such a probe but one to Proxima Centauri would be easier and potentially get some results within a single researcher's lifetime.
1
It seems like this sort of exploration takes on more and more urgency, as it becomes increasingly clear that our sphere has taken too much abuse from its human inhabitants to sustain them much longer. At one point, scientists probably felt they literally had all the time in the world to find another host and figure out how to colonize it. Probably not the case anymore.
11
That is a pie in the sky notion. Traveling at the fastest current speed a spacecraft can achieve (New Horizon) which can reach speeds of 36,000 mph, it would take a little under 20,000 years to travel a single light year. This planet is 11 light years away. Our life spans and our cultural memories are far too short to be able to accomplish this (at the present time).
We need to do everything we can to keep this planet habitable for all mankind.
58
Actually there is an old theory from the 1960's that we could send a probe or spaceship riding on the wave of a massive nuclear explosion in space. What we'd have to do is construct a massive shield the size of a football field - right behind the probe - that would protect the probe and absorb the energy from the explosion - propelling the probe possibly up to a speed of 1/10th the speed of light. In that sense it would take 40 years to reach Proxima Centauri or 110 years to reach the star mentioned in this article.
Number23, you've been reading too many alarmist websites. Even if the Earth was on the verge of being uninhabitable, which it isn't, we stand a far better chance of fixing it than we do of getting people to one of these other planets. I do love the possibilities that finding these planets opens up for the future, but no one living today will ever see them.
14