There Better Be Some Aliens in This Solar System with Earth-Sized Planets

Since the begining of time humans have tried and looked for other life out there and have always come up empty handed. Its the fact that ppl are not able to grasp that WE are Truly the ONLY Smart ones out there and always will be. Until i can touch,smell,feel,lick it taste play with it whatever theres NOTHING out there DEAL with it ppl :D
 
DrLobotomy said:
I live in Texas. I drive mostly on Interstate highways. There is only one listing on my paycheck that shows 'Federal Tax'. I don't care how it got divided up from which pile with which title.
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Still wrong. The states own and operate the interstate highway system. The lack of maintenance for them is on your state not the federal government. https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/faq.cfm#question5

You really should know more about your government.
 
kju1 said:
Still wrong. The states own and operate the interstate highway system.
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The easiest way to visualize this is travel through several states on an interstate highway - the condition of the road can change dramatically at the state line.
 
PaulP said:
And here I was hoping to have a nice science discussion, but no, it seems we can't talk about anything these days without politics infecting the discussion. :(
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I think it comes down to the fact that a lot more people look at the TV instead of looking at the sky.

When I was a kid/teen, my dad used to get me to sit at the balcony with him and 'hunt' for meteors and satellites. We saw plenty of interesting stuff like a huge meteor streaking through like half of the visible sky.
We used to take long exposure photographs of the Perseids and such. A few times we saw spinning satellites that emitted a bright rapidly pulsing light as they threw reflections of the Sun every second or so. Often times I was able to see, via telescope, Jupiter's surface 'belts' and also the rings of Saturn.

I can't take out the bins without standing in the middle of the block staring upwards like a madman for several minutes. I live in a somewhat rural area and the Milky Way is pretty obvious.
Once you do that for a while, it honestly becomes obvious there is, was or will be life somewhere else.

The planets mentioned in the OP may be in the right configuration, but who knows if they aren't simply examples of dead or dying planets. There may be water - but who's to say it isn't heavily irradiated water after some ancient civilizations went to sticks.

Overall, it's not relevant IMHO. I think the game is every species for itself.
 
I was thinking on the 500 mil years old. It's too damn young for life let alone colonization. Not even oceans teaming with microscopic life means no oxygen. I think we need to let it cook another 500 million years.

edit: or better yet SEED it
 
DrLobotomy said:
Hell no. But I would like a road without 20 potholes in it and maybe some internet access when I am 5 miles away from down town.

Maybe pay off some debt that already exists.

Unless we are researching how to send snowflakes to this new discovery location, then spend the money more wisely.
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Just to educate you, those are LOCAL issues. Not FEDERAL.

If you want potholes fixed get off your ass and go to a city/state board meeting and raise your voice there. I'd guess your city/state under-taxes. To fix the problems you listed you and your neighbors need to spend more in taxes to actually fix the public infrastructure.

If you want better internet, demand that from your city. Start a campaign for locally-run internet. Here in Longmont, Co that's what was done and i now have 1 gig up/down for $50/month.
http://www.longmontcolorado.gov/dep...ngmont-power-communications/broadband-service

As for this discovery, it's only one of a billion/trillion stars, most of which have planets orbiting around them. There is life out there and we're getting ever closer to finding it! So exciting!

Edit:
I see you live in Texas DrLobotomy. That's the problem. Texas doesn't tax. Thus public infrastructure like schools and roads are crap. Why i do not and will never live in Texas.

Please learn how Local/State/Federal governments work and their jurisdictions before spouting such nonsense

Edit 2:
Read Capital in the Twenty First Century to better understand how a country's debt works (hint: it's nothing like credit card debt)
https://www.amazon.com/Capital-Twen.../ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
 
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Shotglass01 said:
I'd love for NASA to stop finding planets, and figure out ways to get us to said planets- like tomorrow! :D
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More money goes into space travel, and without a doubt getting to planets so far away is a huge objective. We gotta get comfortable traveling to closer planets first though, Mars for example.

Here's an interesting read about the money that goes into NASA, and how it's actually adding money to our economy (for those who feel NASA is a waste):

https://www.thebalance.com/nasa-budget-current-funding-and-history-3306321
 
Youn said:
More money goes into space travel, and without a doubt getting to planets so far away is a huge objective. We gotta get comfortable traveling to closer planets first though, Mars for example.
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Pffftttt.... Go big or go home! We've been to the moon, close enough!
 
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NASA should have a 3rd of the defense spending. Someday we'll (or our decedents will) regret gutting them to the point we have. It'll be too late by then. The potholes will have killed us all!
 
kju1 said:
The condition of a road can very dramatically even at county lines in some states. Maryland I am looking at you...
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Why would you want to fix the roads in a shithole like Baltimore?
 
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Etherton said:
NASA should have a 3rd of the defense spending. Someday we'll (or our decedents will) regret gutting them to the point we have. It'll be too late by then. The potholes will have killed us all!
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NASA has sucked up Trillions, not billions, of tax dollars since their inception. Nobody was gutted. Just think if the USofA had spent that on their populace? What could have been!
Instead you have a lot of pretty, pretty pictures. Awe aint them sweet.
Not sure how badly your inner Trek/Wars is grasping for logic but it is time you realized these NASAholes have done nothing but fuck your country out of the greatest pile of money in all history. All for some nice pictures.
And your fighting to give them more! Good thing you live in a science fiction utopia where $$$ is on a never ending tap. Drink it up. Cheers!
 
I say, "What difference does it make?".

Seriously, can someone explain to me why we spend the time and money on stuff like this? We get it...there's other planets out there that may or may not be habitable. Cool.

Sooo...can we move that aside now and focus this time and energy and money on things like GETTING THERE, can ya dig it? I know it's not that simple, I am being sarcastic...but if only slightly... I do wish that we'd focus more on high speed travel in space though.
 
sfsuphysics said:
These reminded me of some responses of my students who said putting telescopes in space is useful because it gets them closer to the stars.... yeah I failed them.
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Would you mind explaining the rest of the argument- my (relatively uneducated) reaction to their 'it gets them closer to the stars' is to say that they're technically right, as the telescope is just enough closer that it's not peering through Earth's atmosphere ;).
 
Mut1ny said:
I say, "What difference does it make?".

Seriously, can someone explain to me why we spend the time and money on stuff like this? We get it...there's other planets out there that may or may not be habitable. Cool.

Sooo...can we move that aside now and focus this time and energy and money on things like GETTING THERE, can ya dig it? I know it's not that simple, I am being sarcastic...but if only slightly... I do wish that we'd focus more on high speed travel in space though.
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I'm sure there are people who said the same thing when scientist were researching on relativistic physics or quantum physics. These knowledge were gained purely out of curiosity, they were not trying to answer any problems or needs that existed at that time.

Scientist have always attempted to learn anything and everything they can about nature, simply because they were driven purely by curiosity. Like it or not, our human race got to where we are today because of the curiosity we have.
We've never pick and choose what to study about nature.

If you only want to study what you think is important, someday you'll look up and realize that others have gotten ahead because they will be the one to discover all the things you never knew existed or possible.
 
Kaitian said:
Why would you want to fix the roads in a shithole like Baltimore?
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In my opinion we should burn that place to the ground and start over. I hate baltimore in case you couldnt tell. F. it I hate maryland! Damn I wish I could move.

Mut1ny said:
I say, "What difference does it make?".

Seriously, can someone explain to me why we spend the time and money on stuff like this? We get it...there's other planets out there that may or may not be habitable. Cool.

Sooo...can we move that aside now and focus this time and energy and money on things like GETTING THERE, can ya dig it? I know it's not that simple, I am being sarcastic...but if only slightly... I do wish that we'd focus more on high speed travel in space though.
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See my earlier post about NASA spin offs and you can see how NASA has had a direct impact. Heres a few more: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/nine-ways-may-benefited-nasas-innovation-realized/

Do you know anyone alive today with a pacemaker? Thank NASA and the researchers who based it off their tech.
 
Mut1ny said:
I say, "What difference does it make?".

Seriously, can someone explain to me why we spend the time and money on stuff like this? We get it...there's other planets out there that may or may not be habitable. Cool.

Sooo...can we move that aside now and focus this time and energy and money on things like GETTING THERE, can ya dig it? I know it's not that simple, I am being sarcastic...but if only slightly... I do wish that we'd focus more on high speed travel in space though.
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Inventing a warp dirve has turned out to be [H]ard (gratuitous H) given our current tech and we haven't made one yet.

Telescopes have been made for 400 years and we're pretty good at it. Besides, you want to know where to drive the ship to right?
 
Aliens: "Take us to your Leader"

Takes to Trump

Aliens: "Don't fuck with us, he can't be the leader, we will blow this fucking planet up" :)
 
Lord_Exodia said:
Aliens: "Take us to your Leader"

Takes to Trump

Aliens: "Don't fuck with us" [removed for further conversation :p]
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Humans: "Well you see... the majority didn't pick this guy..."

Aliens: "Then why is he your leader?"

Humans: "There's this archaic thing created a few hundred years ago, before long-distance communication was a thing, where the founding fathers decided to have each state have a number of votes - this being a republic and all - and well this is the result.

Aliens: "Your species is not worth our time. We will make the intergalactic highway as planned." Looking over his shoulder he adds, "Blow this fucking planet up"
 
IdiotInCharge said:
Would you mind explaining the rest of the argument- my (relatively uneducated) reaction to their 'it gets them closer to the stars' is to say that they're technically right, as the telescope is just enough closer that it's not peering through Earth's atmosphere ;).
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Yes it gets them closer to the stars, most space telescopes have been at an altitude of roughly 200 miles, the nearest star to us is about 25,000,000,000,000 miles away. So yeah they might be technically correct (since it's only 200 miles off the ground depending upon the direction and observation points of the stars they might actually be farther away! The key is to get out of the atmosphere, not to get closer to the star. It would be like saying "I'm closer to Hawaii" by walking across the street in a westward direction, while yes technically true, I'm not exactly going to put on my swim trunks and reach for a Mai Tai :)
 
funkydmunky said:
NASA has sucked up Trillions, not billions, of tax dollars since their inception.
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Nope, their combine budget since inception has not been trillions, and when you "adjust for inflation" the budget over the last 60 years of NASA just barely surpasses 1 trillion. Next argument?
 
Blakestr said:
How the fuck can members of [H]ard Forum, which is literally a hardware enthusiast site, KNOWING the history of hardware and the progress it has made, NOT be in complete, unanimous support of a space program?
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\

Do not conflate 'space program' with 'NASA'. Right now, the science is somewhat stalled- we're still using massive chemical rockets to put stuff into orbit, so the money is going more toward commercial activities (SpaceX, Boeing) that are finding ways to do that cheaper, or in other words, do more with the same or less money.

In reality NASA is still getting the money they need to do what science can be done- when we figure out how to do something new, expect more investment.
 
My friends. Debt itself is a valuable commodity. Having no debt would not be strategic.

Additionally, its get even more complicated then that. Money is created from debt. Think about this. Nearly all the legal tender is this country is created through loans (either at the individual bank level, or at the federal reserve level). These are through loans. Those loans have interest attached to them. But you see the problem. The money you have comes from loans, but you have to pay back the loan and then some. So the debt is what actually drives the economy. You have to come up with more money from somewhere else to pay back the extra interest. This generally is done through more loans or investments, which generate more interest.
 
funkydmunky said:
NASA has sucked up Trillions, not billions, of tax dollars since their inception. Nobody was gutted. Just think if the USofA had spent that on their populace? What could have been!
Instead you have a lot of pretty, pretty pictures. Awe aint them sweet.
Not sure how badly your inner Trek/Wars is grasping for logic but it is time you realized these NASAholes have done nothing but fuck your country out of the greatest pile of money in all history. All for some nice pictures.
And your fighting to give them more! Good thing you live in a science fiction utopia where $$$ is on a never ending tap. Drink it up. Cheers!
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Psst... I got a secret to tell you.

You know that computer you're typing on right now? That one you are using to spread your trolling and ignorance with? Yes that one...

You wouldn't be doing that right now in this point in time without the government spending massive amounts of money on Cold War Era Ballistic Missiles, Computer Networking, and NASA's evolution of those tools of destruction into peaceful innovations. Between the satellites they laid the groundwork on to the nutrient enriched baby food your mother likely fed you as a kid, you likely wouldn't be here typing this crap without them. We'd be stuck mashing out an existence akin to 1950's America.

If that weren't enough, all those nifty tech advances help manage the economy that provides all those social things you need on a daily basis that you and Lobotomy are bitching about right now.


westrock2000 said:
My friends. Debt itself is a valuable commodity. Having no debt would not be strategic.

Additionally, its get even more complicated then that. Money is created from debt. Think about this. Nearly all the legal tender is this country is created through loans (either at the individual bank level, or at the federal reserve level). These are through loans. Those loans have interest attached to them. But you see the problem. The money you have comes from loans, but you have to pay back the loan and then some. So the debt is what actually drives the economy. You have to come up with more money from somewhere else to pay back the extra interest. This generally is done through more loans or investments, which generate more interest.
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Holy shit, I thought I'd never see the day that someone here understood basic macro economics.
 
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Waste of a good thread.

To get back to the topic, if there was a species living in that system they are lucky. Here the Earth to Mars distance is about 0.5 AU and takes us about 9 months to travel it.

In that system it is 0.05 AU from the innermost to outermost planet. It would take <1month to travel that entire distance. Jumping from one planet to another is <0.01 AU and would take only a week or two...would make it a "very simple" feat to become an interplanetary species.
 
We could already be an 'interplanetary species' if there was any utility to settling other planets. Right now there really isn't; the main reason to move to and begin terraforming Mars is to ensure that there's room for more humans as Earth 'fills up'. The real prize is the belt; hell, we'd need belt resources (primarily ice) on Mars to seriously jump-start that process.
 
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