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Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered[W:17]

longview said:
I think an interstellar ship would have to be built in orbit, but I could see a several thousand ion drives powered
by a nuclear reactor, being about to run under continuous boost.
Such a ship could make it there in maybe 10 years ships time, Earth time would be much longer.
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Well let us assume we could build all that stuff. The fastest theoretical speed for an ion drive would be 200,000 MPH. Divide that into 25 trillion miles and you get a transit time of about 125 million hours. Divide that by 24 and you get around 5.2 million days. Divide that in years and you're looking at around say, 14 thousand years.

Nope, still unworkable. Unless aliens come down from the sky and gift us a faster than light drive, we are stuck in our own solar system.
 
PoS said:
Well let us assume we could build all that stuff. The fastest theoretical speed for an ion drive would be 200,000 MPH. Divide that into 25 trillion miles and you get a transit time of about 125 million hours. Divide that by 24 and you get around 5.2 million days. Divide that in years and you're looking at around say, 14 thousand years.

Nope, still unworkable. Unless aliens come down from the sky and gift us a faster than light drive, we are stuck in our own solar system.
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Fair enough, I was not thinking of the top end but the acceleration, hopefully getting close enough to light speed to dilate time.
 
danarhea said:
This official announcement is set to be made at the end of the month. This is huge. There could very well be a second earth, and one in which humans could reach in about 20 years with the technology we have today. It would take a Manhattan Project to do it, but it would be one of the most exciting projects in the history of humankind. Russian billionaire Yuri Milner intends to send a laser-sail driven-nanocraft to Alpha Centauri in the coming years. The destination is about to change to Proxima Centauri.

Exciting times.

Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered - Universe Today
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Using the technology we have today it would take about 30,000 years to reach Alpha Centauri. Could we have technology in 20 years that would allow us to travel at 1/4 the speed of light? Not likely.
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Kal'Stang said:
If this is true and there is a planet there that can support life as we know it then its actually possible that we really have had extraterrestrials visit our planet. Even assuming that they are just as advanced as we are technologically it is still possible for them to visit us if they come from a location that relatively close with no need of what others deem as "impossible travel".

Now considering that this is a red dwarf star that we're talking about, a star that will live far longer than our own sun its quite conceivable to believe that if that planet is habitable to life as we understand it is far older than ours and quite possibly far more technologically advanced than ours. IE: another reason to believe that we have actually been visited before.

I know, sounds like a conspiracy theory. :shrug: But if this article is true, and there is a planet that close to us that is habitable to life as we understand it, its actually a very real possibility.
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If they are there, let's hope they're friendly.
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Kal'Stang said:
If this is true and there is a planet there that can support life as we know it then its actually possible that we really have had extraterrestrials visit our planet. Even assuming that they are just as advanced as we are technologically it is still possible for them to visit us if they come from a location that relatively close with no need of what others deem as "impossible travel".

Now considering that this is a red dwarf star that we're talking about, a star that will live far longer than our own sun its quite conceivable to believe that if that planet is habitable to life as we understand it is far older than ours and quite possibly far more technologically advanced than ours. IE: another reason to believe that we have actually been visited before.

I know, sounds like a conspiracy theory. :shrug: But if this article is true, and there is a planet that close to us that is habitable to life as we understand it, its actually a very real possibility.
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This star might live far longer than the sun, but it's actually not really any older than the Sun. Of course, that doesn't necessarily preclude the possibility that life there is older than us....
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Kal'Stang said:
You proved my point for me. What if another species doesn't use radio waves for communication? Perhaps they use bursts of light? Or tachyon beams? Or for all we know telepathy. See what I'm saying?
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That only explains why we haven't detected them, not why they haven't made sure to grab our attention, or even moved a tiny craft into a better observation point (which might in turn allow us to observe them). There is no trace of them, anywhere, in our solar system. They may have thrived at one point, and have long since ceased. Or complex life might've never evolved
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Two things, what we're seeing is not the current condition of that solar system but rather light that left there long ago. A picture from that solar system's past. Also, we don't need a continuous burn. Without inertia (space) the propulsion will only be necessary for getting up to speed, course correction and for slowing down.
 
gdgyva said:
i am confused by one statement you made here

There could very well be a second earth, and one in which humans could reach in about 20 years with the technology we have today.

the planet is 4.25 light years away

how do we get there in a 20 year time span?

that math doesnt compute for me....i am missing something

5.88 trillion x 4.25 = 24.99 trillion miles

lets call it 25 trillion miles

so we would have to traverse over a trillion miles per year.....

i dont think we have that capability....do we?
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A laser-driven nano spacecraft can get there averaging 20% the speed of light. The next trick is to do it with a craft that can carry people. That's what the Russians are working on.
 
danarhea said:
A laser-driven nano spacecraft can get there averaging 20% the speed of light. The next trick is to do it with a craft that can carry people. That's what the Russians are working on.
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I'll reserve my applause for when they actually build a working prototype thank you very much.
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Nilly said:
This star might live far longer than the sun, but it's actually not really any older than the Sun. Of course, that doesn't necessarily preclude the possibility that life there is older than us....
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We don't know that. It might be older, it might not. The sun, BTW, is about 4 billion years old. The universe is about 13 billion years old. Much of the sun is made of material that was blown off by previous stars when they went supernova.
 
danarhea said:
A laser-driven nano spacecraft can get there averaging 20% the speed of light. The next trick is to do it with a craft that can carry people. That's what the Russians are working on.
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so the answer is no....

we dont have the tech to reach there in 20 years....

where will we be in 20, 30, 40 years? i dunno....

knowing there are possibly planets that could sustain life is one thing....

getting there is a whole different ballgame
 
PoS said:
There are theories to create interstellar drives that can do it- but no workable prototypes exist- its really just a pipedream at this stage.

Alpha Centauri is the nearest star to us at 4.3 lightyears away, but thats like 25 trillion miles. At our current technology you're talking anywhere around 6000 years using our rockets- and thats assuming we have the fuel for a continuous burn.
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We don't have that kind of fuel, as it would require more than exists on planet earth itself. This is why we need something other than chemical rockets to get us there. Ion drives are a possibility, but the best bet now is the laser-driven sail being developed by the Russians.
 
gdgyva said:
so the answer is no....

we dont have the tech to reach there in 20 years....

where will we be in 20, 30, 40 years? i dunno....

knowing there are possibly planets that could sustain life is one thing....

getting there is a whole different ballgame
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Yeah, it'll take a long, long, long time before we ever consider going to other planets (excluding unmanned probes).
 
shagg said:
The article mentioned that we can achiave about 20% of the speed of light, so 4.25 light years would take 21 years at that speed.
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This brings up an interesting paradox in space flight. Assuming that the article is correct and we can achieve 20% the speed of light, the chances are pretty good that the first star ship to leave our solar system will not be the first to reach its destination.
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

danarhea said:
We don't know that. It might be older, it might not. The sun, BTW, is about 4 billion years old. The universe is about 13 billion years old. Much of the sun is made of material that was blown off by previous stars when they went supernova.
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Yes we do. The sun is 4.6 billion years old. Proxima Centurai is 4.8bn.
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Our luck, we'll get there about the time they reach the Mesopotamian era. Or right about the time the Philadelphia Eagles last won a championship.

We could really freak them out, though.
 
danarhea said:
We don't have that kind of fuel, as it would require more than exists on planet earth itself. This is why we need something other than chemical rockets to get us there. Ion drives are a possibility, but the best bet now is the laser-driven sail being developed by the Russians.
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jmotivator said:
This brings up an interesting paradox in space flight. Assuming that the article is correct and we can achieve 20% the speed of light, the chances are pretty good that the first star ship to leave our solar system will not be the first to reach its destination.
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The other issues is that it's all well and good getting to 0.2c and reaching the planet in 20 years, but we also have to decelerate so we don't fly straight past it! No such things as brakes in space, and the laser propulsion is based on slow constant acceleration. We would also have to somehow slowly decelerate (or use rockets to decelerate) once we got there. I'm very doubtful that 20 years is at all realistic.
 
Do we just assume if there is life on another planet that they want to meet us? Or friendly?
 
straykatz said:
Do we just assume if there is life on another planet that they want to meet us? Or friendly?
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No, I'm pretty confident if there's alien life out there it wouldn't be willing to be friends with us.

They'll probably just go Independence Day on us.
 
straykatz said:
Do we just assume if there is life on another planet that they want to meet us? Or friendly?
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Of course they don't want to meet us. Would you want to meet us? I wouldn't. Unfortunately, we have no choice in the matter. We have to know us because we're all around us.
 
humbolt said:
Of course they don't want to meet us. Would you want to meet us? I wouldn't. Unfortunately, we have no choice in the matter. We have to know us because we're all around us.
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I bet you if aliens did come to our planet, they probably just took one look at humanity and skipped over us.
 
Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

Kal'Stang said:
I like SETI. But they're limited in what they can do and listen to. Partly due to resources and partly due to limitations in our own technology. There are literally millions of frequencies that can be used for communication. SETI cannot observe them all every second of every day no matter how much they may want to. And that's even assuming that an extraterrestrial needs to communicate in our known ways.
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remember though, alien races are confined to the same laws of physics that we are.

it is likely they would have had to use radio at some point in there development, and it wouldn't make sense to use radio frequencies outside of our usable range, there's a reason we broadcast between 20 and 800 mhz for most communication purposes.
 
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