Anomaly Discovered around Distant Star (Possible Alien life)

Kepler is designed to observe stars and look*for tiny dips in their brightness. These dips, especially if they repeat, can be a sign the star has one or more planets orbiting it. By measuring the timing and the size of the dips, scientists can learn a great deal about the transiting planet.

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Kepler observed the star KIC 8462852 for four years*starting in 2009. Typically, orbiting planets only dim the light of their host star for a period of a few hours to a few days depending on their orbit. A group of citizen scientists noticed that this star appeared to have two small dips in 2009, followed by a large dip lasting almost a week in 2011, and finally a series of*multiple dips significantly dimming the star’s light in 2013.

Tabetha Boyajian, a postdoc at Yale,*told The Atlantic: “We’d never seen anything like this star. It was really weird

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The pattern of dips indicates that the star is orbited by a large, irregular-shaped mass. If it were orbiting a young star, this mass might be a protoplanetary disc, but KIC 8462852 is not a young star. We would also expect to see the presence of dust emitting infrared light, which hasn’t been observed.*

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But researchers from UC Berkeley’s SETI Institute think it could be something else entirely: They think this could be a sign of alien technology. Boyajian is working with SETI and Jason Wright, an astronomer from Penn State University, to develop a proposal to observe the star with NRAO’s Green Bank Telescope to search for radio waves. If they detect anything intriguing, they then have plans to use the Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico to listen for what could be the sounds of alien technology.

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Gathomas88 said:

Astronomers Have Spotted Something Very, Very Strange Surrounding A Distant Star



Basically, something very big and irregularly shaped (either a single large object, or a cloud of smaller objects) is orbiting this star. Something we've never observed before, which might not be natural.

It'd be interesting if it turned out to be an incomplete Dyson Sphere. However, I guess we'll just have to wait and find out.

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Paleocon said:

Are you aware that the idea that there are races of men on other planets is heretical? It's called antipodeanism.

And for anyone who cares, there is no logical connection between sporadic starlight levels and intelligent life. All this speculation tells us is the assumptions of the commentators.

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Moderator's Warning:

This thread is about science. If you can't talk about science, go talk somewhere else. Start a thread in Religion about antipodeanism if you like. If you attempt to hijack this thread you will be banned from it.

Gathomas88 said:

For the record, a certain someone is incorrect, as usual. :roll:

Vatican Astronomer Says Alien Life Will Be Discovered, But Will Not Prove or Disprove God

Now, back to science!

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Paleocon said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giordano_Bruno

You are wrong. And that astronomer is materially just as much of a heretic as his predecessor Giordano Bruno.

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Gathomas88 said:

Ya-huh, sure. The Vatican is wrong but Paleocon is right. Gotcha. :roll:

I'm going to go ahead and report this, just so you know.

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Gathomas88 said:

Astronomers Have Spotted Something Very, Very Strange Surrounding A Distant Star



Basically, something very big and irregularly shaped (either a single large object, or a cloud of smaller objects) is orbiting this star. Something we've never observed before, which might not be natural.

It'd be interesting if it turned out to be an incomplete Dyson Sphere. However, I guess we'll just have to wait and find out.

Click to expand...

Gathomas88 said:

Astronomers Have Spotted Something Very, Very Strange Surrounding A Distant Star



Basically, something very big and irregularly shaped (either a single large object, or a cloud of smaller objects) is orbiting this star. Something we've never observed before, which might not be natural.

It'd be interesting if it turned out to be an incomplete Dyson Sphere. However, I guess we'll just have to wait and find out.

Click to expand...

Gathomas88 said:

Astronomers Have Spotted Something Very, Very Strange Surrounding A Distant Star



Basically, something very big and irregularly shaped (either a single large object, or a cloud of smaller objects) is orbiting this star. Something we've never observed before, which might not be natural.

It'd be interesting if it turned out to be an incomplete Dyson Sphere. However, I guess we'll just have to wait and find out.

Click to expand...

But researchers from UC Berkeley’s SETI Institute think it could be something else entirely: They think this could be a sign of alien technology.

Click to expand...

Aunt Spiker said:

I think there's a huge leap between 'something we haven't observed before' and 'might not be natural'.

Like - those two conclusions are light years apart. Seems entirely silly to me.

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