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1 philosophus invidius  Thu, Sep 30, 2010 3:32:41pm

“The chances for life on this planet are 100 percent”

My guess: the guy meant to say only that the chances of life on this planet are as good as anywhere else. Otherwise the statement is bonkers.

2 Buck  Thu, Sep 30, 2010 4:12:39pm

And anything detected right now on the planet happened 20 years ago.

3 major tom  Thu, Sep 30, 2010 5:20:17pm

I think the statement should read ‘there are 100% of the correct conditions for life to exist…’ though I don’t even think that is accurate unless they can tell if there is liquid water from the mass/size ratio.

…I saw a show or read an article on the goldilocks zone of gravity on hypothetical habitable planets. It said there are statistically more ‘super earths’ with life in the Universe, than smaller ‘earth-sized’ planets with life. However, the larger the world, the more gravity it has, the less likely any life on the planet will develop into a space fairing race. Getting into orbit now is hard enough, but rockets on a ‘super earth’ would need enormous amounts of fuel to break the gravitational pull of the planet- enough to make the prospect of reaching orbit virtually impossible… It was something I had never considered before. I used to think the larger the world the more resources. But now, It seems the larger the world the more a species would be held back by the shear limitations of physics. I forget where I learned that, but they went on to say that the search for Sophisticated life should be narrowed down to smaller habitable planets… If you think about it, a planet slightly smaller than Earth, would actually have a slight advantage in technological evolution, hypothetically… I can’t wait until we have the ability to find planets of that size. Then we can stop feeling around the room like a blind man.

4 First As Tragedy, Then As Farce  Thu, Sep 30, 2010 5:51:33pm

I’ve also read (too lazy to find the link) that Gliese 581g’s rotation is such that one hemisphere permanently faces its sun, and the other is permanently The Dark Side. So, it would be very hot in one hemisphere, extremely cold in the other hemisphere, and Just Right in a relatively small band between the two.

Of course, that still leaves a range of temps in which life could adapt and evolve, but the “100% chance” claim is bullshit, and I’d be shocked if Vogt actually said that.

5 freetoken  Thu, Sep 30, 2010 5:59:53pm

re: #3 major tom

re: #4 negativ

This story of Gliese 581g is yet another example of SCIENCE-FAIL by so many media outlets. Some version of this story has run on almost all news sites, and most of them embellish the truth, from a little to a whole lot.

Yes, 581g has a good chance of being tidally locked to its host (the star) thus the same side faces its sun all the time, leading to hellish differences in radiation between the sun side and the night side.

Also, the planet is more massive than Earth and larger too. It’s atmosphere could be anywhere from near non-existent to an incredibly hot murky version of Neptune’s.

This story is getting pushed by several people involved in it because, I suspect, they want to beat the Kepler team in announcing a planet in the “goldilocks” zone. Kepler will find many, and there is planned some big announcements right before or at the next AAS mtg in DC in January.


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