NASA finds possible habitable planet.

[Mayareira]

Gliese 581g

I thought Gillette released a new razor

[Yabby]

It would be cool if we were to go there one day, land there, find out there was intelligent life. But, then our ship breaks down because we let NASA and American automakers merge to cut costs on the spaceship and then we're fucked because the people there are actually not that friendly(like we are), so they section our asses off and force us to work in sweatshops; making Nikes and Ed Hardy T-shirts(since they're the easiest to produce). Except, in this movie we can't make an escape pod because we only sent people we can afford to lose(insert politician, reality stars, popstars, amish, etc.) as a test-run, while we are making replicas of Independence Day ships so we can show them how exploration is done on Big Blue.

Well if it has the basic needs of life there is a good chance there is life there. I guess the question would be when life started evolution on the planet. But based on how it works i doubt the life on that planet would be anything like ours. That could be a good thing or bad lol.

[Atreides]

yeah, I think the idea of a planet covered in barren rock and vast, lifeless oceans seems a lot less likely than a planet teeming with at least microscopic life

we better hope it has trees though, how else are we going to be able to waste reams upon reams of copy paper once we're done chopping down all of our own forests in a few years?

[Eliseos]

Three times the mass, three times the gravity, right?

Nah, the mass of pretty much all of the objects on the planet are significantly less than than the mass of the planet itself, so the gravitational field is g(r) = -G*m/r^2 where G is the gravitational constant, m is the mass of the planet, r is the distance between the surface of the planet to the center of it. So a planet with (roughly) the same mass with twice the radius as another will experience 1/4 times the gravity. That's why black holes have such a high gravitational field, they don't really have a distance from a surface to the center.

[Tyrath]

yeah, I think the idea of a planet covered in barren rock and vast, lifeless oceans seems a lot less likely than a planet teeming with at least microscopic life

Why? lol I just don't understand where all this optimism for life comes from. We're the only observed case of such a phenomenon. I'm not saying that it's impossible for there to be life there, but I don't understand where people come up with stuff like "no life is much less likely." Why is either circumstance more likely than the other?

Not trying to pick a fight, just curious what leads people to these conclusions.

[Atreides]

probably because the more we learn about microbial/microscopic life and whatnot, the more resilient it seems to be, at least on this planet. I have an easier time believing that the development of single-celled organisms are just a natural part of an ecosystem's evolution if the environment conditions are right, than just a fluke.

I mean, if you play the lottery every day for a few billion years eventually you're going to win, probably more than once too.

[kuronosan]

I think it's more interesting that given today's technology it's only a few generations away. If we could ever travel near the speed of light, it would only take 20 years to migrate there.

Then the Solar Imperialism will begin.

[Raytheon]

Why? lol I just don't understand where all this optimism for life comes from. We're the only observed case of such a phenomenon. I'm not saying that it's impossible for there to be life there, but I don't understand where people come up with stuff like "no life is much less likely." Why is either circumstance more likely than the other?

Not trying to pick a fight, just curious what leads people to these conclusions.

If you look at it from a mathematical perspective, statistics-wise, it can be argued this:

1. As far as we know, Earth is the only planet with habitable, life, sentient or not.
2. The universe is always expanding.
3. The universe, as far as we can comprehend, is infinite.
4. In an infinite universe, the chances of a planet similar to ours will increase to the point that it will have to be true.

In simpler terms, I allow you to choose a number between 1 and ∞, however, you have ∞ guesses. (This train of thought can be argued depending on your belief that the universe is infinite.)

There's a great read on the wiki about this topic though:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Earth_hypothesis

[Saga]

Proof that Santa Cruz does more than just grow weed. They find planets.

[Kaylia]

Three times the mass, three times the gravity, right?

Gravity is proportional to m/r². A planet three time the mass probably has a larger radius as well(not necessarily since we don't know its density), and you have to take that number into account as well.

[Max™]

Yeah, they estimated it as being similar in composition to the Earth, and 3x the mass from the wobble on Gliese 581.
It should be bigger than the Earth, so the gravity shouldn't be too bad.

[vagus]

Too bad the American government would rather drop money into a war then space exploration. Russia & China continue to explore space, hopefully NASA gets some major funding soon.

[Max™]

Spoiler alert: NASA will never help US citizens leave the jurisdiction of the US government.

[Khamsin]

Spoiler alert: NASA will never help US citizens leave the jurisdiction of the US government.

I'm sure that when planet-to-planet trips become practical, and off-world colonization is feasible, that the government would set up a branch on the new world first before allowing civilians to go there. Would only make sense.

Then the first spacefaring civilians can move to the new planet at pioneer a new life under the USA - Planet Bob Branch.

Nobody's going to want to move to a fresh new planet if they have to go back to the old west days, foraging and fending for themselves, building their own shelters and not having a structured government or law to protect them.

[Atreides]

it's all academic, cuz if anyone is going to the moon now it's china, and I'm sure they'd be happy to ferry anyone anywhere for the right price

[Max™]

*wonders why people would go through all the work of climbing OUT of one gravity well, to go sit at the bottom of another*

It's like being a caveman, discovering how to survive outside in the wide open spaces of the world, so you can immediately scurry over to another cave.

[Atreides]

*wonders why you make that point every single time just to shit on everyone's happy space travel fantasies*

and if im not mistaken the point is because this planet is pretty much fucked

[Max™]

The planet isn't as bad as you might hear, though the resources are being depleted (oh shit, I wonder if there are resources in space!), the main things that are suffering are other lifeforms. We should probably get on finding other planets to pump dry/rape the local flora and fauna, huh!

I make the point because happy space travel fantasies suck compared to knowing we could be taking steps towards happy space travel realities.

[Atreides]

well yeah, the point isn't that the planet is going to die, it's that it can't support nearly 8 billion humans consuming at an ever-increasing rate. The 22nd century probably won't be a particularly happy one for the majority of human civilization, to say the least.

[Yugl]

Too bad the American government would rather drop money into a war then space exploration. Russia & China continue to explore space, hopefully NASA gets some major funding soon.

Too bad the government doesn't spend enough money helping children learn proper grammar.