Richard Hayward
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September 21, 2015 22:01:10
September 17, 2015 17:53:53
Pete Mancini We can't say we have looked hard at all for SETI signals. No analysis have ever shown that the signal originated near Earth which makes it the only viable candidate we have for a signal from another civilization. Also, with 98% of the sky not having been surveyed we haven't even tried. There are 5 degrees of freedom here. Big Ear hit the big one by being lucky. The spot where the signal appears to original is largely empty. On the one hand you might conclude this proves it was a false signal, or perhaps a glitch in the processing by Big Ear's computers. I was in this boat until I played out several game theory rounds and discovered that the smartest strategy is to negotiate contact off of your home world. Now, being able to create a 2.2 GW signal in interstellar space takes technology we don't have. However we can imagine it. It's not impossible. If that is the case then perhaps the Wow! signal came from a probe or a reflector. In which case it's up to us to scan wider, more constantly and everywhere. To do this I suggest a crowdsourced project where people build small, purpose built radio telescopes and run them. Get enough people and enough data and let SETI@home crunch the numbers. It would greatly increase the coverage of space, produce useful radio telescope science, and be a neat project. It's easy to build one and several people have created web pages and pdf documents dedicated to it.
September 21, 2015 20:33:47 · Reply
September 14, 2015 18:50:22
Tin Shark Fountainworks Fraser Cain turning the absurdity knob to ludicrous! :)
September 17, 2015 16:47:10 · Reply
September 1, 2015 18:43:02
Kuri the Vegan "Meh." LOL. *I* was still fascinated anyway, haha. Though as a true introvert, I'm easily affected by sound. Loud noises give me physical-like pain, I plug my ears when the Doppler effect is imminent, and space noises (real or fake) always make me a bit happier, even if they creep me out at the same time.
September 2, 2015 17:24:53 · Reply
RIchard Parker so is the suits sound proof?
September 4, 2015 15:15:31 · Reply
Jeannette Iriye I love those metallic sounds on Titan. Not a noise that we would expect here on Earth.
September 28, 2015 22:35:07 · Reply
September 3, 2015 19:30:28
Richard Hayward nice catch!
September 4, 2015 01:59:39 · Reply
James Truck Captain Stumpy what aspect of the big bang do i find most interesting? Eccentrica Gallumbits, Marvin and pretty much everything else that is actual science... just can't get enough of the science...
September 7, 2015 20:12:10 · Reply
August 27, 2015 19:59:10
John Kimberley Let's go back to Uranus and Neptune. Take a good look at Triton. Then maybe let's go see Eris.
October 2, 2015 11:56:37 · Reply
John Kimberley oh yes and while we are looking out, let's look in and go to Venus with a balloon or something, so we can definitely show whether there are active volcanoes on Venus or not.
October 2, 2015 12:47:15 · Reply
August 20, 2015 21:23:20
Ross Trower Imagine being able to look up and see an entire galaxy (or two!) in the night sky. #wow
August 22, 2015 08:55:03 · Reply
Fraser Cain We can already do that with the Milky Way. The closer you get, the more it gets spread out so it remains the same level of brightness.
August 24, 2015 18:31:32 · Reply
Ross Trower We can't see the entirety of the galaxy though, I meant seeing the Galaxy from above whilst orbiting a rogue star outside of the Milky Way. xD
August 25, 2015 09:41:10 · Reply
Rick Bennette In answer to your question, what would life be like if we were following a rogue star out of the galaxy, I think the answer would depend upon a number of factors, the main one being would our solar system remain intact, or would all the planets change their orbital distance? I'm not sure if the gravitational center of the Milky Way has as much effect on the orbits of planets around the sun as it does on the orbit of the sun around the center of the Milky Way. Assuming the sun was flung into open space with all the orbits of its planets intact, I don't think we'd notice much more than the gradual shift of the positions of stars in the night sky as we drifted away from The Milky Way. Once we were far enough away from the Milky Way, eventually the night sky would be devoid of most of its stars, and only a few rogue stars and other galaxies would be visible at night. For some time, we'd be treated to an incredible outside view of the Milky Way. Naturally, this also assumes we were not flung into another star on our way into never never land. Thinking about the cause of such a solar fling, it would likely be the result of a high powered, nearby star exploding that would cause this, and such explosion would likely affect the planets and their orbits as well. If the Earth was flung from the sun in the process, the Earth would eventually lose its solar energy supply from the sun, eventually ending all life on our planet. A few people in underground shelters would survive a little longer, but eventually those too would succumb to the cold.
August 24, 2015 18:24:54 · Reply
August 10, 2015 17:56:01
Ray Bingham Oh darn. I thought you were going to talk about trajectories and catching up and orbiting small near gravity less objects. Maybe you can do that later.
August 12, 2015 20:40:50 · Reply
Fraser Cain Hmm, that's a really good point. I guess that part was less dramatic than the actual landing so we didn't focus on it.
August 19, 2015 02:56:13 · Reply
August 5, 2015 20:40:47
July 18, 2015 02:48:39
James Truck Captain Stumpy my favorite bizarre object in the solar system happens to be Yall at Universe Today... and yes, he really must snicker every time
July 18, 2015 15:31:52 · Reply
Edward Barnard Io. Erupting volcanoes all the time everywhere? Aw yeah.
July 21, 2015 04:19:17 · Reply
Howard Amos Just a FYI, but maybe you already saw it. A 300 Year Old Mystery Solved: Why Saturn's Moon Iapetus Is Half-Light, Half-Dark http://www.forbes.com/sites/ethansiegel/2015/07/25/a-300-year-old-mystery-solved-why-saturns-moon-iapetus-is-half-light-half-dark/
July 25, 2015 19:35:18 · Reply
July 21, 2015 02:45:03
July 24, 2015 00:10:56
James Truck Captain Stumpy My first thought about future episodes would be to try and find a mission to Jay's beard to search for life... (my beard is better than your beard - nyeah nyeah)- IMAGINE the wonders that might be found in that bushy forest? LOL But seriously... In all honesty, Europa, Callisto and Ganymede are likely the BEST candidates, but i also think we might have a good chance for finding life on Venus... one might find life in the more manageable temps in the atmosphere, but in all honesty, i am thinking subterranean searches on the planet might be more fruitful. (but what do i know, right? my BEARD might have life in it as well... )
July 24, 2015 16:33:03 · Reply
Kuri the Vegan I'm sure it's on the list, but I vote for a video about the Pluto flyby.
July 25, 2015 04:37:50 · Reply
Richard Hayward A video update on where we are with New Horizons, as well as where the probe might be headed next would be nice and timely.
July 25, 2015 10:35:03 · Reply
July 6, 2015 19:02:31
Patrick calhoon Me I was send a probe to Mars volcanic tubes look for life and just anything cool
July 6, 2015 21:08:31 · Reply
Nathan Wihnan I'd have to send it to Uranus or Neptune as there are just so many mysteries!
July 8, 2015 18:35:43 · Reply
June 24, 2015 17:45:10
James Truck Captain Stumpy well... before i make a prediction about sending a probe to another star... what about the Voyager program? they included data about humans (and a record) in case it met up with alien life... now, i know that the primary mission was to study the outer solar system but, considering they also included data for extra-terrestrial life to examine, doesn't that "technically" make it our first attempt to send a probe to another star? i will predict that we will send another probe out in the next 200 years... that may sound like a long time, but i feel that if we can get viable interplanetary missions within our solar system active for commercial and other purposes (something that i don't see being feasible until at least 30+ years) then it is inevitable that we will turn once again to our closer stars for more data. I put such a short time period there for a simple reason: technological progress. Given our current state of affairs and our driving need for knowledge, we will move ahead in great leaps towards expanding our living quarters to other planets just for the sake of exploration... the time frame may be driven by need (AGW) or by curiosity, but i feel that it will be driving us more rapidly in the next millennium for several reasons, starting with population, control, shattered cultural paradigms that are negative to our survival (i hope) and the need for expansion beyond our simple rock. Once we start truly exploring our solar system with boots on the ground science, we will be looking at stars for the next step... and survival. and unicorns
June 25, 2015 04:48:45 · Reply
Jamie Rich We already did launch a probe to the stars. In fact, we launched two of them, the Voyager spacecrafts!
June 26, 2015 14:51:54 · Reply
June 8, 2015 18:15:32
June 15, 2015 16:48:49
Alexandru Barbovschi Why neutron stars holds? How does neutrons not crash?
September 6, 2015 19:13:28 · Reply
June 18, 2015 14:28:56
Richard Hayward Terran Nebula sounds about right to me.
June 19, 2015 04:24:01 · Reply
John Kimberley About 2020 perhaps with 20/20 vision. More likely by 2027 just 70 years after the first Sputnik.
June 25, 2015 08:50:57 · Reply
Damon Rieth I've been thinking about the Fermi Paradox and Great Filters a lot lately. People think that there must be Earth like planets and life, based on the sheer numbers of stars and planets in the universe. But, I think the importance of our moon and Earth's iron core are underestimated with regard to the development of life. Our moon regulates the tides on Earth, creating regularity in the biological and chemical evolution of life - critical to allowing experimental continuity in life's formation. The magnetic field from the iron core protects life from deadly radiation from the sun. Without both of these I don't think life would exist, and I think both of these are not common. Perhaps there are planets with large moons like ours, and planets with iron cores like ours, but are there many planets with both requirements? Couple these requirements with the fact that there must also be liquid water in the habitable zone, and the chances of life on another planet could be much lower than commonly believed, even given the sheer numbers of stars and planets. I hope i'm wrong. Meanwhile, my home computer is cranking away on Seti@home data, keeping the hope alive.
July 15, 2015 20:02:38 · Reply
April 28, 2015 21:43:06
April 16, 2015 16:07:44
James Truck Captain Stumpy I was going to answer your question but the voices in my head told me that it was a violation of the secrecy agreement with the under-verse doesn't that make it sound Riddick-ulous ?? i know, i know... it was not very punny... (but i AM going to buy a sash and grow a goatee )
April 16, 2015 19:32:06 · Reply
Jim Meeker Clearly, the beard makes you Mirror Fraser! *Salute*
April 23, 2015 00:42:15 · Reply
April 13, 2015 18:41:20
James Truck Captain Stumpy The near perpendicular alignment of the SS with the galaxy causes me to wear my wife's underwear on my head which, in turn, gives me the exact same superpowers of a quadriplegic ninja with Alzheimer's ... it also allows me to channel the long dead over-acting career of William Shatner ...
April 14, 2015 18:21:13 · Reply
April 9, 2015 14:29:56
April 6, 2015 05:58:53
April 2, 2015 17:58:41
Howard Amos Black Holes don't shine, but I swear I could hear it bark!
April 30, 2015 02:59:56 · Reply
March 27, 2015 16:31:05
James Yanushka Thanks Fraser for mentioning my name at the end of one of the more uplifting videos, that's something I won't soon forget. Anyway, here's a thought. What happens to Dark Energy as the Universe cools down? With everything being stripped down to its virtual atomic structures won't Dark Energy actually stop the Universe from expanding since so little energy is left and if so(Hope!) somehow, someway cause an equally long implosion of particles back to their origins so that another singularity is created and, voila, another Big Bang thereby the cycle begins once again? Just a thought. Love the videos (hey, a dog's gotta do what a dog's gotta do).
March 28, 2015 21:03:32 · Reply
John Kimberley What if the proton does have a half-life? 10 to the 34 years is not that long.
October 2, 2015 12:54:51 · Reply