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craigi
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There doesn't seem to be a thread about this, but it's very popular in the news today. I thought it'd be good to have a place to discuss it here.
DaveC426913 said:That's been considered, yes.
The problem is, the farther from the star the more incredibly unlikely that they would line up and stayed lined up.
The universe isn't old enough for black dwarfs, they would still be brown dwarfs radiating mad infrared at least.DaveC426913 said:Some really intriguing light curves here. Read the article for some explanation.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astr...ge_dips_in_brightness_are_a_bit_baffling.html
Look at the smooth curve lower left. That has got to be a single body transit. Multiple bodies couldn't make such a smooth curve. Yet that body results in a 15% drop in the light curve!
And it's cold, so not a companion star.
I don't see how exo-comet fragments can explain this.
Black dwarf?
Shouldn't a part of Dyson Sphere be a bit closer thus obscure its star in more regular and frequent pattern?Borg said:
Czcibor said:...
EDIT: Media are delighted because right now no explanation is really convincing, but this "alien did it" part is also not so good.
Czcibor said:Shouldn't a part of Dyson Sphere be a bit closer thus obscure its star in more regular and frequent pattern?
Those aliens really do a shoddy work and park their panels on wrong orbits.
That lightcurve looks very similar (except for it's magnitude) to the one produced by KIC12557548, which is discussed in this Scientific American blog from May 2012. They also give a possible explanation.DaveC426913 said:Some really intriguing light curves here. Read the article for some explanation.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astr...ge_dips_in_brightness_are_a_bit_baffling.html
Look at the smooth curve lower left. That has got to be a single body transit. Multiple bodies couldn't make such a smooth curve. Yet that body results in a 15% drop in the light curve!
And it's cold, so not a companion star.
I don't see how exo-comet fragments can explain this.
Black dwarf?
TurtleMeister said:That lightcurve looks very similar (except for it's magnitude) to the one produced by KIC12557548, which is discussed in this Scientific American blog from May 2012.
I know. Looking for plausible explanations.inuk2600 said:The universe isn't old enough for black dwarfs, they would still be brown dwarfs radiating mad infrared at least.
DaveC426913 said:I know. Looking for plausible explanations.
Here's a new idea from 1957:inuk2600 said:It was new to me, I had to wiki it. Any new ideas bubbling up out there?
Andy Resnick said:Here it is, captured @ 85/2, 1 hr integration time, 300% magnification:
Giant ring huh? Obviously a Halo joke, but it gave me an idea.DaveC426913 said:I KNEW it!
Look at that giant ring. Aliens, plain as day!
No, look at the picture! Post 17. Oh never mind, the joke's lost.newjerseyrunner said:Giant ring huh? Obviously a Halo joke, but it gave me an idea.
Would it be naive of me to suggest that, if that were the explanation, they would be regularly blocking off the light from many other sources? That would take an almost trivial test to verify the idea or otherwise.inuk2600 said:Perhaps they appear so large because they may be a group of stray asteroids which are much closer to us than we think, and not in fact in orbit.
sophiecentaur said:Would it be naive of me to suggest that, if that were the explanation, they would be regularly blocking off the light from many other sources? That would take an almost trivial test to verify the idea or otherwise.
Bandersnatch said:Before jumping to conclusions and speculation, I'd suggest people first read the paper linked by nsaspook in post #7. Section 4.4.1 provides constraints on the size and orbit of the debris.
To be frank, I don't even see where the whole Dyson sphere (or swarm or ring) idea came from, other than an off-kilter comment by one of the scientists. It doesn't fit the constraints at all.
Follow to section 4.4.5.inuk2600 said:The author specifies constraints based on the assumption of a circular orbit.
Bandersnatch said:Follow to section 4.4.5.
I prefer Hoyle's black cloud to an alien Dyson sphere.inuk2600 said:What other crazy ideas are we considering here? Orbital comets that massively occult a star that's bigger than the sun and an alien Dyson sphere.
The problem with an interstellar cloud of debris is that you need it to maintain sufficient spread for the required occultation, without collapsing under its own gravity to form a more compact object.inuk2600 said:Still the author is assuming the objects are in orbit. However unlikely the relative speeds may be, can we confidently rule out the possibility that the objects are in interstellar space?
What other crazy ideas are we considering here? Orbital comets that massively occult a star that's bigger than the sun and an alien Dyson sphere.
Bandersnatch said:The problem with an interstellar cloud of debris is that you need it to maintain sufficient spread for the required occultation, without collapsing under its own gravity to form a more compact object.
inuk2600 said:Still the author is assuming the objects are in orbit. However unlikely the relative speeds may be, can we confidently rule out the possibility that the objects are in interstellar space?
Ernest S Walton said:The authors clearly rule it out, saying "...clumps that are too distant move too slowly across the stellar disk to explain the observed duration regardless of their size; e.g., a 3-day duration dip cannot arise from a clump beyond 15 AU." And they go on to say "... the middle solid line and a depth of = 20% therefore decreases the outer limit on the clump locations mentioned above to closer to 8 AU."
Do you have any other suggestions?inuk2600 said:Remember these constraints assume the objects are in orbit