Super-Earths: Three Exoplanets Discovered Orbiting Star Gliese 667C, May Support Alien Life

The habitable zone of a nearby star is filled to the brim with planets that could support alien life, scientists announced today (June 25).

Lookin' good!

The universe wastes nothing, it's simply transferred.
Lynn

I still think they are going way out on a limb with some of these claims. Heck we still can't confirm or deny whether there is some form of life on Mars which we have landed on (robotically).

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

I still think they are going way out on a limb with some of these claims. Heck we still can't confirm or deny whether there is some form of life on Mars which we have landed on (robotically).

Well said Bob! These discovered new earths they call super-earths, in the galaxy that could support life. What kind of life?? Bugs, robot's, or still making life as we did long ago. They are just 22 light-years from our earth. Loads of luck we will ever get there.

The universe wastes nothing, it's simply transferred.

In time we will come to realize that planets that actually are earth-like are extremely rare in the Universe. They will be too far away if they exist at all in the Galaxy. I postulate no more than a handful that mimic our planet in each galaxy.

Alien worlds that would be hostile to life on Earth might develop other forms of life but I doubt if it would be anything like what we have here on Earth.

These are the thoughts that I come to when I think of the delicate balance of so many things that are necessary for us to have started and evolved to sentience.

It would be thrilling to find another true "Earth" but I'm not expecting that to happen in my lifetime or ever. I'll keep listening but I don't expect a return call or anyone else at the other end of the phone line.

i agree that there are billions of earth- like planets in the universe.
But the philosophers' stone will be to find a planet whose physical parameters are nearly exactly the same as we know them form earth.
For example: mass, rotation-period, the solar spectrum and the age of the star where the planet is orbiting, a moon (big moon), a jupiter like planet in the outer solarsystem, percentage of heavy metals (heavier than He), climate of the planet, axis dispositon, plate tectonic, spiral galaxy, habitable zone of this galaxy.... and so on..
all this parameters reduce the our opportunities to find such an planet.
the next big question is: is life omnipresent?

i would rather think they are billions of earth-like in the universe

Yes that's what I think. Since there are 100 billion Galaxys--that's one earth-like planet for every ten Galaxies. I think that there are perhaps a half dozen per Galaxy. That means they are probably 30,000 light-years away from us in our own Galaxy.

Purely a guess--be happy to find one nearby --say in Alpha Centuri

This is a thread that needs a boost. To further my belief that we have a very few Habitable (Earth-like planets ) in our Galaxy I present the following.

The habitable zone for our solar system is roughly 1+ or minus .1 astronomical unit. This range allows surface water which is essential for intelligent life to form. This is a very narrow range . Other stars would have different lengths to describe their habitable range depending on the luminosity of the Star.

I am currently adding to my list of essentials for intelligent life to exist. So far I have one dozen parameters that must be in a narrow range. I suspect that there are several more.

What do you all think is an essential parameter and it's range for intelligent life to form.

It was also mentioned on the Science channel that a typical galaxy most likely has a narrow habitable zone where the stars are not too close together as to create intolerable radiation levels or where the stars are too far apart and the cycle of star birth and death wouldn't provide sufficient heavy elements to enable life.

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

Fred Hoyle imagined a living gas cloud (The Black Cloud, 1958).

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I agree that the conditions for life of any sort are most likely broader than most biologists have anticipated but in locations where the radiation levels are extreme it doesn't seem likely that biological life could survive. Also it doesn't seem likely that near the edges of a galaxy that enough raw material in the form of heavy elements would exist to support even simple forms of life. Only time will tell.

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

The habitable zone for our solar system is roughly 1+ or minus .1 astronomical unit.

False. If Venus and Mars were in opposite orders (because of their sizes) - both could have been habitable (human standards.)

Just don't remember the source

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Mars would have insufficient pressure to keep water from sublimating and drying out at the surface, There is no water on Venus either--it escaped a long time ago.

WOW! This is a real wow. When the famous "wow" signal of 1977 was received we couldn't verify or duplicate it. Our robot probes are doing a thousand times more than the "man to Mars" mission that I was in favor of in 1980. There's more to come and I'm gritting my teeth. Will SETI be directed to point their radio telescopes at probable Earths to increase the chance of a signal? How many new planets per month is it now? God has rolled the cosmic dice. Dare we guess at the odds!?

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All computers idle at the same speed.

S@H will only get data from those stars if someone buys them telescope time :-(
There was an exercise a while ago to use another telescope, but as yet the data from that hasn't been released to us - as far as I can gather the release was dependant upon some quite significant coding changes, of which S@H v7 is part.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

S@H piggybacks data when others are using the telescope. However, we now have a beam that looks at multiple sites in the sky when observations are being made. this enables S@H to get much more data from the same observational direction.

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

They found a pink planet today. Huge gas giant.

i would rather think they are billions of earth-like in the universe
OC they all got their own form of life

You wouldn't be that far from the truth, I think...

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There probably are billions of Earth-like planets in the universe which means there may be a few or none on average per Galaxy. This is my belief. Kepler is just starting of course; but no planet of Earth size has been found in the habitable zone of any star. More data is needed and will be forthcoming I suppose. After we have a catalog of truly habitable, Earth-like planets we must investigate if these planets have the other list of requirements for life to start and evolve.

Super Earths will attract/retain Hydrogen and other gases and hence will not have a useful atmosphere.

It's all a moot point unless or until we have a way of getting there either in person or robotically

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.