KIC 8462852 (Tabby's Star) Faded Throughout the Kepler Mission

[steph]

Well, didin't know exactly how to name it. By now, the news is pretty much doing the rounds around most science-oriented sites. Some star 1,500 light-years away is having these really weird light fluctuations, which don't really fit neatly into any scenario, so the idea of some sort of Dyson-style star engineering keeps popping up.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astr...ge_dips_in_brightness_are_a_bit_baffling.html

And the original article:

http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2015/10/the-most-interesting-star-in-our-galaxy/410023/

 

[Urwumpe]

Well, didin't know exactly how to name it. By now, the news is pretty much doing the rounds around most science-oriented sites. Some star 1,500 light-years away is having these really weird light fluctuations, which don't really fit neatly into any scenario, so the idea of some sort of Dyson-style star engineering keeps popping up.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astr...ge_dips_in_brightness_are_a_bit_baffling.html

And the original article:

http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2015/10/the-most-interesting-star-in-our-galaxy/410023/

On one hand, I am expecting some boring naturalistic explanation for that in a few months.

On the other hand, it would be really exciting if this is really the first astronomical mega-construction ever observed.

 

[boogabooga]

Seems like a classic case of "I don't know, therefore aliens" to me...:facepalm:

 

[Urwumpe]

Seems like a classic case of "I don't know, therefore aliens" to me...:facepalm:

Not really, they have a good point why suggesting it is not as crackpot scientific as it sounds.

Something is absorbing the energy of the star in a way, that is unknown to us in nature, and it does not emit the energy as IR radiation as expected. And this thing as not only asymmetric, but also one of a large group of objects with similar characteristics.

Of course, it could still be natural. There are maybe 9 natural hypotheses left to test, maybe 90 natural hypotheses still unknown and only one says ALIIIEEENS.

But hey, finding the first Dyson Bubble in the universe would be cool, why not trying it?

 

[boogabooga]

I remain skeptical.

 

[Urwumpe]

I remain skeptical.

Same here, the chances that it will survive better observations is low.

But again, what makes me excited there is the fact that this star is really exotic. Even if a natural explanation would eventually be found, such a star system would at least be worth getting named. Which is a rare event in astronomy.

 

[Dantassii]

Reminds me of a part of the original Cosmos series where Dr Sagan describes how early planetologists determined what Venus must be like.

• Observation: They saw Venus engulfed by clouds so we can't see its surface
• Invalid fact assumed: Clouds are always made of water
• Invalid conclusion: Venus must be VERY damp and wet
• Observation: Venus is closer to the sun than Earth
• Valid assumption: Venus must be warmer than Earth
• Invalid conclusion: With all that water and warmth, Venus must be very swamp-like
• Valid Fact: Venus is the same relative age as the Earth
• Invalid fact assumed: Life must exist on Venus similar to what existed on Earth when Earth was warm and most
• Invalid conclusion: There are dinosaurs on Venus

In the end the logic went like this:

• We can't see anything
• Therefore there must be dinosaurs

Dantassii

 

[Topper]

I don't realy belive yet that it is "alien made", but who kows...

But the interesting fact is, that this is exactly what some scientists expected to observe from an alien civilisation.

"No matter if we are alone in this big Universe or not, both imaginations are fantastic." (I don't know the source)

 

[N_Molson]

I can't help myself finding a bit weird to expect an alien civilization to build a device which is a product of human intellect. I feel that if there is an alien civilization somewhere, they would have... alien ways to deal with technology, and their own concepts very... alien to our brains.

 

[Artlav]

I can't help myself finding a bit weird to expect an alien civilization to build a device which is a product of human intellect.

A lot of technology is dictated by the laws of physics.
The shapes and brands might be different, but basic ideas would very likely be similar.

 

[Urwumpe]

I can't help myself finding a bit weird to expect an alien civilization to build a device which is a product of human intellect. I feel that if there is an alien civilization somewhere, they would have... alien ways to deal with technology, and their own concepts very... alien to our brains.

Form follows function.

 

[Kyle]

I read the paper for the discovery this afternoon and it made a decent case for this being the result of a recent collision of exocomets or a collection of exocomets. The idea reminds me of some of the papers out there trying to explain some of the unusual characteristics of Fomalhault b, which is understandable considering how much debris there is in that system, but this star is an older, F-sequence star with what should be a stable solar system, so I call into question the possibility of us seeing a collision in this system.

 

[boogabooga]

Are there any possibilities related to the star itself? Some sort of new type of variable?

 

[Urwumpe]

Are there any possibilities related to the star itself? Some sort of new type of variable?

Well, Cepheids for example reach such changes in their luminosity, but they also vary in radius for that pulsation. Other variables also emit different signatures and have much longer pulsation periods than observed (millions of years instead of days). And such variables are regular, while the observed pulsations are irregular.

The star is as a F3V star close to the region where many known variables are:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instability_strip

But those oscillate because of Helium ionization, and are thus pretty predictable today.

 

[Cairan]

I read the whole paper (not the articles on the Internets ) ... I'd say, give it a year of intense scrutiny with everything we have in the whole available spectrum, from radio to gamma rays, and they'll rule out 8 out of 9 of the plausible explanations ... One of them is "not natural". It might be, or might not... but the point is, it is not ruled out yet, except if you want to jump to assumptions that only humans have evolved in this galaxy to the point of modifying their environment on large scales...

Granted, this is a couple of orders of magnitude greater engineering than our greatest cities, but still... I want to believe

 

[Fabri91]

Seeing some headlines these days:

 

[RisingFury]

“It looked like the kind of thing you might expect an alien civilization to build.”

How does anyone know what an alien civilization might build?

 

[Urwumpe]

How does anyone know what an alien civilization might build?

That is not the question, you pretty much invert it that way.

We have no idea what an alien civilization might build because we don't know what they need to build.

But in the other direction: We know what a Dyson bubble is. We know what properties a generic Dyson bubble would have. We can deduct how a Dyson bubble would appear on existing sensors of us.

Even if not every civilization would build one, if they would build one that is not fundamentally different to our understanding of a Dyson bubble, we could be able to formulate the observation properties of it.

 

[steph]

What if (assuming it is an alien artifact) it's a beacon? The random variations don't really sugest something orbiting the star, in a classic sense. Maybe a huge swarm of objects on extremely varied orbits would produce what we see, but even so....

What if they're trying to send a signal? We keep talking about sending signals using planet-based antennas, but a star's light propagates waaaay better than any puny radio signal.

If you want to get noticed in the cosmic neighbourhood, messing around with a star's output Morse-style might be one of the best ways to do it.
So...it would be nice to see if they can find any sort of pattern in the variations. I mean, it's one of the megalomaniac things that you might expect technologically advanced lifeforms to pull off...Sure, first reaction is "naaah, they wouldn't", but then again, of course they could. And it would work as a statement of technological prowess as well.

Then again, that 2 week ciclical variation that then vanished might mean a big spacecraft stopping by to refuel.

Edit: IIRC, the Ramans in Clarke's novels used huge cylindrical spacecraft that refueled by skimming the sun's outer layers. Sure , they were on a hyperbolical trajectory and all that, but it still makes me wonder if it isn't something similar to that happening there. Of course, it's a veeery long shot.

 

[RisingFury]

We have no idea what an alien civilization might build because we don't know what they need to build.

That's my point: Out of ignorance, aliens!

Aliens could be hippies, smelling flowers and bathing in the Sun. Could be intelligent, but not technological.


I'd be far more likely to say that if there indeed is some kind of debris, maybe it's from a planetary collision. They don't happen often when a solar system gets old, but could still happen.