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New planets outside our solar system - what will we find on them??

astrojax69

05:01 / 09.06.05

story recently on a new planet, outlining the new techniques that make more extra-solar system planet discoveries increasingly likely.

given this, what will we find on them when we find out how to get there? (i note that voyager 1 has gone through a region known as termination shock, some 14 billion kilometres from the sun, and entered an area called the heliosheath)

why is it important for us to be looking and judging new planets against earth? isn't that a bit anthropocentric?

All Acting Regiment

08:25 / 09.06.05

Well, maybe we're looking for somewhere we could move to if something happens to Earth, and even if that is a bit anthropocentric, it's certainly useful and practical in some ways, especially considering the current population explosion.

As to the question of what it could harbour, presumably an Earth-like planet could sustain life, there are threads about this here and also here. The life could be anything, couldn't it? It would be amazing to find a whole ecosystem.

sleazenation

09:07 / 09.06.05

and even if that is a bit anthropocentric, it's certainly useful and practical in some ways, especially considering the current population explosion.

Is it really all that practical? remember it's taken approximately 28 years for Voyager 2 to leave the solar system. These planets are so far away that visiting them is not an option.

'Earth-like conditions' serve as a benchmark for scientists to guage where life like that on earth MIGHT have developed. This might seem anthropocentric, but since we are yet to discover life anywhere outside of the earth, it is a little difficult to know with any certainty what to look for out of extra terrrestrial life...

Evil Scientist

10:37 / 09.06.05

I'm don't think looking for planets similar to Earth is something that should be criticised on the grounds that it's anthropocentric? Surely, as far as we know, Earthlike conditions are what is required for the presence of life so in our search for extraterrestrial life we should look for places where life is likely to blossom.

I accept that the Earth environment may not be the only place where life can express itself, but as far as we know it is. Confirmation that there are other planets like ours out there would certainly give new hope in the search for extrasolar life. Even if all we can do is look at them from here.

Axolotl

14:19 / 09.06.05

I think that limiting the search to Earth-like planets is a bit short sighted. Stuff like the life found round the undersea volcanic vents suggests that life can in fact thrive in a far wider range of environments than what until recently would have been considered possible, and that's just on Earth. Who's to say what forms it is likely to take elsewhere?
On the other hand proving the existence of Earth-like planets elsewhere would provide a nice public boost to science and is quite cool.

Tamayyurt

20:03 / 09.06.05

why is it important for us to be looking and judging new planets against earth? isn't that a bit anthropocentric?

Because the long term goal is to find comfortable real estate to retire to when we’ve completely fucked, not only this planet, but every other piece of rock in our solar system.

Is it really all that practical? remember it's taken approximately 28 years for Voyager 2 to leave the solar system. These planets are so far away that visiting them is not an option.

This is true today. Eventually, though, we’ll be able to reach these planets in 70-80 years time. That sounds long road trip, but with hibernation, life extending procedures, and/or generational ships we’ll get there. And I’m not a big sci-fi nut waiting for this to happen, but I’m fairly certain it will.

Lurid Archive

10:26 / 10.06.05

As people have pointed out, the search for extra-terrestrial life is a major goal here and focusing on earth-like planets a very reasonable strategy for achieving that goal, since the problem of looking for life beyond what we know is that it isn't clear what we should be looking for. Moreover, most scientists would hold that unless earth is unique in the universe, in some un-thought of way, it seems implausible that there aren't lots of planets like earth, replete with life.

Of course, our ignorance is so profound that little can be said for certain.

Tamayyurt

12:29 / 14.06.05

Looks like we've started spotting them.

"A small planet just seven or eight times as massive as the Earth has been found circling a nearby star. Astronomers say it is the most Earth-like world we have ever seen beyond our solar system."

Axolotl

13:42 / 14.06.05

The problem is our current technology only detects really big planets as we detect planets in the "wobble" they cause in our observations of their star. A world 8 times bigger than earth is still not very earthlike.

invisible_al

15:04 / 14.06.05

However the fact that there are Gas Giant sized planets out there does raise the odds of Earth like planets being found. I remember reading that the Gas Giants gravity intercepts a lot of free floating asteroids and comets that would otherwise be moving about the system and making large craters on Earth. The fact they're shielding us allowed us the time between massive impacts for life to evolve.

Tamayyurt

15:25 / 14.06.05

Yeah, but we'll soon find smaller ones:

The team says the new planet is unlikely to remain a record-breaker for long. At the Keck Observatory, it is now possible to measure extremely subtle star wobbles, so even smaller planets should soon turn up.

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