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Post by swamprat on Jul 16, 2011 11:19:52 GMT -6
Stellar Clusters in M31 from PHAT: Survey Overview and First Results (1) University of Washington, (2) Harvard-Smithsonian CfA, (3) MPIA, (4) University of Utrecht, (5) NOAO, (6) University of Florida) The Panchromatic Hubble Andromeda Treasury (PHAT) is an on-going Hubble Space Telescope (HST) multi-cycle program that will image one-third of the M31 disk at high resolution, with wavelength coverage from the ultraviolet through the near-infrared. This dataset will allow for the construction of the most complete catalog of stellar clusters obtained for a spiral galaxy. Here, we provide an overview of the PHAT survey, a progress report on the status of observations and analysis, and preliminary results from the PHAT cluster program. Although only ~20% of the survey is complete, the superior resolution of HST has allowed us to identify hundreds of new intermediate and low mass clusters. As a result, the size of the cluster sample within the Year 1 survey footprint has grown by a factor of three relative to previous catalogs. lanl.arxiv.org/abs/1107.2668Magnetic Fields in Earth-like Exoplanets and Implications for Habitability around M-dwarfs Conference Proceedings, Montpellier, France, July 3-8 2011 We present estimations of dipolar magnetic moments for terrestrial exoplanets using the Olson & Christiansen (2006) scaling law and assuming their interior structure is similar to Earth. We find that the dipolar moment of fast rotating planets (where the Coriolis force dominates convection in the core), may amount up to ~80 times the magnetic moment of Earth, M_Earth, for at least part of the planets' lifetime. For very slow rotating planets (where the force of inertia dominates), the dipolar magnetic moment only reaches up to ~1.5 M_Earth. Applying our calculations to currently confirmed rocky exoplanets, we find that CoRoT-7b, Kepler-10b and 55 Cnc e can sustain dynamos up to ~ 18, 15 and 13 M_Earth, respectively. Our results also indicate that the magnetic moment of rocky exoplanets not only depends on their rotation rate, but also on their formation history, thermal state, age and composition, as well as the geometry of the field. These results apply to all rocky planets, but have important implications for the particular case of exoplanets in the Habitable Zone of M-dwarfs. lanl.arxiv.org/abs/1107.2804 On the Detection of (Habitable) Super-Earths Around Low-Mass Stars Using Kepler and Transit Timing Variation Method Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy (special issue on extrasolar planets) We present the results of an extensive study of the detectability of Earth-sized planets and super-Earths in the habitable zones of cool and low-mass stars using transit timing variation method. We have considered a system consisting of a star, a transiting giant planet, and a terrestrial-class perturber, and calculated TTVs for different values of the parameters of the system. To identify ranges of the parameters for which these variations would be detectable by Kepler, we considered the analysis presented by Ford et al. (2011, ArXiv:1102.0544) and assumed that a peak-to-peak variation of 20 seconds would be within the range of the photometric sensitivity of this telescope. We carried out simulations for resonant and non-resonant orbits, and identified ranges of the semimajor axes and eccentricities of the transiting and perturbing bodies for which an Earth-sized planet or a super-Earth in the habitable zone of a low-mass star would produce such TTVs. Results of our simulations indicate that in general, outer perturbers near first- and second-order resonances show a higher prospect for detection. Inner perturbers are potentially detectable only when near 1:2 and 1:3 mean-motion resonances. For a typical M star with a Jupiter-mass transiting planet, for instance, an Earth-mass perturber in the habitable zone can produce detectable TTVs when the orbit of the transiting planet is between 15 and 80 days. We present the details of our simulations and discuss the implication of the results for the detection of terrestrial planets around different low-mass stars. lanl.arxiv.org/abs/1107.2885
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Post by swamprat on Jul 28, 2011 10:41:50 GMT -6
PHYSORG
Astrophysicists apply new logic to downplay the probability of extraterrestrial lifeJuly 27, 2011 by Bob Yirka David Spiegel of Princeton University and Edwin Turner from the University of Tokyo have published a paper on arXiv that turns the Drake equation on its head. Instead of assuming that life would naturally evolve if conditions were similar to that found here on Earth, the two use Bayesian reasoning to show that just because we evolved in such conditions, doesn’t mean that the same occurrence would necessarily happen elsewhere; using evidence of our own existence doesn’t show anything they argue, other than that we are here. The Drake equation, developed in 1960 by Frank Drake uses probability and statistics to derive the possibility of life existing elsewhere in the universe. The data for it comes from observations of the known universe, i.e. the number of stars and solar systems that can be seen, the number that are thought likely to have conditions similar to our own, etc. It’s this equation and its results that drive much of the belief that there surely must be life out there; hopefully, intelligent life. The problem with all this though, is that so much of it is based on assumptions that have no real basis in reality. As Spiegel and Turner point out, basing our expectations of life existing on other planets, for no better reason that it exists here, is really only proof that were are more than capable of deceiving ourselves into thinking that things are much more likely than they really are. The two argue that just because intelligent life occurred rather quickly here on Earth, once conditions were ripe, giving rise to the people we are today, that doesn’t mean it naturally would on another planet just like ours in another place in the universe. There are other factors after all, that could have contributed to us being here that we don’t yet understand. So, they contend, deriving numbers from an equation such as that put forth by Drake, only serves to bump up our belief in the existence of other alien life forms, not the actual chances of it being so. When taken at face value, some might conclude that such arguments hold no more logic than arguments for the existence of God, i.e. it’s more about faith, than science. At any rate, most would agree that the only concrete way to prove whether there is life out there or not is to prove it, by finding it. www.physorg.com/news/2011-07-astrophysicists-logic-downplay-probability-extraterrestrial.html
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Post by skywalker on Jul 28, 2011 18:50:54 GMT -6
They could use that same idiotic argument to say that there are no other planets out there also. Just because there is a planet here doesn't mean there are any others. The planets in our solar system? Those are just weather balloons!! They could also say that just because we have a sun that doesn't mean there are any others out there either. All of those stars we see in the sky? That's just swamp gas!! In fact, while they are at it they could also say that just because one person is intelligent that doesn't mean anybody else is. The scientists who came up with this wacko theory...? I rest my case.
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Post by swamprat on Jul 28, 2011 19:18:29 GMT -6
You tell 'em, Sky!!
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 1, 2011 21:20:08 GMT -6
You could look at it that way but it's true when it comes to the Drake equation. The odds of stuff just happening the way it did all plays into the Theory of Evolution which I do not buy into at all. It's still valid just because all the stuff is out there doesn't mean there is life? That doesn't sound too far fetched for me. The odds of life forms like us just randomly arrising are pretty astronomical errrrr impossible by statistical odds. There are so many things that would have to happen just right. My opinion has always been that theories are just another form of religion without God equated into the matter . Hence why I don't buy into evolution. I used to up until I was about 17 and started researching stuff instead of what I was just told to believe as fact.
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 1, 2011 21:21:32 GMT -6
IMO they makea very valid point. You can mess with statistics to make them say anything you want. But in this case I find it valid.
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 1, 2011 21:27:03 GMT -6
I also think that most of the science material we have is based off of assumptions. No doubt science has helped and hurt mankind greatly over the years. But when you get down to the true nitty gritty and deep researches of things. Everything that comes together tends to not be a SOLID fact. There are absolutes sure, such as if you go stick your hand in a flame it will burn your skin some people it may not even hurt them but it will burn their skin if left there in the flame. For every rule there is and exception but for some rules there are no exceptions which makes them an exception to the rule . Lets talk about some theories of atoms and such, did you know the model you learn in school is just what they think the setup is??? It's not a fact. What if we are just straight up wrong about more things than we think?? Just giving a different view on this playing devil's advocate.
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 1, 2011 21:29:55 GMT -6
What if both of those thoughts on life in the universe are wrong and it's something so far into the left field that we just cannot understand it??? The more we learn the more infinite the questions become, but all come back to the same question how did it get there in the first place. It seems thats always what we are trying to answer. I also read a good point on there, what exactly are we looking for?? Making factual statements off of theories tends to make the statement seem like quicksand to me.
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 1, 2011 21:31:28 GMT -6
Just thinking out loud guys. This was not directed towards any of you but meant so you could read it and to help my post count out jk lol
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 1, 2011 21:36:31 GMT -6
"Intelligent alien life is one of those "game changer" topics that will spawn endless speculation because of the complete lack of data and the principle of not knowing what we don't know.
Given the range of outcomes, I'm guessing it would be better for us if life is rare and FTL travel really is impossible regardless of advances in technology.
Even without FTL though, a sufficiently capable civilization might adapt their consciousness to be unconcerned with the long travel times of interstellar travel. If your physical form can endure millions of years and your awareness can be slowed to an arbitrary extent, you could spread among the stars over the course of a billion years with no FTL.
So then ask, what would be interesting to them? How about seeding planets with DNA to see what grows?"
^I thought that was a pretty good thought someone had posted in the comments on there.
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Post by skywalker on Aug 2, 2011 18:42:11 GMT -6
All science really is is our explanation of how things happen. Science changes all the time whenever we get new information. That doesn't mean that science is wrong because there is no way we will ever know everything there is to know. There will always be more discoveries that can be made. As far as the theory of evolution goes I believe it is correct to a certain extent. I think that life does evolve to adapt to changing conditions. This is why we end up with huge dinosaurs when the planet is hot and dry and woolly mammoths when there is an ice age going on. Life adapted to changing conditions. I think that God designed it that way. I also think it was designed to spread throughout the universe from one planet to another. When one planet becomes uninhabitable another one is flourishing. Life always finds a way.
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 3, 2011 0:36:47 GMT -6
I have no belief in the Theory of Evolution. There is no proof not even in the plant kingdom of one species slowly evolving over time into another one, one reason I find it hard to believe is because it goes against what it teaches. Survival of the fittest at some point when you think about something that evolved to fly, well there had to be a stage where it either couldn't live just on ground very good or it had wings and couldn't fly good, too many things that woulda went wrong for me to believe it. I DO believe that things can adapt to their surroundings such as things adapting to cold weather, take dogs for instance some are more apt to survive cold weather whereas others are not good at it at all, most dog breeds are the result of designers making the breed but same thing in the animal kingdom, take birds, some adapted for different environments, the thing is there is no proof of any of the examples going from one species to another whole new species, there are just examples of normal mutations within the species own parameters. The vast majority of mutations are not positive in nature therefor it makes it even more far fetched for it just so happens to have been positive mutations for everything. Carbon dating is also suspect in my opinion. Now I don't believe the world is 6-7 thousand years old nor do I for sure believe it is 4 billion years old. I think we don't really know how old it is and are just guessing in the dark. The problem I have with carbon dating is nobody has ever observed the actual decay of it over a million years or even a thousand year. The only way we know some things is because they were written down. I think we have very little answers about pre-written history. I just don't buy into all the stuff we are fed and think there are so many things we will probably never know, no matter how advanced we become. Take for instance lightning. It's still a theory on how that happens yet we claim to know exactly how and atom works . Just throwing my alternative point of view out there. I do believe in a creator as I stated before. I kinda like the Electrical Universe Theory myself. I think discussing evolution ties in with the written article also. I just can't see life randomly spreading from planet to planet myself. At least I could never ever believe it to happen just randomly and by chance. Thats too much of a chance that it becomes impossible. Very good article though.
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Post by skywalker on Aug 3, 2011 8:59:26 GMT -6
Evolution is not necesarily survival of the fittest but more survival of opportunity. Random mutations are the process that makes it happen. Some mutations are bad and are not passed on for one reason or another, other mutations are good and are passed on which could eventually lead to an entirely new species. That doesn't mean it always happens though. Some good mutations don't survive while some bad mutations do. It just depends on the situation and how it plays out.
I agree with a lot of the other things that you said. Science is imperfect because humans are imperfect. We all make mistakes. That is why we always need to keep studying and learning and pushing the boundaries of knowledge. We will never knoiw everything there is to know about everything. Right now I would guess that we actually know for certain less than 1% of the knowledge that exists right now, the rest is just an educated (or not) guess.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 3, 2011 12:47:29 GMT -6
Evolution is not necesarily survival of the fittest but more survival of opportunity. Random mutations are the process that makes it happen. Some mutations are bad and are not passed on for one reason or another, other mutations are good and are passed on which could eventually lead to an entirely new species. That doesn't mean it always happens though. Some good mutations don't survive while some bad mutations do. It just depends on the situation and how it plays out. I agree with a lot of the other things that you said. Science is imperfect because humans are imperfect. We all make mistakes. That is why we always need to keep studying and learning and pushing the boundaries of knowledge. We will never knoiw everything there is to know about everything. Right now I would guess that we actually know for certain less than 1% of the knowledge that exists right now, the rest is just an educated (or not) guess. I agree. I'm a mutant by the way... not a teenage mutant ninja turtle kind though... hehehe... I have gray eyes which change color depending on the lighting. My mother has blue eyes and my father has green eyes. Nobody else in my family (that I know of at least) has gray eyes. I looked it up on the internet a couple years ago. It turns out gray eyes are a mutation... not a common one, but not an uncommon one either. It's a mutation of the blue eye gene. My first boyfriend back in high school had gray eyes too... and the lead singer of Rammstein. His eyes appear to be different colors in different photographs too... ~shrug~ I'm a mutant. Spooky. ~smirk~ Be afraid. Be very afraid.
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Post by breakarm87 on Aug 3, 2011 15:30:12 GMT -6
Evolution is not necesarily survival of the fittest but more survival of opportunity. Random mutations are the process that makes it happen. Some mutations are bad and are not passed on for one reason or another, other mutations are good and are passed on which could eventually lead to an entirely new species. That doesn't mean it always happens though. Some good mutations don't survive while some bad mutations do. It just depends on the situation and how it plays out. I agree with a lot of the other things that you said. Science is imperfect because humans are imperfect. We all make mistakes. That is why we always need to keep studying and learning and pushing the boundaries of knowledge. We will never knoiw everything there is to know about everything. Right now I would guess that we actually know for certain less than 1% of the knowledge that exists right now, the rest is just an educated (or not) guess. Only problem is there is no proof to support positive mutations happening to create a new species. Just theories. I agree there are those that are within the species parameters though. BTW my son has grey eyes, I have dark brown and my wife has bright blue. Thats pretty cool
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Post by Deleted on Aug 21, 2011 23:42:24 GMT -6
PHYSORG
Astrophysicists apply new logic to downplay the probability of extraterrestrial lifeJuly 27, 2011 by Bob Yirka David Spiegel of Princeton University and Edwin Turner from the University of Tokyo have published a paper on arXiv that turns the Drake equation on its head. Instead of assuming that life would naturally evolve if conditions were similar to that found here on Earth, the two use Bayesian reasoning to show that just because we evolved in such conditions, doesn’t mean that the same occurrence would necessarily happen elsewhere; using evidence of our own existence doesn’t show anything they argue, other than that we are here. The Drake equation, developed in 1960 by Frank Drake uses probability and statistics to derive the possibility of life existing elsewhere in the universe. The data for it comes from observations of the known universe, i.e. the number of stars and solar systems that can be seen, the number that are thought likely to have conditions similar to our own, etc. It’s this equation and its results that drive much of the belief that there surely must be life out there; hopefully, intelligent life. The problem with all this though, is that so much of it is based on assumptions that have no real basis in reality. As Spiegel and Turner point out, basing our expectations of life existing on other planets, for no better reason that it exists here, is really only proof that were are more than capable of deceiving ourselves into thinking that things are much more likely than they really are. The two argue that just because intelligent life occurred rather quickly here on Earth, once conditions were ripe, giving rise to the people we are today, that doesn’t mean it naturally would on another planet just like ours in another place in the universe. There are other factors after all, that could have contributed to us being here that we don’t yet understand. So, they contend, deriving numbers from an equation such as that put forth by Drake, only serves to bump up our belief in the existence of other alien life forms, not the actual chances of it being so. When taken at face value, some might conclude that such arguments hold no more logic than arguments for the existence of God, i.e. it’s more about faith, than science. At any rate, most would agree that the only concrete way to prove whether there is life out there or not is to prove it, by finding it. www.physorg.com/news/2011-07-astrophysicists-logic-downplay-probability-extraterrestrial.html Because of the fact that were just starting to figure out some of the statistics with other planets and solar systems, I feel its too early to calculate ratios at such an early stage . Its only been but a brief moment in history with new developments such as hubble and Im sure future equipment, like the James Webb telescope that will help supercede these latest discoveries. I remember not too long ago that astronomers thought there were only nine moons around jupiter. I personally believe that drakes equation isnt over exagerated as these scientists suggests, instead, its a gross understatement because we have many more discoveries in the future years ahead !
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Post by swamprat on Sept 18, 2011 11:27:28 GMT -6
There's an app for that..... ;D GALMASS: A SMARTPHONE APPLICATION FOR ESTIMATING GALAXY MASSESKyle R. Stewart1,* Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91109, USA ABSTRACTThis note documents the methods used by the smartphone application, “GalMass,” which has been released on the Android Market. GalMass estimates the halo virial mass (Mvir), stellar mass (Mstar), gas mass (Mgas), and galaxy gas fraction of a central galaxy as a function of redshift (z < 2), with any one of the above masses as an input parameter. In order to convert between Mvir and Mstar (in either direction), GalMass uses fitting functions that approximate the abundance matching models of either Conroy & Wechsler (2009), Moster et al. (2010), or Behroozi et al. (2010). GalMass uses a semi-empirical fit to observed galaxy gas fractions to convert between Mstar and Mgas, as outlined in Stewart et al. (2009b). lanl.arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1109/1109.3207v1.pdf
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Post by Deleted on Sept 18, 2011 20:21:42 GMT -6
Once they figure out what dark matter is and how much is in our universe I wonder how that will affect all these equations . For instance f=gm1x gm2 / d squared . then, would it be something like - f= - gm1xgm2 / -d x-d ? I dont know, its been too long since i've studied math, I need to get back into it again ( i'm probably waaaaaay off !!).
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Post by Deleted on Sept 18, 2011 20:30:58 GMT -6
Or,,lol,, f= force ,,,g= gravity,,,m= mass,,d= distance. maybe this instead(just playing around) f = g-m1 x g-m2 / d2,, ,o.k., im done now,lol .
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