7 Earth-Size Planets Found by NASA

[Montegriffo]

This is the part of the debate where I usually ask, why bother? What's the point of travelling huge distances to find some slime on the underneath of a rock? Are there not plenty of more pressing issues to expend our brain power and resources on?

...and this is the part where I post an inspirational treatise on the potential for radical societal changes, once we realize that we're not some 'anointed species', and just another bit of slime on a rock, and the possibility of expanding our species' survival throughout eons, rather than a few short millenia on a forgotten dust mote.

Which then gets ignored and forgotten the next time this topic comes up.

At which point I suggest we wait a few centuries until our current problems have been solved rather than think far into the future to when the Earth is no longer habitable. In fact striving to get off the planet we are ideally suited to is only accelerating the process of destroying it.

[SuburbanFarmer]

This is the part of the debate where I usually ask, why bother? What's the point of travelling huge distances to find some slime on the underneath of a rock? Are there not plenty of more pressing issues to expend our brain power and resources on?

...and this is the part where I post an inspirational treatise on the potential for radical societal changes, once we realize that we're not some 'anointed species', and just another bit of slime on a rock, and the possibility of expanding our species' survival throughout eons, rather than a few short millenia on a forgotten dust mote.

Which then gets ignored and forgotten the next time this topic comes up.

At which point I suggest we wait a few centuries until our current problems have been solved rather than think far into the future to when the Earth is no longer habitable.

Oh, it will take a century or more to really get extrasolar, but we can get to Mars pretty soon. And I think the opposite - that the only way to save our planet may well be to get some people off of it, to gain some perspective on how easily we could end all known intelligent life on a whim.

In fact striving to get off the planet we are ideally suited to is only accelerating the process of destroying it.

Please tell me you're not talking about carbon emissions from rocket launches.

[Montegriffo]

I'm talking about wasting valuable resources in an effort to send some poor sucker on a suicide mission to prop up the ego of an Empire in terminal decline and increase the profits of the MIC.


Have we reached the point where we agree to disagree and move on by composing short poems ridiculing each others ideological positions yet?

[SuburbanFarmer]

I'm talking about wasting valuable resources in an effort to send some poor sucker on a suicide mission to prop up the ego of an Empire in terminal decline and increase the profits of the MIC.


Have we reached the point where we agree to disagree and move on by composing short poems ridiculing each others ideological positions yet?

Nope. On this point we are quite opposed, and I seek to enlighten you concerning the criticality of this mission.

What valuable resources? Massive technological research, and a few tons of materials? That's nothing, on the scale of human industrial effort.

[Montegriffo]

It will take quite some persuading to convince me of the "CRITICAL" nature of this mission. I seriously doubt your ability to do any such thing..........

[ssu]

This is the part of the debate where I usually ask, why bother? What's the point of travelling huge distances to find some slime on the underneath of a rock? Are there not plenty of more pressing issues to expend our brain power and resources on?

Yep, then we start to discuss how hilariously expensive and totally meaningless a trip to Mars would be to some (and not to others).

Well, people either find astronomy interesting or not.

I got this winter my son really excited when on a clear night in the countryside Jupiter's moons were visible clearly and even more excited he was to see Aurora Borealis up North (which is quite a thing when it covers the sky with bright colours). And thanks to smart-phone apps even someone as ignorant as me can pick up just where are the planets are and where are the other constellations than the few I know. Unfortunately the ISS cannot be seen from here.

[Montegriffo]

This is the part of the debate where I usually ask, why bother? What's the point of travelling huge distances to find some slime on the underneath of a rock? Are there not plenty of more pressing issues to expend our brain power and resources on?

Yep, then we start to discuss how hilariously expensive and totally meaningless a trip to Mars would be to some (and not to others).

Well, people either find astronomy interesting or not.

I got this winter my son really excited when on a clear night in the countryside Jupiter's moons were visible clearly and even more excited he was to see Aurora Borealis up North (which is quite a thing when it covers the sky with bright colours). And thanks to smart-phone apps even someone as ignorant as me can pick up just where are the planets are and where are the other constellations than the few I know. Unfortunately the ISS cannot be seen from here.

Oh, I find astronomy very interesting indeed but apart from the excellent Hubble space telescope most of the research into this is done with both feet firmly planted on planet Earth. I am anxiously awaiting the first images of a black hole which are expected soon from a combination of data from several radio telescopes in different locations. It's the science fiction and over exaggeration of the benefits of manned space flight I have trouble accepting.

[ssu]

Oh, I find astronomy very interesting indeed but apart from the excellent Hubble space telescope most of the research into this is done with both feet firmly planted on planet Earth. I am anxiously awaiting the first images of a black hole which are expected soon from a combination of data from several radio telescopes in different locations. It's the science fiction and over exaggeration of the benefits of manned space flight I have trouble accepting.

Hmm.. Weren't these exoplanet findings done by the Spitzer space telescope?



One looking firmly at space and then taking notice of the wobbles that planets create to suns (or something like that). I assume exoplanet findings are done by space telescopes, but I may be wrong. Any telescope on Earth has the (fortunate) difficulty of having the atmosphere and everything in it in the way. And has the problem of being on a rotating planet, while actually Spitzer is on a heliocentric orbit.

[Mercury]

The sun will die someday. The only chance for human life, beyond that point, will be to leave (or move) the Earth.

Our species' survival won't be something that can be cobbled up at the last minute.

[Speaker to Animals]

We actually are pretty close to sending ships to nearby star systems. We basically need to start mining for materials around the solar system. For instance, while its quite feasible to build an unmanned Orion ship that will travel to this system in less than fifty years as experienced by Earth, it would require something like one small nuclear blast every minute or so. We don't have enough fuel for that, and can't reasonably get it here on Earth unless it's an emergency. But once you start mining around the solar system, that's no longer a problem at all.

EM drive might change things a great deal, however.