Seeking New Worlds, New Life - - -

Analyzing what we've been learning about other planetary systems, some scientists say that maybe Earth is unusual, after all: maybe.

Other scientists found another maybe-habitable planet less than 14 light-years away. Maybe planets like Earth are common: again, maybe.

1. Earth, Copernicus, and "a Preliminary Guess"
   • Life in the Universe: Eventually
   • Space Aliens Might Not be Human
2. Wolf 1061c: Nearby Super-Earth
   • Habitable: Maybe
   • Life as We Know It: and Maybe Otherwise

I like living in a world where last year's list of known planetary systems is obsolete. Some folks don't. I'll talk about Copernicus and Sacred Scripture — right after my usual harangue about using our brains.

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Curiosity, Ulysses, and Being Human

Thinking is not a sin.

Neither is wondering what's over the next hill.

Dante didn't put Ulysses in his eighth circle of Hell because being curious is wrong, and I've been over that before. (July 24, 2015)

We're supposed to use our brains. (Wisdom 7:17; Catechism of the Catholic Church, 35, 159, 1730-1738)

We're rational creatures, created in the image of God, and "little less than a god." Studying this universe, and using that knowledge is part of our job. So is using our power responsibly. (Genesis 1:26-27, 2:7; Psalms 8:6; Catechism, 35-36, 282-289, , 355-373, 1704, 2292-2295, 2402, 2415-2418, 2456)

"Little less than a god" isn't God. Forgetting that gets us in trouble, and that's another topic. (June 19, 2015; March 29, 2015)

Copernicus: Physician, Mathematician, and — Troublemaker?

Nicolaus Copernicus was a physician, classics scholar, translator, governor, diplomat, economist, and held a degree in Canon Law.

He's probably best-known these days as a mathematician and astronomer who helped establish that Earth orbits our sun, not the other way around.

Hermann Bondi coined the phrase "Copernican principle" in the 1950s, while discussing the equivalence principle, a working assumption that Earth isn't unique or central in this universe. Another name for that idea is the mediocrity principle, but it's not quite as catchy a name. My opinion.

Anyway, Copernicus knew that Aristarchus of Samos thought the universe centered on our sun, used more epicycles than Ptolemy, and came up with a better theory for predicting how long Earth's year will be.

Copernicus passed "Commentariolus," a 40-page discussion of his heliocentric theory, around his circle of friends and acquaintances in 1514.

Pope Clement VII most likely learned about Copernicus' work from lectures Johann Albrecht Widmannstetter gave in Rome.

Quite a few folks, including the Pope, liked the 'Copernican model.' The Pope really liked what he heard, giving Herr Widmannstetter a gift for explaining the new theory.

Others, not so much. Let's remember that the 16th century was a lively era.

The Protestant Reformation was getting hijacked by northern princes, and Barbary pirates were raiding the French coast. England's Henry VIII set up a national church and started going through wives; and Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, said it wasn't his fault when his troops sacked Rome.

Understandably, publication of "De revolutionibus orbium coelestium" was put off until just before Copernicus died.

Joshua, Aristotle, and Getting a Grip

Rumors about the book had leaked out, though, prompting Luther's condemnation:

"People gave ear to an upstart astrologer who strove to show that the earth revolves, not the heavens or the firmament, the sun and the moon ... This fool wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy; but sacred Scripture tells us [Joshua 10:13] that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and not the earth."
(Martin Luther; quoted in Thomas Kuhn, The Copernican Revolution, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 1957, p. 191; via Wikipedia)

Aristotle's fans were upset, too. I've talked about Thales of Miletus, Aristotle, and the 219 Propositions of 1277, before. (August 21, 2015)

It gets complicated at this point, including reaction to Pope Gregory XIII's Gregorian calendar: which was controversial for centuries.

An enthusiastic Christian told me that our sun goes around Earth a few decades back. He used Luther's 'because the Bible says so' argument, citing the same bit from Joshua. I'm fairly sure that he was sincere: but I'm quite sure that he's wrong.

I take Joshua 10:13, and the rest of Sacred Scripture, seriously. (February 21, 2016)

Since I'm a Catholic, I think the Bible is the Word of God: the entire Bible, not just the bits I like. I'm also expected to read Sacred Scripture: often. (Catechism, 101-133)

"Through all the words of Sacred Scripture, God speaks only one single Word, his one Utterance in whom he expresses himself completely:⁶⁴

"You recall that one and the same Word of God extends throughout Scripture, that it is one and the same Utterance that resounds in the mouths of all the sacred writers, since he who was in the beginning God with God has no need of separate syllables; for he is not subject to time.⁶⁵"

(Catechism, 102)

"...The Church has always venerated the divine Scriptures just as she venerates the body of the Lord, since, especially in the sacred liturgy, she unceasingly receives and offers to the faithful the bread of life from the table both of God's word and of Christ's body....

"...The sacred synod also earnestly and especially urges all the Christian faithful, especially Religious, to learn by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures the 'excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ' (Phil. 3:8). 'For ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.'(5)..."
("Dei Verbum," Pope Blessed Paul VI (November 18, 1965))

"...So convinced indeed was Jerome that familiarity with the Bible was the royal road to the knowledge and love of Christ that he did not hesitate to say: 'Ignorance of the Bible means ignorance of Christ.'[121] And 'what other life can there be without knowledge of the Bible wherein Christ, the life of them that believe, is set before us?'[122]..."
("Spiritus Paraclitus," Benedict XV (September 15, 1915))

I am not, however, required to believe that the Bible was written by metaphor-challenged Industrial Age Americans. (February 21, 2016)

And I'm certainly not obliged to believe that folks living in Mesopotamia, more than two dozen centuries back, knew everything there is to know about this universe.

Just the Bible and Me: and Catherine of Siena, and Albertus Magnus, and Thomas Aquinas, and - - -

I don't have to guess what the Bible 'really means.'

I'm a Catholic, so I take my cue from Sacred Scripture, Tradition with a capital "T," and the Magisterium.¹ (Matthew 16:16-19; Catechism, 65-95, 2032-2040)

Lower-case tradition, valuing customs and attitudes of a bygone age, can be nice: in moderation. I like some traditions — but don't yearn for the 'good old days' before 1962, 1954, 1933, 1848, or some other imagined golden age. (July 12, 2015; August 3, 2014)

With an upper-case "T," Tradition is the "living transmission" of the "full and living Gospel:" what the Apostles believed, passed down through our bishops, under the Holy Spirit. (Catechism, 77-78)

That is not trying to live as if the Council of Trent never happened.

The Catholic Church is old, ancient: but not old-fashioned. (February 13, 2015)

We've been passing along the best news humanity's ever had for two millennia: God loves us — all of us — and wants to adopt us. (John 1:12-14, 3:17; Romans 8:14-17; Peter 1:3-4; Catechism, 27-30, 52, 1825, 1996)

There's a catch, sort of. I'm expected to act as if what our Lord said matters: so I try to love God, love my neighbors, and see everyone as my neighbor. (Matthew 5:43-44, 7:12, 22:36-40, Mark 12:28-31; Luke 6:31 10:25-27, 29-37; Catechism, 1789)

I see treating others the way I want them to treat me as a corollary, and that's yet another topic. (October 18, 2015; May 25, 2014)

Where was I? Copernicus, Joshua, the Council of Trent, Prohibition. Right.

I like being part of an outfit that predates my civilization's current iteration, was global before internationalism was cool, and embraces all cultures. For two millennia, we have been bringing a message of love and hope to the world. (Catechism, 758-776, 816, 1202)

We're not trying to drag the world back to some imagined golden age. Even if we could, our job is moving ahead, not repeating past mistakes. We have a mandate to build a better world. (Catechism, 1928-1942, 2419-2442)

One more thing: there isn't one 'correct' kind of government or culture, so our job is not trying to make everyone into Victorian-era Americans, Renaissance Italians, or Imperial Romans.

We're told to work with what we have, correcting what is unjust, and supporting what is right. (Catechism, 1897-1917, 1928-1942)

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1. Earth, Copernicus, and "a Preliminary Guess"

"Exoplanet Census Suggests Earth Is Special after All"
Shannon Hall, Scientific American (February 19, 2016)

"A new tally proposes that roughly 700 quintillion terrestrial exoplanets are likely to exist across the observable universe—most vastly different from Earth

"More than 400 years ago Renaissance scientist Nicolaus Copernicus reduced us to near nothingness by showing that our planet is not the center of the solar system. With every subsequent scientific revolution, most other privileged positions in the universe humans might have held dear have been further degraded, revealing the cold truth that our species is the smallest of specks on a speck of a planet, cosmologically speaking. A new calculation of exoplanets suggests that Earth is just one out of a likely 700 million trillion terrestrial planets in the entire observable universe. But the average age of these planets—well above Earth's age—and their typical locations—in galaxies vastly unlike the Milky Way—just might turn the Copernican principle on its head.

"Astronomer Erik Zackrisson from Uppsala University and his colleagues created a cosmic compendium of all the terrestrial exoplanets likely to exist throughout the observable universe, based on the rocky worlds astronomers have found so far. In a powerful computer simulation, they first created their own mini universe containing models of the earliest galaxies. Then they unleashed the laws of physics—as close as scientists understand them—that describe how galaxies grow, how stars evolve and how planets come to be. Finally, they fast-forwarded through 13.8 billion years of cosmic history. Their results, published to the preprint server arXiv (pdf) and submitted to The Astrophysical Journal, provide a tantalizing trove of probable exoplanet statistics that helps astronomers understand our place in the universe...."

Earth is special: so is North America, and the town I live in, near the top of the Mississippi watershed. It's where I live. It's also where everyone I know lives — plus all of humanity, except for Expedition 46 on the International Space Station.

Granted, they're in Earth orbit: about 400 kilometers/250 miles up, about as far away from Earth's surface as I am from Rochester, Minnesota. But it's a start. (February 5, 2016; January 8, 2016; December 24, 2015)

"...Their results...provide a tantalizing trove of probable exoplanet statistics that helps astronomers understand our place in the universe..." might imply that Shannon Hall wants us to depend exclusively on science for 'meaning of life' questions.

I don't think that is the case, since the "place in the universe" being discussed is whether or not Earth is exceptional: apart from it being where we live.

I'm fascinated by our expanding knowledge of the universe, but don't look to science for all the answers. Discovering why the universe, planets, and humanity, exist isn't what natural sciences study. (Catechism, 284)

However:

"The question about the origins of the world and of man has been the object of many scientific studies which have splendidly enriched our knowledge of the age and dimensions of the cosmos, the development of life-forms and the appearance of man. These discoveries invite us to even greater admiration for the greatness of the Creator, prompting us to give him thanks for all his works and for the understanding and wisdom he gives to scholars and researchers. With Solomon they can say: 'It is he who gave me unerring knowledge of what exists, to know the structure of the world and the activity of the elements. . . for wisdom, the fashioner of all things, taught me.'¹²¹"
(Catechism, 283 [emphasis mine])

As I keep saying, studying this universe and using what we learn is part of being human: it's part of our job. (Wisdom 7:17; Catechism, 307, 1730, 2292-2295, 2415-2418)

I figure we'll see more studies like this, as scientists start sifting through data they're collecting about planets circling other stars.

"...'It's kind of mind-boggling that we're actually at a point where we can begin to do this,' says co-author Andrew Benson from the Carnegie Observatories in California. Until recently, he says, so few exoplanets were known that reasonable extrapolations to the rest of the universe were impossible. Still, his team’s findings are a preliminary guess at what the cosmos might hold. 'It's certainly the case that there are a lot of uncertainties in a calculation like this. Our knowledge of all of these pieces is imperfect,' he adds...."
(Shannon Hall, Scientific American)

Life in the Universe: Eventually

(From PlanetQuest, NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory; via Wikimedia Commons; used w/o permission.)
(Illustrations of our neighborhood in the Milky Way Galaxy, and the Milky Way's position in the Local Galactic Group.)

"...'Whenever you find something that sticks out…' Zackrisson says, '…that means that either we are the result of a very improbable lottery draw or we don't understand how the lottery works.'

"But Max Tegmark from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who also was not part of the research, thinks Earth is a colossal violation of the Copernican principle—not because of its location but because of its young age. 'If you have these civilizations that had a 3.5-billion-year head start on us, why haven't they colonized our galaxy?' asks Tegmark. 'To me, the most likely explanation is that if the planets are a dime a dozen, then highly intelligent life evolves only rarely.' So should we feel insignificant? Should we be reduced to near nothingness? Not at all, he says. 'It might be that one day in the distant future much of our universe will be teeming with life because of what we did here.' "
(Shannon Hall, Scientific American)

I'm quite sure that Earth is the only place in the universe that supports life: or that we'll find life on millions of worlds in this galaxy. Right now, we don't know.

As I've said before, often, finding an extraterrestrial equivalent of bacteria would be a monumental discovery. Finding life like ourselves, self-willed intelligent creatures: I'd be delighted at news that we've got neighbors, others probably not so much. (August 2, 2015; November 7, 2014)

As for what MIT's Max Tegmark said: it's nice to see someone who looks at the universe and doesn't feel "reduced to near nothingness." As I've said before, humility isn't being delusional. (March 29, 2015; August 10, 2014)

On the other hand, I'm not so sure that "the most likely explanation is that if the planets are a dime a dozen, then highly intelligent life evolves only rarely."

Space Aliens Might Not be Human

If humans represent the only possible form that intelligence can take — any neighbors we meet will be as incurably chatty as we are, with the same wanderlust that started us seeing what's over the next hill at least 1,900,000 years ago.

If that's the case, maybe intelligent life is rare.

I don't know whether we have neighbors, or whether we're the only folks in this universe.

But if we do have neighbors, I'd be more than a little surprised if they were just like us: physically or psychologically.

For all I know, dozens of billion-year-old civilizations exist within a few hundred light-years of us: most of them serenely unscrewing the inscrutable and meditating on the whichness of what, safely anchored to the ocean floor of their home. (July 18, 2014)

More:

• "Terrestrial Planets Across Space and Time"
  Erik Zackrisson, Per Calissendorff, Juan Gonzalez, Andrew Benson, Anders Johansen, Markus Janson (February 1, 2016)
  (From arxiv.org/pdf/1602.00690v1.pdf (March 2, 2016))

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2. Wolf 1061c: Nearby Super-Earth

(From "The Aladin Sky Atlas," developed at CDS, Strasbourg Observatory, France; via CNN; used w/o permission.)
(Wolf 1061, seen from the Solar System.)

"Wolf 1061 exoplanet: 'Super-Earth' discovered only 14 light-years away"
Will Heilpern, CNN (December 17, 2015)

"Alien life could be closer to us than previously thought. Scientists have just discovered the nearest habitable planet to Earth.

"The new world is one of three surrounding a red dwarf star called Wolf 1061, which is just 14 light years away. It was detected by scientists at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Australia.

"All three planets have the potential to be solid and rocky, but only Wolf 1061c exists within the 'Goldilocks zone' -- a distance from the star (much smaller and cooler than our sun) that is not too hot and not too cold for liquid water.

" 'This rare discovery is incredibly exciting,' UNSW's Duncan Wright, who led the study, told CNN.

" 'Other planets found that are habitable are not nearly this close to Earth. Because of the close proximity of this planet to us, there is good opportunity to find out more about it.'..."

At 13.8 light-years, Wolf 1061 is "close:" compared to most stars in our galaxy. As Duncan Wright said, the Wolf 1061 planetary system will be much easier to study than most.

We won't be sending probes there any time soon, though. One light-year is roughly 9,000,000,000,000 kilometers, 6,000,000,000,000 miles. That's a lot of zeroes.

Guy Ottewell's 'make a scale model of the Solar System' page ("THE THOUSAND-YARD MODEL/or, The Earth as a Peppercorn") gives an idea of how far away the closest stars are.

In this model, our sun is a ball eight inches across: like a bowling ball. Earth is a peppercorn 26 yards from the bowling ball. Pluto is about a thousand yards out.

At this scale, one light-year is about a thousand miles: so Wolf 1061 would be 13,800 miles from the bowling ball: going in a straight line, that's roughly halfway to satellites in geosynchronous orbit.

Habitable: Maybe

(From universesandbox.com, via CNN, used w/o permission.)
("The planets have orbits of 4.9 days, 17.9 days and 67.2 days."
(CNN))

"...'The close proximity of the planets around Wolf 1061 means there is a good chance these planets may pass across the face of the star,' UNSW team member Rob Wittenmyer said in an earlier statement. 'If they do, then it may be possible to study the atmospheres of these planets in future to see whether they would be conducive to life.' ..."
(Will Heilpern, CNN)

Studying light shining through another planet's atmosphere is sort of like looking through a glass of water to see what's dissolved in it. (February 19, 2016; August 21, 2015; October 3, 2014)

'Habitable' doesn't mean 'inhabited,' and I've said that before. (January 2, 2015; June 27, 2014)

Again, we don't know if there's life anywhere except Earth. Not yet.

My guess, based on how many potentially habitable exoplanets we've found so far, and how common life's chemical components are, is that we'll eventually find life-as-we-know-it on another world. (October 3, 2014)

I put a link list of 'exoplanet' resources at the end of this post.²

Life as We Know It: and Maybe Otherwise

Speaking of life-as-we-know-it, defining "life" has become increasingly tricky. By one definition, NASA's Mars rovers are "alive." I try to be open-minded, but that seems silly. (November 28, 2014)

More of my take on vitalism, robots, and space vampires —

• Life, Water, Fire, and Exploding Martians
• "Metropolis," Tsukumogami, and the Roomba Revolution that Wasn't

— and that's yet again another topic. Topics.

As if this post wasn't weird enough already — in the '60s, a former professor at Boston University put together a pretty good argument for life chemistries that might plausibly work in temperatures ranging from near red-hot to near absolute zero:

• Fluorosilicone in fluorosilicone
• Fluorocarbon in sulfur
• Nucleic acid/protein (O) in water
• Nucleic acid/protein (N) in ammonia
• Lipid in methane
• Lipid in hydrogen
  ("View from a Height" Isaac Asimov (1963), Lancer Books (p. 63))

Isaac Asimov's grasp of ecology and physics was a trifle shaky, at least in his fiction: but this time he was speculating in his professional field, chemistry.

Life-as-we-know-it may not be the only sort. We're #3 on that list, by the way. (Adapted from Apathetic Lemming of the North (March 24, 2010))

Like Haldane said, "....the Universe is ... queerer than we can suppose..." (July 31, 2015)

More; mostly about humanity's search for new worlds:

• "SETI: Looking for Neighbors"
  (January 15, 2016)
  Particularly
  • Flying Chicken Incubators, Invaders, and All That
  • Alone: Or Not
  • Assumptions
  • Globular Clusters and SETI
    • Outward Bound
• "Enceladus and Kepler's Planets"
  (December 18, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Thinking and Humility
  • Neighbors
  • Kepler Data Analyzed: False Positives and Big Planets
• "Faith, Fear, and Flying Saucers"
  (August 2, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Scala Naturae: The Ladder of Nature
  • First Contact
  • Predictions and Policies
  • Hands, Eyes, and Speculation
  • God's Decision, Not Mine
• "Pluto, Earth 2.0, and Life in the Universe"
  (July 31, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Oh Ye of Brittle Faith
  • Science, Truth, and God
  • Earth 2.0, Aristotle, and All That
  • Kepler 452b: 'Earth 2.0?'
  • HIP 11915b: An Extrasolar Jupiter
• "SpaceX, Mars, and Someday the Stars"
  (December 24, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Imagining, and Building, Spaceships
  • Faith, Fear, and Being Human
  • SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Cargo Runs

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¹ Definitions:

• "BIBLE: Sacred Scripture: the books which contain the truth of God's Revelation and were composed by human authors inspired by the Holy Spirit (105). The Bible contains both the forty-six books of the Old Testament and the twenty-seven books of the New Testament (120). See Old Testament; New Testament."
• "MAGISTERIUM: The living, teaching office of the Church, whose task it is to give as authentic interpretation of the word of God, whether in its written form (Sacred Scripture), or in the form of Tradition. The Magisterium ensures the Church's fidelity to the teaching of the Apostles in matters of faith and morals (85, 890, 2033)."
• "TRADITION: The living transmission of the message of the Gospel in the Church. The oral preaching of the Apostles, and the written message of salvation under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (Bible), are conserved and handed on as the deposit of faith through the apostolic succession in the Church. Both the living Tradition and the written Scriptures have their common source in the revelation of God in Jesus Christ (75-82). The theological, liturgical, disciplinary, and devotional traditions of the local churches both contain and can be distinguished from this apostolic Tradition (83)."

And see Catechism, 95, 113, 174, and 126.

² A serious search for new worlds and life in this universe, resource link list:

• The Extrasolar Planet Catalog
  The Extrasolar Planets Encyclopaedia; Exoplanet Team
• Wikipedia
  • Exoplanet
    
    • Detection methods
    • Formation and evolution
    • Planet-hosting stars
    • Atmosphere
    • Habitability
  • Extremophile
    • In astrobiology
  • Kepler (spacecraft)
    • Objectives and methods
    • Planet finding process
    • Mission status
  • List of exoplanets
  • List of nearest terrestrial exoplanet candidates
    [outdated (August 2015)]
  • List of potentially habitable exoplanets
  • Super-Earth
  • Terrestrial planet
    • Solar System's terrestrial planets
    • Extrasolar terrestrial planets
• NASA
  • Life on the Edge FAQ
    Dr. David Noever
  • "Identification and Characterization of Extremophile Microorganisms with Significance to Astrobiology"
    Asim K. Bej, Ph.D. (2002)

SETI: Looking for Neighbors

Some scientist think globular clusters aren't good places to look for neighbors.

Others took a fresh look at the data, crunched numbers, and pointed out that parts of globular clusters might be better spots for interstellar civilizations than the boonies where we live.

Meanwhile, someone with a lot more money than I'll ever see decided to spend some of it on a systematic search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

1. Globular Clusters and SETI
   • Speculation
   • Outward Bound
2. SETI, Breakthrough, and Assumptions

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Flying Chicken Incubators, Invaders, and All That

I read speculative fiction back when it was called fantasy and science fiction, watched The Invaders, and enjoyed Star Trek when it was new. (September 4, 2015; September 7, 2014)

But — do I "believe in" space aliens?

No, not in the Close Encounters of the Third Kind sense.

My guess is that most folks say "UFO" these days, when talking about visits with space aliens.

The term "flying saucer" goes back to around 1947, when Kenneth Arnold said he saw nine UFOs flying near Mount Rainier.

Seeing flying saucers, having conversations with or being abducted by, aliens — interstellar pregnancy test optional — was all the rage for the next decade or so.¹

Small wonder that I run into folks who dismiss the notion of extraterrestrial intelligence as nonsense: if they're feeling charitable.

Do I "believe" we're alone in the universe?

That depends on what you mean by "alone:" and "universe," for that matter.

SETI

(From SETI@Home BOINC Client software, via Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission.)
(Screen shot of SETI@Home screensaver.)

Depending on context, SETI means Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence; SETI Institute, an astronomical research organization; or SETI@home, software using the BOINC platform.

Seti, or Sethi, or Sethos, if you like ancient Greek, was a not-uncommon name a few millennia back. I hardly ever hear folks talking about Seti the Viceroy of Kush; commander Seti, grandfather of Seti I; Seti II; or Seti-Merenptah; now, though: and that's another topic.

Where was I? Alien abductions, old television series, public figures of Egypt's 19th dynasty. Right.

I was running SETI@home on my desktop computer, some years back. The software's demands on my system resources were minimal, and I liked the idea of helping folks search through digital haystacks in search of a needle that might not be there.

SETI@home apparently didn't find space aliens, but did identify a few spots in Earth's sky with mildly anomalous electromagnetic activity. My guess is that they're natural phenomena, not neighbors: but we'll learn something by reviewing the data and making new observations.

Maybe. It's also possible that SETI@home's data and analysis will get lost or ignored. I hope not: that was a lot of data.

Although I recognize that some organizations use SETI as part of their outfit's name, I use the term generically, meaning humanity's recent search for neighbors.

I've known a few folks who apparently really "believed in" space aliens of the 'take me to your leader' or 'we have come to lead mankind to a groovier tomorrow' variety.

I've known others who share my belief — that the universe is real, follows knowable laws, and that we may or may not share it with other creatures like us. Well, more-or-less like us.

About the universe operating according to logical, knowable, physical laws: as a Catholic, I must believe that. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 299)

Ignoring God's wonder-filled creation is most emphatically not part of my faith. (November 6, 2015; March 29, 2015)

Alone: Or Not

I am firmly convinced that in all the vast expanse of this universe, through all the billions of years which have elapsed since it began, and until it finally ends — humanity is alone, that nobody else lives and looks at the stars, and wonders if they are alone.

Or we have neighbors.

Right now, we don't know.

Either way, I figure it's up to God whether or not we have company.

As far as I know, the Catholic Church hasn't made an official statement on this particular topic. That's hardly surprising, since we've got very little data to work with.

Besides, the general principle was addressed back in 1277, when some Aristotle fanboys said that there couldn't be any other worlds — because Aristotle said so.

Some of the 219 Propositions of 1277 have since been rescinded, but not the basic principle of 27/219: God's God, Aristotle's not. (October 23, 2015; May 8, 2015)

Getting back to those earnest folks who look to the stars in hopes that space-alien emissaries of niceness will come to solve all our problems — I think, and hope, that they're sincere. I'm also quite sure that they're wrong.

I implied earlier that I'd talk about what I mean by "alone" and "universe," and this looks like a good spot to blather on about my take on what's real and what's not.

Ladders, Angels, and (Maybe) a Multiverse

I've talked about the Scala Natura, Ladder of Nature/Creation, before. (August 2, 2015)

We've learned a bit in the two dozen centuries since Plato and Aristotle studied the nature of reality.

When the 45th century rolls by, I'm quite sure we'll have filled in some of the gaps in today's knowledge, discovered new vistas that we hadn't known about before, and that's yet another topic.

Skipping past Plato's forms, Aristotle's taxonomy, and Medieval Neoplatonism — we're learning that living creatures don't divide neatly into "plants" and "animals," for example — I think the the scala naturae, or ladder of nature, is still an adequate illustration of some very basic ideas.

Humans are living creatures with a material body: the sort we call animals. But we're not just animals. We can reason and have free will. We can decide what we do or do not do. (Genesis 1:27; Catechism, 1951, 1700-1706, 1730)

It's being rational creatures that makes us "in the image of God." (Catechism, 1730)

We may or may not learn that we share this universe with other self-willed creatures with material bodies of some sort.

On the other hand, we've known about the folks without bodies for a very long time.

Angels, like us, are intelligent and have/had free will; but they don't have bodies. They're pure spirit, not material at all. (Catechism, 328-330)

Some angels work for God, others decided to do their own thing, that lot is not safe to be around, and that's yet again another topic. Topics. (Catechism, 391-395, 409, 414, 2851-2852)

When I write about neighbors in the universe, I'm talking about folks who are self-willed creatures with a physical form.

Some of what we're learning about quantum mechanics make more sense if we assume that we're not in the only space-time continuum, and that's still another topic. (September 26, 2014)

Assumptions

Efforts at finding or contacting extraterrestrial intelligence make an assumption which I think is dubious, at best: that our non-human neighbors are pretty much just like us.

If non-human people live on another world, my guess is that they're not human: at all.

That, I think, would be a more sensible explanation than the conventionally pessimistic response to the Fermi paradox: that civilizations go into self-destruct mode as soon as they develop the sort of tech we did about fifty years ago.

I don't see why every intelligent species must be as irrepressibly chatty as we are. Then there's the assumption that everyone, everywhere, uses modulated electromagnetic signals for long-distance communication.

I've discussed Oldowan tools, slit gongs, Klemperer rosettes, and H. P. Lovecraft, before. (July 24, 2015; June 27, 2014)

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1. Globular Clusters and SETI

(From Science Photo Library, via BBC News, used w/o permission.)
("Plenty of neighbours: Might clusters like this be the place to search for alien civilisations?"
(BBC News))

"Star clumps harbour 'sweet spot' in search for alien life"
Jonathan Webb, BBC News (January 7, 2016)

"Ancient, tightly packed clumps of stars found at the fringe of the Milky Way are a good bet in the search for extra terrestrial intelligence (Seti), research suggests.

"Because of their abundance of stars, these 'globular clusters' were an early favourite in the Seti field.

"But recent efforts to scour the sky for planets orbiting alien stars have had little success within star clusters.

"Now, two astronomers say there is good reason to keep up the search.

"Rosanne Di Stefano from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, US, and Alak Ray from the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in India, have described what they call the 'globular cluster opportunity'...."

First, a quick review.

This universe began 13,799,000,000 years ago, give or take 21,000,000. Stars started forming somewhere between 150,000 and 1,000,000,000 years later. Many or most of those stars are no longer around.

The larger ones became supernovae. Others eventually became red giants. These stars produced elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. Red giants release these elements gradually, Supernovae dump their contributions into the cosmos rather abruptly.

Either way, clouds of gas and dust — including heavier elements — collapsed to form new stars: including our sun. The Solar System is about 4,600,000,000 years old now.

Life appeared on Earth at least 3,500,000,000 years back, folks were making stone tools 3,400,000 years before Darwin published "Origin of Species" — that was 156 years ago — and I've been over this before. (August 14, 2015; May 29, 2015; July 15, 2014)

'Life as we know it' depends on water, which is made of hydrogen and oxygen; and requires a wide variety of heavier elements.

Globular clusters, according to that BBC News article, are about 10,000,000,000 years old on average. Their stars generally don't have as many heavier elements as ours: but we're leaning that such stars can have rocky planets like Earth orbiting them.

Here's where it gets interesting.

Speculation

(From Science Photo Library, via BBC News, used w/o permission.)
("Back in 1974, globular cluster M13 was the target for the first deliberate radio transmission into outer space"²
(BBC News))

We're learning that a planet like Earth could be in a stable orbit in the habitable zone of a small, stable, and very old, star in a globular cluster.

If life started on such a planet, and folks more-or-less like us showed up about three and a half billion years later, like we did — that's a lot of "ifs."

But if all that happened, there could be folks living on such a world: whose ancestors started sending probes into the universe before our sun began shining.

Such a world almost certainly wouldn't exist in the most densely-packed parts of a globular cluster. Tidal/gravitational forces from passing stars would disrupt its orbit: probably. The good news is that globular clusters thin out toward the edges.

"...there is a region within these clusters, Dr Di Stefano said, where the stars are not so tightly packed that huddled, small, rocky planets would be stripped from their stars - and yet they are still close enough together that an alien civilisation might manage the leap from one to another.

"Fun speculation

" 'In this large region... planetary systems can survive, and yet it's dense enough that it may facilitate interstellar travel.'

"In fact, she added, these planets - if they do exist - could last even longer than the current age of the Universe, leaving ample time for intelligence and interstellar ambition to flourish.

"Other researchers at the conference agreed that these were interesting observations, even if the notion of ancient, star-hopping civilisations was - of course - a provocative speculation...."
(, BBC News)

The typical distance between stars in a globular cluster is around 1 light- year: that's just an average, though. (Wikipedia)

Let's say that folks whose home world orbits a star that's dimmer, cooler, and older, than ours — and is in the 'one light-year between stars' section of a globular cluster — got curious about their corner of the universe, and started sending probes out.

If they were as good at building robot spaceships as we were in 1977, they could launch something like Voyager 1. If they did, their probe could reach the closest star in a little over 2,250 years.

Outward Bound

(From Ames Research Center of the United States/NASA Photo ID: ACD97-0036-1, used w/o permission.)

Voyager 1 is currently outward bound, headed in the general direction of the constellation Camelopardalis. About 40,000 years from now, unless someone goes out to retrieve it, it'll be in the general vicinity of Gliese 445, some 17.6 light-years away.

We can't build probes that'll stay in good working order for 40,000 years, yet. But if we lived on that hypothetical planet, and knew that a probe could reach another star in a bit over two and a quarter millennia?

My guess is that some of us would be figuring out how to make a probe that would last that long.

Maybe someone already has: and has been working on 'next generation' technology since Earth's Hadean eon began.

More:

• NASA
  • Advanced Propulsion and Power
  • "Is Warp Drive Real?"
    (March 10, 2015) [answer: not today]
  • Where are the Voyagers?
    Voyager 1
• Tau Zero Foundation
  Pioneering Interstellar Flight
• Wikipedia
  • Globular cluster
  • PSR B1620-26 b
  • Voyager 1

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2. SETI, Breakthrough, and Assumptions

(From Wired, used w/o permission.)

"SETI Gets a $100 Million Gift"
Danielle Venton, Science, Wired (December 21, 2015)

"This summer Russian tech billionaire Yuri Milner announced he’ll fund the most extensive sweep yet for radio signals from alien civilizations. The initiative, known as Breakthrough Listen will allow SETI scientists to buy thousands of observation hours annually at some of the worlds most powerful radio telescopes. The search will scan 10 times more sky than past scouting efforts and will listen in to a larger range...."

Breakthrough Listen is one of Yuri Milner's Breakthrough Initiatives, a systematic search for other people in the universe. Breakthrough Listen's goal is to check 1,000,000 stars for artificial radio or laser signals.

They may find something — or not. My guess is "not," for reasons I discussed last year. (July 24, 2015)

It's not that I think we're alone in the universe — or that we are, and are being ignored.

Basically, I'd be astonished, and pleasantly surprised, if we pick up signal from folks who are as chatty as we are — in the next decade — using communications tech that's almost identical to what we developed over the last few decades.

Scenarios like that are fine for space opera: but my guess is that we'll find that the universe is a whole lot more interesting than what we've seen in Star Trek.

As for whether or not Mr. Milner should be supporting this effort? I figure that it's his money: and I can think of much less-productive ways he could spend it. Besides, maybe Breakthrough Initiatives will hit the jackpot.

More, mostly why I won't tell God how to run the universe:

• "Enceladus and Kepler's Planets"
  (December 18, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Thinking and Humility
  • Neighbors
• "Organics on a Comet, and Earth's Early Magnetism"
  (August 7, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Beyond Anaximander's Cosmology
  • God, Faith, and Accepting Reality
  • "...Truth Cannot Contradict Truth..." — or — God's not a Schlemiel
  • Living in a Big World
• "Faith, Fear, and Flying Saucers"
  (August 2, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Scala Naturae: The Ladder of Nature
  • First Contact
  • Hands, Eyes, and Speculation
  • God's Decision, Not Mine
• "Pluto's Unexpected Terrain; SETI, Radio, and Drums"
  (July 24, 2015)
  Particularly
  • Earth Isn't Flat, Poetry isn't Science, and Curiosity isn't a Sin
  • Intelligent Life in the Universe: Still Searching
  • Broadcast Signals: Slit Gongs, AM Radio, and Whatever is Next
  • Klemperer Rosettes?
• "Life in the Universe, and Titan's Disappearing 'Island' "
  (June 27, 2014)
  Particularly
  • Star Trek, Scientists, and Catalogs of Known Worlds
  • Alone in the Universe: Or Not
  • Klaatu, Angels, and Getting a Grip
  • Eldritch Horrors and SETI
  • Living with Reality, Finding "Wonderful Things"

---

¹ If even a fraction of the 'I met space aliens' tales were true, Earth would be — in my opinion — an unaccountably popular destination for profoundly bored aliens. I've opined seriously and otherwise, on life, the universe, and everything, in other blogs:

• Apathetic Lemming of the North
  • "The Great Moon Hoax, Dihydrogen Monoxide, and a Rambling Lemming"
    (July 18, 2014)
    Particularly
    • Space Aliens and a Nearly-Blind Octopus
  • " '...If There Were Intelligent Life Up There....' "
    (November 22, 2012)
• Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space
  • "NO! Don't Shoo... - - - GLIPNARF!!!!"
    (January 16, 2014)
  • "The Aliens are Coming! The Aliens are Coming!"
    (April 26, 2010)
  • "Interstellar Empires, Imagination, and an Occasionally-Sozzled Detective"
    (March 12, 2010)
  • "Gods, Demons, and Used Spaceship Dealers"
    (February 13, 2010)

² M13, Messier 13, the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules is a globular cluster containing about 300,000 stars: roughly 22,200 light-years away. I don't think anyone seriously expected the message to be picked up. It was aimed at M13's current position, the signal will take tens of thousands of years to arrive where the cluster was, and — oh, well, it was a nice gesture: and serves as a demonstration that we can, in principle, send messages to folks on planets circling other stars.

• Arecibo message
  Wikipedia

On Mars by 2040?

Robots have orbited Mars, landed there, driven around, taken pictures, and studied Martian rocks.

But humanity's exploration of Mars has been by proxy: Nobody's gotten farther from Earth than Lunar orbit.

That could change before 2040. NASA has worked out a step-by-step plan for getting humans back into deep space: provided that Congress doesn't change its mind.

Even if that happens, my guess is that it wouldn't be long before someone else decides that people should act like humans.

1. To Mars: Step by Step
   • Field Tests: Asteroids and Robots
2. Schiaparelli, Barsoom, and Life on Mars

---

Science, Mars,and Faith

(From NASA; ESA; G. Illingworth, D. Magee, and P. Oesch, University of California, Santa Cruz; R. Bouwens, Leiden University; and the HUDF09 Team; used w/o permission.)

Mars? Robots? Deep space missions? In a religious blog?

Putting science, bingo, or anything else, at the top of my priority list, would be a bad idea. That's where God belongs. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2112-2114)

However — my faith does not require ignorance.

The universe is packed with wonders that we're only now beginning to find. Scientific discoveries are opportunities for "even greater admiration" of God's greatness. (Catechism, 283)

I think the universe follows knowable rules: which means we can learn how it works. This is okay. We're supposed to study this universe, and use what we learn. (Catechism, 32; 339, 2292, 2295)

Then there's the search for extraterrestrial life, and I've been over that before. Fairly often. (December 18, 2015; August 7, 2015; July 31, 2015)

---

1. To Mars: Step by Step

(From NASA, used w/o permission.)
(Infographic outlining NASA's plans for Martian exploration.)

"NASA Releases Plan Outlining Next Steps in the Journey to Mars"
Stephanie Schierholz, NASA press release (October 8, 2015)

"NASA is leading our nation and the world on a journey to Mars, and Thursday the agency released a detailed outline of that plan in its report, 'NASA's Journey to Mars: Pioneering Next Steps in Space Exploration.'

" 'NASA is closer to sending American astronauts to Mars than at any point in our history,' said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden. 'Today, we are publishing additional details about our journey to Mars plan and how we are aligning all of our work in support of this goal. In the coming weeks, I look forward to continuing to discuss the details of our plan with members of Congress, as well as our commercial and our international and partners, many of whom will be attending the International Astronautical Congress next week.'

"The plan can be read online at:

"http://go.nasa.gov/1VHDXxg...

"...Future Mars missions will represent a collaborative effort between NASA and its partners—a global achievement that marks a transition in humanity's expansion as we go to Mars to seek the potential for sustainable life beyond Earth...."

NASA described the three steps toward folks walking on Mars:

• Earth Reliant exploration
  • Mostly research on the International Space Station
• Proving Ground
  • Deep space operations
    • No more than a few days from Earth
    • Mostly near Earth's moon
• Earth Independent
  • Deep space operations
    • Beyond Earth's moon, possibly
      • Low Mars orbit
      • Martian moons
      • Eventually landing on Mars

We're closer to having someone on Mars now than we were a year ago: but there's still a lot left to learn, and technology to develop. My guess is that the biggest challenges will be developing life support systems that will keep working for years.

Using today's propulsion tech, it takes very roughly eight and a half months to get from Earth to Mars, or Mars to Earth. Getting back takes about the same time, but the crew has to wait for Mars and Earth to be in the right positions. ("#21d Flight to Mars: the Return Trip," NASA)

That gives them about one and a quarter years to look around, collect samples, and keep their equipment in good working order.

Field Tests: Asteroids and Robots

(From NASA, used w/o permission.)

"NASA's Journey to Mars"
Gary Daines, NASA (December 1, 2014)

"NASA is developing the capabilities needed to send humans to an asteroid by 2025 and Mars in the 2030s – goals outlined in the bipartisan NASA Authorization Act of 2010 and in the U.S. National Space Policy, also issued in 2010.

"Mars is a rich destination for scientific discovery and robotic and human exploration as we expand our presence into the solar system. Its formation and evolution are comparable to Earth, helping us learn more about our own planet's history and future. Mars had conditions suitable for life in its past. Future exploration could uncover evidence of life, answering one of the fundamental mysteries of the cosmos: Does life exist beyond Earth?...

"...Our next step is deep space, where NASA will send a robotic mission to capture and redirect an asteroid to orbit the moon. Astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft will explore the asteroid in the 2020s, returning to Earth with samples. This experience in human spaceflight beyond low-Earth orbit will help NASA test new systems and capabilities, such as Solar Electric Propulsion, which we'll need to send cargo as part of human missions to Mars. Beginning in FY 2018, NASA's powerful Space Launch System rocket will enable these 'proving ground' missions to test new capabilities. Human missions to Mars will rely on Orion and an evolved version of SLS that will be the most powerful launch vehicle ever flown...."

Sending "...a robotic mission to capture and redirect an asteroid to orbit the moon..." — that sort of thing was 'science fiction' in my youth.

'The sky's the limit' doesn't mean quite what it used to. I've discussed asteroid mining, lawyers, and extinction events, before. (January 16, 2015; October 3, 2014)

I'm pretty sure NASA will pick a small asteroid with an orbit that takes it near Earth: but that's still impressive. 'Parking' the asteroid in lunar orbit will be a good field test for Mars mission equipment.

How loud the sound and fury over moving an asteroid closer to Earth will get — that's another topic.

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2. Schiaparelli, Barsoom, and Life on Mars

(From Giovanni Schiaparelli, via NASA and Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission.)
(Giovanni Schiaparelli's Martian map, complied between 1877 and 1886. He named the canali (channels) after Earth's rivers.)

"Is there life on Mars?"
Pallab Ghosh, BBC News (October 2, 2015)

"For more than a century, people have speculated about whether there is life on Mars. Within five years we may have an answer.

"In the late 19th Century, the American astronomer Percival Lowell thought he saw canals on the surface of Mars.

"He suggested that this was evidence that our near planetary neighbour might not only harbour life, but could possibly be home to an advanced civilisation.

"This fired the public's imagination - prompting HG Wells's novel, The War of the Worlds, several comics and numerous Hollywood science fiction films depicting Martian invasions...."

We've learned a lot about Mars since Giovanni Schiaparelli's work got mis-translated into English. I've talked about Mars, perceptions, Percival Lowell, Barsoom, and all that, before, too. (October 30, 2015; January 2, 2015; Apathetic Lemming of the North March 14, 2009))

A half-century ago last July, Mariner 4 sent back pictures of a cratered Mars.

Years later, after Mariner 9, Mars 2, and Mars 3 went into orbit around Mars — and a planet-wide dust storm cleared — we saw craters: and what looked like river channels.

Now it looks like life could have started on Mars. Whether it did, and whether critters still live there: that's something we haven't learned yet. (October 30, 2015)

Then there's the matter of defining "life," and that's yet another topic.

More about Mars and life in the universe:

• "Kerberos, Mars: Answers Raise New Questions"
  (October 30, 2015)
  • "Wonderful Things"
  • "Liquid Water Flows on Today's Mars"
• "Pluto, Earth 2.0, and Life in the Universe"
  (July 31, 2015)
  • Oh Ye of Brittle Faith
  • Science, Truth, and God
  • Earth 2.0, Aristotle, and All That
  • Kepler 452b: 'Earth 2.0?'
• "Alien Worlds, Martian Methane, Looking for Life"
  (January 2, 2015)
  • Noticing "Wonderful Things"
  • Martian Methane, and More
    • The Lost Ocean of Mars
  • Defining "Life"
    • Life, Water, Fire, and Exploding Martians
    • Being Alive: Or Not
    • Vitalism, Alchemy, and Science
  • Time, Tides, and Looking for Life
    • Slow-Burning Stars and Really Long-Term Planning
• "New Maps for Earth and Moon, and India's Mars Mission"
  (October 10, 2014)
  • Mangalyaan in Mars Orbit: Kudos, India
• "Starships, Dinosaurs, and Long-Distance Service for Mars"
  (August 1, 2014)
  • What is — and is not — in the Beatitudes
  • Ulysses, Fraud, and Sin
  • Seeking Knowledge
  • Long-Range Travel Plans
    • Should We Stay, or Should We Go?
    • Island-Hopping to the Stars?
  • Long-Distance Telephone Service: for Mars