Tabby's Star keeps presenting questions

www.popularmechanics.com...

So Tabby's Star is even more un explainable than before. So its dimming by as much as 20% and had been getting progressively dimmer since we began observing it 100+ years ago. I love this stuff

a reply to: norhoc


My explanation for the shifting down of light from the star is that it is a space ship of some size hurtling directly toward us from that location. The bulk of that ship is interfering with, blocking, the transmission of light from that star.


As the ship gets closer to our star, on a direct line from it, the radius of its bulk increases to shield more of the light. When those emissions dim to nothingness the ship is within our solar system. When portions on earth or our satellites start seeing light from that star again, the ship is near at hand as its straight line journey has ended and it blocks other portions of the sky as it takes up a different position over Earth.

I think that explanation seems just as likely as the current scientific argument that imagines hordes of comets so thick that they are blocking the light from the star.

originally posted by: norhoc
www.popularmechanics.com...

So Tabby's Star is even more un explainable than before. So its dimming by as much as 20% and had been getting progressively dimmer since we began observing it 100+ years ago. I love this stuff

So, they are building a Dyson Sphere. Why wouldn't they?

To have no-one out there would be "an awful waste of space".

originally posted by: Aliensun
a reply to: norhoc


My explanation for the shifting down of light from the star is that it is a space ship of some size hurtling directly toward us from that location. The bulk of that ship is interfering with, blocking, the transmission of light from that star.


As the ship gets closer to our star, on a direct line from it, the radius of its bulk increases to shield more of the light. When those emissions dim to nothingness the ship is within our solar system. When portions on earth or our satellites start seeing light from that star again, the ship is near at hand as its straight line journey has ended and it blocks other portions of the sky as it takes up a different position over Earth.

I think that explanation seems just as likely as the current scientific argument that imagines hordes of comets so thick that they are blocking the light from the star.

If an interstellar probe was travelling towards us it wouldn't really explain the regular interruption to the star's light.

However, the size of a ship in comparison to the diameter of the star would mean that it would have to be very, extremely, large if close to the star. Considering the orbit of the Earth and the time periods the star has has been imaged over, means that the "ship" would likely have to be closer to us and probably larger than the Earth, to cover-up so much of the star. We would probably be detecting the "ship" itself.

Also, any material that hitched a ride on the superluminal phase of interstellar travel would still be approaching us faster than the decelerating ship. This would cause a pulse of energy, with the potential to sterilize or annihalate all life on Earth, to arrive well before the ship arrived.

"In this case, we looked at variations in the brightness of a number of comparable stars in the DASCH database and found that many of them experienced a similar drop in intensity in the 1960's. That indicates the drops were caused by changes in the instrumentation not by changes in the stars' brightness."

Read more at: phys.org...

a reply to: glend


That isn't relevant to the current study. That one debunked the claims from earlier in the year that the star's luminosity had dropped by 19% since the 1890's. That apparent drop was due to differences in equipment used to watch the star and the researchers not accounting for the differences.

The newest data, all from Kepler watching the star for 4 years, shows a 0.34% drop in luminosity annually for the first 1000 days, then a more than 2% drop in the next 200 days. 195 other stars near Tabby's star and 355 stars similar to Tabby's star did not show the same dimming. If it were the instrumentation all of those stars should have dimmed as well.

a reply to: Roxxo

Thanks Roxxo my mistake.

a reply to: norhoc

We're witnessing an intergalactic war?

(2 cents)

The way in which the star declined in brightness, over the entire time that the Kepler Space Telescope observed it, is remarkable, in itself. It first dimmed slowly, then more much more rapidly, then slowly again. If we graphed the apparent rate at which light-obscuring matter was accumulating around this star, we'd have a sigmoid ( S- shaped) curve.

I'm wondering what sort of astrophysical phenomenon could produce such a curve

Sigmoid curves are typically associated with the population growth of living things, and with the growth of artificial systems, like economic enterprises, organizations, and cellular automata.

Has anybody studied the light curve to see whether there's a message encoded in it?

a reply to: Aliensun

You better hope your wrong or they could destroy all life on earth considering the size. But I'd say this is well impossible it would have to be the size of Jupiter heading towards us at close to the speed of light. Thr energy required to do this would require thr entire energy from our galaxy. And if they had this kind of power be easier just to make small ships and send them out and more practical

originally posted by: Astyanax
Has anybody studied the light curve to see whether there's a message encoded in it?

No one would encode a message it would litterally be impossible much easier to just create a laser beam and direct it to a location.

a reply to: Aliensun

That's a pretty interesting theory.

As good as any to me with the information and my lack of knowledge lol.

Wouldn't that be something...... *drifts off into day dream land*


-Alee

originally posted by: dragonridr
a reply to: Aliensun

You better hope your wrong or they could destroy all life on earth considering the size...

That's ok. By the time they get here, our solar system will no longer be "here" -- having since moved about 1.15 LY from where we currently are.

originally posted by: Astyanax
Has anybody studied the light curve to see whether there's a message encoded in it?

Yes. The massage was "Be sure to drink your Ovaltine"

a reply to: dragonridr

Depends on who they're sending to, and what they think they're sending. They may not be very bright you know.

So many possibilities but I'd bet on an alien race conducting some energy extraction or experiment in a hopefully unpopulated area of space.
If it is some form of dyson sphere it's construction is totally beyond our current comprehension of technology.

Seem like a small black hole could cause this. Constant dimming due to black hole pulling it's gas. Odd orbit. Bent light etc...