The claim that wasn't: "Claim of Alien Signal from Planet Gliese 581g Called 'Very Suspicious'"

www.space.com...

Following the Sept. 29 announcement of the discovery of Gliese 581g, astronomer Ragbir Bhathal, a scientist at the University of Western Sydney, claimed to have detected a suspicious pulse of light nearly two years ago, that came from the same area of the galaxy as the location of Gliese 581g, according to the U.K.'s Daily Mail online. [Alien Planet Gliese581g: FAQ]

I can't believe the media haven't figured this out yet. As has been discussed elsewhere, Dr. Bhathal never claimed the signal he detected came from Gliese 581. The detection came from the globular cluster 47 Tucanae:

www.lpi.usra.edu...

In December 2008 a sharp laser look alike signal emanating from 47 Tucanae was detected. However, further searches in the same region have failed to detect the signal again.

Now none other than Frank Drake is saying that Dr. Bhathal refuses to comment on where he detected the signal? Nonsense! It's right there, plain as day, 47 Tucanae.

i just wrote to space.com site administrator asking them to correct the news. thanx, good find!

Where was Gliese 581 in the sky relative 47 Tucanae two years ago?

Don't get me wrong; this is pretty obviously a hoax.

reply to post by Astyanax


More than 90 degrees apart in the sky, and a few tens of thousands of light-years in range.

I don't think anyone's actually forgotten about it. I remember reading that the researcher who found the signal supposedly went to Drake (founder of SETI) with the news. But Drake wasn't too inclined to accept his work as upon requesting proof and evidence of his finds, the researcher declined. I'll try dig up a link later, but it shouldn't be too hard to find.

Truth is, we don't know what this signal was or if there even was a signal. The whole story with the '100% sure of life' statement was blown out of proportion, on a global scale, it was simply one man's opinion, nothing more. Point being, the Gleise signal that was supposedly received earlier this year is yet to be proven legit.

Originally posted by Saint Exupery
More than 90 degrees apart in the sky, and a few tens of thousands of light-years in range.

There you go, then.