BBC Reports Lasers could 'Cloak Earth' from Aliens

So I read this report on BBC and it's been reported by a few other online sources. Basically it refers to these two guys that are either students or professors (it wasn't clear in the article) at Columbia University in NYC. Apparently they have a new suggestion to the world for prevention of on alien invasion. They want to use lasers to project light into space and into our atmosphere that will cloak our planet from any onlookers that just may happen to be strolling through our galaxy or even looking at us from another distant planet.

We should shine lasers into space if we want to hide our presence from aliens, two US-based astronomers suggest.
The beams could compensate for the dip in light the Earth creates when it passes in front of the Sun, as viewed from far-off worlds, they contend.
A number of researchers have questioned the wisdom of advertising our existence to the galaxy.
They fear that if aliens did visit us they might not be very friendly, and could introduce disease.
The analogy is Europeans arriving in the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries. The contact wrought havoc in the health of indigenous populations.
David Kipping and Alex Teachey from Columbia University in New York say that if we are fearful of a similar outcome from an alien encounter then lasers offer a solution.
The team has calculated what would be required to cloak the Earth and published the concept in a paper in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
It "perverts" the technique scientists already use now to look for distant planets around other stars. This method relies on staring at these suns, hoping to catch an object passing in front. When such a "transit" occurs, there is a tell-tale decrease in starlight.

Then it goes on to say this line that I thought was interesting:

If intelligent civilisations are out there, it is safe to assume they too will be looking for other worlds - like ours - using the same idea, believe Kipping and Teachey.

And then it goes on to say some more interesting stuff:

According to the pair's calculations, emitting a continuous 30-megawatt laser for about 10 hours, once a year, would be enough to distort the characteristic dip in light when Earth transited the Sun, as viewed from an alien Kepler telescope.
"It doesn't have to be one huge laser; it could be an array positioned around the Earth. Or you could put it in space as a satellite, and we've calculated that the International Space Station already collects exactly the amount of energy we would need," Prof Kipping told BBC News.
This is true for a laser system working in visible light. Prof Kipping concedes, however, that a laser cloak that covers all wavelengths, not just the visible colours, would need a very large array of tuneable lasers with a total power of 250MW.
But an alternative might be to use a laser simply to disguise the interesting aspects about Earth - features in its atmosphere that betray the fact that life exists here. These are a suite of gases that include oxygen, ozone and methane.
"If we just cloaked out those biosignatures then another civilisation might detect our planet through a transit, everything would add up, but Earth would appear as a dead world and they'd soon lose interest," Prof Kipping added.

So the article starts off by alluding to a total elimination of Earth from the visible spectrum to simply using lasers to change our atmosphere's biosignatures.

It all sounds interesting to me. But my first reaction to this was:

What about heat signatures?

We're talking about (presumably) an evolved alien race that may be more technically advanced than we are and therefor may be a threat to the planet Earth. If we use heat signatures to scan our own planet's surface (which we do), wouldn't a more advanced alien race be doing the same thing if not something more advanced?

The article piqued my curiosity only for a moment before I began to feel like I was reading a subtle expression of UFO Tabloid Sensationalism.

The Link

Are they freaking serious?

Hiding the planet from a people who could offer a once in a life time chance to learn how to get to other worlds!

Wow.

Its like they dont want the bubble to pop. Things are great! Dont look behind the curtain!

a reply to: ColdWisdom
I'm curious. Have astronomers looking for life thought aliens may do this and have they thought of a work around?

Hey Tiamat384,

Yea the other obvious implication is that an alien race, if more advanced than us could already be using some sort of laser technology or even something we couldn't currently comprehend, to shield themselves from us.

And then one goes on to speculate that if they have the technology to cloak a whole planet then certainly they can cloak a tiny spacecraft capable of visitation.

I'm a natural born skeptic, but I want to believe. It's just that I believe the majority of what the general public is exposed to in UFO culture is either naive, ignorant, or blatant disinformation. Then there are some exceptions. And of course there are always unexplained anomalies.

Hmmmm, could this be the excuse needed to have 'protective cloaking lasers' in space that gets used as a cover story for Star Wars laser weaponry that is pointed at Earth rather than away from it? . . . Or is this an April fools article?

a reply to: ColdWisdom
Personally I don't believe in the conspiracy of the government being in contact with aliens or the abduction stories, but I am certain there is something out there. Isn't it amazing to wonder what the individuals over there are doing? Is there some sort of conflict?

Interesting find. I've never heard of such an idea(not even in science fiction) and would not have thought of it myself. Rather simple really. At least in comparison to the technologies of science ficiton and turning ships or planets invisible.

Since it is April Fools Day, we must assume it's a joke.

If not it is borderline stupid.
The dip in light is only in a direct line from the sun through the earth and further into space. So only aliens in that line will be April Fooled.
Anyone else will be alerted by a sudden increase in light.
Not to mention......
What about the other planets.

Nahhh

Aprils Fool and not even very good.

This reminds me of when my cat hides halfway under the couch, butt stuck in the air, thinking I can't see her and she's somehow invisible.

The idea an advanced race(s) could come all the way here yet not know our planet is here because they can't see it when looking out the window, is amusing.

Hopefully the aliens aren't busy playing with their iphone 542 when they drive by.

I've never heard of such an idea(not even in science fiction) and would not have thought of it myself. Rather simple really.

Yea the article makes itseem simple by being vague. They don't even say whether these two guys at NYC are actual students or professors. I guess I'm more interested in the how & why such an article can be proliferated to the surface of main stream news. Like what is the motivation for the article? Who stands to gain from it being published?

And no... While I was momentarily caught off guard by a seized by the FBI homepage when first logging in, this is not an April Fool's joke or if it is we aren't in on it. And if it does turn out to be an April Fool's joke I'm going to feel pretty lame about posting this.

Other sources include:

space.com

phys.org

Maybe it is a collaborated media April Fool's joke?

But then I found this. If it's not a joke, could this be somehow related? Like maybe an attempt from the two unknown men involved to get intelligence contracts for defense weaponry?

a reply to: ColdWisdom
Hell if it is a joke who cares. It's worthy of discussion and sure let us assume it is a joke. Can you tell me why it wouldn't work? Is the science/reasoning behind it solid?

Hell if it is a joke who cares. It's worthy of discussion and sure let us assume it is a joke. Can you tell me why it wouldn't work? Is the science/reasoning behind it solid?

I'm still looking in to that. I'm awaiting a response from one of my best friends that's a physicist at NIST.

a reply to: ColdWisdom
Alright, well please do update with that answer. Any ETA?

No ETA as he's usually pretty busy but it's already late on the East Coast of the US anyway so I doubt I'll hear from him tonight. The last time we talked about lasers though it was when I asked him about the Fires at Caronia and he told me that NIST already had the world's most powerful laser called the NIF laser, I think. He said that it was already capable of producing enough energy greater than what was estimated to have caused the phenomenon in Caronia by scientists at the time. Keep in mind the Caronia incident was believed by some to be the work of UFOs. But I think NIST publicized that laser several years after the Caronia incident. It makes me wonder how long the technology has quietly existed in the dark. And how could someone could keep such high technology secret for so long? I asked him that, too one time! I still haven't heard a response.

a reply to: ColdWisdom
Same timezone as me then. I don't think it's too hard to hide high tech. Why? Because people don't even know what to look for.

a reply to: ColdWisdom

If this is true, what if "they"are doing something similar and have been for aeons?This galaxy could be packed full of habitable(and obviously populated)worlds.

Waiting and hoping that we stop being malignant and belligerent.Or extinct.

a reply to: ColdWisdom

Let me put it this way. If we are worried about them being a threat then you would have to assume that they could get to us from the vast distance they are away from us.

If they are advanced enough to reach us then trust me they are advanced enough that we could not possibly hide from them.

Anyways, no need to worry because they are already here and they havent exterminated us yet. But, they may have an even more sinister agenda than just simply putting us out of our misery.

a reply to: ColdWisdom

This would explain the 'Dyson Sphere' recently discovered. Ironically, it actually draws more attention than not. Dumb idea...

In my opinion, one planet doesn't just have millions of species of animals, ever changing ever evolving and no others exist. And of the total, all are intelligent. We just don't know how to communicate directly with those of our world who don't have vocal chords. Alien life is very sure to be out there, based on the diversity of life here on our planet showing it in the most desolate areas to areas proclaimed as uninhabitable, to plankton surviving outside the ISS, it suggests life can be pretty much anywhere.

But until we see it we must assume it exists, and it doesn't. But In my opinion, I'd say it's a good move to hide. We live in a world which, life, as we know it shows sitting around hoping that the first living thing to pass by you is here to help you, has failed many times. If you have nothing to offer then, you get overlooked, the more intelligent tend to help though from time to time.

I'd like to believe that if they do exist they'd hide as well. Many animals hide away from interaction unless they believe in their defensive capabilities and many others attack on sight, then run away into hiding.

Weird scientific idea, I thought that gravitational microlensing
was the way of finding other planets?

What could lasers possibly do to avoid such detection ?