Pseudo - Mammoths and Pedantic Planets

Seven Earth-sized planets ?                     image: NASA/JPL/ Caltech

Call me picky, but I'm already tired of reading headlines that say NASA found seven earth- sized planets.
Time to address my inner pedant -
Of the seven planets found, only three of them are in the goldilocks zone of potentially habitable worlds around their parent star , and only one of them is Earth-sized.
Fact.
If that makes me a party - pooping pedant, then so be it.
It's a great discovery, and certainly provides a focus for future science and exploration
But
They are also forty light years away
Which is not to be sniffed at.
My first reaction was that we should point a radio mast and send a signal out there
Which is great until you realise that your excitement would have to last for eighty years to get the signal back along with any message they might attach.
That's if  they respond immediately
And that is if they even exist
What if there's no-one there ?
Eighty years is a long time to wait for silence.
On the other hand - nothing ventured, nothing gained; 
and we  Earthlings are nothing if not curious.
I imagine plans are already afoot - after all with seven ( possibly more ) worlds to choose from...

Curiosity       image NASA / JPL-Caltech

So let's be positive - another NASA initiative is to use metal extracted from Mars to construct habitats, thus saving precious fuel and money .
I don't have anything more to discuss regarding Mars, ( I haven't even seen the film with Mr Damon*) but a dedicated planetary scientist published the above image of the Curiosity rover , taken at  (Martian)  sunset recently - which looks like a studio shot , or CGI.
Conspiracy a-go-go !

Human eyes are best for spotting 'planet nine'
....

With the demotion of Pluto to dwarf planet, there's still a planetary gap to be filled.
There is a candidate for a ninth planet , but it is so far away that it has not yet been found.
A new project allows citizen scientists to look for it.
Personally, I say we should still regard Pluto as the ninth planet.
Why ?
Because the new candidate is so far away that one orbit of the sun is estimated at 10 - 20 000 years.
That's a l-o-o-ong way out.
Whereas, we've already been to Pluto
New Horizons didn't actually leave a flag saying 'Property of Earth ',
but I grew up convinced of this distant little planet being part of our solar system
Okay so it hasn't cleared its orbit of debris  (that pesky kuiper belt), which disquaifies it from being a planet - even so, the whole planetary criteria thing was introduced in 2006 , by which time, Pluto had been a recognised planet for 76 years.
I say that what's done is done.

Back on Earth...


Interesting article here , although I despair at the clumsy word 'de-extinction ' ...
Anyway, the gist of the piece is that an  elephant / mammoth hybrid may be possible, which raises all sorts of moral questions; in this age of concern over animal welfare , do we really want to focus on novelty over practicality ?
If so , why not create a whole herd, after all these were gregarious creatures .
Then of course, there's the inevitable Jurassic Park question.
At which point, I say farewell until next time...






*- but I have seen Arrival and Interstellar

Why Not Ceres ?

Ceres 

I was conflicted about making this post for many reasons, mainly because I don't do mid-week posts, but here we are.
I decided to write this in advance of the proposed N.A.S.A. news release on 22nd Feb - not to ' rain on their parade' , but rather, to enhance the experience.
After all, the proverbial cat is out of the bag already, and I think the leak emanates from somewhere in Europe (details of the whole thing here ).
Personally, I'm disappointed, as it overshadows the quite astonishing news that organic matter has been found on the planetoid , Ceres.
Remember the Dawn explorer , and my previous excitement over the mysterious bright patches which turned out to be forms of salt from subsurface waters ?
Yes ?
Well. not those.
Apparently these organic materials are in an area surrounding a particular crater.
This is not the place to embark on fanciful theorising; but why should organic matter exist in one particular area ?
If the material is from a subsurface body of water, why is there no trace in other areas ?
I'm already letting my feverish monkey - brain get excited by a myriad of possibilities , but this, to me, is a perfect reason to explore further.
Ceres is the largest body in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, and I would argue that it warrants closer investigation - if the only concern is cost, it would surely be a fraction of any Mars expedition.
The previous link is a fanciful Bloomberg piece of speculation, but the idea is there.
Let's just concentrate on exploration rather than the plundering of minerals - after all , the assumption that it's there for the taking smacks of colonial era greed and ignorance - but we're better than that, right ?

Regardless, N.A.S.A. will probably tell us of the three Earth-like worlds orbiting a red dwarf  some 40 light years away; and that is genuinely exciting, especially when the chance of extraterrestrial life is introduced , but even with our best speculative technology, it would take us 60 years in a craft with an immense lightsail to get there, and only then if we could upscale the technology to make it a manned mission, rather than a postage stamp - sized craft.

Just to conclude, this post is my response to the imminent N.A.S.A. announcement - I think they are missing a point closer to home .
Ceres is on a par with Europa, Titan and Enceladus in the ongoing search for life.


Thank you for reading this far - normal service will be resumed in a few days !