The project Breakthrough Starshot aims at sending a fleet of miniautre light sales to Alpha Centauri system to find out habitable planets. However, what if OUR solar system is a target of a similar exploration from other civilizations? Could we detedc them? What is your opinion?
Completely disagree with your point of view, Stefan Rüster.
If such an unknown intelligent civilization could have the minimum chance to reach our planet, they would make it to take adventage of every single resources we have on Earth, and by resources I mean natural, psychological/cultural and material resources that can be found on this little rock and we have used to evolve.
Of course, I am supposing that such an outer intelligence has a similar way of processing information as we have.
@Stefan Rüster, I think that both points of view we have exposed can be right, but each one in its relative context.
Let me develop my sentence. Your argumentation is fully understandable if we presuppose that such an intelligent especies is by far more evolved than us in the present, however, mine would adequate in the case that such an intelligent species capable of visiting another solar systems was just a bit more evolved than us, thing that is completely possible due to the fact that humanity can experience tremendous technology changes in short periods of time.
In short, both argumentation can coexist and reflect real events in the universe we live in.
Please meet my
work at https://vixra.org/abs/1611.0052 means at https://vixra.org/pdf/1611.0052v3.pdf, which has a Google translation at https://vixra.org/pdf/1611.0269v1.pdf
Andreus A. I.
MODERN SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH AND THEIR PRACTICAL
APPLICATION
ABC of the meaning of life. Scale Andreus.
Dear colleagues,
thank you for your opinions :-) Originally, my question was meant to be rather technical: Do we have means or technology to detect such small probes? If we can send the probes to other stars, then it is logical to assume that hypothetic civilizations not much different than ours can do the same. (let us leave their motives behind for a while). We might detect them via infra-red or other radiation they emit, or we can detect their signals sent to the mother star, or there are possibly other ways for the detection. I think this should be taken seriously as the number of recent unidentified aerial sightings are confirmed by the US government. Hence, I propose to focus on this problem and challenge engineers to build a "radar" that could detect these "visitors".
Dear Dr. Mazurek, I picked up your query earlier and understood what you were looking for. Some specific replies: in an optical search of the L4 and L5 points in the orbit of the Moon in the late 1970 with a Baker-Nunn tracking camera, it was believed that anything the size of Skylab would have been detected. A repeat search in the early 1980s with a Schmidt camera would have detected anything the size of Pioneer 10 at the same distance, even in jet black in colour (see the final references in the paper by Dr Robert A. Freitas, attached). As far as I know, the only man-made object photographed at that distance was Lunar Orbiter 5, in sunlight over a particularly dark area of the Moon's surface. In that 1984 paper, Dr. Freitas concludes that 1 Astronomical Unit (93 million miles) is the limit of detectability for 10-metre objects, and that's also the limit even now, for NASA's KA-band radar. Thanks to NASA's infrared NEOWISE survey, it is now thought that about 98% of all asteroids over 1 km diameter between here and the asteroid belt, but only about 10% of objects of 140 metre diameter, though that issue (mandated for action by the US Congress) is to be addressed by a future space telescope. The recent interstellar object 'Oumuamua was detected by the Pan-STARRS telescope at about 20 million miles from us (about 0.25 AU) and was tracked to somewhat greater distance beyond the orbit of Mars. It was 70-300 metres in diameter but highly reflective (albedo 64-70%), as if made of polished metal - one reason for Prof, Avi Loeb's interest in it as a possible extraterrestrial solar sail.
I hope all that's of interest, and if I can be more help please email me on [email protected]. With best wishes, Duncan.
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