Apr 22 2009Scientists Find Watery, Earth-Like Planet?
Earth Day Fools! Oh, wait, no. Apparently this is real, and only 20.5 light-years away! Ladies and gentlemen -- start your rocket engines. PSSSSHOOOOOOOOW! PEW PEW.
The Gliese 581 planetary system now has four known planets, with masses of about 1.9 (planet e, left in the foreground), 16 (planet b, nearest to the star), 5 (planet c, center), and 7 Earth-masses (planet d, with the bluish colour).
Michel Mayor, a well-known exoplanet researcher from the Geneva Observatory, announced the find today. The planet, "e," in the famous system Gliese 581, is only about twice the mass of our Earth. The team also refined the orbit of the planet Gliese 581 d, first discovered in 2007, placing it well within the habitable zone, where liquid water oceans could exist.
Planet Gliese 581 d, is that really the best they could do? GIVE IT A REAL DAMN NAME ALREADY. I propose Waterworld. And speaking of which, that was a hell of a movie, was it not? Oh, I'm getting a "no" from The IWatchStuff Writer. But he had gills, man, gills!
Nearly Earth-sized Planet, Possible Watery World Spotted Near Another Star [universetoday]
Thanks to Morgana, who, for an Earth-related tip on Earth Day, wins a free trip to Gliese 581 d, just as soon I finish my rocketship.
Reader Comments
1. ME - April 22, 2009 3:06 PM
F1RST!!!!!
I hope there are aliens there.
2. me 2 - April 22, 2009 3:07 PM
2nd?
3. Gordon "Fücking" Shumway - April 22, 2009 3:13 PM
@1 & 2
I hope naas finds you in your sleep and kills you. naas was really in Japan for advanced ninja training. He's awesome like that.
@post
I can only hope we get our moon base finished before I die. That's the first step tward colonizing this strange new world.
4. Turd Ferguson - April 22, 2009 3:22 PM
Pfffft!
Been there, done that.
Drinks are too expensive,the food sucks, and they don't take American Express.
However, there is plenty of parking.
5. Gordon "Fücking" Shumway - April 22, 2009 3:23 PM
@4
Provided you don't get lost in the parking lot.
6. catch22 - April 22, 2009 3:29 PM
why bother with planets with a travel distance of over 1000 lifetimes
we can at least make it to mars if the need arrives within a lifetime... keep working on that douchebags
7. Gordon "Fücking" Shumway - April 22, 2009 3:38 PM
@6
I think the hulbaloo is because we've found the alien home world.
8. SPUNKNUT - April 22, 2009 3:41 PM
I wonder what they do in this world for bacon...
9. Milkman - April 22, 2009 3:44 PM
Sucks we don't have the travel capabilities to reach any of these new stars we're finding. I think we should be concentrating on terraforming Mars. Create greenhouse, start building an atmosphere, seed plants, let it warm up so the water flows again. We'll probably complete that before we develop the technology to visit a world 20 light years away.
10. Turtizzle - April 22, 2009 3:50 PM
yaaa saw something on tv the other night about this. looked it up on youtube before i posted, and found it. they have everything on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfyzajqVcjw
enjoy fellow geekologie readers (GR's) i hope this starts a new trend
and half the comments belong to Gordan Shumway
11. 1st, 2nd, 3rd Police - April 22, 2009 3:52 PM
The next person to comment is a Douche Bag
CHECK BELOW !!!!!!
12. Gordon "Fücking" Shumway - April 22, 2009 3:54 PM
Did Melmac reform? I can go home! Free at last, FREE AT LAST!
13. Gordon "Fücking" Shumway - April 22, 2009 3:56 PM
@11
Correction. I'm am Douche McAllister. You are a fücking firstarded faggot. Congrats!
14. 1st, 2nd, 3rd Police - April 22, 2009 3:58 PM
@13 I rest my case, hahhahahahhaha
I angered you hahaha and it was too easy
15. Ocelot - April 22, 2009 4:00 PM
@11
Everyone hates you and wishes you would STFU. The "first" thing only manages to piss everyone else off. It doesn't make you look cool. Just go die somewhere.
16. 1st, 2nd, 3rd Police - April 22, 2009 4:13 PM
@15 you are right I am on here to be cool
I am glad your day is a little more crappy thanks to me.
Enjoy :D
17. squeehunter - April 22, 2009 4:14 PM
I had heard on Wired Science that this was actually outside of the habital zone. I'd look it up but I'm lazy. Actually, I think it USED to be outside but they refined the orbit so now it's in.
Also, in before some "death of religion" comment. I did the math and about half of American christians are fine with evolution so I think aliens aren't going to be so "damaging" to the faith since Genesis is already not that big of a deal to a lot. If I made a universe, I'd fill it full of aliens.
18. Madgame - April 22, 2009 4:15 PM
Who's in for skinny dipping?
19. Drbendy - April 22, 2009 5:09 PM
Why don't we just fire some nukes at it, then the gnawing worry of global warming/terrorist holocaust will pale into insignificance as we can all embrace armageddon with the sweet thought that we wiped some other know it all alien race that managed to live in peace.
20. Sig Solares - April 22, 2009 5:11 PM
Definitely a fascinating discovery
21. STINK - April 22, 2009 6:20 PM
@8
Their bacon is made from HUMAN!!!
(add more !!!!!!!!! to the back of that if you want even more horror)
22. $.02 and a pocket full of FAH-Q - April 22, 2009 6:39 PM
Why do people assume aliens live in peace? What if they're less advanced than we are? Yeah, think about that possibility - we may be the frontrunners my friends... Now to find some bacon...
23. jimbo - April 22, 2009 9:02 PM
maybe jesus lives here? walking on water?? ha ha. what would happen to religion if we found intelligent life on other planets...
24. Watch - April 22, 2009 10:51 PM
@1 i agree with you
25. Morgana Kriseana - April 22, 2009 11:06 PM
I'm there.
26. Dirjel - April 23, 2009 12:13 AM
Don't worry, GW, Waterworld WAS a pretty sweet movie. Very Mad Max-ish.
27. scurl - April 23, 2009 1:56 AM
this reminds me of the time that i watched a kevin costner movie and soon afterwards came to the realization that rick moranis was god, which makes kevin costner something between an angel-like being who descends from the sky with bryan adams blaring in the background and some gilled non smoker in tights.
28. thechevron - April 23, 2009 3:03 AM
its a comlete waste of time looking for these things, it would be dust before we had the technology to get there.
29. thechevron - April 23, 2009 3:06 AM
@17
finding aliens will be a walk in the park for christians, they just ammend the current theory to allow for them, thats the good thing about fiction, you can make it up as you go along.
30. Graf Zeppalin - April 23, 2009 3:39 AM
Am... nobody bothered by the fact that you would weigh what, 850 pounds on that planet. "hi, my name is bacon pancake, and I can't swim"
see you on mars guys. at least there you could be a space kung fu hero and make like 60f jumps...
and build truly awesome 300f dinosaur robots.
31. Erica - April 23, 2009 4:53 AM
No love for Waterworld, people? It's good, not even in an ironic kind of way.
32. jesus - April 23, 2009 6:29 AM
stop making fun of me!
ill make you guys poor and give you the herp
33. Pat - April 23, 2009 8:35 AM
Yes, yes! "Waterworld" was awesome! And so was Coster's epic follow-up, "The Postman" — though the book by David Brin was better still.
34. Kevin - April 23, 2009 11:08 AM
Thank you. I'm so moved.
35. Uncle Eccoli - April 23, 2009 1:24 PM
@9
Mars has no magnetosphere - any atmosphere we'd attempt to create would be stripped away by solar wind.
It never ceases to amaze (and profoundly disappoint) me how incredibly anthropocentric all of these "discoveries" are. There are still resepcted scientists who believe humanity is alone in the universe. A majority apparently believe that, "Well, okay, there *may* be other life out there, but if there is, it's EXACTLY like our life."
One day, humanity will establish two-way, real time contact with an extraterrestrial civilisation and they'll tell us, "You know, there are seven different civilisations between you and us, but you were too damned arrogant to even look."
36. GenghisKhunt - April 23, 2009 3:15 PM
Waterworld was in no way, shape, or form "very Mad Max-ish". You will burn in eternal hellfire for uttering such blasphemy #26.
I didn't come here to dicuss it, I came here to say it. I'm through.
37. mitchell - April 25, 2009 4:07 AM
@28 actually that probably isnt true, scientist have already telported a single atom 3 feet, so who knows how much better it will get in the next few years
38. Mugglemage - April 29, 2009 12:16 PM
What if there are alien civilizations in our own solar system, but after seeing Waterworld they decided to hide from us as they fear more tortuous Kevin Costner films? Seriously Robin Hood Men in Tights beats Robin Hood: PoT any day of the week.
It would totally rock the jock if we found another civ in the universe, but sadly I see less of a Contact-like meeting and more like Starship Troopers, with our top generals yelling out stuff like "My God, they're coming right for us!" before blasting any alien civilization dumb enough to allow itself to be discovered by us.
39. meowmo - October 28, 2009 2:08 AM
@ 35 and 38 : TRUE THAT.
consider this- they have different dna than us, their eyes are coded in a different language of physics, they might not even be able to see us in the visible spectrum of light nor we see them. parallel universes might just be that simple.