Cannibalism Found in Neanderthal Society

I'm fascinated with man's other hominid contemporaries early in our species' history. They may be the closest we can come to learning about how other intelligent but non-Homo Sapiens interacted as societies. The neanderthals are particularly interesting because they were almost advanced as Homo Sapiens. Today it was revealed that their society, at least in relation to this cave, was cannibalistic.

http://phys.org/news/2016-12-caves-neanderthals-cannibals.html

Scientists Inching Towards Bringing the Auroch Back

The auroch may be among the first species cloned and brought back from extinction.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/12/29/scientists-edge-closer-bringing-back-dead-fabled-aurochs-giant/

This is an update in my continuing coverage of the Proxima Centauri B story. Proxima B remains the closest known, or indeed the closest possible, exoplanet to the sun. Even more interesting, it lies within the habitable zone of its star and could harbor conditions favorable to life including liquid water.

The main development in this story is strong evidence that may lay to rest a decades-old mystery. Up until this point, we weren't certain if Proxima Centauri was gravitationally bound to the nearby Alpha Centauri system. It turns out that it probably is bound and that greatly favors the habitability of Proxima Centauri B.

Proxima Centauri is the closest star to the sun. A small, ancient red dwarf, it lies only 4.25 light years away. This is as close as it gets, and indeed will eventually be within our reach to visit. The planet orbiting it is about the same mass as Earth and may be very similar or could be radically different. We just don't know yet.

Key to this story was determining the star's radial velocity, or how it's moving through space. Using the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher instrument in Chile, astronomers have obtained very precise measurements of Proxima Centauri and Alpha Centauri's radial velocity. They match up very well, both stars are moving relative to the sun in the same direction. This strongly suggests that they are gravitationally bound.

That would imply that all three stars that make up the Alpha Centauri system formed within the same nebula billions of years ago along with the exoplanet. They would also all be roughly the same age. The speculative model based on what we know goes that Proxima Centauri was once far closer to the other stars but was ejected out into its current orbit. The planet likely did the same, forming far from the star but migrating to a lower orbit over time.

Given that it formed distantly, it was probably once an ice world if our solar system is any indicator. That implies the presence of water ice, which seems to be common throughout the galaxy. As the planet migrated, that ice would have melted and if it's still there today, it would be in the form of liquid water.

The only other thing we can infer with any confidence about Proxima B is that it may be tidally locked given how close it is to Proxima Centauri. This would lead to an interesting situation where one side of the planet might be quite hot and permanently facing the star while the other side of the world would be frozen and never see the light of day. This would create a ring of habitability on the terminator zones of the planet that divide permanent day and night.

It could be a ring world where the deep red color of its star would dominate the sky along with two very bright, but distant companion stars. Twilight oceans may lap shores not unlike a permanent sunset on an earthly beach. There may even be life, adapted to its dim environment in ways hard to imagine. But, unlike many of the mysteries that I talk about on this channel, this is one that will be answered. It won't take us long to learn more about this world and in the not too distant future we could be walking on those shores, assuming of course that there aren't others already there.

Thanks for listening! I am futurist and science fiction author John Michael Godier currently with a new book coming out. I pulled out all the stops with this one and asked the deepest question I could think of. If the universe is a computer simulation, then who created it? This book is called Supermind and will be available in a matter of weeks, in the meantime be sure to check out my other books at your favorite online retailer and subscribe to my channel for in depth, regular explorations into the interesting, weird and unknown aspects of this amazing universe in which we live.

Transcript of my KIC 8462852 12/27/16 Update

This is an update in my continuing coverage of the mysterious star KIC 8462852 or Tabby's star for December 27, 2016. For the full back story, I suggest checking out my other videos on this channel starting with my first update video from April of this year and my subsequent updates on this star.

At this stage the star is being monitored every night for the expected deep dimming events first observed by the Kepler Spacecraft. And while there have been a few false alarms, Tabby's star has remained stable in brightness since the observations began earlier this year. And while it's overwhelmingly likely that we're seeing a natural phenomenon, the alien megastructure hypothesis is still not discounted. But the natural explanations that are emerging are improving in quality and we seem to be moving closer to a consensus on what's going on here. But, there is dissent, more on that in a minute.

But which natural phenomenon is causing it? Several new theories and papers have emerged that may provide an answer. According to a recent paper by Jason Wright of Pennsylvania State University, these theories fall into four general categories. Category number one are explanations that lie within our own solar system. Category two are explanations that lie in the interstellar medium between us and Boyajian's star. Category three are explanations that lie in orbit around the star and category four are explanations that involve the star itself.

Category one: The Solar System

To cause the dips in brightness that Kepler observed with KIC 8462852, you need some kind of material to block the light. This could be anything, including alien megastructures. But the location of that material can be anywhere in between us and the star.

One idea is that there is a small, dense cloud of material in the outer solar system orbiting the sun and passing by and blocking the light from Tabby's star. While a reasonable idea on its face, this stands out as odd because we've never seen an analogue of this cloud of material passing in front of any other star in the millions of observations we've made of the galaxy. Because of that we have no real reason other than conjecture to suspect that such a cloud might be lurking out there.

A second possibility is that there is a Kuiper Belt object passing near the line of sight of the star that happens to be out gassing material, such as Enceladus does with water or even Io with its volcanoes. In other words, something spewing material into space. This would seem unlikely, you'd need a bunch of conditions to be just right for a geologically active world to exist in the Kuiper Belt. It would also need to be doing it in a way that's obscuring KIC 8462852. That's a tall order. But, as Pluto recently showed us, bodies in the outer solar system can be quite active and weird stuff does happen in our solar system. So, this remains a maybe.

A third possibility that hasn't been well fleshed-out is a slow collision of comets in the Oort cloud releasing the material. If that's the case, it would probably be obscuring more than just Tabby's star, so it's not a great solution.

But all possibilities involving our solar system face two serious hurdles. Boyajian's star lies well outside the ecliptic plane where the vast majority of matter is congregating. While it's not impossible to have material outside the ecliptic, it's definitely there, it does disqualify most material. The further you are out of the ecliptic, the less stuff there is to block light.

The second problem is that there is some evidence, albeit weak, of potential periodicity in the material that was causing the dips in brightness that Kepler observed. In other words we may have seen it pass by multiple times during Kepler's run. This is to say that there are indicators that the material is orbiting Boyajian's star. But it's really weak evidence. More observation is needed to confirm this. Think of it as hints of being in orbit, not proof.

Category Two: Material in the interstellar medium

The possibility of periodicity also affects any solutions in this category. If confirmed, it would eliminate any possibilities here. However, as it stands, it's still possible that some sort of material is passing in deep space between us and KIC 8462852. The nature of this material is debated, it could be dust or gas and could be linked to any number of astronomical phenomena. One theory even proposed that the material is located in the accretion disc of a black hole. However there are problems with all theories in this category for one simple reason: if it is a cloud of interstellar dust, it's a very strange one of a type we've never seen before. We've never seen one create the kinds of dips Kepler observed.

It's not impossible, of course, but it is unlikely. Unfortunately, with all explanations on the table for Tabby's star, they all seem unlikely. The only consensus is that whatever this is, it's a very rare event and that's what makes pinning it down so difficult.

Category Three: Material in orbit around KIC 8462852

If periodicity is confirmed, this becomes the most likely set of solutions. The problem here is that all of them are really unlikely given what we've observed and because of that the potential for alien megastructures being the culprit remains on the table. But as with anything in astronomy, the last explanation you want to jump to is alien activity. While it's true that we really don't know how common aliens are, the Fermi paradox makes it safe to assume that aliens are very rare or we would have seen them by now.

It's also important to remember that we know absolutely nothing about alien megastructures because we've never seen one of those either. Trying to figure out what sorts of structures a civilization more advanced than our own would build is purely conjectural. We can theorize and speculate, but all we can really define with any certainty is that the megastructures can't defy the laws of physics.  

Because of all the uncertainty, megastructures end up being a wide open explanation that can fit almost any strange phenomenon we observe in the universe. That's why we have to be very cautious when discussing that possibility. It's possible, but not a very good explanation for KIC 8462852.  

The natural explanations in this category advanced so far range from disintegrating giant comets to smashed planets. I've covered these in my previous updates in depth, so check those out for the back story, but needless to say none of the explanations are very good. All of them in this class have fundamental problems based on what we've observed.

Category Four: KIC 8462852 itself.

There's been a few explanations so far that pin the origin of the dips on the star itself. But until now, they haven't been very solid. Star spots and dim areas of the star haven't really held up to scrutiny as far as the data we have goes.

But a new paper suggests something more solid. It presents that Tabby's star is undergoing an internal phase shift that's messing with the light that it emits. A group of mathematicians and scientists at the University of Illinois have been conducting a study and have authored a paper. They looked at how the dips in brightness mathematically relate to each other. This is not unusual, patterns can appear in data and you can study that. Sometimes significant patterns appear. Known as avalanche statistics it can shed light on how and when natural phenomena occur. Importantly, it reveals information about phase transitions.

Think of it as the snaps you hear in a stick as you bend it just before it breaks. The scientists suggest that the small dips in the Kepler light curve are related to the larger dips in such a way that they are linked. This is super-important because it's the first real blow to the megastructure explanation. If the smaller dips are related to the huge dips, then the constraints placed on the alien megastructure theory shrink in a major way.

At that point, it would appear that the star is to blame and that we've caught it in a very rare, but very weird situation where stellar flares and internal conditions of the star are just so that its brightness is being affected in a strange, but entirely natural way. Their model seems to be consistent with what's been observed. Only time will tell if this theory holds up.

But that's not the only paper that's come out recently. German mathematician Eduard Heindl recently proposed that a specific type of alien activity would be consistent with what we see at Boyajian's star. Known as stellar lifting, this conceptual technology would allow a civilization to mine the resources of their star for raw materials.

This may sound like science fiction, but in reality we can think of relatively straightforward theoretical ways to lift material from a star and cool it for use using mirrors, localized heating, and magnetic fields.

Heindl's theory is noteworthy in that it mathematically explains a very strange feature located in the light curve that has so far not been particularly explainable using natural means. The feature is unusually smooth and while not impossible comets and dust clouds would have a hard time creating it. But then again, just about everything we know about KIC 8462852 tells us that whatever we're seeing, it's incredibly rare and unusual.

So there you have it, observations of the star are ongoing but the mystery of Boyajian's star is not yet solved. My transcript for this video can be found at my blog the Event Horizon, link in the description below. You can also find links there to the scientific papers I referenced in this video for people that want to dig in deep regarding this story as well as regular posts about technology, interesting articles I find, and just science and technology stuff in general.

Thanks for listening, I am science fiction author and futurist John Michael Godier currently with a new book coming out in a matter of weeks. It's called Supermind and I'm happy to finally unveil the cover art by noted space artist John Kaufmann, link to his website in the description below and be sure to check out my other books at your favorite online retailer and subscribe to my channel for regular, in-depth explorations into the interesting, weird and unknown aspects of this amazing universe in which we live. 

The papers cited in this video:

FAMILIES OF PLAUSIBLE SOLUTIONS TO THE PUZZLE OF BOYAJIAN’S STAR

Avalanche Statistics Identify Intrinsic Stellar Processes near Criticality in KIC 8462852

A physically inspired model of Dip d792 and d1519 o f the Kepler light curve seen at KIC8462852

METI and Proactively Contacting Aliens

While I'm not against the idea of attempting to communicate with aliens, I think it should be done only after careful and thought out deliberation. I think it's simply prudent for the human race to sit back and just listen for others right now. Let's try to discover them before they discover us. Then we can learn whatever we can about them and then decide if we want to send a message.

What's not prudent is blasting a message towards Proxima Centauri B. There are several reasons for this but chief among them is that it's unlikely to be inhabited by an alien civilization. There are no indicators that such a civilization is there and while the planet may well have liquid water and a potential for life, we really don't yet know how great that potential is. It could be near zero for all we know.

We've known about this world for less than a year. We know almost nothing solid about it. Sending a message there is just an act of expending resources and money on something that has a very low chance of paying off. And if it does pay off by some miracle, we have no idea what the payoff will be. What happens if the Proximans find our message offensive? Or threatening?

It's simply too early in the game for projects like METI.

http://phys.org/news/2016-12-scientists-worlds.html

Technological Unemployment Finally Getting the Media's Attention

Technological unemployment doesn't just affect factory workers. It will eventually affect us all. The bottom line is that computers have the potential to do almost any job. And they will be able to do them better than we can. That doesn't just mean assembly line work, everything from the CEO of a corporation to a scientist will eventually be in the firing line. We must be ready for that as a global civilization. But at least the media is finally starting to catch on that technological unemployment is already an issue we need to be talking about in the public discourse. It's nice to see the subject finally making into popular magazines such as this piece in The New Yorker.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/12/19/our-automated-future

Caught Red Handed: a star that eats planets.

Interesting article about a star that has a composition that indicates that it has eaten at least one of its planets.

https://news.uchicago.edu/article/2016/12/15/astronomers-discover-dark-past-planet-eating-death-star