So much Astronomy drama!
Comment on Searching for signs of life on exoplanets is tough.
chosensilence@pawb.social 14 hours agomy guess: there is an exoplanet, K2-18b, that was discovered to have an abundance of detectable biosignatures in its atmosphere. at the time, there wasn’t much in the way of another explanation that didn’t involve life. however, astronomers recently found a failed star that is filled with biosignature molecules… so… ah lol. now perhaps K2-18b has another explanation after all.
danc4498@lemmy.world 13 hours ago
HonoraryMancunian@lemmy.world 8 hours ago
John Michael Godier will be disappointed
Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 1 hour ago
Would be funny if that failed star was actually an alien megaproject but we think it’s a natural explanation that means a planet teeming with ancient life is assumed to be barren like the rest of them.
Is there a name for that, when something very interesting is mistaken for something very uninteresting? Not that a failed star full of biosignature molecules sounds uninteresting, do they have any explanation for that?