53 lines
2.5 KiB
Plaintext
53 lines
2.5 KiB
Plaintext
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SUBJECT: Why all the interest in Tau Ceti? FILE: UFO3362
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Tau Ceti is one of the four nearby stars most commonly cited as possible
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homes for extraterrestrial life:
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Name Spectra Distance Comments
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---- ------- -------- --------
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Epsilon Eridani K2 10.76 ly
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61 Cygni K5/K7/?? 11.08 ly triple star
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Epsilon Indi K5 11.44 ly
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Tau Ceti G8 11.87 ly
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These are the only star systems within a 16-light-year radius of earth
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that are considered likely to have habitable planets. The others are
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thought to be either too unstable gravitationally to have planets at
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all, or are too hot, too cold, too young, too old, too whatever to
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provide a stable environment for life to develop and to survive long
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enough for it to achieve intelligence. Tau Ceti is considered the best
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candidate, since it is the most like our own sun.
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Of course, even 'uninhabitable' planets could be colonized by high-tech
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immigrants from somewhere else; and in any case the parameters of
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'official' opinion in this area change year by year. For example, it
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was long thought impossible for multiple-star systems such as Alpha
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Centauri and 61 Cygni to have stable planetary orbits within the
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habitable zones, but computer simulations have questioned that
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conclusion.
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One reason these four are attractive is that they all lie approximately
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11 light years from earth. Apparently the first major UFO waves took
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place some 22-24 years after the first high-power radio transmissions
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from earth which could have been detected at interstellar distances.
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Such transmissions, moving at the speed of light, would have taken
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about 11 years to reach them, and spacecraft moving at near-light speed
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would have taken not much more than that to return here--hence the 22-24
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year time frame.
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Of course, that's assuming that 'they' are in fact extra-terrestrials,
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which is far from proven. Jacques Vallee, Gordon Creighton, and others
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have suggested that the so-called 'aliens' are in fact as closely bound
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to this planet as we are, in which case Tau Ceti is utterly
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irrelevant.
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*********************************************************************
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* -------->>> THE U.F.O. BBS - http://www.ufobbs.com/ufo <<<------- *
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*********************************************************************
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