Is the Proxima System Our Best Hope For Another Earth?

[@pbsspacetime]

From the Corrections Department: 1:26 should read "Rigil Kentaurus" rather than Rigel. Rigel, Beta Orionis (β Ori), is a blue-white supergiant star located in the constellation Orion. Thanks to Tristian Yamaty for pointing this out.

[@griffin4cats]

Should also probably correct the thumbnail, which says "expoplanet"! Update: They've fixed it within two hours :)

[@KilosWorld]

Fix your thumbnail, it says "expoplanet"

[@purplenanite]

At 1:26 - the subtitles say "Tolimar" but the slide says "Toliman"? I so want to see pictures of Proxima B - Starshot, get on it! lol

[@dzonybajlando9270]

EXPOPLANETS

[@jimmyjasi-anti-descartes7088]

What is worth remembering is that that planet may have been similar to that "inhabited by inteligent Apes". But. Apart of speculation about possibility of life it is more than impossible to be there any Anthropoid (human shaped creatures) Darwinism forbades that beyond doubt (even Alfred Wallece Darwins coworker and author of heretical view that "humans were predestined to Evolve on Earth") strongly objected to any notion that any other world could be inhabited by humans or by creatures anatomically similar to them! Any one who understand Evolution knows beyond doubt that even if we "are not Alone in the Universe", we are certainly "alone" in the meaning that although our Universe may harbour countless Earth like, life inhabited planets non other places in the Universe (and perhaps Multiverse) can be inhabited by beings we could call humans or make parallels to humans. Scientists or layman who denyes this would be an equivalent of a "Phisists" claiming that E=m3 instead of 2! So Danicken fans to boot. Or no. Bring as more disdain.

[@smacky101]

It boggles my mind that I've watched Matt for like 5 years now. Seeing him with grey in his beard still gets me in a way that few things do. Thank you guys so much for the work you do, it's appreciated in ways beyond which I can articulate.

[@cosmic_gate476]

Love how content like this is ubiquitous and indexed for us. I used to buy and read lots of fun science books as a kid, but now kids can just open youtube.

[@LoveatFirstHike]

I was hit in a similar way with the Jurassic World Dominion trailer and seeing Sam Neil with a fully greyed beard.

[@TheWoblinGoblin]

Did you just call Matt old? And fat!?

[@mugwump7049]

You should see my beard.

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

@@TheWoblinGoblin um... there's no mention of weight at all.

[@Luke-mr4ew]

As someone who plays Stellaris, I can guarantee that we have two very habitable planets nearby. This is probably one of them. Now we just need to find the hyperlane network...

[@illegal_space_alien]

Nah, we are in our own L-cluster, cut off from the network by aliens who have more wisdom than we do.

[@mvmlego1212]

I've tried getting through a Stellaris campaign before, but the intermediate phase (between the time the galaxy is explored and the crisis faction arises) is potentially the most boring gameplay I've ever experienced. Also, the amount of DLC baiting in that game is maddening.

[@JROD082384]

With the proper technology, we have at least 2 planets in our solar system besides Earth that could EASILY be made habitable.

[@innocentsmith6091]

As someone who plays Alpha Centauri, I can guarantee it's covered in psychic worms.

[@innocentsmith6091]

@@mvmlego1212 Paradox is DLC crazy. You should look at how much EU4 or CK2 cost with all their DLC.

[@HansLemurson]

We have to keep in mind that there's a sample bias built in to these detection techniques: Large fast-moving planets are the easiest to detect, so that's why we've seen so many "hot jupiters" and planets orbiting so close as to be tidally locked.

[@andybaldman]

Well said.

[@DrWhom]

Absolutely. In the same vein our own star is not run of the mill as people often assert . It is much larger than the median star in our milky-way

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

@@DrWhom do you have any sources for that? I understood that ours was only slightly higher mass than average.

[@limiv5272]

@@DrWhom Actually to my understanding our telescopes don't usually stay pointed at a patch of sky long enough to detect multiple transits of planets that aren't very close to their star, it would take literally years, and that's why we usually only detect the ones orbiting very closely. It could be that most stars have many planets orbiting them and we just haven't had the patience to find them yet

[@ckl9390]

Also, if a star has as many planets as ours, then the combined effect of their gravitational wobble may make the star effectively hold still or present no discernible pattern.

[@mRibbons]

This is probably the first video here where I understood everything that was said. I'm not great with math, but discoveries in space I can fully appreciate.

[@clarkkent5442]

Are you wearing a kurzgesagt shirt? I absolutely love that channel! About as much as I love this show! Keep up the good work!

[@orangea9458]

he is indeed

[@brandonhoffman4712]

kurzgesagt is the only merch I've purchased from a youtuber period. And I've been around the block a few times... He got me with some ultra-massive black hole pins!

[@38kapz13]

I thought I was the only one that had noticed it 😃

[@motor-head]

I understood a significant portion of this episode. That's quite an improvement for me.

[@FireThemAll]

Ikr. I was thinking I'm finally baked enough to understand this dude. It's awesome

[@fred_2021]

Likewise. This was a comparatively broad brushed info-fest, which suited me just fine - I do better when the brush is the size of a yard broom.

[@georgea2835]

I thought I was the only one

[@blakeb9964]

Lol same.

[@goldenwarrior1186]

That’s prob because the topic of this vid is much easier to grasp than most of the other topics they cover (also same)

[@badlydrawnturtle8484]

I think it's worth emphasizing that the wobble (if I did the calculations right) of Proxima Centauri that allowed for the inference of this planet is around 1 part in 300 BILLION compared to its distance to us. If you're not in awe at this, try to come up with anything that you deal with in your life that's precise to even 1 part in a thousand. Also, the radius of Proxima Centauri's wobble is apparently almost precisely 42 miles, which is clearly the best evidence that there's life there.

[@danieljensen2626]

Basically all of astrophysics comes down to finding a needle of a consistent effect in a haystack of noise. Also, for a fun comparison, LIGO is basically that precision squared (so twice the number of orders of magnitude).

[@FredPlanatia]

assuming the universe is an imperial one ;-)

[@ldbarthel]

42 miles you say? Then it's clear that Proxima is the answer to the question.

[@ballelort87]

42 likes

[@Evolved_Skeptic]

Pity that Science uses Metric standards, unless Adams has hidden the number 67.59258 somewhere in one of his books...?

[@OlivierFRscooter]

This is one of those episodes where I just gasp at the subject, in awe of the ridiculousness of our small species gazing at possible wanders outside of our solar system. Love that feeling

[@N73B60]

Meanwhile... politicians make war.

[@oldman2800]

And getting to our next nearest solar system with current technology will only take 72k in years. I don't think the average homosap has a clue just how uttly vast the universe is

[@robinstevenson6690]

This is the best presentation I have seen by this narrator/presenter. He has slowed down his delivery just enough that I'm starting to be able to absorb the information, and as a result, I'm finding it much more interesting and accessible. Thank you, and please pass on the positive feedback to him.

[@tristianyamaty]

Small typo in the name of the stars. It should be Rigil rather than Rigel. Rigel is much further away, and significantly bigger than Rigil 😁

[@dzonybajlando9270]

Not even smaller typo in the thumbnail, with "EXPOPLANETS" 😅

[@MikeeGG]

Nerd.

[@FederalTaxEvader]

@@MikeeGG All of us here clicked on a video about Astronomy and Astrotechnologics, and you think "nerd" is an insult?

[@fnamelname9077]

The man, the myth, the legend: Tristian Yamaty, of "PBS Space Time's pinned comment" fame.

[@tuneboyz5634]

thanks little buddy :)

[@WildFyreful]

The "black foliage" hypothesis makes me very happy as a sci-fi/sci-fantasy writer who made an exoplanet biosphere with this very requirement. :D

[@earthknight60]

Look up radiotrophic fungi. We already have organisms here on Earth that do this.

[@JimboJamble]

A channel called Atlas Pro has a video where he talks about black/red plants on tidally locked Kepler-186f. You might find it interesting. He also interviews one of the authors of a paper in Science talking about the relationship between plant color and a star's peak spectrum.

[@brianedwards7142]

Ditto.

[@patrickmccurry1563]

Some bacteria that photosynthesizes using infrared has already been found in black smokers on the ocean floor. I can't find information on the pigments used though.

[@Cheezdealer]

Also a great album

[@fridooo1982]

"The radial velocity method can step in and potentially can catch many more systems". "The radial velocity method is emerging as a competitor to the transit approach due to rapid improvement in a class of highly specialized spectrographs". Yet, it is a quite old method and was used to detect the very first exoplanet around a main-sequence star in 1995 (which awarded the Nobel prize in physics to Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz in 2019). Interesting how technological improvement can revive older methods.

[@nikkirazelli3250]

R.E. Startshot, as far as I'm aware, the issue is not with making cameras or interstellar vehicles light enough, for potential laser propulsion, but a transmitter (including power supply), powerful enough, to send that information back to earth, while staying within that weight limit.

[@ckl9390]

I wonder if anyone has considered using a relay of probes so individual transmitters don't have to be as powerful to reach back to Earth?

[@atk05003]

Yes. Project Starshot is still in the research and development stages. Some of the challenges that I've heard people talk about include making a power source that is light enough and powerful enough; hardening the electronics against cosmic radiation and extreme acceleration (up to tens of thousands of G's); and manufacturing a sail that is strong enough, reflective enough, and heat resistant enough to handle the extremely powerful laser beams. Researchers seem confident that these problems can be solved, but we still need to make some improvements to reach the goal. @ckl, Yes. They are planning on relaying signals through the probes. Besides reducing the power needed by the transmitters (likely laser transmitters), it also means they can track the much nearer target of the next probe(s) rather than all of them needing to keep a tight lock on the Earth's position. I've even heard people discussing ways the network of probes could bypass any disabled or malfunctioning probes in the chain.

[@markmcarthy596]

During the last Total Eclipse over St Louis a few years back, I captured it as the Moon sat perfectly in front of the corona. Caught on video (uploaded) and with my bare naked eyes…Magical unforgettable moment

[@slevinchannel7589]

Hi. Want some science youtube recommendations?

[@jovetj]

@@slevinchannel7589 It was cloudy where I was. I was...not happy.

[@slevinchannel7589]

@@jovetj You mean a place where people hated you for liking Science? Yeah, that sounds really sad. But now you have access to not only this channel here but various others just like him. Sci Man Dan, Joe Scott, Hbomberguy, Kurzgesagt, they're all great, arent they?

[@jovetj]

@@slevinchannel7589 I was just reacting with my unfortunate eclipse experience. I think you meant to reply @ someone else ;-)

[@dclomg5]

Yes. I was living right outside of St Louis at the time. It was great. Surreal.

[@dmaxcustom]

By the tshirt, Wonder if Matt also owns a bird. Questions, wouldnt the tidal force made the planet have strong tectonic activity? Seems like a rough world to be in.

[@cholten99]

Birb 😀

[@gluonic]

kurzgesagt

[@FasutonemuMyoji]

@@gluonic this.

[@infinitemonkey917]

That and the solar flares frying the planet.

[@nasonguy]

@@infinitemonkey917 That was my thought too. Since all we know about red dwarfs tells us they flare often. A flare sterilized, tidally locked, half frozen half molten wasteland. I wonder if it even has an atmosphere or if it's been totally stripped by flare activity.

[@TheBrock2525]

Love the kurzgesagt tee! It's great how all the science youtubers are fans of each other.

[@mvmlego1212]

PBS Space Time is one of my three favorite channels on KZbin, but I'm not a fan of Kurzgesagt, and I really don't understand the hype around them. They have a bad habit of expressing opinions of public policy, philosophy, and other subjects with the same certitude that they teach astronomy, without acknowledging that there's room for reasonable disagreement. They also put an enormous amount of their budget into animations that don't add much in terms of education value, and are sometimes even rather grotesque.

[@altortugas5979]

I thought that’s what it was, wanted to see if anyone else had noticed. Now, if we can get him into a duck beanie…

[@allanhernandez6692]

Kurzgesagt is awesome! I really appreciate the research they do for their videos and their animation style is amazing!

[@TheBrock2525]

@@altortugas5979 I've got their hoodie, which is excellent quality and comfortable.

[@kw8274]

@@mvmlego1212 Ngl I don’t respect your opinion.. I find the effort they put in their videos not only attractive to people who are new & interested in the scientific community but also people who are normal blokes with curiosity. The videos are engaging, explore complex concepts with simple dialogue & intuitive visual images , beautiful fluid animation , and a touch of in your own words grotesque humor. A lot of people start off watching these topics with channels like Kurtzgesagt & then branch into more complicated research ; thus-affecting positivity the common opinion towards education & science in general , tons of people learn in a fun & engaging way including me and I don’t understand if anything how you can’t see that even if you personally don’t like the style. I’m also annoyed at the fact you said that they have a “ bad habit of expressing opinions “ when all of their videos are just presenting the topic in a unbiased & factually researched manner if you want discussion of other opinions then by all means go in the comment sections. tons of people have alternate things to say; all they do is spark the discussion starting off with actual data. If you don’t like the channel fine but these seem like pretty dumb reasons.

[@TysonJensen]

I've only ever seen Alpha Centauri once -- it's pretty easy to spot from New Zealand thanks to our round Earth, lol. But I live firmly in the northern hemisphere where it's generally not visible.

[@_nebulousthoughts]

I can see it more or less year round here in Adelaide.

[@Shakkarz]

I love watching PBS that channel is number one rivaling all other channels

[@oldscribe6153]

Patrick Maher has written a trilogy for 10 to 18+ year-olds. Don’t want to give anything away about the plot, but Proxima Centauri figures in the trilogy. If you like a cool read situated in speculative fiction, then it’s a well-written trilogy and worth a read. The trilogy shares the Banner Arthur Templar and the - 1 is The Curse of the Nibiru, 2 is The Secret Codex, 3 is the Serpo Gambit. I enjoyed each one.

[@luudest]

2:47 „So it was named Proxima Centauri or Trisolaris“

[@Audio_Jesus]

I, for one, welcome our Trisolaran overlords.

[@fblazquezgil]

The idea of making a telescope using the Einstein ring around our sun, is something I want to be alive to see.

[@linecraftman3907]

It's a cool idea but it's gonna take way too much effort and it will only able to image one or just a handful of targets. The telescope would have to fly 550 AU. For comparison, voyager 1 is only at ~150AU

[@mnrvaprjct]

@@linecraftman3907 very fast, unmanned ships. Probably next gen propulsion technologies (like break through star shot)

[@linecraftman3907]

@@mnrvaprjct breakthrough starshot is a coin flying on a piece of tissue lol, there's no way it could work as a telescope. I guess you could reach such high speeds if you did beamed power or nuclear propulsion

[@jackb3822]

A bot just named “L” stole your comment. :/

[@mnrvaprjct]

@@linecraftman3907 I know. you can just make the entire coin sized probe a camera (with the other necessary components of course) and send thousands or hundreds of thousands to gather enough information to form a high resolution image and send that back. There’s no such thing as “impossible”, at least in the case here.

[@the-chillian]

"What if aliens were dark matter?" was the entire premise of the second half of the Hugo-nominated SF webcomic Schlock Mercenary, and I recommend everyone to check it out. Bearing in mind that the comic is now complete as of July 2020, and since it began in the year 2000 there's quite a lot of catching up to do if you want to read the whole thing.

[@warpdriveby]

...The premise is that 75% of the mass we think comprises the universe is Aliens? That doesn't seem like a good beginning to me. I'm all for a bit of creative latitude in sci-fi but that takes it so far from the sci half I have to object.

[@travismason2811]

@@warpdriveby Not all dark matter was aliens, but there were dark matter aliens. It has a lot of arcs, and tells a lot of stories and is possibly the best space opera ever made. The dude didn't miss a day for 20 years, don't get me wrong it's pretty simple at first, both in the art work and in the story, but the story starts getting pretty complex pretty early and then seems to square from there about every year. I haven't finished, but the friends I know that have have read it 5-10 over just so they can really understand the whole thing, and from what they say it's pretty solid.

[@the-chillian]

@@warpdriveby The idea was that certain aliens are dark matter, not that dark matter is aliens. And it was far from the beginning of the story.

[@travismason2811]

Ah, you beat me to it lol

[@the-chillian]

@@travismason2811 Howard is one of a handful of cartoonists who worked hard at improving his art over the years, and it showed.

[@ihsahnakerfeldt9280]

Beautiful video. This is one of the best channels on KZbin. Such high quality content.

[@MerlinZuni]

This content is free. This is amazing. I am so thankful for you and your knowledge and generosity

[@StevenRud]

I just love this channel!!! Great video, superb explanation and presentation!!! I’m so glad that you regularly post these fantastic videos and hope to see more in the future!👍🏻😎

[@rugbyguitargod]

I can't wait to see the discoveries made with JWST and Proxima B! I know there are already lots of other large-scale observations planned which are also awesome, but this is probably the one i'm the most excited about; planetary discovery.

[@wendylee1213]

Me too!

[@glennschiffer1742]

@@wendylee1213 Me 3

[@DrMackSplackem]

Re: Breakthrough Starshot, I wonder if anyone is working on imaging techniques to compensate for the optical effects of traveling at 0.2c. Edit: The appropriate Lorentz transform yields a pretty trivial γ of 1.0206, so not really significant. A slight spectral shift might perhaps be noticeable to the eye, but that's about all. Once you get up to about 0.5c is where things start to look really bent, and I believe all of those can be fixed with image processing except one, and that one turns out to a bummer for imaging planets in detail, as they would appear as through a fish-eye lens, with magnification of the center regions. The horizon you'd normally expect to see would get 'bent backwards' around the far side.

[@seriousmaran9414]

Problem is more where you put the power supply and transmitter in such a small probe?

[@TestECull]

Am I the only one that actually wants to see the images unprocessed?

[@rmsgrey]

@@seriousmaran9414 One solution that's been kicking around SF circles for decades is to re-fire the launch lasers for a while about 16 years (in this case) after launch so that the target system is bathed in laser light while the probe is passing through, which can both be used as a power source for onboard systems, and be reflected back as a signal. There are some engineering issues with this approach, but nothing too hairy looking.

[@DrMackSplackem]

@@TestECull There's an old video on here called "Optical Effects Of Special Relativity" that you'd appreciate. It shows a trip down a highway, first with no effects, and then the journey repeats three times with c = 1m/s, each time adding another distortion. It's very low-res but quite a trip.

[@jasonjacoby]

Maybe a Femto camera strapped to a supercomputer?

[@utseb1]

the narration starting from 14:50 gave me goosebumps, felt like listening to an audio book and being really there on this planet

[@inzaneartworks3109]

Love seeing the support of other KZbin channels .

[@gfrozin]

Ah, the Kurzgesagt shirt is a really nice touch!

[@Gavrahil]

"What if Aliens are Dark Matter?" Try reading the Xeelee Sequence by Stephen Baxter. It's a very odd series, but totally worth it!

[@Alexander_Kale]

Why is there a "but" in that sentence?

[@lmelior]

Between the larger Proxima c and the Alpha Cen twins further away, it seems reasonable to assume that Proxima b was relatively safe from asteroid impacts hitting the reset button, much like the outer planets likely soaked up a bunch of damage otherwise headed for Earth. Definitely has the potential to be a very interesting place! Here's hoping we launch the laser light sail missions sooner rather than later.

[@crowlsyong]

Thank you for this channel, everyone involved. This brings me joy.

[@mickjimi]

Good on you Daniel for the support of this brilliant channel. 👍

[@palomareloaded6365]

New Expoplanet? Is that some planetary convention? 🤔

[@maynardtrendle820]

You beat me to it!

[@NeoCyrus777]

I very much enjoyed this slightly different type of episode, I hope you do more like this.

[@nenmaster5218]

I ask around at Random: Want some Science KZbinr to check out?

[@Dragonblood-ok1nn]

Hello fellow science lovers. Nice to see you all here so bright and early.

[@storm2666]

Haha I just finished work myself. In the AU?

[@tommyporter7199]

God bless Anton and his family

[@al3030]

Love how this show transports us to the wonders out there 😍

[@ViquelOoste]

The really good part about this star being a red dwarf is that if we could inhabitate this solar system, it would be for a very very very long time, in comparison to our sun whom probably not live longer than 10 billion years (and will probably be unhabitable within a billion year)

[@NoWay-rv7vj]

Some red dwarfs are noisy with outbursts, is proxima a calm one?

[@ArawnOfAnnwn]

@@NoWay-rv7vj No, but a thick atmosphere can help deal with that. Or sufficient shielding for a dome city. Or living underground.

[@georgethompson1460]

@@ArawnOfAnnwn Or geostationary magnetosphere satellite.

[@SkyRaker77]

I hear the word exoplanet and I’m like “finally, a chance for human interstellar colonies” and then Matt’s like well hold up: tidally locked, blasted with high energy particles, massive convection waves…”

[@Nulono]

Should we take it as a coincidence that the nearest potentially inhabitable planet is around the closest star to Earth? Or should we interpret this as evidence that habitable planets are more common than we'd previously thought?

[@toomanyopinions8353]

I'd think something not being coincidental is more likely

[@Dan-bz4qg]

That Great Filter is getting uncomfortably close...

[@alien9279]

If you only gave 1 data point, assume it's the average!

[@skorpiongod]

Being in the habitable zone is just one of thousands of things that need to go right for life to form/thrive, so if anything it means this one specific condition isnt too rare.

[@garethdean6382]

Our current understanding is that most stars should have planets, and a good portion of those will be in the 'habitable zone'. However this is a tricky concept given that both Mars and Venus qualify as 'habitable' or 'earthlike' by many definitions. Given that red dwarfs make up 3/4 of all stars, and we're NOT around one, this suggests that red dwarfs are less habitable than sunlike stars (Or that humanity is a special exception.) This would suggest looking for more than just the broadest possibility of life before passing judgement.

[@robinbickel2451]

I love those rare Spacetime gems where I can actually understand the entire video!

[@brandonhoffman4712]

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy." - Albert Einstein

[@TheMg49]

Always enjoy your videos! They have me looking stuff up for hours after viewing. 😄👍

[@jajssblue]

This would be rather ideal Proxima T to say the least! Let's hope!

[@nenmaster5218]

I ask around at Random: Want some Science KZbinr to check out?

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

@@nenmaster5218 um, sure. Be aware, though: I'm picky. My faves are Anton Petrov and Dr. Becky, so... I expect a lot. 😄

[@dollarsignfrodofan77]

i really like how the cg light reflects off of matt's face. good job whoever you are!

[@kcarpenter2006]

Oh! Mat must be CGI

[@MrTigerlore]

We keep thinking we need to colonize planets. But in reality, we’ll have the capability someday to create giant starships that fit our needs far better than planets can. Why get a fixer-upper house when you can have the perfect motor-home?

[@Brukner841]

as Isaac Arthur mentioned, "gravity wells are for suckers".

[@Tom_Quixote]

In reality, we have no idea whether it will ever be possible to build such spaceships.

[@Brukner841]

@@Tom_Quixote 117 years ago, right before the first recorded human flight by the Wright brothers, a declaration was given, signed by thousands of academics, which stated that it will never be possible for humankind to fly in the air, no matter how hard we try. Now we're teleporting molecules into space, and flying a robot on Mars. We will capture micro wormholes and enlarge them, we will create warp drives, and so many more FTL technologies, it's inevitable, dare I say, within the next 100 years. We have limitless potential, we develop at a rate that, for all we know, could be the fastest in the Universe.

[@kerwinbrown4180]

People like firm ground but in reality both will be the case.

[@ikeroran7911]

becausre when we get to that time, it will be too late, and the starts wil l likely have moved away

[@sideways5153]

Drip check! We see that merch

[@ryanroyo3419]

I'm subscribed I'm amazed👑 I'm also subscribed to other eons pbs channels ❤❤😘

[@TheMoonSeesMe]

Never before in the history of mankind has the words of a presenter been scrutinized so much, by so many. Good on ya Matt - for all that you get right I salute you!

[@teaser6089]

Question, is there any online animation of the entire Alpha Centauri systems orbital motion available?

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

I think that Universe Sandbox has the ability to do that, but don't quote me.

[@brandonhoffman4712]

That sounds like the death of animation right there...

[@teaser6089]

@@brandonhoffman4712 what

[@brandonhoffman4712]

@@teaser6089 Animation has the ability to traverse beyond reality, and yet you want to use it to visualize reality. Animation brought us movies like WALL-E, and you want bloody moving dots... Edit: don't mean to shoot you down, just giving my thoughts. Please peruse your passions and don't let an ignoramus get in your way!

[@sanctus_furor]

@@brandonhoffman4712 worst possible take

[@DekarNL]

Love the shirt. Kurzgesagd is awesome 😎

[@Kevin-cm5kc]

As a scotsman, I'd like to point out that Robert innes is (almost certainly) pronounced like 'Innis'. I have corrected an astrophysicist. Yesssss

[@FectacularSpail]

I would really love to see Breakthrough Starshot happen in my lifetime, but it seems like the big hurdle to overcome is getting data back from these probes over interstellar distances.

[@Alexander_Kale]

The only technology you need to live to see is radical life extension. Which I personally give fifty / fifty odds to arrive in my lifetime. So let's flip the coin together and in a hundred years, we will both see the first pictures from alpha centauri.

[@protocol6]

Wouldn't precession and axial tilt create good size zones with day/night cycles and manageable size tides in a tidally locked planet?

[@bethanygee6939]

Seeing "Arecibo" credited on the animation is a bittersweet reminder of both how large that facility's contribution to our body of knowledge really was, and how much we lost when we lost that telescope. 😥❤️

[@andersjjensen]

F

[@sjzara]

Informative and inspiring.

[@grahamdelacey5779]

watching PBS whilst playing space engineers is awesome.

[@mattpike7268]

Can I get clarification on something said in the vid? Are we really proximas closest neighbor? I mean, I know it's OUR closest neighbor, but it's not any closer to another system than us? I just find that concept, the distance between other systems to each other, vs distance from us to be really compelling.

[@EnglishMike]

Yes. It looks like the next nearest star to Proxima is Groombridge 34, which is 11.6 light years from Earth, so even if Groombridge 34 was on the opposite side of Proxima to Earth, it would still be a couple of light years further away.

[@garethdean6382]

Proxima C is only 0.2ly from the A-B pair. Outside of the trinary system though, yeah, we are. Perhaps a bit of oversight there.

[@deusexaethera]

I see that Kurtzgesagt shirt you're wearing.

[@francoislacombe9071]

Simulations of atmosphere dynamics have shown that planets like Proxima B probably would probably not be tidally locked. Dominant winds in those atmospheres would transfer enough angular momentum to the planet's body to prevent tidal locks from happening. You wouldn't need very much atmosphere for this to happen, Earth's atmosphere would do the job very nicely.

[@alihms]

So how thick (or maybe how dynamic) does the atmosphere needs to be? If I'm not mistaken, Io has a thin atmosphere but it is still tidally locked to Jupiter.

[@francoislacombe9071]

@@alihms Io's atmosphere is far too thin. Also, even if it was thicker, Io would still be tidally locked to Jupiter because the moon doesn't get enough heat from the Sun to power the needed winds. Look at Titan, a moon of Saturn with a much denser atmosphere, and it is tidally locked to Saturn for the same reason. How thick a planet's atmosphere needs to be depends on how close that planet is to its star, the closer in, the thicker the atmosphere. It's complicated.

[@frankharr9466]

Fascinating possibility. I hope we get to find out.

[@navneetnair3314]

I like how Matt is wearing Kurzgesagt merch

[@iveharzing]

I immediately thought of the book "The Three Body Problem" where there's a civilization on a planet that orbits all 3 Centauri stars. But in the book Proxima Centauri is MUCH closer to Alpha/Beta Centauri, so the 3 stars orbit around each other chaotically, and the planet is passed around like a football between them.

[@nikethunner2732]

Just finished the book. Interesting read, not the best ever, but creative. Maybe i'll read the other books someday.

[@genderender]

It’s not that proxima is closer, it’s that it’s assumed to be in a 3 body orbit with alpha and Beta Centauri, but currently in a “stable” orbit where life can exist. We here can’t really tell what proxima is doing

[@epsilonjay4123]

If a planet like Proxima B had a thick atomsphere, or a magnetic field, could it be shielded from the magnetic storms of a red dwarf star? Also, I want to see an episode on the 2 dimensional cosmic strings.

[@Ulmaramlu]

Excellent news! Good to know that the Stellaris game we live in might have guaranteed habitable worlds set to at least 1.

[@Numba003]

This stuff is so cool. It would be incredible to witness seeing photos taken from another solar system! Even if not, just knowing the worlds are there is fascinating. Thank the Lord for my fiancee sharing my fascination so I can tell her about these things. I love your physics videos, but thank you for this cool astronomy / planetary science video in here too!! Stay well out there everybody, and God be with you, friends! :)

[@alexakalennon]

Awesome opening for this episode. Its such an exciting time to live in as an amateur astronomer

[@BigyetiTechnologies]

But does Proxima have a constant enough output? Or might it have life threatening fluctuations?

[@the1pump1der25]

looking at a mixed bag tbh, because of it's age of ~4.85 billion years, it has settled down a fair bit. however that's in comparison to other, younger red dwarfs, it's still an unpredictable and violent lil fella, enough to cause issues for the chances of Proxima b being habitable

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

It's a flare star.

[@brandonhoffman4712]

Sounds like the night life could be good! The planet earth has enough life-threatening fluctuations for me! We currently live in an oasis that contains all of recorded human history amidst a 2.5 million yearlong ice age that collapsed ecosystems enough for great apes to become the dominant life on this planet. Before that we were food.

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

@@brandonhoffman4712 No, before that, we were omnivores living in trees.

[@brandonhoffman4712]

@@RideAcrossTheRiver Yep trying to keep our 4.5 foot tall 70lb selves (basically a deer) from being eaten by apex predators like leopards and such. Much like the chimpanzee does today.

[@mjhzen8313]

At 41,850,000 miles/hour, it would take you 67.84 years to get there. Unless you're in a suspended-animation device, it would be best to start the trip when you're no older than 22. You would spend the rest of your life looking at darkness out the window, and be close to taking your last breath when you land on that exoplanet of Proxima Centauri

[@samuelandrew4500]

We're probably on the cusp of extending the length of human life; imagine if within the next few hundred years, lifespan is extended to hundreds or thousands of years. Making a journey that takes 50 years might not seem unreasonable to someone who has been alive for hundreds of years. We might be one of the last generations to grow old.

[@AM-dc7pv]

@@samuelandrew4500 True. Well, considering this, we'll likely have one of a few scenarios or a combination of which include: Humans developing and advancing cryogenics, humans developing and advancing medical prosthesis, humans developing and advancing human genetics and evolution, humans developing and advancing sufficient technological innovation for interstellar travel coinciding with what was once science fiction level technology and science, humans developing and advancing temporal science and technology sufficient enough to manipulate time for interstellar travel. We could have an entirely different situation that would suffice and not resulting as a subsequent product of man's hard work and dedication...something else, like we meet aliens, find a magic lamp with a genie or maybe collect all 7 Dragonballs (Earth-based, Dende-bound), lol. We're close to a number of these STEM-derivatives developing to a level that will allow exponential advancement thereafter though.

[@newerstillimproved]

@@samuelandrew4500 I just hope they can extend the life of animals as well. I certainly would not want to go without the company of a dog.

[@chrisfleming701]

All you need is a multi generation crew, parents and their children. Children will be adults when they arrive and be able to take care of aging original crew. Not my idea, from sci-fi.

[@newerstillimproved]

@@chrisfleming701 That sounds easy enough. Easy enough indeed for an attempt with current technology - maybe Elon's "Starship" living up to its name - getting there in 6300 years or less.

[@johnege7352]

When you consider all the things that had to happen for life to be possible on Earth, is it really unreasonable to appreciate how many things had to happen for life there?

[@Gunandrunandgun]

The chance that life exists on earth is 100% simply because well... we're here. That doesn't tell us much about the likelyhood on other planets though.

[@FrikInCasualMode]

Our sample of life in the Universe = 1. We know what 'our' life requires to function. Until we find (or not) life outside the Earth, we will not know what is necessary for life in general to appear.

[@johnege7352]

One of the things i have seen in many of the science book is how lucky life was here on earth. We were just the right distance from the sun. We were lucky to have the perfect sized moon, at the right distance to influence tides. We had magnetosphere, and dynamic tectonic plates and just the right amount water. The arguments against life out there have actually been based in how many coincidences happened here. I agree it happened here, clearly, but no one is making an argument that if it happened here it happens everywhere. So either we were extremely lucky, or life is more likely than we consider.

[@johnege7352]

@PolySaken oh, well sure. I think it’s very reasonable that we will find other types of life. Lee Cronin made cells that could replicate, based on metal… it looks and behaves like life!

[@georgethompson1460]

@PolySaken purge the filthy xenos!!!!

[@georgeindestructible]

Love the background music!

[@victormartins8654]

Is that a Kurzgesagt shirt?

[@joshuascott1266]

"please let there be a new PBS Spacetime episode. Please, let there be a new PBS Spacetime episode!".... *Posted 8 minutes ago* "YES!"

[@blueredbrick]

;)

[@uBastianX]

Keep the trisolarians in mind. It's better if we keep our existence a secret.

[@kayvee256]

It's too late for that. Our past was already too bright in the radio spectrum.

[@3picdermis223]

Came to see if someone made a three body series reference. Was not disappointed.

[@garethdean6382]

Yeah, we don't wanna scare them off.

[@PlanetXMysteries-pj9nm]

Very impressed with this video. I have always been interested in astronomy and physics. It was things like this that drove me to enter those professions. Thank you for feeding my insatiable curiosity about the universe and the wonders that we discove

[@idiaz502]

Nice T-shirt!! It's like a cross over of 2 amazing channels.

[@nrxia]

Wouldn't it take millions of years by today's technological standards to even reach it? I'm not sure humanity would still even be humanity by that point even if we could make it. Or at least it probably wouldn't be recognizable to our current version of humanity. It's interesting to think about.

[@waylondesnoyers7459]

It would take about 20-60k years especially if the speedup using lasers is highly effective, still not a short time but faster than today's engines could ever do.

[@loyalik]

travelling at 20% the speed of light, that sail would reach the system in about 20 years, since proxima is about 4 light years from us

[@k.r.jester5406]

If we leave for the planet today, we would likely reach that planet after a future mission would. The reason is because it's very likely our tech would progress faster than we could travel today.

[@brothermine2292]

If Proxima B has a strong magnetic field, could any of our instruments detect it? Perhaps by the way it would deflect charged particles of Proxima's "solar" wind.

[@viorelush4187]

Will the James Webb telescope be able to find out what kind of an atmosphere (if any) proxima B has? If so, THIS IS EXTREMELY EXCITING!

[@oligould8575]

I was thinking the same thing... it'll certainly be interesting to see what the JW telescope can see... if there's liquid water there's a good possibility of some kind of life... especially if there is a deep ocean

[@rogerthornton4068]

Maybe Webb can give us more information on this system.

[@franklin9400]

We can't even save our own perfectly habitable planet for life. The worst thing we could do is go destroy more planets.

[@franklin9400]

@PolySaken Wow, quite delusional as well. The first thing we would do when we got there, is start destroying the place because we want things and can. The much more likely scenario is, we end life on our planet, long before we ever make it to another planet or nuke ourselves back to the dark ages, to start over with the few that survive.

[@peterkelley6344]

Gentle cough. Excuse me guys James Webb only sees in inferred light.

[@gunatitmehta7692]

Love the kurzgesagt shirt! You have great taste.

[@Dwnsnc81swanny]

It's fascinating living in this era in spacetime we all share.

[@liamwinter4512]

It would be wildly convenient if our nearest star system has habitable planets.

[@Mohammad__M__]

I rather say "weirdly convenient"

[@hurgcat]

might make you think what seeded planets of similar climes? 🤔 but I still think we are inescapably alone in the void.

[@Dan-bz4qg]

It'd be cool if life from Earth or Proxima b somehow seeded the other with life. Like, what if we're all actually Proxlings, and humanity's first interstellar voyage will actually just be life returning to its ancestral home. Really wish I could be alive to see it.

[@RandomYT05_01]

Let us just hope the James Webb can confirm if it does have an atmosphere. If it does, and its breathable, then that would get people more excited about it.

[@david2tm]

is that kurzgesagt t-shirt?

[@callmeprettybaby]

YEAH that’s what I was gonna ask!!

[@GustSergeant]

Another person with a Keen eye!

[@meister0388]

That closing line reminded me of “Foundation”. Thanks for the explanation!

[@haydies0]

My cat really enjoys all of your videos. She makes me put them on by shouting at me until I do 🙂

[@XuryFromCanada]

Imagine, humans show up there after ruining the Earth and realize that was their old planet 😂

[@altortugas5979]

That wound be a Douglas Adams level of dark irony.

[@sacr3]

Probably left a message saying "don't fck up the new one!"

[@teok8855]

Given the recent developments, I’d say its wise and should be a priority to colonize Mars and look for other planets that can support life. I didn’t see it as a priority before.

[@benr3799]

15:00 yep I cried. I’m so excited for the future of humanity, we are just getting started. Let’s just preserve this planet first and foremost please. We have a beautiful place to live, let’s not trash it so quickly. I want future people to be able to visit Earth and enjoy its spectacular beauty as the home planet of their ancestors. Clean energy needs to be the absolute global priority. I want all the animals to have a chance to survive the current and past destructive nature of humans, they are forms of life too. Let’s stop global warming before it becomes an overbearing global catastrophe. Listen to scientists!!

[@IshijimaKairo]

You're out of luck, humanity won't make it. I will make sure of it.

[@rlenter9]

@@IshijimaKairo there was a film called the titan where they genetically engineered people to live on titan and also last days on Mars where people where genetically changed to live on Mars without a space suit

[@nikw3026]

Great video - love the history included

[@Calventius]

Very competent briefer.

[@ZiggidyZach]

"What if aliens are dark matter" This neatly clears up the Fermi Paradox too. The universe's missing mass is just super advanced type III+ aliens hiding themselves behind perfectly absorbent dyson spheres. Neat and tidy.

[@TheInfectous]

how many planets are in the galaxy? How many planets have we checked? How many galaxies are there? Where are the aliens? Perhaps we might want to check .00001% of our own galaxy before claiming they don't exist.

[@brandonhoffman4712]

@@TheInfectous Ok I'll check out planet earth, you check out... Good luck getting beyond the ort cloud, you would be the 1st great ape to do so! To think a planet could create such sentience from yogurt!

[@mitsuracer87]

Bro wtf...2 nights ago I had a fever dream that I was on a starship traveling at an extremely high speed to go to another star system light years away. I was having a panic attack thinking about how if we were to even hit a small rock in space at that speed it would likely destroy our whole ship and we could die at any second..and there was a fear about how long we were going to be in this ship. I was thinking about how Mars is months away from earth and that I was going to be on this ship for years or decades just to reach the planet we were going to...and that due to time dilation, everyone on earth that I knew would at least be several years older or possibly dead by the time I got there. Maybe it was Proxima B...

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

How high was your fever? 😳 By the way, the thinking now is that we could sustain 10% the speed of light safely without too much stronger shielding than we already know how to mak, so, depending on how old you are, you could live to see your destination! 😄

[@xtpsxreportsx]

If the cameras are moving at 20% the speed of light, i imagine the resulting photos will be fairly distorted. Have we done any tests that suggest that our camera tech could produce useful data at that velocity? I imagine if we had to stop accellerating them in response to distortion levels of the images coming back then the trajectory would be off

[@myfriendbro]

Let's go to Proxima humans!!! This is a big sign!! Our next stepping stone is Proxima

[@PauloBorges9]

NAVE com propulsão Nuclear

[@Andrew-bq9gz]

This helps me improve my attention span

[@cS-nf2dg]

That's quite a leap of faith for any life to be on a tidally locked planet. About the same chance as finding life on our own moon.

[@the1pump1der25]

not necessarily, models suggest that with the right orbital distance, gravity, strong magnetic field, atmospheric density and oceans to circulate the extreme temperature differences, a tidally locked planet can support a ring of habital conditions along the boundary between the sunlit side and the night side

[@cS-nf2dg]

@@the1pump1der25your parroting what was said in the video with no new insight.

[@the1pump1der25]

@@cS-nf2dg sorry, only just watched the video then, my original comment was off the top of my head before I'd even started

[@the1pump1der25]

@@cS-nf2dg bruh he literally spells out how a tidally locked planet can theoretically support life, where are you pulling the figure of "same chance of being habitable as the moon" from. the moon is dead because its under 2% the mass of earth and primarily lies outside our magnetic field

[@jackb3822]

Ik its a moon and bot a planet, but like, Europa exists.

[@kurtbogle2973]

We don't need to move to any other planet until we learn how to take care of this planet properly. After all if we destroy everything we come in contact with how do we justify our own existence? What kind of creatures are we? So far we have behaved like we want to destroy the entire Universe. Truthfully I don't think our self aware contestant Universe is going to let that happen!