5 ms·

My favorite theory is that they are actually artificial, alien light sails being used to travel. http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a25609/fast-radio-bursts

My favorite theory is that they are actually artificial, alien light sails being used to travel. http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a25609/fast-radio-bursts-alien-space-travel/ http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a25609/fast-radio-burs...

19eightyfour 10y ago
It seems like 500 Million suns worth of energy ( not totally converted into momentum -- since we can observe it ) to power a spaceship, by an advanced civilisation, is a bit wasteful. I think it's more likely if FRBs are from a civilization they represent something like the output of an industrial process ( maybe for creating dark matter or other exotic materials ), or the equivalent of blasting to get access to minerals, or even a weapon, like a super powerful nuclear or dark matter weapon. Someplace the expenditure of energy is justified by the cost. Or maybe it's a race of super-advanced giants playing with enormous laser pointers just for fun.
- mseepgood 10y ago
  > It seems like 500 Million suns worth of energy ( not totally converted into momentum -- since we can observe it ) to power a spaceship, by an advanced civilisation, is a bit wasteful. Wastefulness doesn't stop civilizations from doing something. It could be the spaceship equivalent of a SUV.
  - 19eightyfour 10y ago
    Lol. That's good. So true. I didn't think of that. It's more like "unconscious" nature that is usually more efficient instead of civilizations. Although I don't understand why some crop genomes have so many more genomes than humans. Maybe wastefulness is everywhere.
    - derefr 10y ago
      Are you talking about polyploid genes? Having more copies of each gene per cell nucleus is effectively RAID: it protects against copying errors, and therefore against genetic disorders and cancers. This does have the side-effect of increasing the size of the nucleus of each cell, which is a problem if you're an animal with cells that need to float around in a blood stream and squeeze through tiny capillaries—but not if you're a plant, with all your cells locked in place.
      - 19eightyfour 10y ago
        That's also an important consideration I hadn't thought of. The plants can have the cell size constraint relaxed because of their different morphology / physiology. In fact, it came from me looking at human and other vertebrate genomes, and then looking at some reference "crop" genomes and seeing multiples as many genes. I didn't know if they are polyploid copies as you say or not tho it could have been. I'll try to find the links where I saw these numbers (from a few years ago now) and update. [edit] Ok, for example: chimpanzee genome, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/202 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/202? , size: ~3Gb, scaffolds: ~50k bread wheat genome, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/11? https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/11?, size: ~13Gb, scaffolds: ~750k And more summaries are at the Wikipedia page of sequenced plant genomes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_plant_genomes#Grasses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_plant_genome... ( there are many with over 30,000 genes ( cf humans < 20,000 ) and there are a few big ones ( Aegilops tauschii (Tausch's goatgrass) has 4.3Gb ), and most are more than 200 Mb ( cf fruit fly is around 180Mbp ) When compared with small insects and animals ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_eukaryotic_genomes#Animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_eukaryotic_g... ) plants often have larger genomes. And in some cases larger genomes than humans. The weird thing is that genome size is correlated with "complexity" in non-animal world too. With fungi and so on having smaller genomes generally than large plants. All this seems weird because my assumption is that animals are more "complex" than plants. So either there is a lot of redundancy there or plants have some kind of unseen complexity. It would be cool to see models that try to quantify the explanations of large genomes given here by others ( error and viral resistance and freer nuclear sizing ) and see if those models can account for the sizes somehow, or if there might be more to the picture. Another possibility is that genomes grow with genetic manipulation so cross-breeds have bigger genomes. But what does that say for humans? Are we the result of genetic breeding as well?
    - tejtm 10y ago
      a genome is a dartboard, a virus is a dart, having a giant dartboard means the dart is more likely not to hit a bullseye (really big. so big you can't even throw the dart far enough to reach[1]) 1 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1095-8339.2010.01072.x/abstract http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1095-8339.2010....
      - 19eightyfour 10y ago
        I never even considered that! As far as I'm concerned that's a really workable explanation. Thanks!
  - pif 10y ago
    > It could be the spaceship equivalent of a SUV. I bought my first SUV a few weeks ago. It's a Jeep renegade, thus not very big, still the comfort from big space inside (without a huge 2-D surface) is priceless.
    - 19eightyfour 10y ago
      Jeeps are solid. I'm one of those Defender geeks.
      - macintux 10y ago
        Nice. Wrangler is my poison of choice, but stumbled upon a 70s-era Defender near my house recently, and a co-worker owns an even older one. Beautiful vehicles.
        cr0sh 10y ago
        I've been thinking about a Wrangler myself, something with the I-6 if I can still find one. But that mention of the Defender sent me looking, and I really like how it looks. But unless I get a much better (much, much better!) job somewhere, I can't even afford a used one. There are ones on CL right now in my area, dating from the 80s (but with low, low miles for some reason) selling for close to 90K - and if I'm going to spend that kind of money locally, I might as well get a Local Motors Rally Fighter! Honestly, though, what I would love to own isn't for sale yet, and if they ever do finish them for sale, likely they won't sell them to anyone in the US: http://oxgvt.com/ http://oxgvt.com/ ...though they should be legal to drive, as a "kit car" (though probably deadly in a collision on our streets).
  - smoyer 10y ago
    My SUV has about the same fuel economy as my mini-van ... It's better on the highway and worse around town.
    - 19eightyfour 10y ago
      Yeah they do get a somewhat overzealous helping of shade. Sometimes it's more of a "pile on" effect than actually deserved. But I literally think Tsubi "pajero" ruined everything forever with their cynical naming. Leopard. Yeah, right.
    - bitJericho 10y ago
      Except your minivan can haul things, your suv is barely better than a car.
      - smoyer 9y ago
        Kind of ... the seats in the SUV fold down and I haul stuff in there too. You're right that it isn't as big an open space. More importantly, the SUV will haul my (small) yacht but it's a strain on the mini-van.
- adrianN 10y ago
  Does the 500 Million suns figure come from a calculation that assumes propagation in all directions? A focused beam would use a lot less energy.
- tomaskafka 10y ago
  Every new thing seems wasteful. Try explaining to your grand-grand-granddad why there are huge manufacturing cities in China, global supply chains, hundreds of thousands of undersea cables, worldwide network of cables and base stations in order to get you a funny cat video into your pocket in park.
  - 19eightyfour 10y ago
    This is a valid point too. When the "why" is not understood, the "thing" looks wasteful. Thanks so much!
a3n 10y ago
If they're coming from different locations, then any one ship's path would be disrupted by "foreign" sources, making it somewhat unreliable. Worst would be when two sources are blowing (puffing?) at a ship between them. Or, maybe they are intended to push ships: alien ships, to keep them away. Or, maybe the ships are messages in bottles, and the senders don't care where they end up. Their current Voyagers? Our future Voyagers?

19eightyfour 10y ago

It seems like 500 Million suns worth of energy ( not totally converted into momentum -- since we can observe it ) to power a spaceship, by an advanced civilisation, is a bit wasteful. I think it's more likely if FRBs are from a civilization they represent something like the output of an industrial process ( maybe for creating dark matter or other exotic materials ), or the equivalent of blasting to get access to minerals, or even a weapon, like a super powerful nuclear or dark matter weapon. Someplace the expenditure of energy is justified by the cost. Or maybe it's a race of super-advanced giants playing with enormous laser pointers just for fun.

mseepgood 10y ago
> It seems like 500 Million suns worth of energy ( not totally converted into momentum -- since we can observe it ) to power a spaceship, by an advanced civilisation, is a bit wasteful. Wastefulness doesn't stop civilizations from doing something. It could be the spaceship equivalent of a SUV.
- 19eightyfour 10y ago
  Lol. That's good. So true. I didn't think of that. It's more like "unconscious" nature that is usually more efficient instead of civilizations. Although I don't understand why some crop genomes have so many more genomes than humans. Maybe wastefulness is everywhere.
  - derefr 10y ago
    Are you talking about polyploid genes? Having more copies of each gene per cell nucleus is effectively RAID: it protects against copying errors, and therefore against genetic disorders and cancers. This does have the side-effect of increasing the size of the nucleus of each cell, which is a problem if you're an animal with cells that need to float around in a blood stream and squeeze through tiny capillaries—but not if you're a plant, with all your cells locked in place.
    - 19eightyfour 10y ago
      That's also an important consideration I hadn't thought of. The plants can have the cell size constraint relaxed because of their different morphology / physiology. In fact, it came from me looking at human and other vertebrate genomes, and then looking at some reference "crop" genomes and seeing multiples as many genes. I didn't know if they are polyploid copies as you say or not tho it could have been. I'll try to find the links where I saw these numbers (from a few years ago now) and update. [edit] Ok, for example: chimpanzee genome, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/202 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/202? , size: ~3Gb, scaffolds: ~50k bread wheat genome, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/11? https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/genomes/11?, size: ~13Gb, scaffolds: ~750k And more summaries are at the Wikipedia page of sequenced plant genomes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_plant_genomes#Grasses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_plant_genome... ( there are many with over 30,000 genes ( cf humans < 20,000 ) and there are a few big ones ( Aegilops tauschii (Tausch's goatgrass) has 4.3Gb ), and most are more than 200 Mb ( cf fruit fly is around 180Mbp ) When compared with small insects and animals ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_eukaryotic_genomes#Animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sequenced_eukaryotic_g... ) plants often have larger genomes. And in some cases larger genomes than humans. The weird thing is that genome size is correlated with "complexity" in non-animal world too. With fungi and so on having smaller genomes generally than large plants. All this seems weird because my assumption is that animals are more "complex" than plants. So either there is a lot of redundancy there or plants have some kind of unseen complexity. It would be cool to see models that try to quantify the explanations of large genomes given here by others ( error and viral resistance and freer nuclear sizing ) and see if those models can account for the sizes somehow, or if there might be more to the picture. Another possibility is that genomes grow with genetic manipulation so cross-breeds have bigger genomes. But what does that say for humans? Are we the result of genetic breeding as well?
  - tejtm 10y ago
    a genome is a dartboard, a virus is a dart, having a giant dartboard means the dart is more likely not to hit a bullseye (really big. so big you can't even throw the dart far enough to reach[1]) 1 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1095-8339.2010.01072.x/abstract http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1095-8339.2010....
    - 19eightyfour 10y ago
      I never even considered that! As far as I'm concerned that's a really workable explanation. Thanks!
- pif 10y ago
  > It could be the spaceship equivalent of a SUV. I bought my first SUV a few weeks ago. It's a Jeep renegade, thus not very big, still the comfort from big space inside (without a huge 2-D surface) is priceless.
  - 19eightyfour 10y ago
    Jeeps are solid. I'm one of those Defender geeks.
    - macintux 10y ago
      Nice. Wrangler is my poison of choice, but stumbled upon a 70s-era Defender near my house recently, and a co-worker owns an even older one. Beautiful vehicles.
      - cr0sh 10y ago
        I've been thinking about a Wrangler myself, something with the I-6 if I can still find one. But that mention of the Defender sent me looking, and I really like how it looks. But unless I get a much better (much, much better!) job somewhere, I can't even afford a used one. There are ones on CL right now in my area, dating from the 80s (but with low, low miles for some reason) selling for close to 90K - and if I'm going to spend that kind of money locally, I might as well get a Local Motors Rally Fighter! Honestly, though, what I would love to own isn't for sale yet, and if they ever do finish them for sale, likely they won't sell them to anyone in the US: http://oxgvt.com/ http://oxgvt.com/ ...though they should be legal to drive, as a "kit car" (though probably deadly in a collision on our streets).
- smoyer 10y ago
  My SUV has about the same fuel economy as my mini-van ... It's better on the highway and worse around town.
  - 19eightyfour 10y ago
    Yeah they do get a somewhat overzealous helping of shade. Sometimes it's more of a "pile on" effect than actually deserved. But I literally think Tsubi "pajero" ruined everything forever with their cynical naming. Leopard. Yeah, right.
  - bitJericho 10y ago
    Except your minivan can haul things, your suv is barely better than a car.
    - smoyer 9y ago
      Kind of ... the seats in the SUV fold down and I haul stuff in there too. You're right that it isn't as big an open space. More importantly, the SUV will haul my (small) yacht but it's a strain on the mini-van.
adrianN 10y ago
Does the 500 Million suns figure come from a calculation that assumes propagation in all directions? A focused beam would use a lot less energy.
tomaskafka 10y ago
Every new thing seems wasteful. Try explaining to your grand-grand-granddad why there are huge manufacturing cities in China, global supply chains, hundreds of thousands of undersea cables, worldwide network of cables and base stations in order to get you a funny cat video into your pocket in park.
- 19eightyfour 10y ago
  This is a valid point too. When the "why" is not understood, the "thing" looks wasteful. Thanks so much!

a3n 10y ago

If they're coming from different locations, then any one ship's path would be disrupted by "foreign" sources, making it somewhat unreliable. Worst would be when two sources are blowing (puffing?) at a ship between them. Or, maybe they are intended to push ships: alien ships, to keep them away. Or, maybe the ships are messages in bottles, and the senders don't care where they end up. Their current Voyagers? Our future Voyagers?