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If you are an alien civilization with interstellar capabilities why risk a fly by from a planetary system which could easily be detected, or even intercepted, e

If you are an alien civilization with interstellar capabilities why risk a fly by from a planetary system which could easily be detected, or even intercepted, even by less advanced beings instead of just park a probe in the outskirts of the Solar system and collect as much data as you like undetected. If then again Oumuamua was a probe traveling for millennia in search for alien life then there's no point of sending two in the same planetary system.

cr0sh 7y ago
I'm not saying it was - but what if Oumuamua was some kind of "derelict" - an intergalactic equivalent of the "Mary Celeste" - a ghost ship from deep space? Imagine a civilization that is maybe 500 years more advanced than ours in space travel - perhaps they have nearly conquered their solar system. Instead of building ships the regular way, they instead carve up asteroids or other similar "space rocks" and attach engines to them in some way. But something went wrong - maybe the engines got stuck "on" or something, and the entire thing was launched out beyond their system, never to be seen by them again... ...and it floated for however many of our millenia before briefly tumbling through our system. To us, it looks like a rock - we can't even optically resolve it properly, it's too fast and too far away. In (fantasy) reality, though, on board is a bunch of technology that we could probably understand, that would allow us to "leap" to hands-on human exploration (and exploitation) of our own solar system. It might be both a blessing and a curse. Again - sheer fantasy - and most likely it was just a shard of rock and nothing more. But is it far fetched to think that there isn't "large scale" ships or probes of some nature just drifting through space, probably completely broken down and relatively inert, moving at sub-light speeds due to various reasons, but made out of rock because it's easy to get, provides relatively good protection from space, easy to modify, etc? We humans have already flung tiny objects out of our solar system - I can believe that larger artifacts might be something that could "drift away" as well (then again, one would think that if a civilization got to that level - they'd be able to go out and retrieve it before it got too far away). Maybe it'd make a good science fiction story - from both ends (the creation of the "ship", the "loss" after trying to retrieve it, then the journey and the eventual discovery of it by another civilization "far away" - and how it changes the discoverers socially, politically, and technologically).
- elorant 7y ago
  Even if Oumuamua was a probe how would that explain the second interstellar sucker we're discussing here? The closest star system that could harbor life is 4 light years away. So even if Oumuamua signaled home that it found a planet with little brown beings it would take them at least 8 years to send a second probe. Oumuamua was detected just two years ago.
  - sandworm101 7y ago
    >> The closest star system that could harbor life is 4 light years away. Under the conclusion that space-born civilization would remain around stars. If we one day tap into other energy sources, ie whatever is powering dark energy, stars may become irrelevant or even awkward to be around. A civilization of kilometer-wide cities could be just beyond Pluto and still totally outside our perceptions.
    - elorant 7y ago
      In which case you don't need to send probes hundreds of meters long. You'd send something much more compact and undetectable. You don't have to worry for probe's longevity so to enclose it inside an asteroid since you're launching from relatively shorter distances. Oumuamua as an alien probe sounds probable. Two of them in a span of two years, not so much. Besides contrary to Oumuamua this one has all the characteristics of a comet.
      - sliken 7y ago
        You are assuming that the civilization that sent it is trying to be stealthy. Not to mention at only 60,000 mph (Oumuamua) or 90,000 mph (C/2019 Q4) these probes need to be designed for many 100,000 years of travel if not millions. During that time they will see quasars, supernovas, and a wide variety of high energy particles. Might well make more sense to have many feet of rock as shielding instead of trying to keep a high power energy source going for that long. If you are patient gravity assisted slingshots makes quite a bit of sense.
a3n 7y ago
Send two in case one fails. Distance might be so difficult that a "ballistic approach" within a margin of error is the only practical plan.
sliken 7y ago
Dunno. There's an efficiency in making this less than perfect. It might well be more efficient to make 100 probes that have a 90% chance of making it 1 million years than trying to make 10 probes that have a 99% chance. Not to mention there's likely some hierarchy of probes. The smallest ones relay to the bigger ones, the bigger ones can related to the huge ones, and the huge ones can report back home. So maybe somewhere within 100 light years a factory started converting asteroids to probes and launching them at 100k miles an hour and lobbed a few our way. That would have been some 600,000 years ago.

cr0sh 7y ago

I'm not saying it was - but what if Oumuamua was some kind of "derelict" - an intergalactic equivalent of the "Mary Celeste" - a ghost ship from deep space? Imagine a civilization that is maybe 500 years more advanced than ours in space travel - perhaps they have nearly conquered their solar system. Instead of building ships the regular way, they instead carve up asteroids or other similar "space rocks" and attach engines to them in some way. But something went wrong - maybe the engines got stuck "on" or something, and the entire thing was launched out beyond their system, never to be seen by them again... ...and it floated for however many of our millenia before briefly tumbling through our system. To us, it looks like a rock - we can't even optically resolve it properly, it's too fast and too far away. In (fantasy) reality, though, on board is a bunch of technology that we could probably understand, that would allow us to "leap" to hands-on human exploration (and exploitation) of our own solar system. It might be both a blessing and a curse. Again - sheer fantasy - and most likely it was just a shard of rock and nothing more. But is it far fetched to think that there isn't "large scale" ships or probes of some nature just drifting through space, probably completely broken down and relatively inert, moving at sub-light speeds due to various reasons, but made out of rock because it's easy to get, provides relatively good protection from space, easy to modify, etc? We humans have already flung tiny objects out of our solar system - I can believe that larger artifacts might be something that could "drift away" as well (then again, one would think that if a civilization got to that level - they'd be able to go out and retrieve it before it got too far away). Maybe it'd make a good science fiction story - from both ends (the creation of the "ship", the "loss" after trying to retrieve it, then the journey and the eventual discovery of it by another civilization "far away" - and how it changes the discoverers socially, politically, and technologically).

elorant 7y ago
Even if Oumuamua was a probe how would that explain the second interstellar sucker we're discussing here? The closest star system that could harbor life is 4 light years away. So even if Oumuamua signaled home that it found a planet with little brown beings it would take them at least 8 years to send a second probe. Oumuamua was detected just two years ago.
- sandworm101 7y ago
  >> The closest star system that could harbor life is 4 light years away. Under the conclusion that space-born civilization would remain around stars. If we one day tap into other energy sources, ie whatever is powering dark energy, stars may become irrelevant or even awkward to be around. A civilization of kilometer-wide cities could be just beyond Pluto and still totally outside our perceptions.
  - elorant 7y ago
    In which case you don't need to send probes hundreds of meters long. You'd send something much more compact and undetectable. You don't have to worry for probe's longevity so to enclose it inside an asteroid since you're launching from relatively shorter distances. Oumuamua as an alien probe sounds probable. Two of them in a span of two years, not so much. Besides contrary to Oumuamua this one has all the characteristics of a comet.
    - sliken 7y ago
      You are assuming that the civilization that sent it is trying to be stealthy. Not to mention at only 60,000 mph (Oumuamua) or 90,000 mph (C/2019 Q4) these probes need to be designed for many 100,000 years of travel if not millions. During that time they will see quasars, supernovas, and a wide variety of high energy particles. Might well make more sense to have many feet of rock as shielding instead of trying to keep a high power energy source going for that long. If you are patient gravity assisted slingshots makes quite a bit of sense.

a3n 7y ago

Send two in case one fails. Distance might be so difficult that a "ballistic approach" within a margin of error is the only practical plan.

sliken 7y ago

Dunno. There's an efficiency in making this less than perfect. It might well be more efficient to make 100 probes that have a 90% chance of making it 1 million years than trying to make 10 probes that have a 99% chance. Not to mention there's likely some hierarchy of probes. The smallest ones relay to the bigger ones, the bigger ones can related to the huge ones, and the huge ones can report back home. So maybe somewhere within 100 light years a factory started converting asteroids to probes and launching them at 100k miles an hour and lobbed a few our way. That would have been some 600,000 years ago.