Researchers discovered alien megastructure?

[bison]

The only viable natural explanation offered (comets) has been thrown into very serious doubt by Dr. Schaefer recent findings. The megastructures explanation seems worth further consideration. The 16 percent dimming in the course of about a century appears to suggests about 500 years more to complete utilization of the star's energy, assuming work continues at the same rate. This is also assuming that complete utilization of that energy is the goal.

Dr. Schaefer doubts that even a super-civilization could arrange to collect this much stellar energy in only about 100 years time. He may not have been considering the possibility of self-reproducing, automated construction machines.

[Leonardo]

The only viable natural explanation offered (comets) has been thrown into very serious doubt by Dr. Schaefer recent findings. The megastructures explanation seems worth further consideration. The 16 percent dimming in the course of about a century appears to suggests about 500 years more to complete utilization of the star's energy, assuming work continues at the same rate. This is also assuming that complete utilization of that energy is the goal.

Dr. Schaefer doubts that even a super-civilization could arrange to collect this much stellar energy in only about 100 years time. He may not have been considering the possibility of self-reproducing, automated construction machines.

That's not the only viable natural explanation offered - just the one picked up by the media and popularised.

The dimming and occluding effect could be explained by a planet whose orbit decayed too close to the star, and subsequently broke up due to tidal stress and other forces. That star could have wandered through a gaseous region of space (a nebula) and picked up some of the gaseous matter which is only now settling into an planar orbit and causing the occlusions.

There are many natural explanations other than comets to explain what is being observed, and "wait, and continue to observe" is the best approach to take for now.

[bison]

A fragmented planet was considered briefly in the first scientific paper on this star's dimming (Boyajian, et al.) but it was realized that this would have left behind a great deal of dust, which should be detectable. When the signs of such dust were looked for repeatedly, they were not found.

Nebular matter capable of sporadically obscuring the light of the star by up to 22 percent of its current brightness, and reducing its light over a century by 16 percent would also presumably contain masses of dust. I find no indication in the scientific papers on KIC 8462852's dimming that nebular matter is considered a viable explanation.

[Uncle Sam]

Why can't it be the star is dying? Turning into a Brown Dwarf Star which is basically a dead star that isn't hot enough to ignite.

[bison]

The astronomers report that KIC 8462852 is, in most respects, a quite ordinary yellow-white (F type) star in the long, stable part of its life, called the main sequence. No apparent indications that it nearing the end of its life. The dimming both long and short term seems to be a genuine puzzle.

[Why not]

As interesting as this all is, we know it is going to turn out to be a natural formation.

[seeder]

Remember 2001 A Space Odyssey? Monoliths swarming round Jupiter, and yes I KNOW its just a movie

Edited January 18, 2016 by seeder

[Sundew]

I can't say anything about this with certainty, but our star has an asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Would it not be likely this is a much larger one, perhaps closer in to the star resulting in collisions from rocky planets sometime in the past? The missing dust could be blown away over time by the star's solar wind or be attracted to and captured by the larger asteroids. Just seems more likely then mega-alien tech.

[Jacques Terreur]

......, and yes I KNOW its just a movie

but a good one!!

[Only_]

Proofs of aliens keep piling up and yet some dogmatic skeptics are still denying the obvious fact before their eyes. How is that possible? Their denial is almost religious. We have the pyramids, structures on mars, countless of UFO reports and now this.

Edited January 18, 2016 by TaridD

[Aftermath]

Proofs of aliens keep piling up and yet some dogmatic skeptics are still denying the obvious fact before their eyes. How is that possible? Their denial is almost religious. We have the pyramids, structures on mars, countless of UFO reports and now this.

pyramids = human made

structures on Mars... nope.

countless UFO reports... um, ok but doubt any of them are alien in nature.

the jury is still deliberating on this one. you cannot seriously state it's an alien structure, however in my mind, you cannot seriously discount it. but I think we're all on the same page, that you cannot point to pyramids, rocks on Mars, and DoD black projects and say "this must be an alien structure".

[Ashyne]

The star is not a star but an alien craft.

[Aftermath]

The star is not a star but an alien craft.

- no but seriously...

[Merc14]

Proofs of aliens keep piling up and yet some dogmatic skeptics are still denying the obvious fact before their eyes. How is that possible? Their denial is almost religious. We have the pyramids, structures on mars, countless of UFO reports and now this.

What proof are you referring to and which skeptic has denied anything? We have an observation of a phenomenon with several hypotheses offering a possible explanation. That is it. No rational person would declare that an alien structure is causing the phenomenon to happen based on what we know today. As far as the rest of your silly post please show me an image of the pyramid and structures on Mars and what UFO report proves the existence of an ET being

[Imaginarynumber1]

Proofs of aliens keep piling up and yet some dogmatic skeptics are still denying the obvious fact before their eyes.

I don't see anyone on here saying that aliens might not exist.

We have the pyramids,

So what?. They were made by humans.

structures on mars,

Those don't actually exist.

countless of UFO reports

Anecdotal. Nothing more.

and now this.

Which is still an unknown. Not proof of anything, yet.

[Golden Duck]

... you cannot point to pyramids, rocks on Mars, and DoD black projects and say "this must be an alien structure".

It seems obvious you can

[toast]

Proofs of aliens keep piling up ...

In the CT`s world, yes. In reality, no. Not just one single case.

... and yet some dogmatic skeptics are still denying the obvious fact before their eyes.

There are no facts, not just a single one.

How is that possible? Their denial is almost religious.

The FTBs, and not the realists, are connected to a kind of religion. They want to make us believe things for those not one

single proof exist yet. They are prayers, simply just that.

We have the pyramids,

Yeah. And whats the claim?

...structures on mars,

Yeah. And whats the claim?

countless of UFO reports ....

But until today there is not just one lousy single report that delivered a proof for the presence of extraterrestrial creatures and/or

extraterrestrial originated technology on Earth and/or within the range of human made technology, like probes and telescopes.

[Future_Ikann]

This is starting to remind me of Pandora's Star....

[Peter B]

Why can't it be the star is dying?

Because these sorts of stars don't die in that sort of way.

Turning into a Brown Dwarf Star which is basically a dead star that isn't hot enough to ignite.

Normal stars don't "turn into" Brown Dwarfs. Rather, Brown Dwarfs are formed from collapsing dust clouds, like other stars.

However, whatever is happening is incredibly interesting, and I'm certainly looking forward for further observations (and perhaps further investigation to see whether we have any other historical data about the star).

[Harte]

There could be something about star types that we don't know.

Harte

[ShadowSot]

Yeah, that's on the list of possibilities.

So are weird planetary or various debris type formations. But aliens get the eyeballs.

And aliens are a real possibility.

[barbco196]

Surely an advanced civilization would have a grasp on nanotechnology...utility fog!

[psyche101]

The astronomers report that KIC 8462852 is, in most respects, a quite ordinary yellow-white (F type) star in the long, stable part of its life, called the main sequence. No apparent indications that it nearing the end of its life. The dimming both long and short term seems to be a genuine puzzle.

Yet they keep coming back to a dusty swarm of comets.

I wonder if it could simply be a more intense solar system than we have ever seen, maybe more planets than we expected?

[Peter B]

There could be something about star types that we don't know.

Harte

That's for sure.

In fact, I'm wondering how accurately we know the star's distance from the Earth, and whether its apparent spectral class and the loss of brightness in the last century may combine in some way to show the star is actually some significantly different distance from the Earth than is currently understood. Is that possible?

[Merc14]

Yet they keep coming back to a dusty swarm of comets.

I wonder if it could simply be a more intense solar system than we have ever seen, maybe more planets than we expected?

We may have to wait for tehnew generation of telescopes to come on line, The JWST is now scheduled to launch in 2018 or the EELT scheduled t\for first light in 2022