3I/ATLAS
Avi Loeb, the ridiculous Harvard astronomer who claimed that the interstellar object ʻOumuamua was a technological artifact, has battened on a different rock that was discovered in July called 3I/ATLAS as the object of his alien fantasies. He’s published his explanation in an in-house journal (which is not peer-reviewed) in a paper titled Is the Interstellar Object 3I/ATLAS Alien Technology?. The answer is “no”, but Avi really wants it to be “yes.” To give him a chance to make his argument, here’s the abstract.
At this early stage of its passage through our Solar System, 3I/ATLAS, the recently discovered interstellar interloper, has displayed various anomalous characteristics, determined from photometric and astrometric observations. As largely a pedagogical exercise, in this paper we present additional analysis into the astrodynamics of 3I/ATLAS, and hypothesize that this object could be technological, and possibly hostile as would be expected from the ’Dark Forest’ resolution to the ’Fermi Paradox’. We show that 3I/ATLAS approaches surprisingly close to Venus, Mars and Jupiter, with a probability of ≲ 0.005%. Furthermore the low retrograde tilt of 3I/ATLAS’s orbital plane to the ecliptic offers various benefits to an Extra-terrestrial Intelligence (ETI), since it allows the object access to our planet with relative impunity. The eclipse by the Sun from Earth of 3I/ATLAS at perihelion, would allow it to conduct a clandestine reverse Solar Oberth Manoeuvre, an optimal high-thrust strategy for interstellar spacecraft to brake and stay bound to the Sun. An optimal intercept of Earth would entail an arrival in late November/early December of 2025, and also, a non-gravitational acceleration of ∼ 5.9 × 10−5 au day−2, normalized at 1 au from the Sun, would indicate an intent to intercept the planet Jupiter, not far off its path, and a strategy to rendezvous with it after perihelion.
The paper is full of the technical details about the orbital mechanics of this object. It’s unpleasantly dry and boring, with occasional insertions of his wild speculations. Fortunately, he also has a blog post titled Is the Interstellar Object 3I/ATLAS Alien Technology? which is enriched for the Loeb lunacy, so I’ll mainly write about that.
Finding a big rock or comet of interstellar origin is not a revolutionary discovery — it’s interesting, but not something that is necessarily indicative that aliens are hitching a ride on it. His justification for suggesting that it’s an alien artifact are tenuous and based entirely on speculations about its trajectory. For instance, it’s approaching on roughly the ecliptic plane.
The retrograde orbital plane (defined by the orbital angular momentum vector) of 3I/ATLAS around the Sun lies within 5 degrees of that of Earth — the so-called ecliptic plane. The likelihood for that coincidence out of all random orientations is 0.2%.
So it’s unlikely that a rock flying through interstellar space would have the particular approach angle that this one has. But wouldn’t any specific trajectory be unlikely? So what?
Another coincidence is that it’s going to pass sorta close to Venus, Mars, and Jupiter.
For its orbital parameters, 3I/ATLAS is synchronized to approach unusually close to Venus (0.65au where 1au is the Earth-Sun separation), Mars (0.19au) and Jupiter (0.36au), with a cumulative probability of 0.005% relative to orbits with the same orbital parameters but a random arrival time.
Therefore it might be a probe that’s sent here to inspect the planets. It’s checking us out!
You might be thinking that zooming by Venus, Mars, and Jupiter is fine, but what about Earth? It’s not coming anywhere near us, which is evidence that it is a probe.
3I/ATLAS achieves perihelion on the opposite side of the Sun relative to Earth. This could be intentional to avoid detailed observations from Earth-based telescopes when the object is brightest or when gadgets are sent to Earth from that hidden vantage point.
So it’s checking us out, but specifically avoiding being detected by us. Convenient.
But the aliens must be fascinated by us! So he postulates that 3I/ATLAS will fire up its engines and change its trajectory out of our sight, on the other side of the sun, so it can intercept the Earth.
The near alignment of the retrograde trajectory of 3I/ATLAS with the ecliptic plane offers various benefits to an extraterrestrial intelligence, since it allows a spacecraft to access Earth with relative impunity. The eclipse of 3I/ATLAS by the Sun at perihelion for observers at Earth, would allow a spacecraft to conduct a clandestine reverse Solar Oberth maneuver, an optimal high-thrust strategy for interstellar spacecraft to brake and stay bound to the Sun. An optimal intercept of Earth would entail an arrival in late November or early December of 2025. Detection of a non-gravitational acceleration could also indicate an intent to intercept Jupiter, not far off the path of 3I/ATLAS, and a strategy to rendezvous with it after perihelion.
Note that this kind of maneuvering would suggest that 3I/ATLAS is an alien artifact, but it has not been observed. He can’t use a hypothetical motion that has not been seen as evidence that the object is capable of maneuvering. All of his evidence that 3I/ATLAS is an artifact is about remarkable changes in trajectory that have not been observed.
He has NOTHING to support his hypothesis that 3I/ATLAS is alien technology! The idea is that if it suddenly changes its path and approaches Earth, then it must be driven by some novel propulsive force. And, yeah, if a bunch of little green men pop out of it and use flying saucers to visit us, then at last Avi Loeb will be vindicated.
But of course, he does not predict that.
Our paper is contingent on a remarkable but testable hypothesis that 3I/ATLAS is a functioning technological artifact, to which I and my two co-authors do not necessarily ascribe.
So he does not predict that, but if it happens, he’s staking his claim on it. Very cheesy. He’s going to have a future as a television psychic, vague and making predictions so broad that they can cover all eventualities.
But there’s more! He wants us to prepare for the alien invasion!
1. The consequences, should the hypothesis turn out to be correct, could potentially be dire for humanity, and would possibly require defensive measures to be undertaken (though these might prove futile).
2. The hypothesis is an interesting exercise in its own right, and is fun to explore, irrespective of its likely validity.
He doesn’t actually believe 3I/ATLAS is an alien artifact, but we’d better start preparing defensive measures
(what would those be, I wonder? Like maybe back in the 15th century someone should have suggested to the native Americans to prepare defensive measures
.)
And no, it’s not an interesting
exercise. He also admits that his speculation are a pedagogical exercise
, and that it is probably just a comet.
Our paper is largely a pedagogical exercise, with interesting realizations worthy of a record in the scientific literature. By far, the most likely outcome will be that 3I/ATLAS is a completely natural interstellar object, probably a comet, and we await the astronomical data to support this likely origin.
He went ahead and spread his unfounded hyperbole, though. The story has made it to the NY Post, and you can guess what the headline was: ‘Possibly hostile’ alien threat detected in unknown interstellar object, a shocking new study claims.
I have to give some credit to the NY Post, though — they actually talked to real astronomers and got their opinion of Loeb’s hypothesis.
“All evidence points to this being an ordinary comet that was ejected from another solar system, just as countless billions of comets have been ejected from our own solar system,” added Samantha Lawler, an astronomer at the University of Regina in Canada who studies solar system dynamics, Live Science reported.
“Astronomers all around the world have been thrilled at the arrival of 3I/ATLAS, collaborating to use advanced telescopes to learn about this visitor,” Chris Lintott, an astronomer at the University of Oxford who helped simulate 3I/ATLAS’s galactic origins, told Live Science. “Any suggestion that it’s artificial is nonsense on stilts, and is an insult to the exciting work going on to understand this object.”
That ought to be the take-away on this story, that it’s “nonsense on stilts,” and it ought to diminish Avi Loeb’s already tattered reputation.
If these hypothetical little green men were to come down here and ask me to take them to our leader, I just might die of embarrassment. Or maybe they would die laughing.
I saw this playing out over on BlueSky as Loeb claimed 3I/ATLAS didn’t have a coma — the cloud of gas and dust around a comet — so the reported size was of a solid surface. When a number of astronomers pointed out ‘yes, it did’, he claimed the blur seen was due to improper tracking which… well, when a colleague who doesn’t study comets claims the people who do study comets did a task that is done for every comet photograph wrong, you maybe don’t consider it serious criticism.
(Of note, Jason Wright, whose BlueSky I linked, has an interest in SETI and ‘technosignatures’, so this is also criticism of Loeb coming from someone who has actually thought of ‘okay, it’s unlikely, but how would we know if an alien spaceship visited us’. Just… willing to admit that historically all of the ‘Could It Be Aliens?’ space objects were the product of known physical and chemical laws (not biology), but often weird enough to be worth studying for their own merit.)
(And, while I have a PhD in astronomy, I’ve never worked on comets but understand that comet outgassing is a normal source of non-gravitational acceleration a la Newton’s Third Law, dependent on how the comet’s rotational pole is oriented. So ‘comet has a non-gravitational acceleration’ is not news, though still the sort of thing that’s reported when you publish an orbit.)
“would possibly require defensive measures”
Crank up the Slim Whitman.
Did Betteridge author a law of headlines?
@ ^ Reginald Selkirk : ” Did Betteridge author a law of headlines?”
Yes.
@ 1. Big Boppa : “If these hypothetical little green men were to come down here and ask me to take them to our leader, I just might die of embarrassment. Or maybe they would die laughing.”
To quote the little girl in the taco ad – why not both?
@2. Becca Stareyes : Respect. Thanks. Agreed as amateur armchair astronomer who does love thst field and has read alot about it over.. Far too many decades now.
Big Boppa @1: If these aliens are really big and have lots of nasty teeth, I hope you’l send them in the right direction.
Surprised this guy hasn’t been hired by Trump to head NASA.
Has he read ‘Rendezvous with Rama’? They were harmless.
@ ^ stuffin : isn’t NASA suffering enough already?
FWIW :
Source : https://www.space.com/space-exploration/nasa-is-under-attack-space-agency-employees-and-lawmakers-protest-mass-layoffs-science-cuts-amid-budget-turmoil
The world, Science generally is so much wose off for this..
A 0.2% chance is roughly twice as high a probability as dying from measles if you catch it.
It is not at all unlikely.
So now Loeb is latching onto all that “dark forest” shit made popular by “The 3-Body Problem?” I guess that makes sense, given our current climate of racism, nativism, “America First” and willfully-stupid anti-immigrant hostility. So I guess he at least knows how to read a room…
Does anyone remember a book that talked about how ETs basically fill the same psychological function as elves and fairies did in earlier times? I read it decades ago and have been looking for it ever since.
It also discussed, at length, that Harvard researcher who concluded that ETs are real.
John Mack? There was also Jacobs at Temple.
AVILOEB014, your InterstellarUber™ will be arriving to pick you up soon. Please remember to rate your driver at the conclusion of your trip.
Let’s just hope they’ll honor his credit card.
Ignore the babblings of Loeb.
Here is real cool stuff.
SIMP 0136 is a weird object, 20 light years away. It was detected by radio emissions from the aurora borealis and rotates in two and a half hours. It has a cloud cover made of condensed iron.
.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIMP_J013656.5%2B093347
Let’s talk again if this object actually does perform a Then we’ll really have something to discuss.
Loeb is an undercover agent for real aliens. They strive to make the concept of extra-terrestrials so ridicilous no one takes it seriously. The “reptilian” guy is sadly a human, he is just nuts.
I have not yet made up my mind about Stephen Miller. Clearly not human, too ugly to be a cylon. ‘Dark City’?
@12 hillaryrettig1
I think Carl Sagan might have used that argument. It’s been several years since i have read his stuff, but The Demon-Haunted World might be a likely place to check.
These probability calculations are often synonymous with numerology. The probability of the orbit being close to the ecliptic plane is not very remarkable when you consider it as a joint probability of being in the ecliptic plane AND being observed. That is, if you’re being observed in our solar system, then you are probably spending a lot of time in it. To do so, you’re probably close to the plane of the solar system, which increases the encounter time, all other things being equal.
Similar arguments could be made for the other probabilities. There is a common causal event that binds all these other events together with higher probability. That is, being observed in the first place.
It reminds me of the following quote from the movie ‘Pi (1998)’: ‘But, Max, as soon as you discard scientific rigor, you are no longer a mathematician (astronomer), you’re a numerologist.’
Sort of sad that a Harvard astronomer never got past looking upon Star Trek as a documentary.
It’s sad with Loeb – he must have done some good science work to get his position before he went off the deep end about interstellar objects being alien spacecraft. Now he’s a lot more famous, but he’s famous for crackpot ideas.
If a comet is losing mass, then d/dt(mv) is not zero. If it’s not a perfect sphere losing matter evenly from all over, then the centre of mass will shift position. That acceleration is due to work being done on the comet, in the form of it absorbing radiant heat from the star it’s orbiting. Not gravity.
No, it doesn’t mean aliens, but it is quite rare. Probably because we have more and better telescopes to search for such object today. We have space-based telescopes, we have earth-based telescopes with active optics, we have specialty instruments designed to excel at specific tasks.
A Rare Interstellar Object Is Zipping Through Our Solar System. This Brand-New Telescope Saw It First
We clearly do not comprehend Advanced Alien Technology. Their spaceships are built of gravel and boulders held together with ice that outgas and change shape as they approach the star. Very practical.
I was curious enough to do some back of the envelope calculations and determine how long this scout ship, a precursor to invasion, has been heading towards us.
Given it’s current speed (60 km/sec = ~2 x 10E9 km/yr) and the distance to the nearest star (~4 x 10E13 km), it has been in flight ~2 x 10E4 years (~20000 years).
With the claimed acceleration of 5 x 10E-9 km/sec/sec (~5 km/sec speed increase every 10E9 seconds = ~32 years) it takes (60/5)*32 ~= 400 years to get to 60 km/sec.
Questions:
Assuming they didn’t waste energy decelerating, why did they accelerate to ~60 km/sec, cut the engines for ~20000 years, then start them up again before we detected them?
Is a 20000 year scouting mission a useful precursor to invasion?
Does any nearby star have a planet with space flight capable civilization? (if so, the galaxy must be loaded with them)
If space aliens have such advanced technology, why don’t their spy-rocks ever exceed typical interstellar speeds? 60 km/sec is pathetic for interstellar travel.
And most important, why don’t these space aliens nuts ever pull out their calculators and do some math?
PZ Myers @ # 24: Their spaceships are built of gravel and boulders held together with ice that outgas and change shape as they approach the star.
Basic inter-planetary/stellar camo, iow. Double suspicious!!1!
As time goes on, I suspect that scientists will find these interstellar objects more and more frequently, because there are growing numbers of ever more powerful telescopes. Are Loeb and those who support him going to then argue that earth is being examined by dozens of alien probes coming from every direction?
@springa73 #27
Yes.
Big Boppa @1
More likely they would just Nuke us from obit – –it’s the only way to be sure.
@12 and 18– I have no idea who has priority, but I remember David Brin writing an essay about the curious similarities between elves and post-Streiber ETs.
Ed Peters@25–
Thanks for crunching the numbers. I had a similar thought that this rock must have been in interstellar space for many thousands of years, which means that it can’t possibly have been preprogrammed to make close approaches to all those planets given the chaotic nature of solar system orbits.
Scott Robson@19– Yes, this is a common fudge by people misusing probability theory to support outlandish hypotheses. There are, of course, an infinite number of possible paths through the solar system. Therefore any given path through the solar system is unlikely, with the calculated probability entirely dependent on how granular your make your probability distribution. Also, we do not know the probability distribution of interstellar transits since 31/ATLAS is only the third such object discovered.
The first known interstellar object, ‘Oumuamua, came in at a very high angle to the ecliptic, nearly perpendicular, and passed within 0.16 AU of Earth. Avi Loeb insisted that ‘Oumumua is alien technology. 31/ATLAS is approaching close to the ecliptic and will make epihelion on the far side from Earth. Loeb presents this as evidence that it is alien technology. He is just fishing for novelties even when one object’s novelties are diametrically opposed to another’s.
The last nail in the coffin for me was going back and looking at the 2021 paper that got him so much news coverage. It is terrible.
@ chrislawson :
There was a short story he worte abouyt that too ifmemory serves. The elves and fae have changed into aliens & flying saucers but always need our belief our imagination to exist or they stop – make ssome intresting pioiunts. Inone of his anthologies.. Have to see if I can go through my bookshelf and find it ..
@ 8. submoron : “Has he read ‘Rendezvous with Rama’? They were harmless.”
In the first two books or so yeah. Then they were fine until us Humans disturbed them – in fairness, – another species NOT the Rama builders.
@ ^ Aha! Found it Those Eyes short sory by David Brin which was in the Otherness anthology & which folks can read here :
https://davidbrin.com/fiction/thoseeyes.html
Plus the Octospiders vs humans in the last two Rama series – WARNING : SPOILERS on wikipedia here :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Rama
& here : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rama_Revealed
Jacques Vallee has been arguing that UFOs are some sort of multidimensional whatis, not Spaceman DjsJDSuojj in his Galaxie 1000 spacecoupe, for getting on 60 years.
I think the Greys are more likely just a variation on the old trope that future and/or alien beings will have giant heads to house the bigger brains that make them super intelligent. It was floating around for years before the Greys started turning up in supposed alien encounters. The Great Gazoo on The Flintstones is a classic example. The supposed aliens visiting us largely continue to be suspiciously similar to characters from old sci fi.(At least in English speaking UFO fandom. For all I know Spanish speaking UFO fandom discusses robots a lot more.)
@ 12 hillaryrettig1 – Does anyone remember a book that talked about how ETs basically fill the same psychological function as elves and fairies did in earlier times?
Goin’ home late last night
Suddenly, I got a fright
Yeah, I looked through a window and surprised what I saw
Fairy with boots are dancin’ with a dwarf, alright, now
A song by Ozzy – From Fairies Wear Boots.
My tribute to Ozzy.
Thanks everyone. The book included a discussion of John Mack, but wasn’t by him. Also, if it had been Sagan I would have known. :-)
I actually think it was by a well known journalist, and more an psychological discussion than anything else. I wonder if something got the print run destroyed.
Anyhow, this all led me to check out John Mack’s Wikipedia entry, which led me here: http://johnemackinstitute.org/
Some wild stuff, and the poster for the play Space is just gorgeous. It’s on this page: http://johnemackinstitute.org/1999/12/dr-john-mack-in-the-arts/
Let’s assume for the moment that Avi Loeb is correct and 3I/ATLAS is an alien invader. Does it have hostile intent? If it does, then the civilisation behind it is clearly militarily superior as evidence by its mastery of interstellar travel. Resistance is therefore futile, and we should be prepared to welcome our new alien overlords rather than sending a contingent of ICE thugs after them. Either that or prepare to be annihilated.
I am reminded of a science fiction story by Isaac Asimov of an alien civilisation that went through the same stages of development we are going through, the development of nuclear weapons before we enter space. They of course managed to avoid wiping themselves out in a nuclear Armageddon. The jury is still out on us
In its travels though space this civilisation came across ruined worlds with past traces of civilisation until it discovered one in the active phase of nuclear self destruction. It then realised it was onto a nice little grift. Monitor these worlds until they destroyed themselves, then come in and plunder their resources. Perhaps this is what this “alien probe” is doing.
On the other hand they could be entirely benign and acting with our “best interests” at heart, assuming they have hearts, and will intervene to save us from destroying ourselves. This is unlikely because, in the story, they were terrified of only one thing. The thought of an untamed nuclear armed race spreading throughout the galaxy bringing war and pestilence wherever it went just as colonising powers did in the colonial era.
The story ended with them mulling over whether, in the case of Earth, to deliberately trigger a nuclear war to bring about our destruction. If this is the case with 3I/ATLAS we can hope they are content with eliminating Elon Musk and his other Space Bros.
@ ^ garydargan :
That’s ‘The Gentle Vultures’ witn the Hurrians who turns out are also slavers too see :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gentle_Vultures
Which was one of the first SF stories I ever read when I first discovered SF through reading my Mum’s copy of Asimov’s Nine Tomorrows’ anthology.
Let me first say that I really like this blog and all the contents he provides, and the friendliness with which he treats all questions, especially in the YouTube format. Therefore, I hate to be a contrarian, but posting comments when you agree somehow doesn’t feel right to me.
I’ve now read bits of the paper, and while I discovered some flaws, there may be a valid argument in it. Here’s my take.
The composition arguments are not convincing to me, and neither are the atypical comet emissions, because we simply don’t know the composition of interstellar objects, and we shouldn’t believe that they’re necessarily exactly like the stuff that’s flying about in our solar system. Also, the probability that the perihelion is reached opposite the earth is not too small (at 7%). It’s not surprising that it comes from an area where it’s hard to detect either, because that’s simply where the most mass is, and therefore where most interstellar objects are most likely to have originated.
A different ballgame are the orbital characteristics. These are highly unusual. The solar system ecliptic is highly tilted wrt. the galactic plane. Contrary to another comment above, I don’t see why objects that are in the solar system plane should be easier to detect. The approaches to Venus, Mars and Jupiter would cover most of the “interesting” planets where life may be found. I think there is a nonzero chance that this one may be a visitor.
At any moment, there is estimated to be hundreds of exocomets passing through the solar system (but quite few come close enough to the sun to be detectable by modern instruments, we are talking about small objects).
Loeb needs to start taking his meds to keep his obsessions under control.
We should be spending out time talking about future super-telescopes to find exoplanets, not this drivel.