RE: Are we alone? Bets are we're not.
July 10, 2019 at 6:22 pm
(This post was last modified: July 10, 2019 at 6:29 pm by Anomalocaris.)
Because we know exactly how the way with which we detect these exoplanets work, we can be very confident in estimating how many more planets similar to those 4000 must exist in the same volume of space, but which because of some factors known to be largely random did not align with us, our current technical abilities would have failed to detect.
I think it is very fair estimate that in the same volume of space where these 4000 planets exist, for every one of those 4000 plants we detected because of correct alignment of orbital planes, correct alignment with background stars, etc , there must be >>100 similar planets that we can not detect because of wrong alignement of orbital planes, incorrect alignment with back ground stars, etc.
Those are just planets similar to the ones we have already detected. We know there are types of planets that must exist which we can not yet detect at all, such as planets with longer orbital periods, planets in orbital planes perpendicular to our line of sight, planets gravitationally ejected from their home systems, etc, and these likely far outnumber the types we can detect.
It's probably safe to say in the very same overall volume of space occupied by most of those 4000 planets we detected, there are probably millions to tens of millions of planets we have not yet detected.
And the overall volume of space occupied by most of these 4000 planets we've found so far is a tiny fraction of the volume of the milky way.
I think it is very fair estimate that in the same volume of space where these 4000 planets exist, for every one of those 4000 plants we detected because of correct alignment of orbital planes, correct alignment with background stars, etc , there must be >>100 similar planets that we can not detect because of wrong alignement of orbital planes, incorrect alignment with back ground stars, etc.
Those are just planets similar to the ones we have already detected. We know there are types of planets that must exist which we can not yet detect at all, such as planets with longer orbital periods, planets in orbital planes perpendicular to our line of sight, planets gravitationally ejected from their home systems, etc, and these likely far outnumber the types we can detect.
It's probably safe to say in the very same overall volume of space occupied by most of those 4000 planets we detected, there are probably millions to tens of millions of planets we have not yet detected.
And the overall volume of space occupied by most of these 4000 planets we've found so far is a tiny fraction of the volume of the milky way.
