10-23-2015, 01:15 PM
(10-22-2015, 04:55 PM)stevebowers Wrote: After discussing this star on the Cosmoquest board, I realise that I don't really think that these observations are an indication of alien megastructures, or of a partial Dyson sphere.
As we observe more and more systems in detail, we are going to see more and more unexpected natural phenomena; these are exciting times in many ways. But just because we can't immediately explain any particular set of observations doesn't mean that we should be using 'alien megastructures' as a default explanation for any unidentified data. There are going to be a lot of really weird systems up there, even if life and/or intelligent life is not implicated.
As far as alien megastructures and life-signs are concerned, we mustn't forget that they would be alien, so need not conform to any of our preconceptions. An unconstrained factor like alien life and alien civilisation will lead to many possible false positive detections, as well as many possibilities for false negatives as well.
Turning back to the OA setting for a minute, this might make things tricky for astronomers in a civilization comparable to ours that is with the light-cone of the Terragens, unless they catch something unambiguous such as communications beam that they can decipher. Some of the theories they might invent to explain what they observe, without invoking aliens, could be quite interestingly wrong...
Stephen