Education

Harvard Prof Believes An Alien Spaceship Is Flying By Jupiter

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A Harvard University professor believes an alien spaceship could be flying by Jupiter despite criticism from other scientists saying the object could be a sort of rock.

Avi Loeb, who is also Harvard’s Department of Astronomy Chair, said an object called “‘Oumuamua” could be a “fully operational probe sent intentionally to Earth,” according to a research paper published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters in November 2018. The paper, whose co-author is Shmuel Bialy, said this was an “exotic scenario,” however.

‘Oumuamua, which means “visitor from afar arriving first” in Hawaiian, was the first interstellar object discovered in October 2017 by the Pan-STARRS telescope in Hawaii, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

Loeb clarified to The Daily Caller News Foundation over email he is not convinced about the spaceship theory, but “we should contemplate” based on strange characteristics of the object.

The object did not appear to be a “typical comet or typical asteroid,” was “unusually shiny,” and the “dynamical origin of ‘Oumuamua is extremely rare,” Loeb wrote in the Scientific American.

Loeb has received criticism from several scientists, however, since bringing up the theory, according to the Washington Post Monday.

My publicist asked me for a quote on the ‘Oumuamua story making the rounds. Here it is:

“No, ‘Oumuamua is not an alien spaceship, and the authors of the paper insult honest scientific inquiry to even suggest it.”

Feel free to use that, @fcain, @tariqjmalik!

— Paul M. Sutter (@PaulMattSutter) November 6, 2018

“No, ‘Oumuamua is not an alien spaceship, and the authors of the paper insult honest scientific inquiry to even suggest it,” Ohio State University astrophysicist Paul Sutter said in a November 2018 tweet, WaPo reported.

“Sometimes you write a paper about something that you don’t believe to be true at all, just for the purpose of putting out there,” North Carolina State University astrophysicist Katie Mack said, according to The Verge.

Astrophysicist Ethan Siegel called Loeb and Bialy’s explanation “sensationalist, ill-motivated science” in a November 2018 Forbes article.

Loeb said to TheDCNF that Harvard has been “very supportive” despite the push back from others, with the university even publishing an article on the professor’s theory.

The extraterrestrial object is moving away from Earth and is “too faint to be observed by our best telescope,” according to Loeb.

Loeb has been published in hundreds of astronomical publications and has had 30 years of Ivy League professorships, according to WaPo.

Harvard did not immediately respond to TheDCNF’s request for comment.

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