I think if it was framed more as fiction it would get a better read. The title and the abstract suggest they take this possibility seriously, which is ridiculous.

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nprateem 8 days ago | parent | next [-]

The fact you think aliens are ridiculous in an infinite universe is more ridiculous.

	▲	quickthrowman 7 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Aliens existing is not ridiculous, the hubristic idea that aliens are visiting the solar system is what’s ridiculous, plus all the sensationalism around aliens from someone who should know better.
	▲	nkrisc 7 days ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		Seems equally ridiculous to expect we’d ever actually see aliens in a spatially and temporally infinite universe.
	▲	actinium226 7 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		It's not that I find aliens ridiculous, I find it ridiculous to attribute 3I/ATLAS to aliens and I find it especially ridiculous that it's coming from Harvard. They have billions of dollars in endowment and this is what they waste their time on? Maybe the administration was right to pick a fight with them.

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lloeki 7 days ago | parent | prev [-]

> if it was framed more as fiction

At some point, however fact-based, every speculation is a form of fiction, so the line is blurry ...

> The title and the abstract suggest they take this possibility seriously, which is ridiculous.

... but I'd say it's I think the idea is to take some serious and very realistic bits that have a vanishingly low probability ...

> We show that 3I/ATLAS approaches surprisingly close to Venus, Mars and Jupiter, with a probability of ≲ 0.005%

... and then walk from there as rigorously as possible.

As they say, "largely a pedagogical exercise".

There's still a line between the hardest hard sci-fi story about a Boltzmann brain and a fact-based thought experiment computing probabilities for a giant marshmallow to spontaneously appear in the vacuum of space.

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actinium226 7 days ago | parent | next [-]

Rama by Arthur C Clarke is a work of fiction, there's no blurry line there.

> We show that 3I/ATLAS approaches surprisingly close to Venus, Mars and Jupiter, with a probability of ≲ 0.005%

a) What does this even mean? If you throw a dart on a dartboard, anywhere it lands will have some probability. 1/200 doesn't seem that low.

b) It's the height of intellectual laziness and chicanery to go from not-that-low-of-probability to 'aliens'

They're free to make these claims. I'm also free to laugh at how ridiculous it is.

Now, if this thing had some précise shape, or rotational speed, or we saw it adding or subtracting delta V, or if it did gravity assists from multiple planets (not just 'flew kinda close to a couple of them'), now that would be interesting.

	▲	dlenski 7 days ago \| parent [-]
		If you read the paper, you'll find there are many improbable occurrences, rather than just this one. > > We show that 3I/ATLAS approaches surprisingly close to Venus, Mars and Jupiter, with a probability of ≲ 0.005% > > a) What does this even mean? If you throw a dart on a dartboard, anywhere it lands will have some probability. 1/200 doesn't seem that low. Not 1 in 200 here. 1 in 20,000.

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falcor84 7 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I'm actually unsure what you mean - what is that line? Why aren't both just exercises in probabilistic reasoning?