
Strange Signals from the Nearby Red Dwarf Star Ross 128 - r721
http://phl.upr.edu/library/notes/ross128
======
canadaj
Shivans.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descent:_FreeSpace_–_The_Great...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descent:_FreeSpace_–_The_Great_War#)

~~~
Fjolsvith
OMG the best space combat game ever! Wished it ran on modern windows in high
res...

~~~
canadaj
Check out FreeSpace 2, it's got some incredible mods and runs on W10 at any
resolution if I remember correctly.

~~~
sundvor
Nice, I loved Freespace and Freespace 2 - but haven't looked at the mods.

I'm currently into Star Citizen, Elite Dangerous, and have also backed
[http://starfighterinc.gamepedia.com/Starfighter_Inc_Wiki](http://starfighterinc.gamepedia.com/Starfighter_Inc_Wiki)
which looks really promising. Oh and Eve-Online, however that's not first
person as such.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Nice, I loved Freespace and Freespace 2 - but haven 't looked at the mods._

Do check out FreeSpace Source Code Project[0]. They've upgraded the code and
assets to make the game look great on current machines. AFAIK it still
requires the original game for the Single Player campaign (easy to obtain
through GOG).

As for mods changing things, I highly recommend Battlestar Galactica: Diaspora
Mod[1]. It's even better than it looks on the promo[2], and you can do most
(all?) of the tricks Vipers did on the show. And you can fly a Raptor too.
Single Player storyline is well made, with great voiceovers, and doesn't break
continuity with the show.

Oh, and I totally second 'Fjolsvith - FS/FS2 is the best space combat game
ever!

\--

[0] - [http://scp.indiegames.us/](http://scp.indiegames.us/)

[1] - [http://diaspora.hard-light.net/](http://diaspora.hard-light.net/)

[2] -
[https://www.youtube.com/embed/DWt2m1xtJbw](https://www.youtube.com/embed/DWt2m1xtJbw)

~~~
sundvor
Cheers, appreciate that. I've lost the physical installers for all my old
games but will try to check it out. Looking forward to it!

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noahdesu
Is seems like there is a more recent update [0] to the topic than the linked-
to page, but it is really technical and perhaps just a data update.

[0]:
[http://phl.upr.edu/library/notes/barnard](http://phl.upr.edu/library/notes/barnard)

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pavement

      V* RY Sex
    

How this particular red dwarf came to obtain such a name, gives me an inkling
that whoever did it must have known the effect it would have on search
engines.

[http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/sim-
id?Ident=V*+RY+Sex](http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=V*+RY+Sex)

~~~
wolfgang42
This seems to be a perfectly ordinary name for a variable star:

    
    
        V*  - Variable star
        RY  - 16th discovered [^]
        Sex - in the constellation Sextans
    

[^]: The numbering is a bit strange, it starts at R and goes R, S, T, ..., X,
Y, Z, RR, RS, RT and so on. [Edit: I originally did the math completely wrong
and said that this was the 50th.]

For more details:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variable_star_designation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variable_star_designation)

~~~
PhasmaFelis
Starting a numbering system with "R" may seem weird, but it's perfectly in
character for the discipline that declared "metal" to mean "everything in the
universe except hydrogen and helium."

~~~
Factory
"the 2% of the universe that isn't hydrogen and helium", surely.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
"The interesting 2% of the universe."

(Though I thought it was rather less than 1%? Enh, apparently I'm too lazy to
check Wikipedia right now.)

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somedangedname
It's worth pointing out that this is a different star than the dimming /
'Dyson sphere' star KIC 8462852 which was covered in the press earlier in the
year.

All very exciting!

~~~
jorgec
A Dyson Sphere is impractical and not viable.

~~~
baking
When people say "Dyson Sphere" they are frequently talking about Dyson Swarms
or Dyson Bubbles because a solid "Dyson Shell" is inherently unstable.

~~~
CamperBob2
_When people say "Dyson Sphere" they are frequently talking about Dyson Swarms
or Dyson Bubbles because a solid "Dyson Shell" is inherently unstable._

Gonna go out on a limb here and suggest that a civilization capable of
building a Dyson structure is not _entirely_ unfamiliar with control theory.

~~~
Filligree
A more serious problem (with the solid version) is that no material imaginable
could withstand the compressive forces involved.

~~~
taneq
Scrith has enough tensile strength, so I'd imagine it could have similar
compressive strength...

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SideburnsOfDoom
Scrith is a fictional "unobtanium".

"The tensile strength of scrith is theorized to be similar to the Strong
nuclear force" which means "god-level magic involved".

[http://larryniven.wikia.com/wiki/Scrith](http://larryniven.wikia.com/wiki/Scrith)

~~~
taneq
It sure is imaginable, though.

~~~
SideburnsOfDoom
That's a low bar: we can imagine things that are impossible. We can imagine
things that aren't even self-consistent.

See the open pages of chapter 5 - "The Possible and the Actual"
[http://www.inf.fu-berlin.de/lehre/pmo/eng/Dennett-
Darwin%27s...](http://www.inf.fu-berlin.de/lehre/pmo/eng/Dennett-
Darwin%27sDangerousIdea.pdf)

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SubiculumCode
I'm no astronomer, but interstellar mysteries are cool...so are stellar ones.

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gbugniot
SETI analysis:
[http://seti.berkeley.edu/ross128.pdf](http://seti.berkeley.edu/ross128.pdf)

TL;DR No evidence of aliens.

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c3534l
It's not aliens.

