Jason Wright
@Astro_Wright
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Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at Penn State. Son, husband, father, scientist, teacher, student, human, Earthling. Mostly posting astronomy. Mostly.
State College, PA, USA
Joined September 2012
New images of interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS are coming in as it moves out of the Sun's glare and (barely) back into view. This shot, by Michael Buechner and Frank Niebling, shows an intriguing anti-tail and a "smoking" tail. https://t.co/2LvkP6qiDJ
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Amid all the hype and counter-hype, let’s make sure we forefront all the amazing work being done to study our new interstellar visitor! https://t.co/R1xsePrpdU
scientificamerican.com
Astronomers are hustling to use interplanetary spacecraft to study the interstellar comet dubbed 3I/ATLAS while the sun is hiding it from Earth
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Here is a great review from @LeeBillings on the actual science around 3I/Atlas. It seems like lots of folks won't care about this amazing object unless it turns out to be aliens - which it won't (though I'd be psyched too be wrong). https://t.co/o7P7QEfDF0
scientificamerican.com
Astronomers are hustling to use interplanetary spacecraft to study the interstellar comet dubbed 3I/ATLAS while the sun is hiding it from Earth
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@cosmicfactfile This is why I’m a little more vocal on the comet. I learnt from the LHC experience that what seems like fun scientific speculation (in that case around micro black holes - which would have been very difficult to detect and posed no threat to the LHC!) can cause genuine distress
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@cosmicfactfile This is for me a key point - people get genuinely worried about stuff like this. We had a similar issue with LHC many years ago - and that was before social media was as daft as it is today!
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"3I/ATLAS may be revving an engine, Harvard professor suggests". As the comet starts its journey out of our Solar System as expected, paying us no special attention, I am reminded of the insignificance of humankind or any one individual in the grand scheme of the Universe.
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I've summarized the truth about Loeb's 10 "anomalies" about 3I/ATLAS in one post. Thanks to @Deschscoveries, Michael Busch, @aciqra, and @TMEubanks for contributing their expertise! https://t.co/psonqLVhd0
sites.psu.edu
Avi Loeb continues to claim that 3I/ATLAS has many anomalous behaviors that lead to the conclusion that it “might” be an alien spacecraft. He carefully hedges the probability that it is a spacecraft...
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My BlueSky feed is filled with hot takes on the up-to-the-minute results of tonight’s elections and people sharing their wins, while my X feed is full of furious arguments about superhero movies, promoted posts, clickbait, and ragebait.
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I did a fun podcast! Sorry to be a party pooper, but humanity will not build a Dyson Sphere around the Sun in our lifetimes. https://t.co/BzgnxfWzP3
sites.psu.edu
Yes, Betteridge’s Law applies here! I did a fun podcast interview here with Prakash Narayanan (@8teAPi) about Dyson Spheres: The framing is that some commentators had suggested humanity might build a...
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(My point being there's no reason to think that *this one* will do something dramatic like invade Earth with aliens just because we happened to notice it).
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“I've taken that same anointing upon Ronald, speaking of Ronald Reagan, and I've put it upon my Donald .” @TheElijahList @ElijahStreamsTV
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People should remember that these interstellar comets come through the Solar System *all the time.* Only in the past decade have we had the technology to notice them.
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With Loeb's talk of an alien messiah around this comet we're getting dangerously close to Heaven's Gate territory. I find his hints and teasing about how life on Earth might be upended due to this comet's passage to be incredibly irresponsible.
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And most importantly 3) There is NOTHING to be concerned about I know Loeb has gotten a lot of people freaked out about this thing, because they email me and post here and other places and email him.
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But 1) We expect interstellar comets to have differences from Oort cloud comets for many reasons 2) It's not so anomalous that *anyone* who studies comets thinks it could *possibly* be anything other than a comet. It's just Loeb, who is out of his field
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Loeb highlighted today in his blog this unusual brightening. If he stays true to form, he'll spend a while thinking why this "anomaly" argues it's an alien spaceship, then add it to his list and update his "Loeb Scale." https://t.co/JTHnHHyzp2
arxiv.org
Interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS has been approaching its 2025 October 29 perihelion while opposite the Sun from Earth, hindering ground-based optical observations over the preceding month. However,...
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Just to get ahead of Him: 3I/ATLAS is brightening at an unusually high rate through perhelion. This could be because its approach towards the Sun is happening much faster than typical for a comet (because it's interstellar) and this makes ices sublimate faster than normal.
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No, That Harvard Astronomer has not shown that 3I/ATLAS is around 5 km in diameter. [Lots of incorrect assumptions plus a simple factor of 6 error] https://t.co/6PgVlVSyrW
sites.psu.edu
So, in a preprint and in many blog posts, Loeb is claiming that he and others have estimated the mass of 3I/ATLAS from the lack of any measured non-gravitational acceleration. He keeps repeating...
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Are there other examples? In general, it seems like one generally avoids having a catastrophic single point of failure like that, so they must be pretty rare and niche, yes?
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Most companies chase no-code. These guys did the opposite. Instead of replacing engineers, @timgdelisle & @chriscrane, Co-Founder Fiveonefour, built tools that make devs 10x faster. Here’s what we discussed: • Why “developer-first” beats “no-code” • How simplifying code
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