NY post new article on Oumuamua, and why this harvard astronomer is so sure it is alien

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In his upcoming book, “Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth” (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), out Jan. 26, the professor lays out a compelling case for why an object that recently wandered into our solar system was not just another rock but actually a piece of alien technology.

The object in question traveled toward our solar system from the direction of Vega, a nearby star 25 light-years away, and intercepted our solar system’s orbital plane on Sept. 6, 2017.

On Sept. 9, its trajectory brought it closest to the sun. At the end of September, it blasted at about 58,900 miles per hour past Venus’ orbital distance, and then, on Oct. 7, it shot past Earth’s before “moving swiftly toward the constellation Pegasus and the blackness beyond,” Loeb writes in the book.

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The space object was dubbed ‘Oumuamua (pronounced “oh moo ah moo ah”), which is Hawaiian for — roughly — “scout.”

As space travelers go, it was relatively small at just about 100 yards long, but it was a big deal in the scientific community.

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it was the first interstellar object ever detected inside our solar system. Judging from the object’s trajectory, astronomers concluded it was not bound by the sun’s gravity — which suggested it was just traveling through.

No crisp photos could be taken, but astronomers were able to train their telescopes on the object for 11 days, collecting reams of other data.

At first, scientists thought it was an ordinary comet. But Loeb said that assumption ran the risk of allowing “the familiar to define what we might discover.”

“What would happen if a caveman saw a cellphone?” he asked. “He’s seen rocks all his life, and he would have thought it was just a shiny rock.”

Loeb soon opened his mind to another possibility: It was not a comet but discarded tech from an alien civilization.

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Astronomers looked at the way the object reflected sunlight. Its brightness varied tenfold every eight hours, suggesting that was the amount of time it took for it to complete a full rotation.

Scientists concluded the object was at least five to ten times longer than it was wide — sort of like the shape of a cigar.

No naturally occurring space body we’ve ever seen has looked like it — or even close.

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What’s more, ‘Oumuamua was unusually bright. It was at least “ten times more reflective than typical solar system [stony] asteroids or comets,” the author writes.

He likens its surface to that of shiny metal.

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But the anomaly that really pushed Loeb toward his E.T. hypothesis was the way ‘Oumuamua moved.

“The excess push away from the sun — that was the thing that broke the camel’s back,” he said.

Using physics, scientists can calculate the exact path an object should take and what speed it should travel due to the gravitational force exerted by the sun. The sun’s pull will speed up an object massively as it gets closer, then kick it out the other side, only for the object to slow considerably as it gets farther away.

But ‘Oumuamua didn’t follow this calculated trajectory. The object, in fact, accelerated “slightly, but to a highly statistically significant extent,” Loeb writes, as it moved away from the sun.

In other words, it was clearly being pushed by a force besides the sun’s gravity alone.

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Loeb believes it is being propelled by a "light sail"

Some 400 years ago, astronomer Johannes Kepler observed comet tails blowing in what looked like a solar breeze and wondered if that same force could propel rocket ships through space like the wind pushes boats through water.

It was a smart idea that scientists now use to develop light sails for probes. Thin, reflective sheeting is unfurled in space to capture the particles streaming off the sun, propelling a ship at great speeds through the empty void. Alternatively, powerful lasers from earth could be aimed at the sail to make it go even faster.

Loeb, who is involved in a light-sail project to send a tiny, unmanned craft to a nearby star, said if we earthlings have thought of this idea, then why couldn’t aliens?

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