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BeepBlipBlapBloop t1_j25d53f wrote
The chances of that happening in the next 100 years are very small.
[deleted] t1_j25edv8 wrote
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tempejkl OP t1_j25ejh3 wrote
Oh ok, thanks for the answer though.
thisisjustascreename t1_j25f391 wrote
Pretty much just as likely as it was to supernova in the last 100 years.
[deleted] t1_j25fjsq wrote
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Equivalent_Ad_8413 t1_j25fqqr wrote
Actually, the odds of something already happening is known. It either happened or it didn't.
NephalemPride t1_j25fyew wrote
Very small doesn't really do it justice. I think infinitesimally slim comes closer
Dartagnan1083 t1_j25g6ba wrote
Are we talking when the star itself goes boom? When we see it? Or when the earth is affected by the wave? Those are vastly different dates on a timeline.
JustAnotherRedditAlt t1_j25ge5h wrote
Not to mention that even if it were to supernova today, we wouldn't find out about it for another ~700 years...
HarryHacker42 t1_j25gew7 wrote
Before it supernovas, Yellowstone will erupt and erase the least used 1/3rd of the USA. So think globally, die locally.
Deluxe78 t1_j25gg7z wrote
It could have supernova’d yesterday we wouldn’t know until 2,664
GraGal t1_j25gtq3 wrote
if Betelgeuse goes supernova right now, we won't know about it until 500 years from now.
thisisjustascreename t1_j25gwvi wrote
So you're saying it's 50/50
Palanquin_IR t1_j25happ wrote
Well it either has or it hasn't. But it's still going to continue looking pretty much the same to us for around 640 years after [it blows / it blew] anyway.
Ivedefected t1_j25hd76 wrote
Not when what's happening is over 500ly away.
Midwinter77 t1_j25hys9 wrote
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Turtley13 t1_j25iozr wrote
The most likely occurrence of an extinction level event will be a super volcano.
[deleted] t1_j25iwil wrote
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Vita-Malz t1_j25j0l6 wrote
How did you manage to answer the question with an actual answer that has nothing to do with the question asked? Are you a politician?
[deleted] t1_j25jc1h wrote
Unless it already supernova-ed and the evidence hasn't reached us yet.
[deleted] t1_j25jiim wrote
u/Turtley13 2024 - "You won't get what you want, but you'll get something else pretty good."
TiredOfRatRacing t1_j25jje8 wrote
Or it supernova'd in the last 600 years and the light hasnt reached us yet.
ThumbsUp2323 t1_j25jopn wrote
Right it could have happened 699 years ago and we'd have absolutely no idea.
shawnwingsit t1_j25jw3p wrote
But the good news is that disaster will bring the world together. The world will come together and heal the world will enter a golden age. And dying to redeem everyone is so on-brand for us that It's perfect.
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DarkUtensil t1_j25k4f5 wrote
We're going to find out one day that everything we see is just the remains of advanced civilizations going to war and that stars don't go supernova naturally or turn into black holes.
In all seriousness though, no one knows. The best educated guesses are either it already has or it will in the future.
Drwillpowers t1_j25kaoo wrote
Because people can understand when someone asks a question, what they're really trying to learn is sometimes is not the question they stated.
I also had the exact same interpretation of this question. I figured the person wanted to know what the odds of a local star going supernova was, because literally if that happened, it could bleach the earth clean of life.
So this answer is not unreasonable, but even if OP doesn't care about it, it doesn't hurt anybody. It was interesting for me to read anyway.
Be nice to people online. They are actual humans just like you. This person was just trying to contribute something helpful to the conversation, they didn't need to be attacked.
john_parrott t1_j25kcnd wrote
Like a giant Saving Private Ryan!!
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aspheric_cow t1_j25ki9p wrote
When we say "happen in the next 100 years," we mean "observers on Earth will see it happen in the next 100 years."
Like, supernova 1987a was the one that was visible from Earth in 1987. It actually happened about 168,000 years ago.
educones t1_j25kl4r wrote
U just got called unintelligent.
kayl_breinhar t1_j25klbf wrote
Nah, a supervolcanic eruption is definitely in the Top 5, maybe even the Top 3, but the more likely candidate in the near future is a continental biosphere collapse.
The entire biosphere won't fail everywhere, but whatever/wherever doesn't will be what everyone fights over, and that fighting/warring will be what kills whoever's left.
Vita-Malz t1_j25klxb wrote
How was my response an attack? How do you come to the conclusion that not answering the question at hand is the intelligent choice here? If I ask a question I want the question answered, not what you decide was my actual hidden question.
If OP wants to know what the odds of an extinction level event occuring was, or what it would be, he could have just as well asked exactly that.
SavienKennedy t1_j25ku2u wrote
It's a 100% guarantee.
In our lifetime, however, is another story all together.
jrdubbleu t1_j25kupy wrote
Yeah, that's how it'll work. Just like a pandemic would bring us all together.
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Xaxxon t1_j25lalm wrote
That wasn't the question. If it already supernova'd then the chances of it doing it in the next 100 years are 0.
krum t1_j25lv27 wrote
People always bring this up but you know what they mean.
slawkis t1_j25m6fo wrote
It can't decide, unfortunately :)
shawnwingsit t1_j25m7bz wrote
Don't confuse me with facts, buddy!
WhyNotDoItNowOkay t1_j25m9cm wrote
50/50. It either will or it won’t. Me be good at math.
Turtley13 t1_j25mjs3 wrote
It's a neat fact that I could share.
This isn't even tagged as a question but a discussion.
Are you familiar with reddit? 90% of comments are just nonsense.
Your comment adds nothing of value so good job being a hypocrite.
Turtley13 t1_j25mmon wrote
From climate change?
NorthernViews t1_j25mpat wrote
Unfortunately you’re right. It will probably explode in the next 500,000+ years, and I wish we were wrong in our estimates so maybe we could witness it, but it won’t happen. Universal time scales are too large.
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Vita-Malz t1_j25n2ke wrote
My comment is a question to you. Questions don't add, other than the opportunity to answer. You come across as if my response to your comment really struck a nerve. Why are you so offended?
27allen51 t1_j25n4np wrote
I don't get this. Astronomers say it is so far away , we won't see it for a long time. So how do you know it hasn't happened already?
Raspberries-Are-Evil t1_j25n4zb wrote
Slim to none.
Or its already happened and we wont know for 600 years.
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Raspberries-Are-Evil t1_j25n87a wrote
Last visible recorded was about 1,100 years ago.
phunkydroid t1_j25nbzm wrote
Betelgeuse isn't close enough to be dangerous to life on Earth.
iCantPauseItsOnline t1_j25nj5k wrote
Do you understand your headline title question and then the text specifying a 100-year timescale are two completely different questions?
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punknothing t1_j25nm6h wrote
It might have already nova'd, but we won't know for sure for another ~642.5 years. ;)
iCantPauseItsOnline t1_j25nv3g wrote
People take questions as attacks these days. Not just online, but in person as well.
It's part of America's attack on intelligence. It's socially unacceptable to question information someone just told you. They think it's okay to be upset, when instead it's critically important for us to share correct information.
GorillaP1mp t1_j25nxvf wrote
Won’t matter to us if it does, it’s not close enough to do any damage. Models suggest 25-100 light years is when you should be concerned about supernova. Betelgeuse is significantly further.
gladeye t1_j25nxv1 wrote
He man, I use that 1/3 of the USA.
Assassin_by_Birth t1_j25ny8p wrote
Plot twist, it explodes tomorrow (or yesteryear however long ago it would take for the light to reach us)
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GorillaP1mp t1_j25ohz6 wrote
GRB. Just have to be in the path, and the Ordovician extinction, which is very different from the other big 5 bears a lot of the signs it happened almost half a billion years ago.
TiredOfRatRacing t1_j25opa1 wrote
But if it already supernovaed, and we havent seen it, then from our perspective, we dont know that it has or will soon. So the chances of our seeing it are unknown since we are unaware it may have happened already.
zeeblecroid t1_j25oyry wrote
Zero - it's not burning the right elements to be near that point yet.
Stars on the road to supernovas go through a sequence of burning increasingly heavy elements for increasingly short periods of time, and Betelgeuse is still in the helium-burning phase. The following phases burn carbon, neon, oxygen and silicon in order, and once a star starts gnawing on its helium that gives observers about one thousand years' warning. Betelgeuse is 600-ish lightyears out; if it was most of the way through that process we'd be able to tell.
Equivalent_Ad_8413 t1_j25pa9z wrote
I'm pretty sure he means adjusted for speed of light limitations.
Turtley13 t1_j25pdau wrote
What are the frequencies of these occurring?
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StarVoyager96 t1_j25pqre wrote
It probably will go supernova in the near term on a cosmic time scale but that can mean anything between now and millions of years from now.
Ivedefected t1_j25pykf wrote
Even so, there are unknown knowns and unknown unknowns.
shuckster t1_j25q6fd wrote
The whole “it might have happened already” argument that everyone says about these things might not turn out right.
I mean, if the warping of spacetime for the purpose of FTL travel isn’t possible under any condition, then we can say causality itself propagates at the speed-of-light.
Which means Betelgeuse will explode when we see it explode, not “600 years ago already”.
GorillaP1mp t1_j25q76c wrote
Several times a day, but I should clarify that you would still need to be fairly close, say 50-100 light years away, and then also be directly in the path. I think Eta is the closest binary capable of producing GRB and it’s 7500 light years or more and offset 45 degrees so we wouldn’t be in the path anyways. Universe is a big place.
EDIT: I only have the most rudimentary of knowledge in this area, and even that’s a stretch. I would verify.
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Xaxxon t1_j25qri6 wrote
stars don't just randomly go supernova. There is a long and predictable lifecycle of stars that lasts way longer than 500ish years.
Lucid-Machine t1_j25qvud wrote
No one will appreciate your boondocks reference.
AriochQ t1_j25r7x0 wrote
I think they were probably referring to visible with the naked eye.
Skyhawk_Illusions t1_j25rbt6 wrote
No, this is not true. Only stars beyond a certain weight can supernova. Our sun will simply condense to a white dwarf
donzzler t1_j25rcaq wrote
Not all stars will supernova. Our sun for example.
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led76 t1_j25relh wrote
Not all stars will supernova and Betelgeuse is not that far.
AncientMarinerCVN65 t1_j25rer7 wrote
Not true. Most stars aren't massive enough to go Supernova. Like our sun, they will swell to become red giants, slowly lose their outer material, and shrink to become white dwarves.
jidar t1_j25rgnr wrote
I was going to argue at the start of your post but you stuck the landing.
Okay yeah, causality travels at c.
_A_Good_Cunt_ t1_j25rncv wrote
Wow, man you deserve a price for the most amount of wrong facts in a reply
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AncientMarinerCVN65 t1_j25sp5j wrote
That's how I understand it, as well. And when it does go Supernova, it's too far away to do serious damage to Earth. It will give off enough light to be as bright as a half moon for about a month. It will even be visible during daylight, but the blast wave will dissipate to almost nothing by the time it reaches us. We'll just have really nice aurorae for a few years as the stellar remains wash over our Solar System (centuries after we see the Supernova itself, since what's left of the star will be traveling below the speed of light).
AnferneeThrowaway t1_j25sv57 wrote
so, are you gonna sit there all smug, or are you going to share your knowledge with the community?
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meinblown t1_j25t662 wrote
The chances of it not happening in the next 100 years are very small as well.
AriochQ t1_j25t7ah wrote
Kepler’s Supernova was 1604. He is probably referring to the one from Chinese records in 185 A.D. EDIT: there are also a few from around 1000 AD that we’re visible to the naked eye.
Open-Alternative-979 t1_j25taxx wrote
Why is your google not working or something?
kayl_breinhar t1_j25tdjk wrote
Not just one factor. Climate change is one part of the whole when it comes to biosphere collapse. Massive use of persistent pesticides have disrupted the beneficial insect life on the planet - not just the bees. Microplastics in combination with warming and increasingly deoxygenated seas in combination with massive overfishing are killing ocean life. The percentage of wildlife on the planet is the lowest it's ever been since hominids first showed up, and we just keep making more of ourselves.
Seanspeed t1_j25tm2c wrote
It's not a problem at all for anybody who does the reasonable thing and reads the OP before responding.
BeepBlipBlapBloop t1_j25ts7u wrote
The chances of it not happening are enormous.
ImNoAlbertFeinstein t1_j25u503 wrote
would we get irradiated ..if and when the supernova appeared ?
tempejkl OP t1_j25u61g wrote
Well yeah. Betelgeuse is nearing the end of its lifespan. That’s why I asked.
blackadder1620 t1_j25uag1 wrote
crab nebula was made about 1000 year afaik, maybe that one?
tempejkl OP t1_j25ucs8 wrote
Betelgeuse’s supernova won’t be an extinction level event anyway
tim_worst_isthe_best t1_j25udyb wrote
It's already happened ... we just haven't seen it
Open-Alternative-979 t1_j25ueyj wrote
Can’t believe I got downvoted for this lol. 1987 people. February 1987 holy shit. A world were people are out on blast for being correct is a weird world to live it
tempejkl OP t1_j25uga4 wrote
I know about this, but can we see what elements a star that far away is burning? How does that work?
tacoeater1234 t1_j25ulhp wrote
This is how I like to look at the progression of time. It's much simpler and consistent, in a lot of ways.
tempejkl OP t1_j25uma4 wrote
I don’t think the response was an attack.
Taxoro t1_j25un5i wrote
>then we can say causality itself propagates at the speed-of-light.
You got it backwards lol. What we call speed of light or 3*10^8 m/s is actually the speed of causality. That's why it's denoted as "c". It's light that propagates at the speed of causality.
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Xaxxon t1_j25upuz wrote
> Scientists don’t expect Betelgeuse’s weird behavior to result in a supernova explosion anytime soon
BeepBlipBlapBloop t1_j25ut16 wrote
No. But it'd be bright enough that we could see it in the sky during the day and it would be the brightest object in the night sky.
tacoeater1234 t1_j25uwng wrote
Female wallabies have three vaginas.
tempejkl OP t1_j25uxah wrote
Not vastly different on a cosmic anyway. I was asking about when we see it. Because it would look cool.
Turtley13 t1_j25uyo4 wrote
True. I thought it may have been closer given the question.
tempejkl OP t1_j25v3a3 wrote
I meant when we see it.
tempejkl OP t1_j25v4b8 wrote
Fair enough.
horsesizedpuppy t1_j25v61e wrote
Yellowstone may not ever erupt again if the Rockies move over the hotspot before it does. Or it may be millions of years until it is east of them.
ChubbyWanKenobie t1_j25v6ba wrote
It would be amazing to see a supernova light up our sky before I am dust.
tempejkl OP t1_j25vj7d wrote
Probably not. It takes 600 years for us to see it. That means it’s going to happen between now and 100000 years from now.
[deleted] t1_j25vn33 wrote
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tempejkl OP t1_j25vo71 wrote
Truly a once-in-a-lifetime event.
space-ModTeam t1_j25vpft wrote
Hello u/tempejkl, your submission "How likely is it that Betelgeuse will supernova?" has been removed from r/space because:
- Such questions should be asked in the "All space questions" thread stickied at the top of the sub.
Please read the rules in the sidebar and check r/space for duplicate submissions before posting. If you have any questions about this removal please message the r/space moderators. Thank you.
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Larry_Phischman t1_j25vrtz wrote
There’s less than a 1% chance that it will go supernova in the next century. About a 10% chance that it will go off in the next 10,000 years. And it’s almost certain that it will explode in the next 200,000 years. We can’t see what is going on in it’s interior, or what stage of its fusion cycle it’s in. It’s probably still fusing hydrogen or maybe helium.
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Pleasant_Carpenter37 t1_j25w2gb wrote
You know how fireworks flash different colors? We put different things in the fireworks to make different colors. Aluminum burns white, barium burns green, etc.
The same thing is true in stars. We basically look at the light coming from a star, count up the mixture of colors we see, do some complicated math, and that gives us an estimate of what it's doing.
If you want more detail than my crude eli5 can give you, read up on spectroscopy.
Milk_Tea5011 t1_j25wf67 wrote
yes, the probability of me becoming the president of the US is 50%, I either do or dont
shuckster t1_j25wu96 wrote
> The speed of light in vacuum is usually denoted by a lowercase c, for "constant" or the Latin celeritas (meaning 'swiftness, celerity')
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_light
Still, even if you were right I don’t think you need convincing that many here are optimistic about warp-drives eventually becoming an actual thing.
If so, then we’ll have to choose another letter for “c”. I’d vote for “b”, meaning “bulb” in honour of that sly huckster Edison.
KorgX3 t1_j25wybp wrote
This chances of it never happening are possibly higher.
KitchenSandwich5499 t1_j25xtdw wrote
1987’s supernova in the maggelenic cloud was visible to the naked eye, though dimly.
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ChubbyWanKenobie t1_j260rnx wrote
Have to say, all that Betelgeuse chat had me out back with my telescope, freezing my butt off hoping to see it pop.
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tempejkl OP t1_j263wiw wrote
Oh ok thanks.
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Drwillpowers t1_j26f575 wrote
What is the exact distance to which we actually have to give a shit? I'm genuinely curious if you happen to know.
JustAnotherRedditAlt t1_j26nmtz wrote
True, but if the star suddenly started acting very unstable and scientists believed it was going to supernova "soon", it probably went supernova 400-600 years ago and our children's children will be the ones to see it light up the sky...
JustAnotherRedditAlt t1_j26nrgh wrote
perspective, perspective... /s
JustAnotherRedditAlt t1_j26o089 wrote
Well, there will likely be increased activity some years (or centuries) before it actually goes boom...
ThumbsUp2323 t1_j26pvdx wrote
Like regions of the star's surface rapidly cooling unexpectedly? Gargantuan clouds of gas exploding thousands of miles into space? The fallout from these eruptions being so dense and vast that it reduced the star's brightness by more than a factor of 2?
HarryHacker42 t1_j26v04n wrote
A decision had to be made. Sorry, you didn't make the cut.
HarryHacker42 t1_j26v5a7 wrote
Same as with climate change!
The only thing bringing this world together is continental drift. We're on our way back to Pangea, just very, very slowly.
Overlander2112 t1_j271s54 wrote
So, you’re saying there’s a chance…what was all that one in a million talk?
MysterTery t1_j27hnmc wrote
Chances are small.... but NEVER ZERO
Vita-Malz t1_j29dq0x wrote
Now that is a neat fact. But I do not wanna know how you found out.
_d3vnull_ t1_j25ct5w wrote
Im pretty sure i readed lately it is estimated that this star will go supernova in something between 100.000 and 1.000.000 years. So.. chance for it to be happen in the next 100 years is not that big