Bacle H
Posts:
172
Registered:
4/8/12
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Re: Coincidence of meteor strike and close asteroid approach at same time.
Posted:
Feb 17, 2013 1:32 PM
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On Sunday, February 17, 2013 7:43:27 AM UTC-8, Mike Dworetsky wrote:
> Robert Clark wrote:
>
> > I really don't like coincidences in science. Reports are asteroids
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> > the size of 2012 DA14 getting this close occur about once in 30
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> > years. And meteors the size of the Russian one enter our atmosphere
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> > about similar frequency. But the problem is their both occurring in
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> > the same 24 hour period. If you imagine the asteroid arriving on a
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> > particular day, the question to ask is what is the probability of the
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> > Russian meteor arriving on that same day? Once in 30 years, and then
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> > 365 days in a year, means the chance of this happening is like 1 in
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> > 10,000. That's disturbingly unlikely.
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> > On the other hand if this really is just coincidence, then it should
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> > be kept in mind that chances this low have been quoted in regards to
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> > large asteroids impacting Earth in our lifetime.
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> >
>
> > Bob Clark
>
>
>
> However unlikely, the coincidence did occur. And they were on very
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> different orbits, hence unrelated physically. All you can really conclude
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> is that it was very unlikely, but it did happen.
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>
>
> By your argument, you should be deeply disturbed every time someone wins a
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> big lottery sweepstakes, or is killed by lightning. These are also rare
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> events for individuals but they do happen
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> regularly to someone in a larger population
>
I think a better comparison would be the event of someone winning the
lottery _and_ being hit by lightning, since the OP considered a pair
of unlikely events happenning at the same/similar times.
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>
> Would you be worried if they had been a week apart? A month?.
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>
>
> --
>
> Mike Dworetsky
>
>
>
> (Remove pants sp*mbl*ck to reply)
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