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Star quality
The back pages Almost the last word Are owls brainy enough to justify their role as a symbol for mental prowess?
Star quality With the enormous pressure and temperatures within Jupiter, what is the chance that one day it could ignite and turn itself into a star?
Mike Follows Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands, UK The smallest known stars are red dwarfs. EBLM J0555-57Ab, which is about 600 light years away, is the current record holder for the star with the least mass. It is slightly smaller than Saturn and has about 6.4 per cent the mass of the sun or about 70 times the mass of Jupiter. Richard Swifte Darmstadt, Germany This subject was a theme in Arthur C. Clarke’s novel 2010: Odyssey Two in which Jupiter turns into a star, albeit with help from alien monoliths that increase the planet’s density past a critical point. This is the key factor in 54 | New Scientist | 2 November 2019
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Hillary Shaw Newport, Shropshire, UK Jupiter’s diameter is in fact larger than that of the smallest star, at 140,000 kilometres against 121,000 km for the tiniest star. However it is mass, not size, that counts. This determines the internal pressure that, if sufficiently high, can overcome the mutual repulsion of hydrogen nuclei and convert these to helium through nuclear fusion. This releases the huge amount of energy that makes stars shine. If a large cloud of interstellar gas came Jupiter’s way, maybe the planet could gain enough extra mass to start fusion. Fusion would be short lived if it became a brown dwarf, an object midway between star and planet. If it accreted even more mass, just enough to become a true star, it would be a dim red dwarf. Its radiation would barely affect us and it wouldn’t look very different to now. A bigger worry would be Jupiter’s increased mass disrupting the solar system, not to mention the raised temperature of the sun, as a result of it capturing most of the gas cloud.
Of course all of these formulas are there to be subverted, inverted and played with, but all good communication can ultimately be likened to a story structure.
This week’s new questions Twit or true? Owls have become a symbol of wisdom. Are they really so intelligent compared with other birds? Subramaniam Divakaran, Euless, Texas, US Dead before his time I have just read Poor Little Warrior, a story about a man who time travels to the dinosaur era, dies there and is fossilised. Can we be sure hominin fossils haven’t met a similar fate? Edward Mynors, Walderton, West Sussex, UK
going from giant planet to star. Exact figures are uncertain, but calculations suggest Jupiter would need to be 80 times as massive as it is to turn into a small red dwarf star. Another possibility, though, is a brown dwarf, which is a kind of half-star. This isn’t massive enough for ordinary hydrogen to fuse into helium as in most stars. Instead it uses the rarer hydrogen isotope deuterium. First predicted by theory in the 1960s, several brown dwarfs have been found, faint objects emitting mostly infrared radiation. It is estimated a brown dwarf needs to be about 13 times the mass of Jupiter.
Once upon a time Why does my brain like fictional stories?
Graham Lawton London, UK In two words: survival value. Stories are part of our evolved nature, and are regarded as the
fundamental unit of human communication for the simple reason that they increase our reproductive fitness. They package up complex and potentially life‑saving information into a digestible, relatable and, crucially, memorable format. This was vital for disseminating information orally, the only means for passing on knowledge for most of our evolutionary history. Stories raise and resolve moral ambiguities, give us heroes to root for and villains to hate. They are often formulaic and predictable, which we also like. The “inciting incident” is a well-known story element that gives the protagonist a goal that they strive for while being thwarted by forces beyond their control. Such stories allow us to marshal our messy real lives.
Izzy Hanson Bishopbriggs, Glasgow, UK I would recommend reading any decent introduction to writing screenplays, which say that story is everything and the primary job of the writer is to create a story that “grabs the brain by the ears”. The brain seems to be a narrative junkie: that’s how it makes sense of the world, even in science. This might be a survival trait, helping us to know what to expect from the world. The only problem is that once the brain has grabbed hold of a story, it hangs on. Even if it is wrong… which is another story. David Muir Edinburgh, UK Our ancestors would have cemented relationships with storytelling. Stories enhance cohesion and cooperation, giving an evolutionary advantage. We are neurologically adapted to enjoy stories. The brain chemistry of early people would have evolved through natural selection to that which we possess today, and they would have responded to a story much like us. We empathise with fictional heroes and emotionally live their predicaments and struggles, all accompanied by a cascade of neurotransmitters in our brain. When a hero comes good or a baddie gets their comeuppance, we experience a chemical hit in the brain’s pleasure centre, and we like it. We want more, so we buy the next book in the series. Enjoying stories is addictive. ❚
Want to send us a question or answer?
Email us at [email protected] Questions should be about everyday science phenomena Full terms and conditions at newscientist.com/lw-terms
Star quality With the enormous pressure and temperatures within Jupiter, what is the chance that one day it could ignite and turn itself into a star?
Mike Follows Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands, UK The smallest known stars are red dwarfs. EBLM J0555-57Ab, which is about 600 light years away, is the current record holder for the star with the least mass. It is slightly smaller than Saturn and has about 6.4 per cent the mass of the sun or about 70 times the mass of Jupiter. Richard Swifte Darmstadt, Germany This subject was a theme in Arthur C. Clarke’s novel 2010: Odyssey Two in which Jupiter turns into a star, albeit with help from alien monoliths that increase the planet’s density past a critical point. This is the key factor in 54 | New Scientist | 2 November 2019
IMAGEBROKER.COM/ARDEA
Hillary Shaw Newport, Shropshire, UK Jupiter’s diameter is in fact larger than that of the smallest star, at 140,000 kilometres against 121,000 km for the tiniest star. However it is mass, not size, that counts. This determines the internal pressure that, if sufficiently high, can overcome the mutual repulsion of hydrogen nuclei and convert these to helium through nuclear fusion. This releases the huge amount of energy that makes stars shine. If a large cloud of interstellar gas came Jupiter’s way, maybe the planet could gain enough extra mass to start fusion. Fusion would be short lived if it became a brown dwarf, an object midway between star and planet. If it accreted even more mass, just enough to become a true star, it would be a dim red dwarf. Its radiation would barely affect us and it wouldn’t look very different to now. A bigger worry would be Jupiter’s increased mass disrupting the solar system, not to mention the raised temperature of the sun, as a result of it capturing most of the gas cloud.
Of course all of these formulas are there to be subverted, inverted and played with, but all good communication can ultimately be likened to a story structure.
This week’s new questions Twit or true? Owls have become a symbol of wisdom. Are they really so intelligent compared with other birds? Subramaniam Divakaran, Euless, Texas, US Dead before his time I have just read Poor Little Warrior, a story about a man who time travels to the dinosaur era, dies there and is fossilised. Can we be sure hominin fossils haven’t met a similar fate? Edward Mynors, Walderton, West Sussex, UK
going from giant planet to star. Exact figures are uncertain, but calculations suggest Jupiter would need to be 80 times as massive as it is to turn into a small red dwarf star. Another possibility, though, is a brown dwarf, which is a kind of half-star. This isn’t massive enough for ordinary hydrogen to fuse into helium as in most stars. Instead it uses the rarer hydrogen isotope deuterium. First predicted by theory in the 1960s, several brown dwarfs have been found, faint objects emitting mostly infrared radiation. It is estimated a brown dwarf needs to be about 13 times the mass of Jupiter.
Once upon a time Why does my brain like fictional stories?
Graham Lawton London, UK In two words: survival value. Stories are part of our evolved nature, and are regarded as the
fundamental unit of human communication for the simple reason that they increase our reproductive fitness. They package up complex and potentially life‑saving information into a digestible, relatable and, crucially, memorable format. This was vital for disseminating information orally, the only means for passing on knowledge for most of our evolutionary history. Stories raise and resolve moral ambiguities, give us heroes to root for and villains to hate. They are often formulaic and predictable, which we also like. The “inciting incident” is a well-known story element that gives the protagonist a goal that they strive for while being thwarted by forces beyond their control. Such stories allow us to marshal our messy real lives.
Izzy Hanson Bishopbriggs, Glasgow, UK I would recommend reading any decent introduction to writing screenplays, which say that story is everything and the primary job of the writer is to create a story that “grabs the brain by the ears”. The brain seems to be a narrative junkie: that’s how it makes sense of the world, even in science. This might be a survival trait, helping us to know what to expect from the world. The only problem is that once the brain has grabbed hold of a story, it hangs on. Even if it is wrong… which is another story. David Muir Edinburgh, UK Our ancestors would have cemented relationships with storytelling. Stories enhance cohesion and cooperation, giving an evolutionary advantage. We are neurologically adapted to enjoy stories. The brain chemistry of early people would have evolved through natural selection to that which we possess today, and they would have responded to a story much like us. We empathise with fictional heroes and emotionally live their predicaments and struggles, all accompanied by a cascade of neurotransmitters in our brain. When a hero comes good or a baddie gets their comeuppance, we experience a chemical hit in the brain’s pleasure centre, and we like it. We want more, so we buy the next book in the series. Enjoying stories is addictive. ❚
Want to send us a question or answer?
Email us at [email protected] Questions should be about everyday science phenomena Full terms and conditions at newscientist.com/lw-terms