Anytime anything even remotely unusual happens in space, you can bet that there will be people who say that it must be aliens. Usually, these are regular people who happen to enjoy alien conspiracies, and they can largely be ignored.

In the case of the 3I/ATLAS object, however, one of the people saying that it is possible that it is an alien craft is a respected astronomer, Avi Loeb.

He wrote a paper and published a blog post supporting the claim. Though, to be clear, he doesn’t seem to actually think it is likely that the object is alien in origin. Instead, he has said that it is something that should be considered and that it can’t be ruled out.

The reasoning is, at least in part, because if it is indeed an alien craft, it may have hostile intentions against the Earth. If that is the case, failing to respond could mean the end of not just humanity, but Earth. With consequences so high, it really makes sense to consider the worst, even if it isn’t likely.

Another paper, written by a Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) scientist and lecturer at the Geoscience department of Universiti Teknologi Petronas, AKM Eahsanul Haque, says the following:

“Loeb et al. found that the retrograde orbital plane of 3I/ATLAS is quite near to 129the ecliptic, with a 0.2% likelihood that this alignment is not just a coincidence. The galactic disk, which is where most stars are, is nearly in line with the solar system’s ecliptic plane. It is plausible that ISOs that are thrown out of other systems may naturally follow paths that are similar to these.”

This paper is available in preprint on Earth ArXiv.

There are many other papers that have been published since 3I/ATLAS was first spotted, virtually all of which look at the object as a comet. This is the first major paper to respond specifically to the claim that it is not.

Other prominent astrologers seem to agree. Tom Statler is NASA’s lead scientist for Solar System small bodies. In an interview with The Guardian, he said:

“It looks like a comet. It does comet things. It very, very strongly resembles, in just about every way, the comets that we know. It has some interesting properties that are a little bit different from our solar system comets, but it behaves like a comet. And so the evidence is overwhelmingly pointing to this object being a natural body. It’s a comet.”

It is very likely that these astronomers are correct in that this comet is just a natural comet. It is only the third object that we have been able to observe coming from outside our own solar system, so it is not like we have a massive library of information showing what these objects should do.

Then again, if an alien race did want to either check on us or simply destroy us, sending something that appears to be a comet would be a good way to get it done.

Fortunately, the rarity of any object coming from interstellar space means that just about every telescope and other instrument will be monitoring 3I/ATLAS closely every step of the way. Whether it turns out to be an alien or the far more likely comet, the experts will be watching.

If you think that’s impressive, check out this story about a “goldmine” of lithium that was found in the U.S. that could completely change the EV battery game.