At best we can speculate about GJ 357d. The case of GJ 357d we have a scientific paper which is about a planet that is in the habitable zone of its star, is at least six point one times the mass of the Earth, based on what we see, and we do not even know its radius (Luque, et al. 2019).  Yet the news media writes and reports on it as if we knew for certain it is Earth like.   (A brief word on Jessica Yaniv follows.)

Fundamental Theoretical Physics is the driver of big science projects.  Confirming old theories and testing new theories is how science advances.  That said what do we really do when part of big science projects?  The stereotype of the theoretical physicist is of a lone genius working in front of a chalkboard, or envisioning the mathematics written in brilliant light in the air in front of them, or dreaming of the solution to a deep problem.  This does really happen.  Theoretical physics is where the lone genius stereotype comes close to being true. Even then, it has always been just as important to bounce ideas off other physicists.    

Choosing a good but memorable password is hard. Here are some tips on how you can do it.  The best practice is to have a password manager, other than your web browser, and use it.  Do not use obvious personal information as part of a password. 

NASA welcoming private space flight participants is not new and it is misleading to call these people "tourist".

General Relativity (GR) is 100 years old and today.   Many writings will try to simplify it using illustrations with sheets and bowling balls and such.  If you want to have a more precise idea of what it really is and you know a bit of algebra this article is for you.  Here is what GR is in simple but still mathematical terms understandable to all who know high school algebra.

We will start with the Pythagorean theorem.  Then add to it until we get to the formula that gives us the big bang theory.  Then relate that to gravity.  

A quark star is a hypothesized type of object more dense than a Neutron star but not dense enough to form a black hole. Long ago theorized, could such an object be observed via, and even made possibly through, gravitational waves? This is not a likely outcome since the conditions it would take to create such an object would be very rare however it is just barely possible. Read on and consider with me what well established theories and laws of physics say about what the LIGO collaboration reportedly observed. Theories posited by Steven W Hawking and Jacob Bekenstein in particular regarding black hole thermodynamics may be put to the test by this kind of observation.