207: Chapter 207: Discovered by the Leaders of the Astronomical Institute

"Just finished watching the replay, and now my head is full of J-Spheres and Causality Guns... am I still dreaming?"

"What is Formula J? What's a J-Sphere? Can a class rep summarize this in human language?"

"Is our tech tree really crooked? Is it too late for me to switch careers and study Quantum Mechanics?"

"An alien laser greeting from 1,480 years ago... the romance of it makes my scalp tingle! So, did they see Li Shimin or Yang Jian?"

"I feel like my IQ took a hit. Everything he says sounds so reasonable. Help, am I being gaslit?"

"Stop wasting time on Weibo. Those who actually know their stuff and those who want to understand have all gone to Zhihu. There's a clash of the titans over there!"

"..."

Related topics on Zhihu shot up the trending list within half an hour after the livestream ended.

The depth of their discussions was completely different from Weibo!

Top of the hot list: "How to evaluate the subversive thinking of Formula J regarding the estimation of the number of cosmic civilizations?"

A verified astrophysics enthusiast named Dark Fish Head began to answer.

"After watching the stream, I can't sleep. The proposal of Formula J uses a very clever approach; it fundamentally challenges our estimations of the number of alien civilizations!"

"Actually, the scientific community has evaluated alien civilizations before, but without a relevant formula, they were just blindly and foolishly looking for bright spots."

"The scientific community classifies anything suspicious as a potential alien civilization."

"But Formula J, also known as Formula Jiang, has a completely different approach. It skips the entanglement with details like the origin of life and evolutionary paths, pointing the core directly at the macroscopic level."

"In the past, while we were debating whether alien civilizations exist, he stopped considering their existence and started thinking—how many are there? What's the minimum estimate, and what's the maximum?"

"He proposed how many stars are born in the Milky Way each year, how many planets are near those stars..."

"I have to say, he's truly the man I stan."

"Especially with the subsequent J-Sphere concept, which points directly at the dark areas of the starry sky. To find alien civilizations, look in the dark. While bright areas certainly have civilizations, we can't detect them. Signals from civilizations in bright regions thousands or tens of thousands of light-years away can't escape their own star systems, creating a dead end."

"If Formula Jiang's direction is even slightly correct, it means we might be asking the wrong question. Whether the universe is lonely or not doesn't depend on how many Earth-like planets there are, but on how many stars in dark regions have brightness levels that [look wrong]!"

Clearly, this user was a fan of Jiang Zhe.

In the comment section below, comments were increasing by the dozens every second!

"Just got online. Can some big shot explain in detail what happened?"

"Class rep summary: Someone proposed a formula to calculate cosmic civilizations, then calculated how many there are—ranging from less than one to eighty billion. Then he explained where advanced alien civilizations are. Formula J and J-Spheres mean advanced civilizations dim their home stars. Conclusion: Scientists looking for aliens should focus on those 'shady,' dim, and 'wrong-looking' stars instead of searching in bright areas. Got it? If not, that's normal—I'm confused too!"

"*Hiss*... Kneeling before the master. We're still debating what aliens look like, while he's already skipped 'if' and calculated 'how many,' even telling us where to look. How many Milky Ways apart are our thinking levels?"

"I feel like the recruitment ads for astronomy departments nationwide might need to change: [Join us and find the civilizations in the universe best at playing dead!]"

"I'm stunned. Finally, someone has the same idea I had as a kid. I used to think we should wrap up the sun, but when my math-obsessed dad asked why, I... well, there was no 'then' because I couldn't explain it. I didn't expect someone to share my thought: wrapping a star to absorb all its energy for Earth. As expected, truly god-tier civilizations keep a low profile and hide themselves. I'm absolutely hyped for Xiaoyu's brother's J-Sphere concept!"

"To the person above, in our community's past discussions, that's called 'the akashic records dropping every ripe technology into everyone's mind to see if anyone can build it.' So, that thought in your head isn't yours; it belongs to the akashic records or the zero-point field!!"

"This..."

"As a PhD student in a related field, my feelings are complicated. On one hand, I think this idea is wildly imaginative to the point of being ridiculous; on the other hand, I'm breaking into a cold sweat realizing that, following this logic, our current observation and screening processes might have actually missed the targets we should be focusing on most. Mentor Liu, can I still change my thesis topic?"

"..."

Inside the bedroom of the villa.

Jiang Zhe was completely unaware of what was happening online.

He was sitting in a blanket chair in front of the floor-to-ceiling window, enjoying the refreshing evening breeze with his eyes closed in concentration.

[This tutoring session has ended...]

[Evaluation complete. The depth and inspiration of the course exceeded expectations, greatly expanding Jiang Xiaoyu's cognition and horizons!]

[Reward settlement: Jiang Xiaoyu: IQ +2, Physics Intuition +3, Cosmology Interest +5, Recent Sleep Quality -1 (due to excitement from information overload), Dark Circles +1...]

[Monetary Reward: 1 million, legally transferred to your bank card!]

[Reward Points: 10 points, free attributes.]

A warm current from the ten free attribute points merged into his limbs and bones, further improving his physical fitness.

Feeling his muscles surging, he nodded with satisfaction.

No new abilities or technologies were obtained this time.

...

Inside a wing room of the Qingfeng Temple.

Professor Zhang Qinian, Zheng Ming, and Wang Chongyang chose not to return tonight and stayed at the temple.

He was wide awake. On his computer screen, he had just integrated a hypothesis about Formula J and J-Spheres, along with related astronomical phenomena, into a document.

In the document, he recounted the core concepts Jiang Zhe proposed tonight as objectively as possible, while attaching the light curve of Tabbys Star and an analysis of gamma-ray events from the LHAASO Observatory in Sichuan Province, pointing out the suspicious points where existing models failed to provide an explanation.

After a long time, he picked up his phone and dialed a number.

The phone rang three times before a slightly tired voice came from the other side, "Old Zhang, it's past midnight. Is there an emergency?"

"Old Wang, sorry to disturb you so late. I've sent you something; take a look. Especially the ideas mentioned regarding Formula J and the concept of the J-Sphere."

"Also, focus on the proposal about looking for abnormal dimming as a potential sign of extraterrestrial engineering."

"I think we might need to appropriately adjust the priorities of some of our research institute's upcoming projects, adding some more open and bold cross-validations!"

The sound of someone getting dressed came from the other end, followed by footsteps, and finally, the sound of returning to the computer and scrolling with a mouse.

A few minutes later, Old Wang's surprised voice came through, "This thinking... Old Zhang, where did you get this? This isn't like your usual style!"

Professor Zhang Qinian stammered a bit, "From a... channel you'd never expect. Never mind, don't ask about the source for now. Do you think it's worth organizing an in-depth discussion, even if just to serve as a 'catfish effect' to broaden our thinking?"

"Yes, absolutely. The elements in this document are very comprehensive!"

"First: 'The first observer of the universe is not at the beginning, but a backward glance after the first civilization of the future leaps out of the universe'—I bet those old guys in the philosophy department will treat this like the Bible!"

"Second: Formula J. This idea is simply too bold and advanced; it actually manages to combine the optimistic and pessimistic groups!"

"Third: And that causality-tech civilization, which uses the energy of the Time Stream. In the past, 'J' even rejected Newton's universal gravitation and believed gravity is a derivative; I couldn't agree more with that!!!"

"Fourth: The J-Sphere idea is even bolder, directly pointing out that our direction in searching for extraterrestrial civilizations is wrong."

"As for the fifth point, it's even more daring, turning the theory of non-natural factors into the brightness fluctuations of a J-Sphere. It's indeed possible, because we in the astronomical community really can't explain that 22% drop in brightness for that star 1,480 light-years away!"

Old Wang grew more excited as he spoke, "Especially... 'J,' right? I know who it is. It's that guy who's been trending in academic circles lately—the one about parallel worlds being black holes, the sun's interior being 36 degrees, and the email you sent me today. It proves it's the same person."

"I'll organize a closed-door meeting with the core team first thing tomorrow morning."

"Old Zhang, thanks. The future direction of astronomical research is going to be fun and challenging. It might even stir up this stagnant pool of water!"

"That's exactly the effect I'm looking for."

Professor Zhang Qinian hung up the phone, looked out at the night sky, and let out a long sigh of relief.

"How interesting. I originally came with the intention of debunking Xiaoyu's brother... what is his name, anyway?"

"Forget it, I can't figure it out. I didn't expect that I'd almost end up becoming his follower!"

After a long while, he shook his head, pushing those thoughts aside. "I haven't become a follower; I've just discovered the brilliance of a man from the people."

Comforting himself this way, he finally fell asleep contentedly.

...