As we await high-resolution images taken by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter of the mysterious interstellar object 3I/ATLAS, Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb is still not giving up hope that it could be an alien spacecraft speeding through the solar system. While there’s a broad consensus among scientists that 3I/ATLAS is most likely a comet predominantly made up of carbon dioxide, Loeb has pointed out its unusual chemical makeup, its close visits to several planets, and its enormous size, among other factors, to argue that it could be a technological artifact sent by an extraterrestrial civilization. And now he’s firing back at critics, saying that he’s still suspicious of the object’s origins and that more data is needed. “The verdict is still out, and I’m very much looking forward to getting more data in the coming weeks,” he told NewsNation over the weekend. “You know, that’s the way science should be done,” he added. “It’s like a detective story, and any of my colleagues who claim to know it’s a comet of a type that is familiar to us is not really curious or imaginative about nature.” “Let’s wait, then check what the subject is in the coming weeks rather than give…
