this post was submitted on 05 Feb 2026
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I assume that, just like with a circular orbit, it could be theoretically possible to have some crazy figure-8 orbit around two stars, but that orbit would be so unstable you will in practice never find it in the real world.
What I mean is you could probably design some crazy solution to the three-body problem that in principle remains periodic, but which will completely dissolve at even a slight perturbation.