Does our knowledge of the solar system give us a better chance of surviving such a catastrophe?
June 29, 2009 by Jason Monsky
Filed under Solar Systems
Geologists generally agree that the Earth has been hit many times by other objects in the solar system, and most predict that another object will again strike the Earth in the near future. Does our knowledge of the solar system give us a better chance of surviving such a catastrophe? How? What other benefit is it to know the solar system better? How can the position of sun, moon, and planets help us to know our position on Earth? How does knowing the conditions on other planets help us to appreciate Earth? Could there be life on other bodies in our solar system? Why or why not?
I think you need to split this up into several different questions. And some of these don’t have a definite answer.
Obviously, knowing the orbits of various asteroids and comets makes it possible to predict when and if they will hit the earth, although it’s hard to include everything that may affect their orbits. That doesn’t really help us to survive a major strike, except that people could leave the area when it gets close enough to tell exactly where it will hit. I don’t think that there are any serious predictions about collisions in the future (like in 2012), because that’s too far out to calculate.
We have found out enough about the other planets in the last few years to know that none of them can support earth-type life, and we haven’t found anything to indicate life on the moon or Mars, but there is a lot of life here surviving in what we think of as difficult conditions, so there may be something on other planets or moons. We don’t really know how life started here, so we don’t know what conditions are necessary.
In considering astronomy in general, I always look in the refrigerator and ask "got milk"?
The answer to that question is very important.
All the astronomy done in the history of man has had absolutely no influence in that important question.
Big Bang? Creationism? Life on Mars? What does it matter…got milk?
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well yes it will and it has before, a comet hit jupiter a while back and by observing that comet hit jupiter the government decided to keep a better eye on our sky, by observing the behavior of other planets and our solar system we can predict and plan ahead of time what we can do to survive a catastrophe like the one your talking about. We have the technology to stop a meteorite from hitting the earth if we detect it in time, we can change its orbit by propulsion systems, we do not however have the technology to stop a comet from hitting the earth, at least not yet…in a few years we will im sure of it, just look at the progress we have made in the last 50 years, computers, tv, transportation think about it.
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I think you need to split this up into several different questions. And some of these don’t have a definite answer.
Obviously, knowing the orbits of various asteroids and comets makes it possible to predict when and if they will hit the earth, although it’s hard to include everything that may affect their orbits. That doesn’t really help us to survive a major strike, except that people could leave the area when it gets close enough to tell exactly where it will hit. I don’t think that there are any serious predictions about collisions in the future (like in 2012), because that’s too far out to calculate.
We have found out enough about the other planets in the last few years to know that none of them can support earth-type life, and we haven’t found anything to indicate life on the moon or Mars, but there is a lot of life here surviving in what we think of as difficult conditions, so there may be something on other planets or moons. We don’t really know how life started here, so we don’t know what conditions are necessary.
References :