The End Not As Near As We Thought

HiyaPower writes: "According to recent calculations cited by this article in TheAge, the calculations that the sun would expand to a red giant and engulf the earth are wrong. It will expand, but due to the loss of solar mass over time due to the conversion of mass into energy, the earth will spiral enough further away thus avoiding the fate of Venus and Mercury. Personally I find this a great relief, I had some long term plans that I had been putting off..."

Comments

I wanted to move to Mars...

[Anonymous Coward]

If only to watch and point and laugh.

You really do have to wonder exactly why people do so much research into this.

Is there something they aren't telling us??

Re:I wanted to move to Mars...

[Zathrus]

I'm not an astrophysicist by any means, but beyond the general idea of "increase the breadth of human knowledge and understanding", there's the reality that we are totally and utterly dependant on that big ball of flaming hydrogen and helium 67 million miles away. Any ability to improve our modeling of that warmish ball of gas may result in some insight on how to eventually control it and thus control our own fates.

This is obviously assuming that we manage to not kill ourselves off beforehand, which remains questionable.

Long term is heat death of the universe, but if humanity survives those few quadrillion years then I think we'll have "succeeded".

Re:I wanted to move to Mars...

[ichimunki]

You really do have to wonder exactly why people do so much research into this.

It is important in cryptography, because the algorithms need to be strong enough to withstand brute force attacks for a very long time and the key inputs to such a determination are rate of change in computations per second and the expected life of the planet.

Re:I wanted to move to Mars...

[uberdood]

I'm not an astrophysicist by any means

Aye, that's the truth.

we are totally and utterly dependant on that big ball ... 67 million miles away

Sure, if the laws of numbers are broken and suddenly 67 is equal to 93. It's called an AU as well - and no, that doesn't refer to Australia.

Re:I wanted to move to Mars...

[xmutex]

no, I think Katz is more content independent.

Re:I wanted to move to Mars...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, dont worry about it. We will kill ourselves well well well before then.

Red giant...

[digitalunity]

I was hoping for a spinning pulsar :)

Re:Red giant...

[Anonymous Coward]

I've told you before, and I'll tell you again. Do NOT tell us how to moderate, cocksucker.

Re:Red giant...

[dastrike]

Aren't all pulsars spinning?

Re:Red giant...

[digitalunity]

Yes. That's why they pulse.

Re:Red giant...

[Anonymous Coward]

I moderate about once a week.
So STFU you stupid motherfucker.
Wanna know what my real sig said?
Wanna know WTF that R is doing at
the end of my sig?

It said 'Read the Moderator Guidlines
before doing anything drastic.' I think
you should go read them. You very obviously
have an axe to grind. You shouldn't be allowed
to moderate.

I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[nzhavok]

after all what are the chances your going to survive the asteroid impacts, catastrophic earthquakes, global warming, ozone depletion and the global flooding after the melting of the polar ice caps?

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Bronster]

after all what are the chances your going to survive the asteroid impacts, catastrophic earthquakes, global warming, ozone depletion and the global flooding after the melting of the polar ice caps?

Exactly - a link is as strong as a single chain - and humans will only exist on earth while _all_ the required conditions for human existance remain. While this is cool science, it isn't very relevant for our survival as a species until we deal with some of our other niggling problems.

... like poisoning people for fun and profit ...

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[LadyLucky]

I have to debunk one of these:

When the polar ice caps melt, the ocean level does not rise. Why? because as ice they displace the same amount of space as they would if they were water. It is achimedes' principle. It is what keeps ships afloat, what makes submarines work. Consequently, melt ALL the polar ice caps and our friends in The Netherlands wont notice a thing.

This came from a piece of mistaken research earlier last century by the EPA, where they forgot this. It was an honest mistake, since owned up to, but that has not stopped it entering the public mind, and assorted do-gooders still using it for shock value.

One thing that can get us is if the ice on the Antarctic continent melts. This is possible, but highly unlikely. Ever opened your freezer on a hot day? Do you get more or less ice? That is probably not a concern.

So what are the possible problems? is the ocean level rising? Yes, it is. It rises naturally over time due to sedimentation processes, about 20cm/century, IIRC. The thermal expansion of water due to global warming (supposedly, see the ATOC project for more info) is likely to add a similar amount.

One hopes to disillusion one more person every day....

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[NightWhistler]

All the same, living in the Netherlands I'm still happy to have all my swimming diploma's... ;-)

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[LadyLucky]

I thought you had a ready supply of little boys to put their fingers in any holes in the dijken?

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Kierthos]

You do realize that just a little bit of the polar ice caps are technically on "dry land", right? And if they melt, then it will add to the level of the ocean. Furthermore, if the polar ice caps go, I daresay most of the mountainous ice and snow will be gone as well, creating (at least temporarily) flash floods, and thereby again adding to the sedementation of the ocean, causing levels to rise further.

Now, while I doubt that I'm going to need to break out a pair of trunks, I think that some other areas might have something to worry about. Something about a large portion of New Orleans being under sea level?

Kierthos

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Yokaze]

>Ever opened your freezer on a hot day? Do you get more or less ice?

A freezer is not a self-containing system.
Try the same without external cooling system and you might get a better idea.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[LadyLucky]

You do realize that just a little bit of the polar ice caps are technically on "dry land", right

Yes, hence my comment about the ice on the Antarctic continent itself. Various models have been performed, and the results are by no means clear. Some suggest that ice will melt also, but it is my understanding that most do not. The increased atmospheric moisture seems to increase the rate of ice build up over the antarctic land. There is the *possibility* of the earth over compensating for global warming, what with more clouds reflecting more sunshine. These are the poorly understood areas of climate modelling, to which nobody has an answer.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[LadyLucky]

A fair comment, but the point of the example was to show that so long as the polar regions remain cold, there is no reason to suggest this will decrease the amount of ice built up.

The earth does have an external cooling device. We radiate heat out into space constantly. If we didnt, our temperature would be increasing dramatically.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Kierthos]

Too true. The weatherman can't even accurately predict tomorrow's weather, much less next week, much less years from now. And there are just as many models indicating that increased temperatures would result in the polar ice caps melting completely as there are models which show that the same increased temperatures would increase the size of those same caps.

Frankly, I think those areas of climate modeling are bound to stay poorly understood for quite some time. Until a point is reached where the field becomes "sexy and popular" it's just not going to get as much funding and interest as other fields.

Kierthos

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[LadyLucky]

>Too true. The weatherman can't even accurately predict tomorrow's weather

As was evidenced by my interaction with vast amounts of rain half way up a local volcano last weekend. Erk. :-)

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[stefanvt]

Luckily "dijken" wasn't translated as "dikes" :-)

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[BCoates]

I thought New Orleans' problem was not so much rising oceans as sinking land...

--
Benjamin Coates

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[pmc]

When the polar ice caps melt, the ocean level does not rise. Why? because as ice they displace the same amount of space as they would if they were water. It is achimedes' principle.

Oft stated, but actually wrong (even ignoring the fact that some polar ice is on land). When the ice melts it melts for a reason - the sea has warmed up. And when the sea warms it will expand. See this Nature Abstract or even from USA Today

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Antity-H]

However we still have to remember that one of these ice cap is not over water but over land , the volume of this end cap (the south one if i remember correctly and yes i am too lazy to check) will add to the volume of the ocean so the level should rise take it like this if you prefer if you put an ice cube in a glass when it melts, the level of the watr won't rise now take the same glass and put the ice cube on a fork over the glass and watch how the level of the water rises (if the glass is big enough you can put the fork just level with the water put the ice cube over it and watch the fork be submerged) sorry for our friends from netherland but the full melting of both ice cap would make the general level of oceans rise

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Antity-H]

sorry hadn't seen all the comments

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Anonymous Coward]

This is funny? What kind of stupid mod would mod this funny??

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[haggar]

Yep, and actually most ice is on land, anyway. Greenland, northern Europe, etc. That's a lot of ice on land, man!

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[fiftyfly]

Umm, maybe I just haven't though this through but...

Water expands by about 1/11 when it freezes - are you sugesting that water, with out under going such a phase change, will expand as much simply by heating it?

Oh, that's right you did mention something about "ignoring the fact that some polar ice is on land". Yeah, that little bit 'o ice, those mere GIGANTICE POLAR ICE CAPS resting on land masses couldn't possibly change sea level when they melt.

Not that I'm entirely convinced that we have any (let alone significat or conclusive) proof of a real (read: disjointed, non cyclical) warming trend.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Anonymous Coward]

Water won't expand until it gets about about 4 degs.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[pmc]

Water expands by about 1/11 when it freezes - are you sugesting that water, with out under going such a phase change, will expand as much simply by heating it?

No. The experiment that the post was eluding to is fill a glass with ice and water so the water is at the brim and the ice is floating. The ice will be above the level of the brim. Now let the ice melt. The glass is still full to the brim of water. This is Archimedes' principle.

This still applies - water is denser than ice. But the water in the seas is, on average, warmer than before. Therefore, if the polar ice cap melts it is because the sea is warmer. And if the sea is warmer then it occupies more volume, which means that sea levels have risen.

Oh, that's right you did mention something about "ignoring the fact that some polar ice is on land". Yeah, that little bit 'o ice, those mere GIGANTICE POLAR ICE CAPS resting on land masses couldn't possibly change sea level when they melt.

Sigh - even if there were no ice caps on land the sea level would rise if they melted: that was the point being made.

Many models of global warming predict that the land ice caps actually get bigger (due to increased precipitation) instead of melting- snow in is greater than meltwater out. Even with some extra water locked in the bigger icecaps the sea level still goes up due to the thermal expansion of sea water.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Yokaze]

The point is, it is called global warming, because the global temperature rises.

This, of course, doesn't have to mean that the temperature in the polar regions will increase.
Here is a study Effects of Atmospheric Climate Change on Ice Stability.
Another study of six Antarctic lakes has shown that the surface ice has thinned by up to 40 percent over the 80s.
(Wharton, R.A., Jr., C.P. McKay, G.D. Clow, D.T. Andersen, G.M. Simmons, Jr., and F.G. Love, 1992: J. Geophys. Res., 97, 3503)

Of course, you are free to interprete this as a sign of global warming, or not.

A different side on glaciers and sea levels from the U.S. Geological Survey.

Of course, you are free to neglect this source, as they get their fundings for those news.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Luyseyal]

I watched a show on The Weather Channel where they were saying that the melted fresh water would contribute to a colder Europe since the water cycle would keep warmer water from reaching UK, France, etc. So, you would get more freezing up north.

Basically, there are so many factors here, it's impossible to say what will happen until it happens. I dunno... I'm not personally worried until the average temperature is up 50 degrees. Then I'll start freaking out. Until then, I just intend to do my little part and not worry.

-l

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[nerdlyone]

I don't personally know enough about the issue to disagree with you except on one point: The volume of ice is greater than the volume of the same mass of liquid H2O. This is why ice floats. Your post also ignores the fact that lots of the ice is now above sea level, but it would no longer be if it were to melt.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[rabidcow]

When the ice melts it melts for a reason - the sea has warmed up. And when the sea warms it will expand.

Um, second to last paragraph of post you replied to:

The thermal expansion of water due to global warming (supposedly, see the ATOC project [ucsd.edu] for more info) is likely to add a similar amount.

But wouldn't the ice melting cool the sea down again? In my experience, if you hold a glass of water with ice in it over heat, the ice melts and the water gets colder. This makes sense because it takes much more energy to heat water from -1C to 1C than from 19C to 21C. That whole "coefficient of freezing" or whatever it is.

I'm probably wrong, but just a thought.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Chris Burke]

Dude, while you're right that there are way too many factors for us to be able to state what will happen, by the time the average temperature rises 50 degrees we'll have long since found out what will happen. It's way to late to -start- worrying. Especially because I don't think we need much more knowledge than we do now to conclude that, at +50 C average global temperature, we'll be - to use scientific terms - "totally fucked".

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[jafac]

You may as well freak out, because it's already happening.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[LadyLucky]

When the ice melts it melts for a reason - the sea has warmed up. And when the sea warms it will expand.

(S)He was right about this.. the whole thing is a kind of equilibrium, so the cooling effect you mention above may have an effect for a while, but not over the long term.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Luyseyal]

exactly my point. I do my part; I leave the worrying to someone with psychological disorders.
-l

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Decimal]

I watched a show on The Weather Channel where they were saying that the melted fresh water would contribute to a colder Europe since the water cycle would keep warmer water from reaching UK, France, etc. So, you would get more freezing up north.

I remember reading something about how the gravity of the ice in and around greenland keeps more water piled around the east coast of Europe. So if the ice melted, the sea level would actually go down near Europe as the water spread elsewhere and flooded other shores.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[kesuki]

Warmer seas melt polar ice, polar ice firmly entrenched on land doe not melt, and only is pushed off by new ice formation. Also, warmer seas give off more water vapor, and lead to higher rates of evaporation, more than compensating for the expantion rate, since this leads to higher precipitation it then leads to greater ice formation near the polar caps, causing giant ice sheets to cover the land, and to some extent even the ocean.
'Global warming' is merely a misinterpertation of the global tempererature shift required to enter a global ice age. Ice ages move slowly, and I would guess that this one will take another 1000 years to get up to speed with oceans warming enough to cause enough ice formation for continental ice sheets to form.

Your arguments remind me of the people who said the last tree would be cut down in 2001. Well it's 2002 now and I can see thousands of trees just from where I live alone.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Sj0]

Just a point, I've read that the Ozone Layer is no longer depleting, and although it will take a long time to recover it, the reduction of CFCs in most industrialized nations is contributing to that.

Things are getting better.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[junkgrep]

Just as a note, the common trope "The weatherman can't even accurately predict tomorrow's weather, much less next week, much less years from now." is a rather misleading and unhelpful one. What we expect weathermen to predict are chaotic eddies on a very very small scale, as far as the expanse of the whole global weather system goes. So there is no justification behind the argument that, just because we cannot predict the particular _configuration_ of next week's weather, we can't predict long term trends. These are two very different things, and the latter may prove to be the far far easier of the two.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[nomadic]

Warmer seas melt polar ice, polar ice firmly entrenched on land doe not melt, and only is pushed off by new ice formation.

Wow, if ice is entrenched on land, it never melts? Amazing. So if I took a blowtorch to it, nothing would happen?

Land based glaciers often melt during the spring. With a high enough increase in temperatures, they'll melt faster, and won't refreeze in the winter.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[csbruce]

Not to mention Antarctica.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Anonymous Coward]

Said jafac, know expert in global warming.

Heh.
/. trolls are so funny ...

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Some Dumbass...]

Your arguments remind me of the people who said the last tree would be cut down in 2001. Well it's 2002 now and I can see thousands of trees just from where I live alone.

Cute bon mot, but did you bother to read his references? Or, for example this page?

It's easy to be an expert as long as you don't have to back up your statements. Although I am not convinced that you're right, I would be interested in seeing some support for your point of view. Any references?

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[pmc]

Warmer seas melt polar ice, polar ice firmly entrenched on land doe not melt, and only is pushed off by new ice formation. Also, warmer seas give off more water vapor, and lead to higher rates of evaporation, more than compensating for the expantion rate, since this leads to higher precipitation it then leads to greater ice formation near the polar caps, causing giant ice sheets to cover the land, and to some extent even the ocean.

What on earth are you talking about? Evaporation from the oceans more than compensates for the expansion? Where exactly did you get this from?

Some numbers
Water in Ice = 1.7% = 24,000,000 km^3
All Fresh Water = 1.7% = 23,000,000 km^3
Water in atmosphere = 0.001% = 12900 km^3
Oceans = 96.5% = 1,300,000,000 km^3

(From Encyclopedia of Climate and Weather)

For a 1 deg C rise in average ocean temperature the change in density = 0.02%

Change in volume of the ocean = 260000km^3

or about 20 times as much as is currently in the atmosphere.

SO you are talking bollox here.

Giant Icesheets covering the land

Again - where did you get this from? Sea ice is melting; glaciers are retreating; premafrost is melting; the land icecaps are receeding. Somehow all this gets thrown into reverse as if the temperature increases more.

Your arguments remind me of the people who said the last tree would be cut down in 2001. Well it's 2002 now and I can see thousands of trees just from where I live alone.

My argument was that warm sea water takes up more space than cold seawater. If this reminds you of trees then I suggest you get your memory checked.

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[Anonymous Coward]

How dare you, Sir! Jafac has been a faithful poster to /. for years upon years. You are not worth to trowel the sewage from the bottom of his boot! So kneel foul knave and lick the road before your master Jafac, known /. authority!!

Re:I wouldn't put too much hope in this

[kesuki]

The only references I have are the fact that glacial ice core samples from the last ice age had nearly triple the pollen count of 'recently' formed glacial ice This generallly infers that there was a massively greater amount of plant life at the time of the last ice age -- which would infer that the last global ice age caused global warming. There is of course the possibility that global warming is not due to an ice age, but ice ages DO cause global warming and while this does cause glaciers to melt faster there is more evidince in the form of lake agazis whish was about 10 times greater in volume than the current great lakes and made entirely of glacial meltwaters. The grand canyon was Also carved out as a result of the torential flooding during the summers.

I could be wrong, but since ice ages Do cause global warming and there is evidence of this then we need to better understand if the global warming affect is due to an ice age.

Often times environmentalists forget to caluclate in crucial calculations into 'doomsday' predictions. Like the fact that a major volcanic eruption depeletes more ozone than mankind has since the invention of a CFC. Or that lightning which strikes every second somewhere on the earth creates ozone In the upper atmosphere. Or that CFCs can bond with other radicals like the resulting O2 left over from the destruction of an ozone molecule. Or that most trees used in paper production are grown in vast tree farms.
This is why we get predictions like no trees left by 2001 or no ozone layer over southern california by 2004... They only look at half the science involved.
They also forget that coniferous forest thrive at a 3% increase in atmospheric CO2 and can easily produce vastly greater amounts of o2 than conventional trees.
While I would say the ecosystem that supports human life may indeed be fragile the ecosystem of life itself has no room for weakness. If we can't maintain an evironment suitable for humankind then we're as obsolete as the dinosaur.

Please

[Anonymous Coward]

We will blow ourselves up LONG before that ever happens.

This is not worrying

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not worried about this. It will in most likelihood have died by then. Yet, my estimates may be wrong too...

At least we'll have time to prepare

[sweatyboatman]

[snip]

He added that, although the Earth is safe from destruction, life here still faces some formidable challenges in the far future. The new calculations suggest that the surface of the Earth will become too hot to sustain human life for a few million years about 5.7 billion years from now.

This is about 200 million years later than previously thought - an extra period of grace that humans could use to develop technologies for living on a hotter Earth, such as building communities deep underground. Alternatively, the human race could move to another planet for a while.

[snip]

hard to imagine that after 5.7 billion years we'll still be worried about something as banal as the expanding sun. No, by then we'll have figured out a way to transmute our living soul into pure electronic energy and we will roam the cosmos, imortal and all-powerful.

Or we'll die out. How long did the dinosaurs live?

On the other hand, we may still be working the bugs out of the missile defense shield. Damn those decoys!

Sweat

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[CatherineCornelius]

hard to imagine that after 5.7 billion years we'll still be worried about something as banal as the expanding sun. No, by then we'll have figured out a way to transmute our living soul into pure electronic energy and we will roam the cosmos, imortal and all-powerful.

Or we'll die out. How long did the dinosaurs live?

Well, the dinosaurs as a family lasted for over a hundred million years, but individual species didn't last anything like as long. Ten million years is a very respectable age for a species, though some become extince much earlier and others last much longer. Given our presence at the top of every food chain on the planet, we're in a rather vulnerable position because we could easily wipe out our food sources. I won't go down the doom route, but I'll simply say that it's _far_ from a foregone conclusion that humans will be around even a million years.

And there are no competitor species waiting around to take our place as articulate and intelligent tool users--apparently we outcompeted the nearest competitors in our niche. That's to be expected, and nothing unusual, but it does mean that worrying about piddling things like novae is a little silly.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[Anonymous Coward]

With an eliptcal orbit though it's possible that we could be closer to the sun depending on the time of year, so we might not be out of the woods yet. So hard to think about this without snikering or openly laughing out loud. Not like the atmosphere could handle such a change in the sun's size and would certianly be burned away.

But with the concern about mini-black holes, and cell phones killing the spirits...ah we're gonna kill each other long before any relative of yours will see the Sun go out.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[eclectro]

There's an interesting short story by Isaac Asimov called The Last Question that deals with some of these very topics.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[archen]

Well, the dinosaurs as a family lasted for over a hundred million years

Correct me if I'm wrong, but haven't alligators, and crocodiles been around for something like 300+ million? I guess that sort of depends on how you define a dinosaur. Not to mention they could all be dead within the next 30 years...

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[buckeyeguy]

I won't go down the doom route, but I'll simply say that it's _far_ from a foregone conclusion that humans will be around even a million years.

OK, I'll go down the doom route for you ;). Even if we assume that local effects (stability of the sun, earth, orbits of other planets) are predictable and non-threatening (big assumption in itself), the chances are very high that another large-body collision will occur before then (like the one that is theorized to have caused the dinosaurs' extinction event 65 million ago). Also, in round numbers, we've got about 25-30 more revolutions around the center of the galaxy... plenty of chance for interaction with other stars or extra-solar bodies. Then there's intergalactic interaction... I forget what the latest estimate is, but Andromeda (M31) is supposed to pay us a visit sometime before 5 billion years is out.

Or, some asshole will push the button, and we'll leave the roaches and telemarketers to ponder the whole thing.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[Sabalon]

I forget what the latest estimate is, but Andromeda (M31) is supposed to pay us a visit sometime before 5 billion years is out.


Move along...nothing to see here.

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy defines space as big...really big....really really big. You thought it was a long walk down to the corner store, well that's nothing compared to the vastness of space.

The thing that blows my mind about how big space is would be what you mentioned - two galaxies "colliding". There is so much space between the stars that when galaxies collide, they just pass through each other, nothing colliding.

Of course, gravity is a bitch, and galaxies that interact kinda revolve around each other, passing through each other multiple times, till they merge.

Ramble for the day.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[jmccay]

We could still be worrying about this if we go through several Dark ages. Humanity as we know it might not even be around at all. We may have killed ourselves off before then.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[buckeyeguy]

Space is empty... I understand that. But then I'm not talking about collisions exclusively; if you've ever played with an orbital simulation program, you find that it takes very little to throw a body off a stable orbit... now, add another galaxy's worth of massive objects, and you double the chances of a close pass-by between our system and an extra-solar object.

Either way, my point is that, while stellar research IS important, the sun going bad on us is likely to be the last thing we'd need to worry about, when compared to other threats to our existence.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[CatherineCornelius]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but haven't alligators, and crocodiles been around for something like 300+ million?

The fossil record shows that the crocodile family has been subject to the usual flow of evolution and species extinction. You're mistaking a family for a species. We're not concerned here with whether there will be simians in n zillion years, but whether there will be humans. There are many species of simians, but only one of those species is currently human (all the other candidates are extinct). So the odds are fairly long.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[MrRogers2]

Just finished reading that, thanks for the link. I'll have to check out more Asimov once I finish lotr (again).

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[dillon_rinker]

The thing that blows my mind about how big space is would be what you mentioned - two galaxies "colliding". There is so much space between the stars that when galaxies collide, they just pass through each other, nothing colliding.

Foolish mortal...how constrained you are by what your senses show you. Know you not that your entire body is empty space, inhabited here and there by point masses called by your scientists "quarks" and "electrons"? Yet these point masses interact powerfully at short range.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[dillon_rinker]

In place of transistors bad come molecular valves so that even the largest Planetary AC could be put into a space only half the volume of a spaceship.

I'd read this story before, but not since I was about 12. Funny that those molecular valves came about within decades of Asimov's story, rather than the centuries he predicted...

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[fredrik70]

Hmmm, Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that since the universe is expanding, all galaxies are moving awway from each other. how could we then collide with another galaxy???

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[a random streaker]

> Given our presence at the top of every food
> chain on the planet, we're in a rather
> vulnerable position because we could easily wipe
> out our food sources.

I submit we are the most stable organism to live on this planet, at least of anything larger than a bug. There is no reason humanity shouldn't last a few hundred years longer to get here, which is all that's needed. Even the worst and most irrational irresponsible threats of global warming (deserts and massive flooding) won't reduce humanity to some tiny, caveman-like group of survivors or less.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[Anonymous Coward]

There is also the possibility that Yellowstone National Park (it's a huge underground volcanoe)will explode taking millions of people with it and reduccing the population by 2/3's or more dropping humanity in to a dark age as we have never seen before.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[CatherineCornelius]

There is no reason humanity shouldn't last a few hundred years longer to get here

That appears to be a website devoted to some kind of quasi-religious belief in the transformation of humans to some kind of machine form. Whatever the result, I suspect that it would not be us, and it would certainly not be human. Interesting idea, though.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[buckeyeguy]

The notion of an expanding universe does not rule out 'local' effects (a few megaparsecs=local) between objects...

and as I mentioned before, 'colliding' is relative... if a new system of stars, planets, dark matter, etc. comes near enough to interact and alter our orbit for the worse, then that's enough of a collision for my definition of it.

Here's a quick link for more discussion and some cool pics of the whole M31 issue...

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[buckeyeguy]

Nuts... wrong link... the pic link is here.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[smallpaul]

Given our presence at the top of every food chain on the planet, we're in a rather vulnerable position because we could easily wipe out our food sources. I won't go down the doom route, but I'll simply say that it's _far_ from a foregone conclusion that humans will be around even a million years.

I don't think it makes sense to talk about humanity as if it were just another species when it comes to extincton. What other species sets up farms? Sure, we may wipe ourselves out, but not in a manner even remotely similar to the ways that the dinosaurs or other species were wiped out.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[CatherineCornelius]

I don't think it makes sense to talk about humanity as if it were just another species when it comes to extincton. What other species sets up farms? Sure, we may wipe ourselves out, but not in a manner even remotely similar to the ways that the dinosaurs or other species were wiped out.

We could wipe ourselves out, sure. But we're just as likely, or perhaps more likely, to be wiped out in a global extinction event. There isn't a lot we could do about it. Escaping to space isn't an option, or at least, not as yet a realistic method of diversifying our habitats.

High intelligence gives us a fighting chance, sure.

But before that happened, I'd expect the species to decline naturally. We cannot assume that civilisation will remain the common, sustainable mode of human existence, or that our intelligence and civilisation will be enough to enable us to adapt indefinitely to whatever ecological changes we might encounter over periods of millions of years.

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[fredrik70]

Ah, cool, looks like I learned something new today!
Pity thing about the earth, but then again doubt I or humanity wil be around long enough that we really have to worry! ;-)

Re:At least we'll have time to prepare

[Sabalon]

Yuppp....wasn't that the whole theory behind Buckaroo Banzzi? (Well, not so much the body being empty space, but matter in general.)

Darn!

[ludey]

There goes my end of the world party! What am I going to do! Caterer is going to hit me with a huge cancellation fee!

Re: Darn!

[QuickFox]

Don't panic. To pay your caterer, just wait and have fun for 7.699 billion years. Then a million years remain to the end of the world. Then put a dollar in a bank account with 1% interest rate. In one million years it grows to a sum that is four thousand digits long (2,365e+4321 dollars).

If your caterer won't be satisfied with a four-thousand-digit sum you might consider making your parties a little more modest.

Give a man a fish and he eats for one day. Teach him how to fish, and though he'll eat for a lifetime, he'll call you a miser for not giving him your fish.

Re:Darn!

[Chris Burke]

Don't you usually only have to pay the fee if you cancel on short notice, like within a couple weeks tops? I'd think once you get into the billions of years advance notice, the caterer should cut you should slack.

Re:Darn!

[Anonymous Coward]

How about the 'penultimate end of the world party'?

I mean, if there's an end of the world party, there must have been one before that, right? And you could have entertainment, and waiters, and a conjurer, and a kangaroo...

Human Species

[oddsheep]

Pointless research - the human species will have all transcended their current forms to become 4 dimensional toasters with great hair.

Re:Human Species

[PopeAlien]

Pointless research - the human species will have all transcended their current forms to become 4 dimensional toasters with great hair.

Yeah right.. Thats what they all say. You'll have to excuse me If I don't put too much faith in your predictions for the far future. I'm still trying to live with the dissapointment of reaching the year 2002 and not having a shiny foil suit, jet-pack, or flying car.

Re:Human Species

[Hektor_Troy]

"Yeah right.. Thats what they all say."

Well then - if they all say it's so, then it must be so. Haven't you heard of revisionist science and democratic rules with regards to the physical world?

Re:Human Species

[duggy_92127]

I don't see any reason why you can't get off your lazy ass and MAKE yourself a shiny foil suit! Plently of foil lying about...

Doug

Solar Output

[Detritus]

I've read a number of articles that say that life on Earth will be destroyed in a few billion years by increased radiation from the Sun. The Sun's output is slowly increasing as it ages. At some point, the Earth will go into thermal runaway.

Re:Solar Output

[Deosyne]

We've gone from horse and buggy to spacecraft over the past 150 years; who gives a shit? Unless, of course, we're only five years from the point where the chain reaction occurs, in which case you bring the burgers, I'll get the dogs 'cause we are in for one hell of a barbeque, somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 degrees F, IIRC. :)

For those who haven't heard this one before

[blonde rser]

At the end of a lecture young student puts up his hand:
"Professor, earlier you commented that eventually the sun will collapse and life on earth as we know it will cease..."

"Yes," responds the professor, "but not for billions of years."

The young student exhales a sigh of releif. "Thank goodness, for a moment there I thought you had said millions."

Those of us who plan to live forever

[FiberToTheCurb]

will be most relieved. Myself, I plan to watch the earth age and die around me, thanks to advanced medical tech from some out of town friends.....

Re:Those of us who plan to live forever

[shokk]

Yeah, I can't wait for that long eternal period of insanity, staring at nothingness, thinking of how lucky the dead ones are. For beings that can't figure out what the hell to do on a rainy Sunday, we sure are eager to have a whole lot of them. Of course, it's not like many of us are eager to join back with the universe and disperse ourselves among the worms, trees, and air.

Microsoft

[smbober]

Don't worry Bill Gates will be awakened from his cryogenic freeze to save the planet (I mean his monopoly). The only down side is that 1/10 of the rocets he builds will crash.

Sean

And in lage friendly letters...

[gnovos]

Astronomer Patrick Moore said: "In the end, no one really knows what is going to happen. But my message would be 'don't panic'."

Those of us who have already seen the galaxy on 30 Altairian dollars a day agree...

Re:And in lage friendly letters...

[Anonymous Coward]

You gotta love Patrick Moore. We need more entertaining experts in their fields.

Plus he's actually from Betelgeuse, which makes it all the more fascinating.

Don't tell anyone I told you that.

It's not?

[TheQuantumShift]

Damn! I guess we'll just have to wait for dubya to turn into the antichrist and have ourselves an old fashioned armageddon...

Re:It's not?

[JimPooley]

I guess we'll just have to wait for dubya to turn into the antichrist...

What do you mean, 'wait' and 'turn into'?

English translation

[Anonymous Coward]

Would somebody please translate that gabbled story in to real English? I think a forth grader could write up a better description than that!

Not to be cynical, but...

[mESSDan]

This matters why? I mean, sure, they have to update the textbooks, but why is this worth researching, let alone newsworthy? Can this problem help us solve other problems that need to be solved?

Any astrophysicists mind?

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[gnovos]

This matters why? I mean, sure, they have to update the textbooks, but why is this worth researching, let alone newsworthy? Can this problem help us solve other problems that need to be solved?

Um, actually, this is the only problem that actually needs to be solved. What is the point of bickering over wellfare or crime or taxes or wars (or anything really) if we are going to go and cease to exist in the next 10 billion years? If the human species is goint to survive in the long term, then we have to plan in the long term.

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[superposed]

This matters why?

The questions they're answering are more philosophical than practical. A lot of people would like to know where we and our world came from and where we're going. This is a stab at answering part of that.

Knowing that our planet will just barely escape the sun might also reinforce the sense that it's special somehow.

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[glwillia]

This matters why? I mean, sure, they have to update the textbooks, but why is this worth researching, let alone newsworthy? Can this problem help us solve other problems that need to be solved?

Any astrophysicists mind?


Well, as a budding astrophysicist (undergrad physics/astronomy major at UofA), planetary/stellar evolution is quite an important area of research (in fact, a whole branch of astronomy focuses on this. It's even a separate degree program at some schools--planetary science). Also, forgetting to account for the radiation of energy and the resultant decrease in mass seems to be a fairly major oversight, in violation of some of the most basic concepts of orbital motion, such as the fact that the downward force due to gravity (and, hence, responsible for the behavior of orbits) is proportional to the mass of the central object and inversely proportional to the radius squared. Decrease the mass, and the force decreases, resulting in a change in the dynamics of Earth's movement, and increasing the perihelion and aphelion.

This is worth researching because Earth and its fate is somewhat important to us, for reasons that should be obvious. This will help us model the evolution of the solar system up to the white-dwarf stage, one which will be reached by most main-sequence stars (we think).

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[dragons_flight]

Though the other reasons people have stated are important and true, the real reason one does this kind of research is because they can get published. Not only that, but this isn't hard. Assumming I had calculator and a reference with all the important astrohysical parameters, I could get a rough magnitude of the correction in an afternoon, easy.

If you're anywhere in academia, then coming up with an insight you can publish after less than 6 months of work is a big thrill. Why does it make the news? Because most people have at least some interest in the fate of humanity; we care about our descendants. Oh, and most people are bad with big numbers and don't really understand how remote 5 billion years.

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[kLaNk]

This is worth researching because Earth and its fate is somewhat important to us, for reasons that should be obvious.

I fail to really see what you are getting at. You haven't given any reasons Not to get into a theological discussion here, but if we die and then turn into dust, what do I care if the earth gets destroyed many (many!) years later. Big f-ing deal dude. Hell, somebody could prove that the earth would be destroyed 500 years from now I wouldn't care.

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, you'll change your mind after we figure out matter transport and time travel and, running late for work, you accidentally set the destination for 7.6 billion years into the future.

Then you won't be complaining about having a planet to stand on, I'll bet.

Re:Not to be cynical, but...

[Austenite]

And if I had a pencil and paper I too could scribble some guff about E=MC^2 upon it in short order.

You said it yourself - it's not the volume of writing that's publishable, it's the insight (and the evidence).

hmmm

[metrix007]

Now, i dont want to start a war or anything, but earth is the only planet that we know that sustains life, could this be divine intervention? thoughts worth thinking about in my opinon. i hope this gets a good mod.

heh

[coldshado]

riiight.

Re:heh

[Anonymous Coward]

Create a website.

Whoop de fuckin do.
Hey look, I can use the tolilet too!

Re:heh

[Anonymous Coward]

haha.

Re:heh

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're so smart then why dont you create your own site! Too lazy? or too incompetent?

Money?

Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[StaticEngine]

You can make your slogan "Earth: As Close As You Can Get To The Action, With Your Feet Still On The Ground!" Or maybe even "Earth: Now The Closest Planet To The Sun!"

Seriously though, 7.7 Billion years from now is a LONG TIME AWAY. I highly doubt that any life form higher than an insect will exist then in a form that we would recognize today. And while possibly providing insight into what planets orbiting other white dwarves we should look to for signs of past life (once we get equipment that can resolve their existance, much less probe their surface), I don't think this is anything anyone needs to worry about today.

Of course, assuming further checks prove that the Earth will survive past the death of our own sun, perhaps we should leave a legacy to the rest of the Universe by planting the sum knowledge of mankind somewhere safe below the surface (assuming we could sheild it from geologic destruction) and send out satellites to the furthest reaches of the galaxy proclaiming the gift to all Life, everywhere. Just be sure to pack this with some T-Shirts that read, "I went to Earth, and all I got was this lousy Data Crystal."

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[suss]

Of course, assuming further checks prove that the Earth will survive past the death of our own sun, perhaps we should leave a legacy to the rest of the Universe by planting the sum knowledge of mankind somewhere safe below the surface

groups.google.com goes underground?

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[Sprunkys]

oeh...

send out satellites to the furthest reaches of the galaxy proclaiming the gift to all Life, everywhere

Does "Friendship One" (ST VOY) ring a bell?
Otherwise, check Startrek.com.

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[sheetsda]

perhaps we should leave a legacy to the rest of the Universe by planting the sum knowledge of mankind somewhere safe below the surface

Any beings advanced enough to find, retrieve, and interpret it probably wouldn't gain much except perhaps insight into an ancient culture. We might give them a good laugh I suppose. Kinda like scratching "mankind was here" in the bathroom of the galaxy in very small letters. I think a better solution would be to create a whole bunch of spacecraft that fly around the Universe distributing this sum of knowledge.

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[wiremind]

Why not make a kind of "Planet, Starter Kit"...
all the basic nessesities:

-lots of plant seeds
--something pretty vigorous, and dominant

-a bunch of eggs for animals, a few mammals, a few amphibians.

well actually, just make a kinda portable garden of eden to get everthing going, include the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy so they can find they way back to us some day, and include the encyclopedia galactica.

and with that in hand, we will just send off a few hundred thousand of them in every direction.

really, whats the worst that could happen?
.
.
Oh wait...

~"maybe this is as good as it gets"~

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[Chris Burke]

You know, that's actually a depressing thought. Usually, when sci-fi has us find the ancient knowledge repository of an ancient species, they turn out to have been not only incredibly advanced, but also incredibly wise, and their secrets inevitably benefit mankind as result. I shudder to think of some less-advanced race finding our Data Crystal and learning about what -our- race has to offer...

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[Anonymous Coward]

Or a bunch of spacecraft broadcasting "For a good time, call 555-HOTLIPS"...

Re:Future Entrepreneurs Take Note

[zCyl]

really, whats the worst that could happen?

Some advanced alien species takes it as a biological warfare invasion and returns to kill us all.

Space, nerds, math.

[ImaLamer]

I love space/universe shows on Discovery and the like, watch it all any chance I get. But I don't know as much as the next guy because I didn't have any 'formal' space nerd training.

Why do I write? Read the quote below.

For decades, astronomy textbooks have insisted that the Earth will be engulfed in an inferno billions of years from now as the sun burns up its nuclear fuel and swells to become a gigantic red star.


You mean this is actually in the texts? I understand why someone would want to check and make sure that the earth isn't going to be burnt up in a nuclear inferno when they leave for work. Hell, check to see if we should celebrate New Years.

But when you are sitting there doing all that astronomical math, and you notice the number is higher than 10,000, why don't you just quit?

Leave the math for later generations.

at least someone's keeping track. . .

[sydney]

As much as a procrastinator as I am, its always reassuring to know I have even MORE time to put things off.

Re:at least someone's keeping track. . .

[An Onerous Coward]

I hope not everyone is like you. Of course, I'm referring to the Mozilla team (slogan: 1.0 sometime before the sun burns out).

Yes, I am exaggerating for humorous effect. I'm sure that, 7 billion years from now, they'll be very close to releasing Mozilla 3.0.

IE, on the other hand, will be up to IE 73,033,075.1, will take up approximately 300 petabytes of storage, and will have a security flaw which will give hackers root access to your machine before you even pop the CD into the tray.

Intel will be destroyed as a corporation after their experimental 27 quintillion transistor processor goes critical, destroying both their research facility and half of North America. Overclocking enthusiasts will then be rounded up and shot for the safety of mankind.

I think I can trust them

[jsse]

Now a team of astrophysicists at Sussex University in England has uncovered a significant flaw in the standard view of how the sun will evolve, with dramatic consequences for the fate of our planet.

I've problem trusting the research results from University major in sussing out sex .

Btw, anyone would tell me why Englishmen had to build University around sex?

(yes, it's a joke, take it easy)

Re:I think I can trust them

[Anonymous Coward]

You must be thinking of Essex, not sussex or middlesex (or the mysterious wessex).

Re:I think I can trust them

[Anonymous Coward]

>>Btw, anyone would tell me why Englishmen had to
>>build University around sex [mdx.ac.uk]?

Very funny. That was my school from 1987-1990. I
can tell ya I wasn't in the "middle" of any sex
action while I was there. That bastard analogue
EE lecturer from Greece - SHOCK - had all those
stuck up bitches in the interior design department
to himself, though. Dunno why, must have been his
BMW...

hm...

[burtonator]

wonder if this will happen before MS is actually punished for their monopolistic behavior??

Re:hm...

[ImaLamer]

M$ will be punished ah, well... I'm guessing it will be cold and rather not to hot.

Re:hm...

[gnovos]

wonder if this will happen before MS is actually punished for their monopolistic behavior??

What, are you kidding? Now thier whole "keep the courts busy until the Earth boils away into a fiery red giant inferno" strategy is all shot to hell...

i was worried..

[ubugly2]

...and i was going to get on the other ship with the middle management and the telephone repairmen...

Simearth

[wbav]

I guess the game was wrong. Okay, time for a re-write of what happens.

Slogan.

[ImaLamer]

How about this:

"Earth, what a tan!"

{this below a picture of George Hamilton}

I like this picture or this one.

this all sounds very nice but...

[atari2600]

All of this sounds very exciting and interesting but i was thinking about intergalactic wireless networks and
hyperspace travel. I do not know whats going to happen to this world tomorrow - if we humans dont blow up ourselves in the next one hundred years - then we might contemplate something billions of years away but still it would be nice to have old Earth when its time for my incarnation. Doh 4am and out of coffee - /. is my caffeine now.

5.7 billion. with a b.

[magicslax]

"This is about 200 million years later than previously thought - an extra period of grace that humans could use to develop technologies for living on a hotter Earth, such as building communities deep underground. Alternatively, the human race could move to another planet for a while."

if they think that the human race will still be around that far into the future, i have some sad news. us crazy advanced primates are completely insignificant in the evolutionary timeline. chances are we get blasted off the face of the planet by disastor (like the dinasarus?) or do it ourselves. more likely still is that we are replaced by something better adapted.

i hardly think the race will be around lonk enough to need that extra 200 million years. it's kind of a shame though; the teasers for Final Fantasy MXXI were looking promising.

--
no caps for the wicked

All RIGHT! Excellent!

[Anonymous Coward]

A few million extra years a few billion years from now. This is great news!

...

...

pizza here yet?

And in the end...

[abelaye]

...there were only cockroaches and Dick Clark.

-- anthony

Re:And in the end...

[gaj]

Well, more accurately, cockroaches and Dick Clark's hair.

Re:And in the end...

[Anonymous Coward]

And this has really crimped his plans - looks like we're just gonna cop some kind of freeze-out end of the world.

He was hoping for a real Rockin' New Years Eve with the most spectacular fireworks ever.

Let me get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

Who's gonna care in 100 years? My *god* people, get some priorities!

P.S. You people make me sick!

Re:Let me get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

C'mon, if you're going to cut and steal my priorities troll, you should at least update it! Like, "India and Pakistan are on the brink of war, Israel and Pakistan are at each other's throats, and 4 terrorists with suitcase nukes are descending upon lower Manhattan..." (oops, er, scratch that last part. I plead the 5th!)

Woohoo!

[ImaLamer]

200 million extra years?

Wow, someone must have been very nice this past year.

...in other news, President George Walker Bush promised to not raise taxes even if we live unto those 200 millions years

20 Ways the World Could End

[jsse]

Actually Discover has an article pointing out 20 Ways the World Could End - long before Sun expanding to get us all. Just telling me sun is a whimpy boy doesn't really relief me at all. :)

(btw, I think 17 is about the present world. :)

Re:20 Ways the World Could End

[Anonymous Coward]

#20 We wake up and realize /. is just a dream.

Re:20 Ways the World Could End

[The FooMiester]

(taken from the gamma ray burst scenario)
killing off the tiny photosynthetic plankton in the ocean that provide oxygen to the atmosphere and bolster the bottom of the food chain.

I disagree here. While the increased UV would cause things on land to die, UV is dissipated rather quickly when it hits the water. Only the first few inches would be cooked. Photosynthisis takes place even at MUCH deeper depths.

Re:20 Ways the World Could End

[Anonymous Coward]

#18 The Earth is demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass.

Almost related...

[Runt-Abu]

YB5 has quietly passed us by, which is nice.

7.7 Billion years

[Mr. Spleen]

I think it's safe to say that humans won't be around long enough for us to worry about this problem. The rate of evolution of species will make us into something else looooooong before then. Even if we are around, we will certainly have the technology to provide light and keep the Earth's geothermal reaction going long enough to move the entire planet to orbit another star. Hell, we may even be able to refuel the sun and keep it going for another 13 billion years. Humans have only been around for 100,000 years, and we've come a long way, but it's only just the beginning of our exponential curve upwards. Just hope we don't kill ourselves off first.

Mr. Spleen

"That's what I call taking the LONG view..."

[Tsar]

I thought the Long Now Foundation's 10,000-year clock was an optimistic project. Why would anyone, especially learned men of the Royal Society, postulate that human life will exist in its present climate-dependent position even a million years from now?

We have gone from living at the mercy of the elements to building living environments in space in the span of only a few millennia, with the bulk of the technology being developed only in the last century. And now we stand poised to rewrite our own genome. Does anyone expect that, if mankind still exists five billion years hence, that it will be limited to this puny ball of rock, entirely dependent on this one yellow dwarf? Or that we will even resemble our current selves, either physically or intellectually?

Mankind may indeed pass through many cycles of near-extinction before the next million years pass. Look at our current speculative fiction. Scarcely anyone attempts to write about the future beyond a few thousand years, because we know it is beyond imagination.

Perhaps it would be best to say of stories such as this, that the Sun is still expected to continue, without substantial changes, for any conceivable lifespan of the human race as we now know it. Beyond that, we're whistling in the solar wind, for only God can know.

Old News

[Anonymous Coward]

Previous studies have reached the same conclusion,
a paper published in 1993 had the same results,showing that the Earth would not be engulfed by the Sun at any time in the future.
Sackmann, Boothroyd and Kraemer coupled the stellar evolution calculations with a simple model to predict the climate of the Earth to estimate
that a 'moist greenhouse' will occur 1.2 Gyr from now. See the original paper at NASA ADS:
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query? bi bcode=1993ApJ...418..457S&db_key=AST&high=3b8eaa35 e207349

ask slasdot : linux stability

[crhylove]

u think my webserver will crash by then?

In another related report....

[Anonymous Coward]

Scientists have discovered that Evolution is a sham and have decided to support Creationism.

So where to go?

[jezreel]

As shown in several movies and recent popul.-charts, humankind will *have* to move to another planet/place due to overpopulation. I wonder where the nearest places are? Do we even have enough ressources to build appropriate spaceships, like, real big and to fire them up? (intentionally not talking 'bout money, there will be enough in case of emergency)

I bet we'll waste the last drop of oil driving to McDonalds to get one of these new SpaceBurgers(tm)

Re:So where to go?

[Anonymous Coward]

at some point, we'll realize that we have to make our population like 1% of what it is now, so we'll randomly select one out of every 100 people, or pick the 99%-ile for intelligence, perhaps, and only those will be allowed to live. the others will be given the option of uploading themselves into a virtual software world before their bodies are turned into baby food. This virtual world will be a lot like this one, unless you want to be creative and put effort into developing your own personal world. Most of us will exist in RAM somewhere, backed up reduntantly on disk, of course, long before we have to worry about whether the sun will expand enough to engulf us.

The question is: do you stay out here in the 'real world,' or go into the the world that seems real in every way that this one seems real. You have a bit more security in this one, but hey, Jeri Ryan (7 of 9) is never going to be your girlfriend in this one, and you can't put Bill Gates on the rack in this one either. The virtual world could model this one perfectly, in all important respects, and perhaps you even get to be God or Q, but somebody will have to run the machine. You could still even communicate with outsiders via Internet, the Internet world being exactly the same whether you're carbon- or silicon-based. Sometimes I read /. postings that seem like they were written by bots whose language module only goes through 4th-grade level, and I wonder if some people haven't transitioned to virtual worlds, unbeknownst to the rest of us. If any /. users are already in virtual worlds, do respond. What's your particular world like? Are you a Q? Details.

And then again, perhaps I'm just too tired and should stop reading /. till all hours of the morning.

Re:So where to go?

[big_hairy_mama]

Why? If the population increases to more than the environment can handle, then the "leftovers" will simply die off. You are correct that the Earth can only sustain a limited number of people, and that in order to keep growing at our current rate, we will have to find new homes. If you had actually read the population predictions, you would see that the population will stabalize and then decrease by the end of the next century. What do you expect will happen?

while(true) {
grow(people);
while(count(people) > count(food))
kill(people);
}

Maybe your morals are just too great to allow those innocent people to die (or really, to never be born) because of lack of resources and space. Before we focus on building the massive spaceships you request, let's take notice that the population *already* exceeds the resources in many parts of the world.

Re:So where to go?

[Luyseyal]

Before we focus on building the massive spaceships you request, let's take notice that the population *already* exceeds the resources in many parts of the world.

Indeed, distribution is the main problem. We sit here and pay farmers to raise crops and let them dry up and die. Admittedly, many of these crops are not approved for human consumption since they contain alterations we consider safe for Food[tm] (i.e., cattle, sheep, etc.) but not for people (silly FDA vs Dept of Agriculture games). But the point still holds... distribution is the main problem, for political and economic reasons. Some countries hate us and don't want our food; others cannot afford the shipping costs. It'll work itself out eventually.

That population study in Nature is really good and holds with gut feelings a lot of us have had for years. If we can keep from some World Dictatorship, affluence will help the third world catch up and their populations will drop accordingly.

randomness,
-l

Re:So where to go?

[Leven Valera]

at some point, we'll realize that we have to make our population like 1% of what it is now, so we'll randomly select one out of every 100 people, or pick the 99%-ile for intelligence, perhaps, and only those will be allowed to live. the others will be given the option of uploading themselves into a virtual software world before their bodies are turned into baby food. This virtual world will be a lot like this one, unless you want to be creative and put effort into developing your own personal world. Most of us will exist in RAM somewhere, backed up reduntantly on disk, of course, long before we have to worry about whether the sun will expand enough to engulf us.
The question is: do you stay out here in the 'real world,' or go into the the world that seems real in every way that this one seems real. You have a bit more security in this one, but hey, Jeri Ryan (7 of 9) is never going to be your girlfriend in this one, and you can't put Bill Gates on the rack in this one either. The virtual world could model this one perfectly, in all important respects, and perhaps you even get to be God or Q, but somebody will have to run the machine. You could still even communicate with outsiders via Internet, the Internet world being exactly the same whether you're carbon- or silicon-based. Sometimes I read /. postings that seem like they were written by bots whose language module only goes through 4th-grade level, and I wonder if some people haven't transitioned to virtual worlds, unbeknownst to the rest of us. If any /. users are already in virtual worlds, do respond. What's your particular world like? Are you a Q? Details.

And then again, perhaps I'm just too tired and should stop reading /. till all hours of the morning.

Yeah, I miss college, and all of the good weed, too.

LV

Re:So where to go?

[jem.cc]

We *cannot* go somewhere other than Earth to alleviate near term overpopulation. It costs about $10,000/pound to put stuff into LEO. To get a billion people off the planet (not considering the food or life-support to prevent their death when they left) 10^9 people * 10^2 pounds/person * 10^4 dollars/pound is a rough approximation of the cost. Anyone have a quadrillion dollars in spare change?

>(intentionally not talking 'bout money, there will be enough in case of emergency)

The value-token system isn't something that exists independent of reality. It was invented in order to model reality in ways that allow the kind of paper-napkin calculation above. If it costs a quadrillion then it means we'd have to reallocate about that many resources to get the job done. The Earth's GDP is around $40 trillion and you can be sure lots of those resources are not flexible enough to be reallocated to something as specific as space migration.

Way long term something might work out. Space elevators and orbital ships built from asteroids might be able to handle a few billion if we had to abandon the solar system, but that would be quite a few decades away even if we started serious work now. By the time we can do anything serious about space migration the population will have shrunk due to the wealth effect in some parts of the globe and famine and disease in other parts.

-------

Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish !!!!!!!!!

[Blackneto]

I hope my Peril sensitive Sens-O-Matic 9000's are working that day.

--

Page-lengthening post

[Anonymous Coward]

Two-hundred million years... I wonder if our Commander of Mexican Foods will get around to fixing the Page-lengthening post bug before then! Oh, and: suck an egg from the anus of a chicken, Klerk.

Regards,
A. Nonimus Coward

Mental instability

[CAIMLAS]

I really don't see what mental instability would promote the thought that humans - or really any sort of life - would exist on earth after that period of time. Hello, people! There's this little thing in our world called entropy - it makes stuff break. That's everything from the decay of last week's pot roast in the oven, to the atomic and molecular integrety of anything you can name.

After 7 billion years, there will be absolutely nothing left to evolve, irregardless of whether evolution is a reality or not.

Re:Mental instability

[pyramid termite]

I really don't see what mental instability would promote the thought that humans - or really any sort of life - would exist on earth after that period of time. Hello, people! There's this little thing in our world called entropy - it makes stuff break

True, but that's only a showstopper in a closed system, which Earth is not. Furthermore, we can leave ...

Re:Mental instability

[Anonymous Coward]

irregardless of whether evolution is a reality or not.

Irregardless is not a word. You should have used regardless.

Re:Mental instability

[CAIMLAS]

Entropy isn't just inclusive of earth. It's a universal scientific property.

Re:Mental instability

[jnana]

What is important is that there are pockets of lower entropy (lower than the larger systems of which they are a part) and that we can migrate to these places long before our system burns out. Our planet, of course, is a good example, of a local low-entropy system, as is a (living) human body; what matters is not that the entropy is increasing for the entire universe, but that it is relatively slowly for our bodies, for example, and someday perhaps this can be avoided (at the cost of increasing entropy to the larger system that includes my body, of course). Long after our solar system is a cool high-entropy mush, there will be newly formed low-entropy star systems and planets, and we will hopefully have figured out the software that causes entropy to eventually win out in our bodies. The eventual entropy death of the entire universe is kind of a bummer, but perhaps we'll be a non-corporeal life form and be unaffected by the physical universe. And there's always the prospect of becoming members of the Q-continuum.

Phew!

[marko123]

This is a relief for me because I was planning to live forever by replacing my body parts with pig organs. The big hole in my plans was that the Earth was going to be eaten by the sun. Woohoo!

By then...

[Anonymous Coward]

M$ would have perfected their product. Stable OS, 100% monopoly of the planet and moon...

on the other hand, if they havent... 5.7 BILLION year seems a loooonnnngggg time, I can't wait.

Oh Darn......Bloody YnK Problem

[Insipid Trunculance]

And here I was thinking no matter what my date field would never need to be bigger than enough to hold 5.8 Billion Years.....

Watch them blame us poor programmers when all hell breaks lose......

heh

[Anonymous Coward]

You're not really a programmer just somebody who thinks he can program. If you're so smart then why dont you create your own site! Too lazy? or too incompetent? The latter seems appropriate.

I'm sceptic...

[hatchet]

I don't really believe that life on earth will last that long.. so why don't we just wait and see:)

Actually.. everything will be gone when I die.. even time. Talking about after that time is totally irrelevant for me. I would care if i could.. but i won't be able to.

Re:Why Slashdot Sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

heh %100 agree. not to mention, you flame linux, you get an instant -1 mod. I seen a few windows flamers get +2. Love the bias ;)

and to anon who posted "heh" i think this guys who article is about you. you must be a slashdot poster.

Re:ep!

[Anonymous Coward]

Lovely, just lovely. I haven't read anything that outright disgusting since the Taco-snotting FAQ. If WIPO ever comes back, tell him to update the JonKatz section with this!

Absolutely beautiful work there, man.

Depressing lack of vision

[Rebelli0n]

I'm a bit amazed at peoples lack of vision concerning this. What happened to building starships, colonising new worlds, building Dyson spheres, wormholes... all that stuff.. and that should just in the next few thousand years.

If the human race hasn't been annihilated by the myriad dangers of space, or by itself, by the time this happens, I'd be pretty disapointed if it hadn't spread all over the galaxy. i'd expect us to be able to *make* planets and stars by then.

it's one or the other, either we are destroyed eons before the sun dies, or we've colonised the universe / evolved into something far greater, and so it's just a trivial event.

It's a bit depressing to read that so many people just think we're going to go the way of the dinosaurs, and it's a just a matter of time. I'm sure we should be trying to survive a little harder than that.

Re:Depressing lack of vision

[cockroach2]

this planet here is getting pretty crowded, so we'd better hurry with building new ones...

Re:Depressing lack of vision

[Anonymous Coward]

We should evolve mentally, not just technologically. If we are still the same naked apes acting on fear, lust for power, greed, etc when the sun burns out then odds are we will have screwed ourselves long before then.

p.s. Read less sci-fi

Re:Depressing lack of vision

[Anonymous Coward]

Your right, in that our EVOLVED DESCENDENTS will be capable of these things if something doesn't happen to kill us all. And I don't mean a random genetic evolution like has been happening in the past. Our minds with the help of intelligent machines will be capable of editing every aspect of ourselves...including boosting our own intelligence to make the NEXT iteration of ourselves. I doubt we would recognize our descendents or understand even what motivated them After all, the fear, greed, love, hate...what meaning would these emotions have for our descendents? What would they fear, understanding all physics and all phenomena? Why would the be greedy if they can make unlimited amounts of "virtual" goods for themselves as well as get a share of the "real" stuff. Why would they love, given that reproduction would not be necesary (infinite lifespan) and sex probably long removed from ourselves except as an "entertainment" option. Why would they hate if they can understand the inner thought processes of the person they hate, reaching understanding?

Course, this is assuming there are even individual personalities...maybe we will all merge into a borg like entity containing the "best bits" of each and every one of us, giving it unlimited skills and abilities.

Moving up!

[dasspunk]

At least we'll moving up from 3rd planet, all the way up to number one! Mother Earth will be so proud...

putting off?

[Anonymous Coward]

"I had some long term plans that I had been putting off..."

Surely you mean going to bring forward? :-)

Aren't you the witty one?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh...stop...yer killin me!!!

Scitific Depression

[Anonymous Coward]

And aren't that all astronomers depressed?
Work every day with such an astronomic numbers of years, and knowing that they only are going to life 50 years more.

An example of this knowledge of limited life time is well known by phisic scientists.
Each generation thinks that they has discovered the unified theory, but it never happens.

Is like read The Bicentenary Man (the book not the movie!) you see throught the eyes of the robot how shot is the human life (shoft but wonderful).

How can you some body that is every day fighting with thinks like the Sun is going to expand in X billion of years, living with it and knowing that they never are going to see what they life every day trhought their dreams?

I have a Scientific Depression.

Not now, but when?

[labradore]

Okay, so we probably don't have to start preparing for the expansion of the Sun anytime soon but this brings to mind an interesting question: when do we have to start worrying? In other words, how long will it take to move an entire population off of the Earth? What would we take with us? Would we take lots of minerals? Lots of other species? Would we rather try to alter the Earth's orbit? How long would it take for us to do that safely? How do you move an entire planet? If you abandon the Earth, what information do you record about it to take with you? It seems to me that this is such a large undertaking that if we have to move with anything like todays technology we would want to start at least 50 thousand years before the eminant catastrophy. It seems to me that it would be the single largest undertaking in history.

On the other hand, if we plan on lasting that long I suppose it would be a good idea to colonize wherever possible. Mars and Venus seem like obvious candidates. Mars seems like a no-brainer but Venus would be the real challenge. Could we alter its orbit and the greenhouse effects in its atmosphere?

I think it is interesting that we expect that our own species will not last that long. I don't have any evidence for our longevity, but consider that we are the only species that we know of in Earth's history that is intelligent and uses tools to survive. We are the only species that we know of that significantly changes our own environment to suit us and we're the only species that can reach beyond our planet. It would seem already that we are a statistical anomoly.

Re:Not now, but when?

[juhaz]

Nothing to worry about, 7.5 billion years is LOT of time, even with todays technology you could probably colonize whole damn galaxy by then, doesn't take longer than few thousand years at most to colonize nearby star and have it in good enough condition for it to send an own colony ship to next and each new solar system adds up to the process speeding up exponentially and in just about no time we are everywhere. Unless there is someone already there who doesn't like pesky hairless apes stealing their territory.

And what comes to taking other species... well, if we are continuing what we are doing now, there will be no other living things to worry about.

Anyway, we gotta go, even if Earth as a planet survives the cataclysm, nothing can live there anymore after the sun shrinks into a white dwarf, no matter how much greenhouse gases we'll pump into atmosphere (which probably doesn't exist anymore), it'll still be colder than the Pluto is now.

Re:Not now, but when?

[grimani]

colonize venus?!?

last time i checked, venus was *closer* to the ever expanding sun.

Re:Not now, but when?

[seaker]

There was a story a few months back on CNN about a proposal to move the whole earth as a survival strategy. This would have involved making repeated passes near earth by an asteroid on the order of 75km in size.

At one pass every 6000 years they felt the planet could be moved about 60million km, and give another 5 billion years or so in the 'habitable zone'.

Re:Not now, but when?

[faldore]

Now is the time to learn about our universe so that we will be prepared when the time comes to prevent the extinction of our species.

Science leads to engineering. Engineering leads to gadgets. And gadgets -- lead to suffering.

Re:Not now, but when?

[Saeger]

Your post was understandably very human and Earth centric, but us humans will "outgrow" both our limited organic brains & bodies, and our cradle Earth, way before the Sun runs out of juice.

A planet is an amazingly inefficient place to live in terms of habitable surface area, energy required to leave its gravity well, wasted resources beneath your feet, etc. In fact, the Earth -- after the other planets -- will most likely be "dismantled" by our future selves in order to reassemble its raw molecular material for more useful purposes (like landfill in the ringworld(s) :)

--

Re:Not now, but when?

[nerdlyone]

We'll just have to move to Ringworld! (No, that is NOT a Tolkien reference!) Go Larry!

Re:Not now, but when?

[Anonymous Coward]

Larry Niven's scifi ringworld design isn't the most efficient either.

His ringworld needs to spin around a star at an ungodly rate to create its pseudo gravity. This puts astronomical tension on the entire structure, requiring extra wasted material to avoid flying apart.

Instead of a flat ringworld belt, imagine a donutshape, and instead of rotating around a star at a gazillion kph, imagine that the donut is stationary except that it rotating about its own axis to create artificial gravity on its outerwalls. Since the donut has such a huge radius the compression/tension fatigue at is inner/outer walls is not signifigant.

I don't know whose idea this was originally, but I like it. You get more surface area, and it doesn't require insane engineering like nivens ringworld. This new idea needs a cool name too.

--Koz

Re:Why Slashdot Sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Speak the Word brother.

/. is just a worn down little cog in a big stinky machine.

Pr0n!

[Anonymous Coward]

I currently have 37,542 pornographic images ("pr0n") residing on my hard drive, for a grand total of 4.36 gigabytes! Just thought you'd like to know...

Re:Why Slashdot Sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Look, I hate slashdot as much as the other guy. However, you really should go somewhere else if you dislike it so.

Hmm...

[tunah]

According to recent calculations

What happened to the old calculations? Did some new information come to light or did they forget to carry the three last time?

It's okay

[DarkHelmet]

Because the Vogons are going to destroy this planet soon enough anyway.

Re:It's okay

[JimPooley]

No no no!

Life, The Universe, and Everything clearly states this will happen in the year 198-.

This is the earth Mk 2!

hmm could be a mistake

[Sk3lt]

What happens if the computers they are using are running Windows XP?

The time could be off a couple of thous...

Since we're gonna kill ourselves anyway

[ColGraff]

Does this really matter? We all know some ass is going to push The Button, or unleash a super-virus, or some damn thing within a few hundred years - it's plain luck we've lasted this long without a nuclear war.

Re:And in large friendly letters...

[cyclist1200]

I've already got my towel.

I'm so excited!!

[eekDude]

I'm so excited about this finding and what it really means! It's kind of like the end of daylight savings, where you get an extra hour to sleep. This is like it, but only better!!!!

Nuclear War is not the end

[Anonymous Coward]

Can Nuclear war kill 99% of population on earth?
The 60 million that survive can go ahead.
And if all humans are killed, life in oceans can survive, so it's important to that life when is the sun to kill all earth life.

And that life throught 7 billion years can evolve to be as intelligent as humans (or more).

IMHO we are too many worried about humans, when the future is going to be ruled by the sons of the sons of the sons... of actual bugs. (Not software bugs. That bugs what can do is killed us all).

More Time! All RIGHT!!!!

[tcort]

More time to perfect Green Jello!

South Pole is a different case.

[dmaxwell]

The northern polar ice cap is indeed a big ice cube and will act much as you say. The anarctic cap however is sitting on a continent. That ice is not part of the oceans displacement in any form. If the southern polar ice cap melts, the oceans will indeed rise. Runoff from places like Greenland will probably count some as well.

Unnecessary

[QuickFox]

This expansion of the sun is such a needless bloat. I tried to tell God to use Linux instead but he just wouldn't listen.

Give a man a fish and he eats for one day. Teach him how to fish, and though he'll eat for a lifetime, he'll call you a miser for not giving him your fish.

We don't have 7.5 billion years

[pyramid termite]

Nothing to worry about, 7.5 billion years is LOT of time, even with todays technology you could probably colonize whole damn galaxy by then,

The problem is, that's not the time limit we have to deal with - we have to start the process before we run out of readily available resources and before we destroy our civilization (or an asteroid or whatever does it for us). If civilization is destroyed, the survivors will have a lot harder time bootstrapping themselves back up to our level because much of the easily mined resources may have already been used up and what's left takes a certain level of technology to get. If they need the technology to get the resources, but need the resources to get the technology, they're checkmated.

An optimistic guess is that we have a few hundred years to get our act together and get off the planet. A pessimistic guess would be that it's already too late. I think we've got 50 to 100 years, but that's a short time to learn to live in space and get a critical mass of self-reproducing culture and techology up there. We should have done more than we have. We need to start soon. There may be only one chance and this may be it.

Re:We don't have 7.5 billion years

[Anonymous Coward]

What are you smoking? Any disaster that leaves enough survivors to continue the human species (ok, so an asteroid collision might kill almost EVERYONE and more importantly what we eat...but assuming its not that bad) we will have PLENTY of raw material to start with...far more to work with than our ancesters ever did. First, we will have KNOWLEDGE. Maybe not everything mankind knows, but as long as we have even a HANDFUL of scientists and engineers we could recreate our current level of technology in a century or two, if the knowledge isn't lost, that is.

Second, umm, we would have TONS of wrecked debris from our PREVIOUS civilization left. Rubble from just about everything imaginable, some in usable condition. Its a lot easier to get iron ore if you have a junked car than it is to mine it out of the ground, for instance.

And what kind of view is this about exhausting resources? Remember we are a short distance away from a GIGANTIC fusion furnace. If we apes aren't smart enough to use it, we deserve to die off. Energy is the only thing our society of consumption actually depletes, and far more falls on the earth every day and is wasted than we burn in hydrocarbons in a year. Remember, just because you burn up the oil doesn't mean you can't still make things...the carbon is still in the ecosystem and there are tons of ways to get it back. About the only thing that we ever PERMANENTLY lose is helium gas, because it leaves the earth's atm. And its not like our society has a critical need for that stuff (can always use hydrogen if you need to cool something with a cold liquid or need something light. You can also transmute hydrogen to helium)

I believe, however, that all of this will become moot. Once we create a thinking machine it will increase its, and hopefully our, knowledge exponentially and rapidly advance our technology to the limits of physics.

Why Bother?

[russianspy]

This post is for everyone who asks: "Why bother?" I've seen some other answers as well, but they did not really say anything. How about this:
This little piece of cosmos is the only one we have fairly accurate information about. We can measure the orbits of the planets, their masses, mass of the sun, etc. with a high degree of accuracy. This makes it usefull in verifying theories. Which in turn helps us understand what is going on in other parts of the universe (since we assume that we're nowhere special and everywhere is pretty much the same).
How do we look for planets? One way is to put a spectrometer on a light comming from a distant star and measure the shift in wavelength due to orbiting mass. You need to ask yourself - how did we know THAT would work??? Any ideas?

End may be closer than we think?

[AnalogBoy]

What about the possibility of being fried by the sun, in its current state?

I remember watching on TLC, and reading subsequently, that the earth's magnetic field is degrading by half every 1600 years. Geophysics isn't my strong suit - Can anyone lend any supporting/debunking information?

It won't be the sun.

[Stupid Dog]

As we all know, the earth will be demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass. And we don't have to worry, since there will be loads of strange fun afterwards anyway.

Just what we need to hear...

[Odinson]

Great, just great.

I have been living my life knowing that all the evidance would incinerated.

Now earth will float around the universe forever as an icy tomb waiting to be dug up, until some alien race finds it and gets pissed enough at human beings to cut earth v3 out of dvd region 1 or somthing.

You think they could of told us this before we voted for Reagan.

Does the center of gravity actually change?

[jmichaelg]

In two different physics classes, the profs made a point of saying that an explosion doesn't change the object's center of gravity. Even though the mass goes flying off helter skelter, the mass'es cg remains where it was or was headed. The equations are still solved as if the mass was compact.

Why would this scenario be any different?

What's even more curious is what happens to matter's ability to attract other matter when the matter is converted to photons? Does the ability to attract matter vanish when matter transmutes to photons?

Re:Does the center of gravity actually change?

[spiro_killglance]

"explosion doesn't change the object's center of gravity"

Quite true, as long a all the matter is inside
the sphere of the earth orbit the gravity will
be the same. However once it is a long
distance outside that sphere it ceases to have
any effect.

According to general relavity, the attractive effect
of gravity comes from not matter but energy,
(actually the source is called the Energy Momentum
tensor, and includes pressure as well). So photons
from the sun have exactly the same effect as the
matter of the sun. However once the light has
passed into deep space the gravity reduces.

What about AI?

[nege]

Well, this is a sigh of relief for the folks over at kurzweil's website (kurzweilai.net) Knowing you are going to live for ever must be a huge burden.

Re:Quit posting to slashdot. Quit posting anywhere

[Anonymous Coward]

How 'bout the difference between no and now? This elitist /. crap has gotten so old...

This reminds me of...

[Faust7]

Red Dwarf.

Future Rimmer: "I'm from the future! I've come to warn you: in three million years, you'll be dead!"
Past Rimmer: "Huh, will I really?"

archimedes principle

[DiveX]

Why? because as ice they displace the same amount of space as they would if they were water. It is achimedes' principle. It is what keeps ships afloat, what makes submarines work.

You nearly have the right idea, but you are still wrong. Anobject that displaces an amount of water that is equal to the weight of the object, then it will be neutrally buoyant. It will neight float nor sink and will be at the mercy of whatever up and down drafts there are. An object that displaces an amount of water that weighs greater than the weight of the object, then that object will float. A copper penny will sink because it displaces very little water, but an aircraft carrier will float because it displaces and incredible amount of water.

The amount of space that is displaced is illelevent as it is the weight relationship of the object and the weight of the water that is displaced.

Re:archimedes principle

[LadyLucky]

NO

Consider a large iceberg. Say, 90% of it lies underwater, 10% of it above water. This is because it is (in my example) 11% less dense than water. But it still has the same weight as the amount of water taken up by the submerged portion of the ice berg. Find any physics text book, or perform the experiment mentioned in one of the other posts, put an ice cube in a glass of water, fill it to the brim and note the water level doesnt change when it melts.

phew!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now I can sleep at night

Brit theory

[Anonymous Coward]

I once read a theory by a Brit scientist that by the year 3800, give or take a century or two, that the radiation from the sun will start to fry all life on earth. If this is true, then we need to get our butts in gear on development of interstellar spacecraft, and hope we can do it in the next 1500 years.

7 billions years from now

[Anonymous Coward]

We will have squeezed every last resource from this planet long before then. If we can't figure out how to live off the earth and control our emotional/moral weaknesses in 7 billion years then I figure we should let the sun cook us. Hell, it only took 1 billion years for life to evolve naturally in the first place.

Andromeda Will Hit Us Before Then

[Mad Bad Rabbit]

In a mere 3 billion years, the Andromeda galaxy will slam into the Milky way. Ouch, and possibly curtains for life on Earth.

nothing new

[lanclos]

I don't have any sources, but this is not a new theory in any way... astronomers and astrophysicists have a rather good understanding of angular momentum and its application, and have maintained for some time that the Earth would not be completely enveloped by the outer layers of our sun as it goes into a red-giant phase.

As others have pointed out, the natural life-cycle of the sun will sear all life from the surface of the Earth long before any potential engulfing happens (as if it was the engulfing that mattered; the outer layers of a red giant are extremely thin, much more tenuous than our atmosphere). We'll experience some kind of runaway greenhouse effect something like a billion years before the sun enters the red giant phase... and our galaxy will collide with Andromeda before the sun goes belly-up.

One of our hopes for preposterously-long-term survival, as researched (with a smile on his face and a glint in his eye) by Greg Laughlin (et al.), is for the Earth to be caught by a wandering type-M star and pulled out of the solar system.

But really now... we're talking billions of years, here. It's fun to think about, but calling it "news" (especially "breaking news") is a pretty harsh misnomer.

Also a 100MY deadline

[coyote-san]

There are also some deadlines for any species that follow us. E.g., the earth has had fairly consistent temperatures even though the sun has been getting brighter because CO2 was getting locked up by life and other geological processes. So the amount of greenhouse gases have tended downward over time.

So far so good, but there's little CO2 left to remove from the atmosphere. As it continues to drop, we'll lose trees. No trees, no wood for construction projects. A bit latter, we'll lose even bushes and shrubs - the only form of plant life will be grasses.

Over an even longer timeframe (250 MY?), we'll hit a "wet greenhouse" phase. Hot oceans release more water vapor, which initially produces clouds that reflect sunlight. But this only goes so far, eventually the "water vapor as greenhouse gas" effect will dominate the "water vapor as bright white clouds" effect and the oceans will boil. This eventually leads to a "dry greenhouse" like Venus.

I'm not sure whether I'm optimistic (I think our window is much wider than you), or pestimistic (if we fail as a species, our successors may not have enough time to evolve.)

Nobody will do anything.

[MillionthMonkey]

Human foresight doesn't extend beyond timescales longer than two or three human lifetimes. It's just human nature. Look at the resistance to taking any action against far more immediate threats (global warming, overpopulation, depletion of fossil fuel reserves, etc.). If the rise in temperature per year stays below a certain rate, people will drive SUVs around until the atmosphere reaches the boiling point of gasoline. People care about their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, but generations beyond that, they only care about in a sort of theoretical sense. Ever hear about that $10 that would be worth $9 million today if it were put in a bank in 1801 and left to accrue interest until now? And yet not one of my ancestors in 1801 seems to have cared about me having $9 million.

So I have to laugh when I see people suggesting that the human race will carry out these wild survival plans that require 200-300 million years for their execution. Nobody will act on a threat from the sun even when it's a million years off, because nobody seriously worries about what's going to happen to their descendants that far in the future. If the sun were even going to explode in a thousand years, you would still be hearing guys on radio talk shows flatly denying that we should do anything involving any sort of personal or national sacrifice.

Re:Nobody will do anything.

[Anonymous Coward]

With any hope, we will...or our machine creations will after they euthanize all of us humans...mentally outgrow such backward ways through genetic enhancements or actual adding hardware to our brains.

Re:Nobody will do anything.

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is, you're an idiot. Your "ancestors" built a society that makes you far more wealthy now, with little direct inheritance, than you'd be if you had $8M and the kind of backwards civilization they worked hard (and in some cases gave their lives) to improve upon.

And you say "look at the resistance to taking any action against far more immediate threats"? And you list GLOBAL WARMING?? So, improving the survivability of humans against bad weather, of crops against climate change, of distribution systems (including CAPITALISM and FREE TRADE, my friend), all of which are going on all the time due to spending bazillions of investor and taxpayer dollars, do not rate as "any action" against global warming?

You also list DEPLETION OF FOSSIL FUEL RESERVES. I guess you haven't noticed the fact that these are generally under the control of a PRICE SYSTEM that takes into account such depletion as it happens, when it happens, and communicates that depletion rapidly over the entire planet's population, requiring no special translation into anyone's "native language"? That's taking ACTION, my friend, whether it fits into your narrow little worldview of what constitutes ACTION. (Which I guess probably is only "pass a buncha laws regulating daily human behavior", eh?)

And OVERPOPULATION? Are you NUTS? The biggest problem with Western Civ today may well be the fact that it is DECLINING IN POPULATION. That's right, what happens when people become educated, wealthy, free, and respectful of laws and property rights, is they STOP INCREASING THEIR POPULATION. Every time.

That's why people like YOU are the biggest threat to humanity's survivability. You refuse to accept the fact that people are, everywhere, ACTING on their own initiative to insure THEIR and their offspring's survival, and since you don't particularly like their actions and hate the steps they take (e.g., drive their children around in SUVs, which are SAFER and do jack-squat to the environment compared to any other vehicle worth driving), YOU are the sort of person who will use FORCE to IMPOSE YOUR WILL on them, REDUCING their practical ability to SURVIVE whatever comes down the pike.

I'd rather let those "guys on radio talk shows" you claim "flatly deny we should do anything involving any sort of personal or national sacrifice" rule than someone like YOU. At least they let EACH of us decide WHAT we will sacrifice, WHEN we will sacrifice, HOW we will sacrifice it, based on what WE each think is best for humanity as WE see it, compared to someone like YOU, who insists everyone march to YOUR silly little tune.

Re:Nobody will do anything.

[MillionthMonkey]

The problem is, you're an idiot. Your "ancestors" built a society that makes you far more wealthy now, with little direct inheritance, than you'd be if you had $8M and the kind of backwards civilization they worked hard (and in some cases gave their lives) to improve upon.

First of all, my momma didn't raise no idiots. Second, your example shows that you didn't read the post you're responding to. My ancestors built a society with infrastructure that I benefit from, that's true, but to suggest that their own efforts did nothing to enrich their own quality of life during their lifetimes strikes me as a little naive.

[I deleted the part about global warming- it was a bad example anyway, since the threat is immediate enough to eventually affect people alive today.]

You also list DEPLETION OF FOSSIL FUEL RESERVES. I guess you haven't noticed the fact that these are generally under the control of a PRICE SYSTEM that takes into account such depletion as it happens, when it happens, and communicates that depletion rapidly over the entire planet's population, requiring no special translation into anyone's "native language"? That's taking ACTION, my friend, whether it fits into your narrow little worldview of what constitutes ACTION. (Which I guess probably is only "pass a buncha laws regulating daily human behavior", eh?)

This shows how well you've been brainwashed. The country is full of wanna-be conservatives who believe that the free market is the cure for everything that ails the world. (I say "wanna-be" because real conservatives aren't dumb enough to believe their own propaganda. A real conservative knows when to dump his dogshit stock and leave his wanna-bes like you holding 401k accounts full of dogshit.) In the case of fossil-fuel reserves, the free market only goes so far. As the cost of oil goes up, more and more oilfields become profitable to use, so the supply increases to meet demand. This doesn't mean that the reserves are somehow an infinite resource. The system is going to constantly move toward a final state where the rate at which oil is consumed equals the rate at which it is created. When this happens, the cost of a gallon of gasoline will have risen to astronomical levels, entirely due to free market forces. Most people would describe this as "no more oil". You can debate and say this won't happen in our lifetimes, and you'd be right- it won't. But it will certainly happen before the sun explodes, definitely within 1000 years.

I should also like to point out that you aren't my friend.

And OVERPOPULATION? Are you NUTS? The biggest problem with Western Civ today may well be the fact that it is DECLINING IN POPULATION. That's right, what happens when people become educated, wealthy, free, and respectful of laws and property rights, is they STOP INCREASING THEIR POPULATION. Every time.

Did you think I was directing some attack at you personally, or at any specific country? The world is bigger than the U.S.A., and overpopulation is generally not considered a problem in the West because it isn't one. (We're educated/wealthy/free/fat/happy here.) The issue centers around places like China and India. Do you see any solution to the overpopulation in India?

That's why people like YOU are the biggest threat to humanity's survivability. You refuse to accept the fact that people are, everywhere, ACTING on their own initiative to insure THEIR and their offspring's survival, and since you don't particularly like their actions and hate the steps they take (e.g., drive their children around in SUVs, which are SAFER and do jack-squat to the environment compared to any other vehicle worth driving), YOU are the sort of person who will use FORCE to IMPOSE YOUR WILL on them, REDUCING their practical ability to SURVIVE whatever comes down the pike.

This paragraph is full of laughs. The quote that SUVs "do jack-squat to the environment compared to any other vehicle worth driving" is my favorite. Did it have the American flag already on it as an option when you bought it?

I'd rather let those "guys on radio talk shows" you claim "flatly deny we should do anything involving any sort of personal or national sacrifice" rule than someone like YOU. At least they let EACH of us decide WHAT we will sacrifice, WHEN we will sacrifice, HOW we will sacrifice it, based on what WE each think is best for humanity as WE see it, compared to someone like YOU, who insists everyone march to YOUR silly little tune.

Dude, I was only making an abstract point about how it's human nature not to act on a threat that's more than 100 years away. I'm sorry if I insulted your personal God somehow, since you seem to have really taken this personally. I have a suspicion though that if Rush was president, the situation wouldn't be as rosy as you imagine.

What's with all the capitalized words anyway? Can't you express yourself in writing without resorting to shouts?

Re:Nobody will do anything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Your "ancestors" built a society that makes you far more wealthy now, with little direct inheritance, than you'd be if you had $8M and the kind of backwards civilization they worked hard (and in some cases gave their lives) to improve upon.

First of all, my momma didn't raise no idiots.

That remains to be seen.

Second, your example shows that you didn't read the post you're responding to. My ancestors built a society with infrastructure that I benefit from, that's true, but to suggest that their own efforts did nothing to enrich their own quality of life during their lifetimes strikes me as a little naive.

It WOULD be if I'd SUGGESTED that, but I didn't! So there!

[I deleted the part about global warming- it was a bad example anyway, since the threat is immediate enough to eventually affect people alive today.]

Not nearly as immediate and dire as the THREAT to their FREEDOM posed by TYRANTS and the pseudo-intellectual POSERS who support them by dissing the efforts of ordinary people to better their own lives as "not doing anything to solve global warming or overpopulation" and CLAPTRAP like that.

You also list DEPLETION OF FOSSIL FUEL RESERVES. I guess you haven't noticed the fact that these are generally under the control of a PRICE SYSTEM that takes into account such depletion as it happens, when it happens, and communicates that depletion rapidly over the entire planet's population, requiring no special translation into anyone's "native language"? That's taking ACTION, my friend, whether it fits into your narrow little worldview of what constitutes ACTION. (Which I guess probably is only "pass a buncha laws regulating daily human behavior", eh?)

This shows how well you've been brainwashed. The country is full of wanna-be conservatives who believe that the free market is the cure for everything that ails the world.

I ain't one of THEM -- the "free market" is simply what HAPPENS to the extent meddlers, TYRANTS, and beauracrats aren't allowed to interefere with it.

(I say "wanna-be" because real conservatives aren't dumb enough to believe their own propaganda. A real conservative knows when to dump his dogshit stock and leave his wanna-bes like you holding 401k accounts full of dogshit.)

Guess I must be a REAL CONSERVATIVE since my FREE-MARKET EXPERIENCES have been mostly PROFITABLE, the rest EDUCATIONAL.

Meanwhile, care to guess what kind of RETURN I've gotten on all the TAXES I've had to pay? Pretty PISS-POOR, I tell ya! But I didn't have a CHOICE there, they way I did with every STOCK I bought or sold!!

In the case of fossil-fuel reserves, the free market only goes so far. As the cost of oil goes up, more and more oilfields become profitable to use, so the supply increases to meet demand. This doesn't mean that the reserves are somehow an infinite resource. The system is going to constantly move toward a final state where the rate at which oil is consumed equals the rate at which it is created. When this happens, the cost of a gallon of gasoline will have risen to astronomical levels, entirely due to free market forces. Most people would describe this as "no more oil". You can debate and say this won't happen in our lifetimes, and you'd be right- it won't. But it will certainly happen before the sun explodes, definitely within 1000 years.

Yup, and the free market will therefore quite reliably and FAIRLY persuade people to transition to CHEAPER ENERGY, instead of having the SELF-APPOINTED ELITES in our society try to force their hands with all sorts of regulation and TAXES ON ENERGY.

Fact is, we will NOT run out of oil. You kinda see this already, we will see increased PRICES as the oil gets harder to extract. But while you're right that those HIGHER PRICES will make extracting the remaining oil EASIER, what you're ignoring is that the FREE-MARKET RESPONSE to this will be, as it has been every other time in history, to MOVE PEOPLE OFF of relying so much on oil. Fact is, this has been happening in fits and starts for DECADES; people like you have been predicting the END OF OIL (plus global warming, or cooling, plus a CATASTROPHIC population explosion, yadda yadda) for DECADES, and they've been WRONG, WRONG, WRONG in every important respect.

I should also like to point out that you aren't my friend.

No, but YOU are MINE, which is why I bother to CORRECT your FOOLISHNESS, you SILLY PERSON you!

And OVERPOPULATION? Are you NUTS? The biggest problem with Western Civ today may well be the fact that it is DECLINING IN POPULATION. That's right, what happens when people become educated, wealthy, free, and respectful of laws and property rights, is they STOP INCREASING THEIR POPULATION. Every time.

Did you think I was directing some attack at you personally, or at any specific country? The world is bigger than the U.S.A., and overpopulation is generally not considered a problem in the West because it isn't one. (We're educated/wealthy/free/fat/happy here.)

Which is why WE are trying to SPREAD THE JOY by getting everyone else to ADOPT THE PROGRAM of FREE MARKETS, RULE OF LAW, RESPECT FOR PROPERTY RIGHTS, and all that 'merican hogwash you resent so much.

The issue centers around places like China and India. Do you see any solution to the overpopulation in India?

Yeah, they got their own problems, solving them as best they can at the moment, but WE can help them do it BETTER by teaching them to get the HECK out of each other's WAY and let the FREE MARKET (etc.) ROAM FREE!

That's why people like YOU are the biggest threat to humanity's survivability. You refuse to accept the fact that people are, everywhere, ACTING on their own initiative to insure THEIR and their offspring's survival, and since you don't particularly like their actions and hate the steps they take (e.g., drive their children around in SUVs, which are SAFER and do jack-squat to the environment compared to any other vehicle worth driving), YOU are the sort of person who will use FORCE to IMPOSE YOUR WILL on them, REDUCING their practical ability to SURVIVE whatever comes down the pike.

This paragraph is full of laughs. The quote that SUVs "do jack-squat to the environment compared to any other vehicle worth driving" is my favorite. Did it have the American flag already on it as an option when you bought it?

Gee, you really seem to RESENT all those moms out there who drive their children around in SAFE SUVs and especially have FLAGS on 'em!

Ever hear of CARPOOLS, which lots of SUV owners use to cart groups of kids around to events like games and such? Rather they drive around in umpteen different little YUGOS for every SUV or two???

And about them FLAGS...no, I don't display one, I wear my commitment to AMERICAN IDEALS on my SLEEVE by advocating FREEDOM, resistance to TYRANNY in all its forms (including anti-freedom LEGISLATION such as Kyoto and attempts to WEAKEN AMERICA'S RESOLVE TO DEFEND ITSELF). Figure that oughtta take care of MY little piece of the pie.

But every time I see one of them FLAG-WAVING SUVs go by, I think "HEY, maybe that's someone who is in the MILITARY, or has a close relative or friend who is".

Those are the dudes who are, right now, protecting OUR freedom, YOURS as well as MINE, to post POLITICAL EXPRESSION like this on a public board, instead of having to meet in PRIVATE, cowering in a cave like TERRORISTS have to do now (thanks to Bush, no thanks to Clinton).

So if they or their family and friends want to WAVE A FEW FLAGS to show their SUPPORT for them, I say "attaboy"!

I'd rather let those "guys on radio talk shows" you claim "flatly deny we should do anything involving any sort of personal or national sacrifice" rule than someone like YOU. At least they let EACH of us decide WHAT we will sacrifice, WHEN we will sacrifice, HOW we will sacrifice it, based on what WE each think is best for humanity as WE see it, compared to someone like YOU, who insists everyone march to YOUR silly little tune.

Dude, I was only making an abstract point about how it's human nature not to act on a threat that's more than 100 years away.

Is THAT all you meant by "people will drive SUVs around until the atmosphere reaches the boiling point of gasoline"?? Sorry to not have READ BETWEEN THE LINES, dude.

But I kinda think you're RIGHT, anyway. Just that I don't think SUVs or global warming or overpopulation are anywhere NEAR the threat posed by TYRANNY and OPPRESSION of individual FREEDOMS that every person should be allowed to enjoy. And folk that talk like YOU do tend to be FIRST IN LINE to oppress, with your Kyoto Protocols and stuff.

Our FOUNDING FATHERS proved THEY thought about ACTING to preserve FREEDOM for CENTURIES, not just for their immediate FAMILY and FRIENDS, who, in many cases, they KNEW would be tortured, killed, turned against them, whatever by the BRITISH, the TYRANTS of the day (and our FRIENDS today, thanks to our UTTERLY DEFEATING them, rinse and repeat for THE SOUTH, THE GERMANS, THE JAPANESE, and, Allah willing, AFGHANS someday).

I'm sorry if I insulted your personal God somehow, since you seem to have really taken this personally. I have a suspicion though that if Rush was president, the situation wouldn't be as rosy as you imagine.

Try LISTENING to Rush sometime. Spend a whole three hours, and catalog every time he talks RESTRICTING YOUR FREEDOM or TAKING YOUR MONEY BY FORCE or something like that.

Then compare to the average liberal politician's score after only TWO MINUTES.

Most of the time, RUSH WINS (has the lowest score). Hands down. Yeah, he prolly supports the stupid WAR ON DRUGS, but doesn't talk it up a whole lot. Most of the time, he CELEBRATES THE POWER OF THE PEOPLE to find their own way, make their lives better, even if they DON'T drop a dollar in an account for 140 years just so ONE GREAT-GRANDCHILD won't go off on them in public. Most of the other talking heads I hear are all about what I'M DOING WRONG in my life (driving a mini-SUV count, dude?) and how THEY WILL CORRECT IT by passing LAWS and TAKING MY PROPERTY WITHOUT ASKING.

So when most elites talk, I just hear them pointing a GUN at my HEAD and COCKING IT to make me BOW TO THEIR WILLS. At least with RUSH that hardly ever happens -- he's the opposite of a LIBERAL, he wants to USE FORCE AGAINST AMERICA'S SWORN ENEMIES and UNILATERALLY DISARM IT AGAINST IT'S OWN CITIZENS in many ways, rather than the other way 'round.

Rush ruling wouldn't be ROSY, just at least a teeny bit BETTER than even GW BUSH, who thinks 1/3 TAXATION is about right (didn't he say that awhile back), though at least they both mean to REDUCE TAXES at least, compare to the POWER-AND-MONEY-MAD DEMOCRATS and their FRIENDS, the OPPRESSIVE and VIOLENT GREENS, even though they all score FREEDOM POINTS here and there, sometimes even compared to THE GREAT EL-RUSHBO, and more often against most REPUBLICANS, especially the COUNTRY-CLUB CROWD.

What's with all the capitalized words anyway? Can't you express yourself in writing without resorting to shouts?

Dude, you've gone off on your ancestors, on me, on anyone who drives an SUV, on conservatives, on the freedom of people to trade with each other FREELY, on Indian and Chinese children who haven't been BORN yet, and you blast ME for my WRITING STYLE??

Hey, I'd rather be an ALL CAPS USER than a WHINING, SELF-OBSESSED, RESENTFUL LOSER like you.

Seriously, dude, as the poet says, "just around the corner at the edge of the night, you can hear the angels celebrating your life"; stop SPITTING on everyone ELSE's, and JOIN THEM! Surely you have better things to do with your mental ENERGIES than RESENT HOW OTHER PEOPLE CHOOSE TO LIVE so doggone much I mean, yeah, you tried to make some good abstracts POINTS, but you dredged up some pretty redundant, elitist claptrap as EXAMPLES.

Yellowstone, aka "The Happiest Deathtrap on Earth"

[Chris Burke]

I don't know about having a wide-area effect, not having read up on the issue but noticing that unlike most volcanos Yellowstone seems to let out a lot of pressure on a regular basis. But anyway...

Despite being one of the most beautiful and spectacular exhibits of geology on earth, Yellowstone certainly is a scary place to visit. Just prior to when I was there, part of a parking lot had collapsed into the hell of boiling mud just underneath. It made me kinda nervous, since one normally doesn't think of the possibility that the ground will suddenly open up beneath you and send you to a horrible burning death.

We will be all dead in 5000 years�.

[Gambit-x7x]

Well, at current rate we wont survive another 5000 years not mentioning millions or/and billions years from now... just look at last 5000 years, weapons went from rocks to nukes, medicine from voodoo dolls to the vaccines... population from some# to 7 billion...

We destroy everything we touch...

So for all I care we all be dead soon any way ....

mass loss not from conversion of mass into energy

[lars-o-matic]

On close reading, the referenced article doesn't claim the mass loss is due to radiation of energy.

I expect the dominant mechanism would be mass lost via solar wind, eruptions, etc.; not E = mc^^2.

-- lars

Alternate thought

[Bouillabaisse]

It seems that the general consensus seems to be that we will either move to another planet/system, or that we will figure out something to change our orbit. But it just makes me wonder if we'll even last that long. Sure, we'll discover more ways to defend ourselves from various astrological disasters, but what about US? What's stopping us from destroying ourselves? With the advances not only in science, but military. We're discovering more ways to kill other people, and people seem more inclined to use those ways for their own benefit. I think we just need to look at what we're doing to each other on earth BEFORE we can do something as a whole.

No one to blame but ourselves

[drox]

The TV tells me what to think, newspapers and magazines back them up, and slashdot does the same exact thing and is somehow worshipped as a haven for free thinking.

Slashdot is certainly not perfect, but it's got one big advantage over TV, newspapers and magazines: most of its content comes from the readers. The ones who run this circus get a few sentences to try to tell us what to think (or what to think about), but then the readers take over. If Slashdot sucks, its our own fault. If we want it to be better, it's our own responsibility to make it so. You don't get that chance with TV, newspapers, or magazines. If they suck, you're stuck with it.

Used to be you could take your business elsewhere, but now they all song the same song.

To quote the good M.C..

[Anonymous Coward]

"Entropy only exists in a closed system, that's with a border. The Earth's not a closed system, it's powered by the sun - so fuck the damned creationists - Doomsday, get my gun."

Who's down wit entropy?

Every last homie!

My personal favorite quote...

[kikta]

CNN has this quote under a picture near the bottom of the page:

The space rock 2001 YB5, identified by the arrow, could have wiped out France, according to a scientist in Britain.

Would the British really be all that upset about that? ;-)

Not only that, but there's tides...

[Ungrounded Lightning]

... forgetting to account for the radiation of energy and the resultant decrease in mass seems to be a fairly major oversight ...

While we're at it, did they also overlook tides?

Just as the tidal friction of the moon on the earth is accellerating the moon (gradually moving its orbit outward while slowing the earth's rotation while friction-heating the earth's core and thrashing the oceans and atmosphere), the earth's tidal friction on the sun should be gradually moving the earth's orbit outward, at a cost to the sun's angular momentum.

This is because in both the earth/moon and sun/earth system the orbit and central body spin are in the same direction, with the central body spinning faster than the orbiting body's period. Tides raise "bumps" on the central body, which (thanks to damping from friction) are carried forward with the central body's spin and produce an accellerating force on the orbiting body.

In the sun/earth case the sun's tides on the earth also transfer some angular momentum from the earth's spin to its orbit, increasing the effect. That doesn't happen with the moon, because the moon has already used up its angular momentum and is tide-locked with the earth.

Nothing compared to the effect on Jupiter, of course. But as long as the earth's orbit isn't in a harmonic relationship with that of another major planet the effect should be nontrivial and the interactions with other planets should inetgrate out to zip.

So, was that taken into account, too? If not, the start of the bake cycle could be even further into the future.

stop your whining!

[feldkamp]

Hey, you might be a panzy, but some of us can take it like real men. Jesus, some people just can't stop whining :)

kidding around as usual
-mike

Feersum Endjinn

[nalfeshnee]

... by the Scottish Sci-Fi writer Iain M. Banks has a great take on this.

In fact pretty much anything by him is to be recommended.