Slashdot Mirror
North Star May Be Wasting Away
sciencehabit writes "The North Star, a celestial beacon to navigators for centuries, may be slowly shrinking, according to a new analysis of more than 160 years of observations. The data suggest that the familiar fixture in the northern sky is shedding an Earth's mass worth of gas each year."
Polaris must be losing nearly the equivalent of Earth's mass—or a little under a millionth of its own mass—each year,
In a little over a million years, we won't be able to use that particular star to navigate any more. IT'LL BE CHAOS!
It's probably losing all that mass due to heat from friction. It must be under tremendous pressure, seeing as how the entire night sky pivots on that single point. Long-term this will have huge consequences - when the North Star finally wears through completely the entire universe will ricochet off into nothingness like a spinning top.
When you have nothing left to burn you must set yourself on fire
Thank God its not shedding the amount of gas a politician evacuates each year. It would be barley visible.
"What Are They Gonna Do When Were All Using Freenet"
Mass of the sun is 330,000 times the mass of earth.
So if it were losing an Earth-Mass yearly it would have had to be 7 times as massive as today at the beginning of the Pleistocene, and would only have a life expectancy of about 330,001 years left.
The Sun appears to have been active for 4.6 billion years and has enough fuel to go on for another Five billion years or so..
So I think you may have lost a few digits (in the exponents) when making your calculations.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Polaris is listed, at least in Wikipedia, at 7.54 solar masses. Also, it is a ternary system: one large star, a smaller star and a white dwarf.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Does this mean victory for the Southern Cross fighting style? Or am I just too much of a nerd so no one will understand the reference?
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Indeed... everyone knows that the first magnets fell to earth from that star, which is why it always experienced a small tug in that direction. Future magnets inherited this trait by mimicking the original magnets' functionality, which was to adhere strongly to certain types of metals.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I don't know what mythos you are referring to, but I doubt it will affect anyone outside your sect.
Besides, Catholics don't speak for all Christianity, and their mythos is radically different from anyone elses. Most denominations that I know don't teach that the north star has any added significance.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
There's a grain (or at least a germ) of truth in each of those posts. Kind of a cereal furrow of truthiness, just plowing along, planting seeds of doubt, perhaps to just lie farro, but then again, maybe knot.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Hrmm I'm Catholic and have a degree in theology. And this is the first time I've ever heard that the star of Bethlehem is supposed to be Polaris - it's certainly not part of the general 'mythos' as you put it
General teaching is that the Star of Bethlehem only hung around until not long after the Wise men left. And from a more scientific viewpoint if it's true then it was likely a supernova
ACK NAK RST
A solar mass is over 300,000 Earths, and Polaris is atleast 7 solar masses, adjusting for the most conservative of all estimates. It's apparent magnitude is about 1.9, while the magnitude of drop off (nolonger visible to the human eye) is defined at 7 (with 6 being relatively hard except under good conditions).
Setting aside the nuclear chemistry that will occur in the meantime (which tends to increase brightness), that Polaris is, in fact, multiple stars and the overall reduction of radiative and mass pressure that will be reducing the production/consumption rate*, I would posit even losing half of its mass, it would likely still be visible in 2000 years, which means the Northern Star will have since switched to Gamma Cephei.
So, no big loss here. Personally, I, for one, welcome our new Alrainian OverStar.
****
*You know what, I'm actually going to do these in the coming weeks. This is sound like a fun problem, even though I do a lot more in theoretical particle physics than cosmology.
"Yeah...it was the numbers that were irrational, not the murderous cult of vegetarians...." -- Hippasus of Metapontum
I've been to 3 separate universities where, in the restrooms in the science wings, above the toilet paper dispenser, was a note reading "theology degree. Please take one".