Solar System? Surely no one has told you these five things before. Many films have been floating around the Internet for a long time. They say that our solar system is full of mysteries and strange things, but all they do is repeat the same old things that are neither strange nor mysterious.
1. Double pair in the Solar System
Sometimes, intriguing Solar System facts are so obscure that they remain secret despite years of research and observation. There is one in particular that appears so minor and obvious that it has escaped everyone’s notice, so much so that it was only brought to light a few years ago by Dennis Rawlins, an eccentric and entirely unusual astronomy historian. Rawlins was the first person to recognize that two pairs of planets in the solar system share numerous traits.
The Venus-Earth pair and the Uranus-Neptune pair. Remarkably, for both couples, each of the following claims is true: Each pair consists of two planets that are adjacent. Each pair consists of two almost identical planets in terms of size and mass. Their position is important in the group of inner, stony planets and in the group of outer, gaseous planets. And as a result, the pairings are symmetrically positioned with respect to Jupiter. The inner members of each pair (Venus and Uranus) are the only ones of the 8 planets to rotate retrograde. Rawlins argues that this peculiarity may contain a deep cosmogonic significance, relating to some unknown mechanism of planetary formation.
2. The Sun and Moon have identical apparent diameters.
Chance versus necessity? Our solar system has always impressed us with the fact that the apparent sizes of the Sun and Moon are nearly similar. This odd concordance of angular dimensions gives rise to solar eclipses, one of the rarest and most fascinating astronomical phenomena available in our sky. And in light of these two “miracles,” it is not surprising that for many years, this was viewed as one of the proofs of God’s intention to provide the earth with two similar sources of light, one for the day and one for the night.
Today, the majority of astronomers feel that the Moon’s near-perfect overlap with the Sun is merely a fascinating coincidence, as there is no physical reason why this should be the case. The Moon is approximately 400 times smaller than the Sun, but the Sun is also around 400 times farther from Earth. This straightforward geometry reveals that the Moon’s apparent disk is nearly identical in size to the Sun’s apparent disk. Due to the eccentricity of their orbits, the distances between the Earth, the Moon, and the Sun are susceptible to slight fluctuations.
Observed from the surface of the Earth, the Sun’s angular diameter ranges between 31,6 and 32,7 arcminutes, whereas the Moon’s ranges between 29,6 and 33.5 arcminutes. As can be seen, the connection is not exact, which explains why total solar eclipses only occur at specific periods. But if it’s all a coincidence, could it be calculated what the odds are that Earth is the only planet in the solar system with a moon capable of properly obscuring the sun?
Someone has estimated that the odds of Earth’s lone natural satellite being large enough to cover the Sun and experience the same eclipses are on the order of one in two hundred. Not many, but not many either. Nonetheless, others contend that the Moon’s magnitude is not wholly coincidental, but is somehow connected to the very existence of our species. According to the “tide pools” theory, a planet without a Moon or with a Moon too small to benefit from tides capable of commencing the chain of life is hypothetically impossible.
On the other hand, had the Moon been substantially larger than it is, it would have caused kilometer-high tides on Earth’s surface, which would have had the opposite impact. Since we exist, the Moon could not have been much different from what it is, according to a theory based on the “anthropic principle” and “intelligent design”. However, it must also be considered that the Earth-Moon system is not static over longer timescales. The Moon’s orbit expands by around 3.8 millimeters every year, while our day lengthens by approximately 0.000015 seconds per year. In around 50 million years, the Moon will never totally obscure the Sun, and annular eclipses will become increasingly thin. This orbital development also suggests that in the distant past, total solar eclipses were more frequent and lasted longer.
3. Mars volcanoes in Egypt?
Who has not heard about the well-known relationship between the pyramids of Giza and the Belt of Orion? In the early 1990s, the hypothesis put forth by Belgian Robert Bauval in his book “The Orion Mystery” became a topic of conversation even among those normally far removed from any form of scientific speculation; probably the accomplice was the fascination exerted by the combination of two disciplines such as astronomy and Egyptology, often perceived as mysterious and “esoteric.” A large number of people have held for some time a strong figurative equivalence between ancient Egypt and the planet Mars; a mental short-circuit that likely originated in the summer of 1976 when the Viking 1 spacecraft, recently in orbit around the red planet, sent back to Earth spectacular images of Cydonia, a hilly region located in the planet’s mid-northern latitudes.
One of these photos, which immediately went around the world, depicted the famous “Martian sphinx,” a relief a couple of kilometers long that Viking’s low photographic resolution helped to show as a humanoid face facing the sky, moreover surrounded by what at first glance appeared to be large pyramid-shaped constructions. Years later, in 1998, further and more advanced probes would reveal that this was not a massive sculpture, but rather an ordinary hill that weathering had given the coarse look of a face when viewed from above, and that even the pyramids were natural geological structures.
But by then, the harm had already been done, and the fantastical theory that a distant culture had occupied Mars and then relocated to ancient Egypt had begun to circulate long before. Exactly as shown in the 1996 film Stargate, which was another landmark in the process of collectively identifying Egyptian and Martian sands. And it is precisely because of the existence of this pseudoscientific movement in favor of the common origin of Martians and ancient Egyptians that we have always been astonished by the fact that almost none of their members have ever paid attention to something much more obvious in “support” of their theses.
We point to the striking resemblance between the configuration of the three pyramids of Giza and the renowned volcanoes of the Tharsis area of Mars. We are referring to the cluster of four volcanoes dominated by the enormous mass of Olympus Mons. The map on the left depicts the Giza plain with its three pyramids, while the map on the right depicts the region of the four volcanoes for comparison. Contrary to the comparison with Orion’s Belt, which is slanted to the meridian by a much different angle, the alignment and orientation are practically similar. Compared to the association with Orion, in fact, there is also something more, namely the flawless (and spooky) identification of Olympus Mons with Gebel el-Qibli, the massive rocky outcrop that – uniquely – rises over the Giza plain to a height of 60 meters.
Who wouldn’t be willing to entertain the notion that the ancient Egyptians originated from Mars in the face of such an astounding concordance of elements? Obviously only for a minute, given the number of (justifiable) objections that would be presented instantly. In fact, if we were to draw a lesson from it, we would suggest that such coincidences should teach us to use our ability to establish connections between entities separated in space and time judiciously. And to put it frankly, this amazing and random association diminishes the uniqueness of the correlation with the stars in Orion’s Belt.
4. What would occur if the Earth’s orbital velocity abruptly became zero?
Why doesn’t the Earth or any of the other planets collide with the Sun? is a topic we commonly ask, but which many people take for granted. Isaac Newton’s idea of universal gravity provides the answer. Remember the one about the apple that fell from the tree? The apple is attracted to the Earth, and once it detaches from the branch, it falls toward the surface with accelerating velocity. However, the Moon is likewise attracted to the Earth, but it does not fall.
What’s the explanation? The Moon, unlike the apple, compensates for centripetal gravitational attraction by orbiting at a speed that permits it to generate centrifugal force of the opposite sign. Additionally, the notion can be applied to the Sun and planets that gravitate around it. The amplitude of the attraction is constant, but the effect it has on the bodies is proportional to their masses. If the Sun were to miraculously vanish, all of the planets would leave their orbits with the same velocity they had at the time of separation.
In “Space: 1999,” the Moon drifted into the solar system, and the Earth would follow suit. What if, however, the orbital velocity, i.e. the centrifugal force, suddenly ceased to exist? The situation would become even less amusing at this point, if such a thing were possible. In fact, our planet would begin to fall toward the Sun. Initially slowly, and then with accelerating velocity. At this point, the only question is how long it would take for the Earth to descend to the Sun. Exists a formula that could inform us?
The formula exists, albeit in an approximation, and it is quite straightforward: Time of fall equals revolution period/5.66 In approximately 0.01767 years, or 64.5 days, the Earth would collide with the Sun’s photosphere with a velocity of 616 kilometers per second. It is possible to calculate, for example, that Jupiter’s fall would take 766 days (more than two years!) and Neptune even 29 years.
5. Between the Earth and the Moon, is there enough space for all planets?
Even after doing and rerunning the calculations, it’s almost impossible to accept. You are familiar with the solar system’s planets. In our imagination, they are enormous, particularly the gas giants, and we like to think of them as the paradigm of everything in the solar system, which is disproportionately large in comparison to our everyday setting. On the other side of the spectrum, let us instead place our conception of the distance between the Earth and Moon.
Is it true that we view it as a simple stroll in the backyard? Compared to other distances, You would never, ever trust someone who claimed that if we lined up all seven planets, they would fit nicely in the distance between Earth and the Moon. Instead, Mercury’s equatorial diameter is 4,879 km, Venus’s is 12,104 km, Mars’s is 6,792 km, Jupiter’s is 142,984 km, Saturn’s is 120,536 km, Uranus’s is 51,118 km, and Neptune’s is 49 km. How much is the total? Shouldn’t it be 387,941 kilometers? Now we know that the average distance between the Moon and Earth is 384,400 kilometers, the minimum distance is 356,600 kilometers, and the highest distance is 406,700 kilometers.
Consequently, this demonstrates that all seven planets may fit comfortably within the cislunar region of the universe. Leaning against one another like ancient bottles on a shelf, while we imagined them to be enormous white whales in the vast solar ocean
