Why is the speed of light so slow?
I have never figured this out either and the first time I worked out how slow light actually travels was kind of an epiphany. It’s not that it’s…
According to Richard Feynman, gravity travels faster than light. If it did not, the torque would cause the planets to spiral out of the solar system. Is this correct?
If gravity takes time to reach Earth, we should be pulled toward where the Sun was 8 minutes ago. This delayed pull should fling us out of the solar system….
How does a missile find a submarine?
The anti-submarine missiles currently in service are best described as rocket propelled torpedoes. They are fired into the area where the submarine is, the torpedo detaches from the…
If you brought a Neanderthal baby to present-day and raised them normally, would they be any different? Could they learn as well or has the brain changed a lot?
While Neanderthals were genetically almost identical to us, as fellow erectus lineage cousins, the baby could probably be raised the same way. The problems would come during socialization….
Can we nuke gas giant planets and wipe them out of solar system?
In 1992 a large comet was discovered that had recently been captured by Jupiter’s gravity. Jovian tidal forces had broken it into several pieces It finally crashed into…
If the Earth was to stop spinning for a full 3 seconds and then resume spinning, what would happen to everything on Earth and how would it be affected?
The world basically starts over. Plenty of life would remain but probably not many humans. Devastation is worse at the equator but pretty bad everywhere. Let’s break it…
Why is Earth’s rotation mysteriously slowing down?
It’s not mysterious at all. Newton predicted it hundreds of years before it could be directly measured. Basically, the Earth is slowing down because the Earth spins “beneath”…
What if the sun extinguished itself tonight? How long would humans survive?
If the sun went out, we would all eventually die, but what would kill us and how long would it take? First, once the sun is extinguished, the…
If Earth is indeed four billion years old, is that a sufficient time for the lifeforms on Earth to have evolved just by chance?
This is a wolf: and THIS is a chihuahua: There is something like 20 thousand generations between them since they shared a common ancestor. Most tetrapods (land animals…
Why can’t the ISS take a picture of Earth and prove to the Flat Earth Society that Earth is not really flat?
Recognize this picture? How about this one? See where I’m going with this? Here’s a view of Florida from the ISS. The point is that the ISS isn’t…