Earth Could Collide With Other Planets 255
Everybody put on your helmet;
Smivs writes "Astronomers calculate there is a tiny chance that Mars or Venus could collide with Earth — though it would not happen for at least a billion years.
The finding comes from simulations to show how orbits of planets might evolve billions of years into the future. But the calculated chances of such events occurring are tiny. Writing in the journal Nature, a team led by Jacques Laskar shows there is also a chance Mercury could strike Venus and merge into a larger planet. Professor Laskar of the Paris Observatory and his colleagues also report that Mars might experience a close encounter with Jupiter — whose massive gravity could hurl the Red Planet out of our Solar System."
Re:Or earth could turn into an elephant (Score:3, Interesting)
As Stephen King said, "Everything's eventual."
Yeah, man, everything's REAL eventual :-)
Great line - I keep telling myself that.
Movie Promotion? (Score:2, Interesting)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455856/ [imdb.com]
Re:I'm no physicist ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Or earth could turn into an elephant (Score:2, Interesting)
It probably happened to Earth. (Score:3, Interesting)
The current theory is that a Mars-sized planet collided with Earth sometime in history. When this planet, usually named Theia [wikipedia.org], collided with Earth, some of the disturbed matter from both planets got ejected into space, some fell onto and became part of Earth, and some got caught in orbit around Earth as natural satellites.
The resulting dust either escaped or eventually coalesced into the modern Earth and Moon.
Re:Or earth could turn into an elephant (Score:3, Interesting)
As Stephen King said, "Everything's eventual."
He did not. I'm sure he said those words at some point, but not as a statement. He entitled a story "Everything's Eventual" (hell, likely as not, his editor entitled it). Pat Conroy did not say "The lords of discipline", John Barth did not say "Lost in the funhouse", and Douglas Beane did not say "Too wong foo, thanks for everything, Julie Newmar". Yeesh! This is even worse than people who attribute characters' quotes to the author directly.