Earth Might Survive Sun’s Explosion

This is good news,for hunanity,ok maybe not humanity,but Earth, in general.
The earth might be able to avoid its "judgement day" afterall.

(NYTimes.com)-What happens to planets when their stars age and die? That’s not an academic question.
About five billion years from now, astronomers say, the Sun will run out of hydrogen fuel and swell temporarily more than 100 times in diameter into a so-called red giant, swallowing Mercury and Venus and dooming life on Earth, but perhaps not Earth itself.
Astronomers are announcing that they have discovered a planet that seems to have survived the puffing up of its home star, suggesting there is some hope that Earth could survive the aging and swelling of the Sun.

www.nytimes.com... anted=print&adxnnlx=1189681372-43bstFuiOs0ByWgUWkNvfQ

Full story here
www.nytimes.com... anted=print&adxnnlx=1189681372-43bstFuiOs0ByWgUWkNvfQ

[edit on 13-9-2007 by Black_Fox]

[edit on 13-9-2007 by Black_Fox]

I'd go so far as to say it's good news for rock and stone in general, but not necessarily humanity in general. This new information changes nothing in terms of the consequences to life on earth should this event take place.

the idea of a planet surviving that is intriguing. however i wouldn't want to be there..the mass gravitational anomaly that would occur in the pre development of the super nova would rip everything to atomic dust off the surface of the planet long before the flames would come to melt whats left...it would be like a nuke with no sound or cloud. glad i wont be there..

After the star becomes a red dwarf, it will let off one final blow before it turns into a white dwarf. This will eject a great deal of mass out into the solar system as well. So, while the Earth may survive the initial expansion of the Sun, i don't believe it would survive the second blow out.

Of course, humanity will have been long gone by that point, and at least all other life as we know it. Five Billion years is a very very long time. But yeah, i do agree that what will be left of Earth (i.e. rocky mass) should survive. Woo-hoo.

Let's say for a moment there was life on Earth, and it did survive the final transition of the Sun into a white dwarf star. The gravitational pull of the Sun would no longer be able to hold Earth in its orbit, and we'd go flying off of our solar path. No way we survive that.

[edit on 9/13/2007 by The Cyfre]

Congratulations to all those rocks out there then!

A good bit of information to know though, one can never know enough, er, stuff.

I'd like to clear up a few issues here.....

1. The Sun is not going to "explode". It doesn't have enough mass.
2. It will never go through a "red dwarf" stage. A red dwarf is a low mass, main sequence star that "burns" for an incredibly long period of time (tens of billions of years). A white dwarf is the highly compressed core of a star that has suffered gravitational collapse when all nuclear fusion reactions have stopped.
3. When the Sun becomes a white dwarf, it won't suddenly lose all of its mass. Therefore, Earth won't suddenly fly off into space. Most of the existing mass of the Sun will be compressed into an object roughly the size of Neptune, so the gravitational pull will essentially be as strong as it is during the red giant stage.

[edit on 14-9-2007 by Mogget]

Hmm,we should build something huge out of hard rock,as a clue to any future space travellers that we once had a civilization here...what could we build?

I know-how about a giant human face and a load of pyramids.That would convince them,no?
On second thoughts...they may just think its a trick of the light,or a rock formation..

Why should we care?

IF humanity manages to survive 5 Billion years, I seriously doubt it would be of any concern.

5 Billion years in the future technology...would more than likely find a way to save the Earth, if only for sentimental value. There are 1000's, maybe 10,000's of habitable planets out there, not to mention planets we can terraform.

Interesting from a scientific standpoint. But not an issue for humanity's survial.

If the human race still exists five billion years from now, they will probably be able to fold up Earth, put it in a plastic bag, and take it shopping with them on Alpha Centauri 5