Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.
Posted on 12/24/2010 11:45:17 AM PST by SunkenCiv
..Scientists have long known that there's a mysterious amount of siderophile ("iron-loving") metals in Earth's mantle. Such metals, including gold, tend to affiliate with iron in their liquid forms.
The best explanation has been that some sort of space object brought the elements to the planet just after it formed its core, but the exact nature of the impactor has been a matter of debate.
Based on computer simulations, the new study says that a small number of enormous, random impacts roughly 4.5 billion years ago are the sources of Earth's iron-loving materials.
These impactors were rocky objects left over from our solar system's planet-formation phase. The largest one that hit Earth was roughly the size of Pluto -- up to 2,000 miles (3,220 kilometers) wide, the study suggests.
And young Earth wasn't the only recipient: Cataclysmic collisions delivered iron-loving metals to the moon and Mars around the same time, the study authors say. What's more, the impacts may have been the source of water on the moon...
Moon rocks brought back during the Apollo missions led to the now widely accepted theory that the moon formed when a Mars-size object crashed into early Earth.
Energy from the impact would have spurred the still forming Earth to develop its mostly iron core. When this happened, iron-loving metals should have followed molten iron down from the planet's mantle and into the core.
But we know that gold and other iron-lovers are found in modest abundances in Earth's mantle.
Using a mathematical approach called Monte Carlo analysis, Bottke's team calculates that iron-loving metals were delivered in a limited number of massive impacts that just happened to miss the moon...
(Excerpt) Read more at news.nationalgeographic.com ...
Silly scientist. Everyone knows the moon, Mars and the Earth were bombarded with gold & iron when the planet between mars and Jupiter was hit by planet X
Sound like a book I ready by Jules Verne.
http://www.julesverne.ca/vernebooks/jvbkchase.html
Talk about wrecking the world economy. Imagine a rock out there big enough to make gold as common as aluminum.
Yes. Maybe we’ll be lucky and get hit by a huge asteroid.
beat me to it :)
One big asteroid was the one that hit Fort Knox. All that gold had a chapel built it over by the natives who now have their warriors guarding it. Be warned! To approach it may mean death to the uninitiated.
A+++
As an aside, from what I have watched/read, the Earth and the object basically destroyed each other, and were nothing but big piles (a single big pile?) of rubble for a LONG time. The early Solar system was a very dangerous place.
Good one! Neither am I. Just a wannabe astronomer/astrophysicist. Never could handle the math, though. Ended up doing computer stuff. Still sciency, but without all the math. My childhood hero was Carl Sagan. But then Reagan came along and knocked him out of first place. :)
Based on computer simulations...IOW, a Wild-A$$ed Guess.
Immanuel Velikovsky was always a fave of mine. My mom handed me one of his books when I was in Jr. High. It was on.
Just because the impact theory is the most widely accepted one currently doesn’t mean I HAVE to believe it.
If they were to bribe me with some of that there high falutin’ grant fundage I might mouth the words they whisper in my ear.
What they need to do is invent a time traveling video camera and send it back. Seeing is believing.
LOVE YA BRO.
HAVE A BLESSED DAY.
Wouldn't the mass of the moon be less comparatively as it lacks the heavier core?
Made of lighter materials.
Lighter than air.
That must be right!
I've SEEN it floating thru the night sky!
;-)
Right you are about the volume. Density also matters, the Moon has about 1/100th the mass of the Earth, Mars though is about 1/8th the mass of Earth as well as about 1/8th the volume.
I like that gif, may have to steal that.
Probably Oddjob.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/1234919/posts?page=4#4
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/653287/posts
Okay, now I’ve got to get crackin’ and do the GGG digest and ping, which was my plan when I got online after a late nap on the 24th. :’)
Yes, the mass is definitely less. But I think you are confusing mass with density. Mass equals density times volume. And yeah, the Earth is a heck of a lot more dense than the moon. All the lighter, dusty stuff coalesced into the moon, while we kept all the nice, dense, metallic stuff for ourselves down here (like our heavy iron core that you mentioned - without which we would be totally $crewed).
And you have a good point about the moon floating. I never thought of that. It's like a gigantic dust balloon. Yeah! That's it!
Oh, and Merry Christmas, everybody! I just noticed it is passed midnight in my timezone.
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