Jabberwocky Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 It came to my attention recently that life on Earth is only possible because of Earths strong magnetic field. This field, I assume its the same thing that causes the northern lights? protects life on the planet by diverting harmful radiation from the sun and as things stand, life on the other rocky planets such as Mars and Venus is impossible without it. Now, the reason we have such a strong magnetic field is because a chance collision with a huge lump of iron in the Earths past gave it the mass thats needed to assist life here. Ok, so life might be possible on a less guarded world, but what about technological life? Its said that this radiation is extremely disruptive to electrical items, so would electricity ever have been used without this protection? Could life be rarer than we even imagined now we know about the protection the field gives us? In fact, could life with a decent level of technology be next to impossible? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Green Web Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 I thinks its a conspiracy theory started by n power. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jabberwocky Posted November 10, 2006 Author Share Posted November 10, 2006 I thinks its a conspiracy theory started by n power. So THATS whats with all the pylons! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heyesey Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 Now, the reason we have such a strong magnetic field is because a chance collision with a huge lump of iron in the Earths past gave it the mass thats needed to assist life here. Actually, the vast majority of the iron in the Earth's core - quite probably all of it - has been there since the beginning. Earth is a big enough lump of rock to have retained iron in the first place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jabberwocky Posted November 10, 2006 Author Share Posted November 10, 2006 Actually, the vast majority of the iron in the Earth's core - quite probably all of it - has been there since the beginning. Earth is a big enough lump of rock to have retained iron in the first place. But theres less than Venus, a similarly sized planet so Venus has a weaker field to protect it. This collision with the iron asteroid was during the very first formation of the planet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heyesey Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 But theres less than Venus, a similarly sized planet so Venus has a weaker field to protect it. That's largely due to Venus's almost total lack of rotation, though - which is, indeed, highly unusual for a planet. This collision with the iron asteroid was during the very first formation of the planet. Yes - that's how planets get made - lots of small asteroids clunk together and stick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jabberwocky Posted November 10, 2006 Author Share Posted November 10, 2006 Venus hardly has rotation? Thats fascinating. For some reason I always thought that the closer a planet was in towards the sun the faster it rotated and orbited. Then I found out that mars rotates only a little bit faster than us... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King Rat Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 It is known that the Earths magnetic field reverses its polarity, this has hapend several times in the past & at prersent the earths magnetic field is moving east towards true & pole north and severly weakening. It is not known if the Earth's magnetic field when it reverses polarity (i.e that is when it reaches pole north) will have weekend to the point of been ineffective before reversing polarity. Therefore what effect will this have for life on Earth? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crayfish Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 It'll be groovy, baby Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heyesey Posted November 10, 2006 Share Posted November 10, 2006 It is known that the Earths magnetic field reverses its polarity, this has hapend several times in the past & at prersent the earths magnetic field is moving east towards true & pole north and severly weakening. It is not known if the Earth's magnetic field when it reverses polarity (i.e that is when it reaches pole north) will have weekend to the point of been ineffective before reversing polarity. Therefore what effect will this have for life on Earth? Well, we know life will survive, because it has done in the past. Exact details on something that last happened 500,000 years or so ago, are a little hard to come by. It's quite likely that incidences of skin cancer will go through the roof. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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