We all know that the planets in our solar system are going to be “all lined up” this Friday. It’s going to be a shabby alignment, with the planets spread all over 20 degrees of the sky.
Anyway, this made me think. I don’t think that anything catastrophic is going to happen, but it does make me wonder…
What would happen if the planets actually did line up all in a straight lin. If such is possible, has it happened? If not, is there any competent speculation as to what would happen if all the planets all lined up in a perfect line and all on the same plane?
I don’t know if it ever has happened but I suppose it’s possible if you spin the planets around long enough.
As to what would happen if such a thing occured amounts to bigger than usual tides and possibly earthquakes or volcanic eruptions since this might give an extra nudge to set them off.
I’ve also heard that the combined gravitational pull of all the planets lined up is practically insignificant at the distance we’re talking about. Certainly nothing that could remotely affect something as massive as the earth (or probably even a person for that matter). I guess technically there is a tug from all of them but it’s vanishingly small.
I heard on the radio this morning that the last time this happened was February 5, 1962. A solar eclipse was thrown on for good measure as well.
I think about the only thing you can reasonably assume about 5/5/2000 is that a lot of Mexican people are going to get drunk and/or generally party down. (Cinco de Mayo)
You don’t really mean a “perfect” line, do you? The chance of even three planets lining up perfectly is exactly zero. (Three is the least number that could line up).
So it gets down to how narrowly you want them to be lined up. I guess there’s a theoretical minimum, because the planets’ orbits are not exactly in the same plane. Even if they lined up as closely as possible, and even if the Earth were on the same side of the sun as the others (which is not the case this time), the gravitational pull of all those planets together is completely negligible. The only effect it could possibly have would be on our tides, but even the Sun with thousands of times the mass of all the planets together, and much closer than the big planets, has a very small effect on our tides (tides are slightly larger at new moon and full moon because the sun and moon are working together).
Hell, if they actually did line up (for argument’s sake let’s say within 5-10 degrees of each other) the only thing that would happen to me would be waking up groggy and surly the next morning because I’d be up all night watching it. Whatta sight! Now if I could just do it on a cold, clear winter’s night in Alaska… oy!!
I honestly can’t remember where I saw this (I think it was http://www.badastronomy.com), or I’d link, but I remember reading a bit by an astronomer who did a rough calculation and determined that he was more influenced by the gravity of the person sitting next to him than he was by the combined gravity of all the inner planets and Jupiter.
That being the case, I think we can probably relax about the possibility of catastrophe due to the alignment.
Yeah, I do. Hence the terms “what if” as in Hy-po-thet-i-cal.
Also, you will notice that I followed this question up with the popular phrase “Is such even possible?” so thank you for answering my question.
I had assumed that all the planets lining up was very improbable, but I don’t know, so I asked. But the possibility is irrelevant at this point, as I was looking mainly for some intelligent speculation as to what would happen if it were possible.
Some sort of hypothesis, some exptrapolation, some speculation, something. I have been wondering about this of late, due to today’s planetary ballet, and I am not an astrophysicist, so I thought I would ask some armchair astrophysicists, knowing none of a higher pedigree, i.e., the real McCoy astrophysicists.
So, knowing this, is there anyone who can say, much like Jeff 42 and Olentzero did.
And as I said, don’t worry. We can all read that nothing is going to happen from reliable sources.
I was looking for speculation as to what would happen if…
Yeah, I do. Hence the terms “what if” as in Hy-po-thet-i-cal.
Also, you will notice that I followed this question up with the popular phrase “Is such even possible?” so thank you for answering my question.
I had assumed that all the planets lining up was very improbable, but I don’t know, so I asked. But the possibility is irrelevant at this point, as I was looking mainly for some intelligent speculation as to what would happen if it were possible.
Some sort of hypothesis, some exptrapolation, some speculation, something. I have been wondering about this of late, due to today’s planetary ballet, and I am not an astrophysicist, so I thought I would ask some armchair astrophysicists, knowing none of a higher pedigree, i.e., the real McCoy astrophysicists.
So, knowing this, is there anyone who can say, much like Jeff 42 and Olentzero did.
And as I said, don’t worry. We can all read that nothing is going to happen from reliable sources.
I was looking for speculation as to what would happen if…
Assuming that all of the planets were on the other side of the sun, so that all of the major bodies in our solar system were combining their gravitational vectors in one direction on the Earth… I think all that would happen is that we would not be able to see any of the other planets due to the dang sun being in our way.
Remember that when the other planets are on the direct opposite side of the sun from us, they are at their furthest point from us (for the most part). The strength of a gravitational pull of an object falls off (IIRC) in an inverse square fashion. That is… for every distance X you move away from an object, the object’s gravitational pull falls off by some function of X squared (sorry, my physics books are in the attic). Even when nearby planets are at their closest point to us in our orbits, their gravitational pulls are miniscule. If they were at their furthest points from us, their gravitational pulls on us would be even less so.
Basically, the Sun’s gravitational pull, plus the moon’s gravitational pull, plus nothing, plus nothing, plus nothing, plus nothing, plus… Which is what we encounter every day anyway.
Or, it could be that aliens actually designed our solar system to act as an antenna to focus their teleporter beams, so that they could invade. If the planets were to line up exactly, it could be the trigger to signal the aliens. Arm yourselves! They’re coming!