Biftheunderstudy
Senior member
- Aug 15, 2006
- 375
- 1
- 81
The moons orbit is getting larger by the year because of the effect of the tides and the dragging effect this has. Something like 1 million years from now the day will be and hour shorter or some other rediculousness(I think I just made a Bushism). Eventually the tide dragging effect will cause the moon to be in a geosyncronous orbit and the earth will continue to spin unimpeded.
I would think slight perturations from the other planets and the sun may be having a similar effect on the earth's orbit except much weaker but I am not sure on this point.
Interestingly, the orbits of the planets are a chaotic system, ie. we can't accurately predict what the stability of the solar system will be on long timescales. Fear not though these timescales are many billions of years, in fact, the time scale for Jupiter is longer than the age of the universe and we're pretty sure nothing crazy is going to happen any time soon....unless something unpredicted like a close encounter from a star......
Now to this 'What lies beyond nonsense?'
The question of what lies beyond is not a valid question since to have a beyond there would have to be more space for something to lie in. The spacial extent of our universe is all there is, no more.
I would think slight perturations from the other planets and the sun may be having a similar effect on the earth's orbit except much weaker but I am not sure on this point.
Interestingly, the orbits of the planets are a chaotic system, ie. we can't accurately predict what the stability of the solar system will be on long timescales. Fear not though these timescales are many billions of years, in fact, the time scale for Jupiter is longer than the age of the universe and we're pretty sure nothing crazy is going to happen any time soon....unless something unpredicted like a close encounter from a star......
Now to this 'What lies beyond nonsense?'
The question of what lies beyond is not a valid question since to have a beyond there would have to be more space for something to lie in. The spacial extent of our universe is all there is, no more.