End of Days? Experts Discuss Various Theories?
Hector Saavedra
Issue date: 3/24/09 Section: News
People are walking down the street; perhaps they are going to the movies, to school, or are on their way to their job on a bright and sunny day when suddenly, all atoms that make up the earth cease to exist. All that was ever known, in an instant, simultaneously vanishes into oblivion.
This is one of the ten possibilities of how the world could end, as posted in livescience.com.
"The odds against this actually ever occurring are considerably greater than a googolplex to one," wrote Sam Hughes in Livescience.
Hits on the website skyrocketed after an asteroid "buzzed" our planet earlier in the month, creating some chatter about the possibilities of how the earth could end.
Another idea, if one is interested in destroying the earth, is to impact the planet with a blunt instrument. In particular a meteor or another planet could be used. The qualifications to have results are as follows: the object should be falling at a minimum velocity of 11 kilometers per second, "and assuming zero energy loss to heat and other energy forms," the object should have roughly 60 percent of the mass of the earth, according to Andy Kirkpatrick, who submitted the idea to the web site.
Rocks fall from the sky all the time - none of them have size that could significantly level the earth. Yet on March 2, an asteroid similar to the one that destroyed more than 800 square miles of forest in Siberia a century ago, just hissed by our blue planet. Missing the Earth by about 48,800, the asteroid named 2009 DD45 measured 69 feet and 154 feet in diameter. Though not enough to pulverize the entire planet, the asteroid, if it were to impact, would have to have a higher speed to give humanity the same "hello" it did to the dinosaurs.
According to Kirkpatrick, a smaller rock would also be able to destroy the earth.
"A mega-ton asteroid at 90 percent of the light speed would do just as well," claimed Kirkpatrick.
Another interesting idea derived from "2010:Odyssey Two" by Arthur C. Clarke, would be to create and allow Neumann machines to end the world. A Neumann machine is "any device that is capable of creating an exact copy of itself given nothing but the necessary raw materials," according to Livescience.com.
This is one of the ten possibilities of how the world could end, as posted in livescience.com.
"The odds against this actually ever occurring are considerably greater than a googolplex to one," wrote Sam Hughes in Livescience.
Hits on the website skyrocketed after an asteroid "buzzed" our planet earlier in the month, creating some chatter about the possibilities of how the earth could end.
Another idea, if one is interested in destroying the earth, is to impact the planet with a blunt instrument. In particular a meteor or another planet could be used. The qualifications to have results are as follows: the object should be falling at a minimum velocity of 11 kilometers per second, "and assuming zero energy loss to heat and other energy forms," the object should have roughly 60 percent of the mass of the earth, according to Andy Kirkpatrick, who submitted the idea to the web site.
Rocks fall from the sky all the time - none of them have size that could significantly level the earth. Yet on March 2, an asteroid similar to the one that destroyed more than 800 square miles of forest in Siberia a century ago, just hissed by our blue planet. Missing the Earth by about 48,800, the asteroid named 2009 DD45 measured 69 feet and 154 feet in diameter. Though not enough to pulverize the entire planet, the asteroid, if it were to impact, would have to have a higher speed to give humanity the same "hello" it did to the dinosaurs.
According to Kirkpatrick, a smaller rock would also be able to destroy the earth.
"A mega-ton asteroid at 90 percent of the light speed would do just as well," claimed Kirkpatrick.
Another interesting idea derived from "2010:Odyssey Two" by Arthur C. Clarke, would be to create and allow Neumann machines to end the world. A Neumann machine is "any device that is capable of creating an exact copy of itself given nothing but the necessary raw materials," according to Livescience.com.
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