Posted on 12/08/2010 8:07:46 PM PST by mdraghici
The axial tilt was not caused by an impact. An impact could cause a wobble, but not a constant 23 degree tilt.
FYI
Welcome to Free Republic.
I've been taught that since the Earth is an imperfectly balanced object, it "wobbles" like any other unbalanced spinning object. Wobbles like a top nearing the end of it's spinning. To finish a complete wobble circumference takes about 26,000 years so today's inclination (23.5 degrees) as to the sun will lessen and increase as this cycle progresses.
It is a large wobble. If one circumscribes in the sky via the axis into the heavens, the circle currently extends from near Polaris (today's pole star) to Vega (the pole star in 13,000 years).
An impact that could cause a permanent tilt probably would have destroyed the Earth. Also, you’d clearly see a massive hole where the comet hit, and the spiderweb fractures that created the tectonic plates would decrease in size the further you get from the impact. Also, something that large traveling that fast would not have curved. It easily would have been a straight line carved out.
It has a constant tilt of ~23degs sir, and a very slight wobble about that axis.
Probably when the expression "Crapped Pants" was invented.
That “wobble” gives us our seasons.
The tilt changes between about 22 and 25 degrees on a cycle of about 41,000 years. The 23.5 degree number is the average that is the simplified version for children’s textbooks.
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Above: sun in middle, with axis of earth in January & July on either side
~23.5 degrees is not just the average, it’s what it is now, and used for meaningful calculations. It’s not going to change any time soon.
Precession.
Tiamat ping.
You guys are way beyond me; it is clear from my perspective, however, that earth has endured cataclysmic events which substantially altered the course of human events. Judgements, some would say.
Either we are random organisms adrift in the cosmos, or we aren’t.
Your call.
That sure does look like a sideways impact but the rest of it just sounds silly.
Given my preference for the available evidence rather than what people would like to believe, it's pretty obviously "random organisms adrift in the cosmos."
Psuedoscientific nonsense; site it comes from appears to be the "scientific journal" (please note I'm making air quotes with my fingers there) equivalent of the pay-to-publish book, with a bunch of random "papers" from Bangladeshis, Nigerians, etc.
Well, yes it would have been, if only pants had been invented by then.
Then, obviously, there is no such thing as right or wrong. “Values” are imagination.
Darwin was correct.
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