Forum: Story Ideas

Losing the moon would mean the loss of tides and the seas would quickly turn stagnant.

Just losing the moon would result in the eventual death of all animals, fish, plants that rely on the tides to exist.
But as long as the Sun is there, there would still be evaporation, rain, wind storms, and the ocean currents & conveyor belt.

Without the competing gravitational forces from the sun and moon not only would the tides stop, but the movement of the tectonic plates would change causing a burst of increased geological activity (volcanoes, earthquakes) particularly in areas that they don't normally occur now.

My take on the tectonic effects is that things would probably quieten down for some time (100's, 1,000's, 10,000's of years? Not a clue).

But when they do start up again they would be catastrophic in their effects.

As it is the Moon exerts considerable force on the Earth, it moves the oceans & seas around as well, all acting on the earth & helping to cause earthquakes to occur earlier than they would without it's effects.

Without the moon, the stresses on fault lines would build up to much higher levels than they do now, before finally releasing.

There would be some wind as the Earth tended to spin out from under the atmosphere. That's what causes the west to east atmospheric flow.

Actually that is more because the warm and cold areas move east to west as the earth rotates relative to the sun. Wind at the surface blows from high pressure(cold) to low pressure (hot) and in the opposite direction at the top of the troposphere. Of course the warmest temperature at any latitude will happen just a little bit behind the noon line as it sweeps across the earth.

If the rotation of the earth had any significant affect in terms of wind, there could never be calm windless days because the earth never stops rotating.

Yes, a lot of people would die, but I think that some could survive if the climate permitted it.

There wouldn't be a climate, at least not a natural one.

With enough advanced warning (years), a few artificial habitats with hydroponic gardens for food and oxygen and geothermal for heat and power could be built and maybe a few hundred thousand could survive, maybe even indefinitely

With no warning, there wouldn't be time to build the kind of shelters that would be needed.

Cold is the big enemy. Under the scenario you describe unless the shell is a perfect thermal insulator the surface of the earth would drop below freezing very rapidly.

No much of a story and certainly not one with a happy ending.

With enough advanced warning (years), a few artificial habitats with hydroponic gardens for food and oxygen and geothermal for heat and power could be built and maybe a few hundred thousand could survive, maybe even indefinitely

Nope, even hydroponic agriculture needs sunlight (possibly artificial, but that would only last as long as fossil or nuclear fuels, geothermal, and batteries, as most alternative energy sources rely on sunlight either directly (e.g. solar panels) or indirectly (wind and hydroelectricity)).

Maybe use deep sea thermal vent lifeforms.

W/m*m

What do the variables stand for? I'm guessing "W" per minute scared, but what does "W" stand for?

What do the variables stand for? I'm guessing "W" per minute scared, but what does "W" stand for?

I don't know what the short cut is for squared, so it stands for Watts per square metre.

I don't know what the short cut is for squared, so it stands for Watts per square metre.

Use either ^ or ** for "to the power of" so x^3 or x**3 would be x cubed.

Use either ^ or ** for "to the power of" so x^3 or x**3 would be x cubed.

Thanks.
I managed to find it, but I suspect it's a bit hard to see depending on your screen resolution, font size & text size settings.
W/m²

What do the variables stand for? I'm guessing "W" per minute scared, but what does "W" stand for?

Watts per square meter.

Thank you Grant and madnige

Nope, even hydroponic agriculture needs sunlight (possibly artificial, but that would only last as long as fossil or nuclear fuels, geothermal, and batteries, as most alternative energy sources rely on sunlight either directly (e.g. solar panels) or indirectly (wind and hydroelectricity)).

First I was assuming that the "shelters would be deep underground, as close to the mantle as we can get them. I specified geothermal power, and there is no reason to believe that geothermal power wouldn't last for millions of years. The surface may freeze fairly quickly, but the earths core won't.

What do the variables stand for? I'm guessing "W" per minute scared, but what does "W" stand for?

That one isn't mine, but W=watts and m=meters

Its an expression of energy spread across an area watts per meter squared.

That just about describes some of the major Cold War bunkers, many of which are still around and still in commission and ready to use (especially the ones in Europe).

Not deep enough and most are probably on some kind of nuclear or fossil fuel power not geothermal.

There would be some wind as the Earth tended to spin out from under the atmosphere. That's what causes the west to east atmospheric flow.

Not sure what you mean by "spin out from under the atmosphere" and "west to east flow".

The Earth's rotation drags the atmosphere along with it. The atmosphere at ground level is moving along with the rotation of the Earth- that's having a nice calm windless day.

The poles are colder than the equatorial regions, so the general movement of air is from the equator, upwards, down to the poles, then back towards the equator at ground level. Rinse & repeat.

Of course here & there are land masses (some very large, others not. Some heavily covered in vegetation, others not. Some very wet, others not), which heat the air more than the oceans, so you get other rising regions of air adding to the general equator-pole flow. And because there are cooler parts amongst the warmer, you get some areas of descending air there as well- all within the general equator-polar flow.

Because of the rotation of the earth, and air being a fluid, you end up with coriolis forces.

End result- winds, high & low pressure systems, bands at various latitudes of high & low pressure (roaring 40s, the doldrums, the jet stream etc), and weather comes from the east or the west depending on where you are in relation to these regions.

And then of course local geography has it's own effect- high mountain ridges, plateaus etc.

The shell would keep heat inside it because it could not escape; thus, the shell would warm up and only radiate some of the heat back to the planet.

Ok.

If we consider the shell a perfect insulator- it lets nothing in, nor lets anything out.

The end result would be a drop of the Earth's temperatures to pretty much the same all over- poles to equator, ground level up to the shell.

As we are burning fuels, producing heat through nuclear reactions etc and the Earth's own production/release of heat the temperature would very, very, very (not enough verys) slowly rise from what ever it did drop to, and be (many verys) slightly warmer at ground level than higher altitudes.

The warmest areas would be around volcanoes, open areas of lava, geothermal regions.

I'm nothing close to smart enough to contemplate the maths required, but I suspect the temperature would drop to extremely low levels before starting to increase again; and I don't see any of us (or most other animals surviving that).

Wild arse guess, -120°c or lower (check out Mars).

The radioactive elements under the ground do a lot to heat the biosphere.

Afraid not.

Heat from the Earth is estimated at 0.09W/m*m

Heat from the Sun is estimated as 341.3W/m*m

http://www.skepticalscience.com/heatflow.html

Humans were expected to die.

So the idiot question here is 'why didn't they just kill us all directly'? Possibly nudging Earth so it drops into the sun - then we can't contaminate anything, but they don't directly kill us.

That's what causes the west to east atmospheric flow.

-but the

!!%$@ stupid thing dumped most of my post!

Summarising what I had, if the shell doesn't insulate, we freeze in days; if it does insulate, we bake in years. The quote was to highlight trade winds which flow east to west near the equator.

From earlier comments I gather the aliens want to sterilize the planet. This would be a very effective way to do it.

I wouldn't say impractical, you just need to establish what environmental parameters you want to exist once the shield goes into effect, then include something like a conversation between the aliens that establishes them, and go from there. It's your universe, you can do anything you want.

Yep.
Instead of them killing us off, their goal is isolation.

If they can make a shell that size, and it can nullify external gravity, it would need a power source. Part of the output of that could provide a single point source of light & heat (artificial Sun), and make the shell large enough to include the moon which would help with the distribution of the heat over the planet- something close would have to have much less output then the Sun so as not too cook things at the equator, but things at the poles would still be much colder.
Hell, they could also make the light & heat source move up & down the shield on a 12 month cycle to simulate the seasons.

There was one thing that I forgot to mention: the atmosphere does not move as fast as the Earth rotates.

That depends on what part of the atmosphere you are talking about. Being a fluid, different layers and rotate at different speeds. The near surface layers are rotating very very close to the same rate as the surface. At the surface there would be no noticeable wind.

Thus, they do not want to cause the death of the humans, just to keep them away from all right-thinking aliens.

At that point, if they can build the shell at all and get it to the earth in the manner you describe, assume that they can provide substitutes internally for just about everything they cut us off from.

There is ALWAYS laminar flow.

That doesn't mean that it's always significant at all layers of the fluid.

Thus, they do not want to cause the death of the humans, just to keep them away from all right-thinking aliens.

The aliens don't want us to live. Why should they? They are scared shitless by our very existence.

Make up your mind. Either they intend to kill us or they don't. If they intend to kill us, very nearly everyone would be dead within a couple of weeks. If they intend to isolate us without killing us, why not provide for our survival inside the sphere?

Either they intend to kill us or they don't. If they intend to kill us, very nearly everyone would be dead within a couple of weeks. If they intend to isolate us without killing us, why not provide for our survival inside the sphere?

It's plot holes or inconsistencies like that which kill stories for me.
If they want to kill us, there are plenty of much easer/ cheaper/ more effective ways of doing it. So the sphere would make no sense at all.

If they're trying to isolate us, to protect themselves & the rest of the universe from us and they are opposed to killing, then the sphere with it's own power source to function and provide earth with heat & light is a plausible option.

Make up your mind. Either they intend to kill us or they don't. If they intend to kill us, very nearly everyone would be dead within a couple of weeks. If they intend to isolate us without killing us, why not provide for our survival inside the sphere?

I'm getting the impression that they don't want humans getting into the universe and don't care, one way or the other, whether we survive their countermeasures.

I think it is ridiculous to call this a plot hole.

Sci-Fi stories depend on the suspension of disbelief. Maintaining the suspension of disbelief requires the story to at least be internally consistent.

Real life, particularly government, is often inconsistent. Fiction can't be internally inconsistent if you want people to read it.

If you call my premise a plot hole without knowing the whole story, then you have my sympathy.

As the story hasn't be written and you haven't explained the plot or reasoning, I can only base my judgment on what has been given so far.

Enclosing the Earth in a sphere that kept out all light and heat would kill off most life on Earth within a matter of days.

Many smaller life forms would probably last several months. Those that live in & around sub-oceanic vents would continue on unaffected.

Even if the aliens were able to teleport the sphere to cover the Earth, they would still have to build it. That would take considerable time & resources. Any civilisation of that level would have plenty of less resource & energy intensive ways of taking care of the Earth problem.

Hence the suggestion that they don't want to kill us, just isolate us. In which case most people would survive.

But without the light & heat from the Sun, we are dead. So having a sphere around the Earth, blocking all heat & light and having any people survive is a big plot hole.

I suppose that as soon as you see the title on the SOL list, you will vote a 1 without reading the story.

I only vote on stories I finish, and I only finish stories worth reading.

I'm not a mindless tool like all the 1 bombers that regularly abuse the scoring system for their own purposes.

You can even make it so it happened a long, long time ago... but we just discovered it. Essentially, the stars are all bullshit - it is just being projected but actually the universe is completely different than what gets projected on the inside of the sphere for us to 'discover'.

- Actually, paralax, changes in relative angles between stars or other celestial objects changing due to the position of Earth in its orbit and/or which side of the Earth we view from, lets us be sure that some things really are a long way out - it's how the nearer distances were measured (it's where we get 'parsec' from). If there's a shell it would have to enclose the whole solar system out to beyond the Oort cloud (otherwise we'd see inconsistent paralax from one side of the Earth to the other) and have patterns projected to match changing views according to where Earth is in its orbit (and Voyager should be reaching it in a reasonable time), or be even bigger (order of the size of the galaxy) with fixed patterns. This seems so much trouble to go to for no definable reason, that Occam's razor allows us to be pretty sure the universe hasn't already been replaced by something even more bizzarly inexplicable.

If there's a shell it would have to enclose the whole solar system out to beyond the Oort cloud (otherwise we'd see inconsistent paralax from one side of the Earth to the other) and have patterns projected to match changing views according to where Earth is in its orbit

The "shell" would have to enclose all or most of the universe because parallax changes the positions of stars relative to each other over time.
Ancient pictures of the stars have been dated because it was possible to work out the date that the stars were in the relative positions indicated. This couldn't work if "stars" were just lights on the inside of a sphere.
The shell would have to be transparent which would allow light to the earth's surface BUT its composition could affect the wavelengths of light reaching the surface (and thus affect agriculture)and earth's ability to shed heat into space

Don't you think that if we were dirtying the playpen then Big Mamma would not simply close us down and perhaps just allow amoeba?

This couldn't work if "stars" were just lights on the inside of a sphere.

Unless they were able to move about the sphere, and able to change their spectra over time.
Very tricky.

Unless they were able to move about the sphere, and able to change their spectra over time.

Very tricky.

Difficult yes. Imagining it is beyond the capability of a race capable of building a shell large enough to encase a planet and then teleporting said shell across interstellar distances so that it encloses a moving object is impossible.

It would have to be more than thirty times the diameter of Earth's orbit (rule of thumb for 3D photography, 3D is discernible at up to thirty times the separation of the cameras). I'll let someone else do the math.

It would have to be more than thirty times the diameter of Earth's orbit (rule of thumb for 3D photography, 3D is discernible at up to thirty times the separation of the cameras).

No it wouldn't Assuming a sphere that encapsulates the Earth, the farthest apart you could get any two cameras is the diameter of the earth itself, not it's orbit.

No it wouldn't Assuming a sphere that encapsulates the Earth, the farthest apart you could get any two cameras is the diameter of the earth itself, not it's orbit.

As it's done now, the two images that are to be pared are photographed six months apart, so the parallax is the diameter of Earth's orbit. The objects being looked at don't move enough to matter in that time. Of course, almost nothing is close enough (less than 60 AU) for it to matter, either.

As it's done now, the two images that are to be pared are photographed six months apart

And for detecting that the sky has changed to an animated computer generated image projected on the inside of a sphere surrounding the earth, those six months don't add anything.

We could loose the moon if we still kept the same tilt to the world.

Sorry, I don't follow that at all.
The proposal was for the sphere to surround the Earth, not including the Moon.
The axial tilt of the Earth doesn't have anything to do with retaining the Moon, that's due to gravity.

Waves would still happen but we would need some external gravitation to keep the bulge around the earth near the equator.

Waves are a result of the wind, which is a result of temperature differences in the atmosphere, which is a result of the Sun.
The Equatorial bulge is the result of the Earth spinning about it's axis.