The solar system is home to the earth, and at its center is the sun, which is constantly glowing and hot. The earth can become a living planet, can evolve into human beings, and has a direct relationship with the sun. The birth of life needs to meet many conditions, not only a stable galaxy environment outside the earth, but more importantly, the planet’s surface needs an appropriate temperature.
How does the temperature of the earth’s surface come from? That is, the energy of the sun comes from radiation, and the energy produced by the earth’s nuclear fusion comes to the earth through radiation, bringing light and warmth to the earth, giving birth to plants on the surface of the earth and a liquid ocean. About 99.97% of the energy of the earth comes from the sun, so we also call the sun the cue ball of the earth, which is also the mother of life on the earth.
Without the mother of the sun taking care of the earth’s heat, there would be no beautiful ecological environment, no warm climate, and no birth of life. A friend once asked such a question: If the sun was a non-heating celestial body from the moment it was born, what would the earth’s temperature reach now? Will it drop to absolute zero?
This is a more interesting topic. If the sun is also a gaseous planet like Jupiter, it will never emit heat to the outside world. Then the environment of the earth must be completely different from the present. The earth had very little demand for solar heat in the early days of its birth. Even if the sun did not glow and generate heat at that time, the earth’s temperature was still very high.
When the earth was first born, it was a molten world. The accumulation and contraction of a large number of rocks and the transformation of internal radioactive materials will generate a lot of heat. At this time, the internal temperature of the earth can reach more than 5000 degrees, and because the movement of the earth has not stabilized at that time, the crust is very weak.
A large amount of heat generated by the internal activity will be emitted through the earth’s crust. Therefore, the early earth volcanic eruptions were very frequent, and the temperature of the earth’s surface would naturally be very high, reaching 500 degrees Celsius. A large amount of volcanic eruption gas and dust enveloped the earth again, preventing the temperature from escaping into space.
In this way, the earth is like a huge oven, the internal heat cannot be dissipated, the temperature of the whole world is higher than the current Venus, and the environment is even more terrible. This scenario lasted for hundreds of millions of years. As time went by, the earth gradually formed a stable atmosphere, the crust became more and more stable, the eruption of volcanoes gradually became less and less, and the entire planet’s plates began to develop. Stabilized.
When the earth stabilized, a large amount of gas and dust from volcanic eruptions continued to fall to the ground. At this stage, although the sun still doesn’t generate heat, the temperature of the earth is still within the warm range. Compared with the early high temperature of 500 degrees Celsius, it has dropped a lot.
However, because the sun does not generate heat and the earth does not have an external source of energy, after the gas and dust on the sky have fallen, the temperature of the earth’s surface will also become lower and lower. In the end, it may only be minus 30 degrees Celsius, but as time goes by, the more stable the earth, the more the temperature drops, and eventually it will drop to minus 270 degrees Celsius.
At such a low temperature, not only will the ocean freeze and become as hard as steel, but the various gases in the atmosphere cannot withstand this low temperature and continue to liquefy and fall to the ground. Therefore, at that time, the earth’s atmosphere will freeze and sink to the surface. The surface of the earth will be in direct contact with the vacuum environment of the universe just like the surface of the moon.
Although the temperature of the earth’s surface is as low as minus 270 degrees Celsius, not all of the earth will be frozen, and there will still be high temperatures inside the earth. As we all know, the structure of the earth is divided into crust, mantle and core. The temperature will be higher starting from the mantle, and the core is divided into inner core and outer core.
The inner core is a solid sphere of iron and nickel, while the outer core is a liquid high-temperature metal. This high-temperature metal solidifies very slowly. For a long period of time, it will continue to release a lot of heat, keeping the earth in an active state. As long as this process continues, the earth will not become a dead star.
This internal heat will also be transmitted to the surface, bringing some vitality to the earth. Of course, since the sun has not been heating up and there is no external heat source, the energy release of the earth’s core is also limited. With the passage of time, the earth’s core may also lose activity after billions of years, and will no longer move or stop. Release energy, and the earth at this time will become a dead star.
Even if the earth’s core stops moving completely and no longer generates heat, the surface temperature of the earth will not reach absolute zero. Because this temperature is currently only a theoretical limit of low temperature. If you have an understanding of the nature of temperature, you should understand that absolute zero can never be achieved. This is the same as a mass object whose speed cannot reach the speed of light no matter how fast it is.
Of course, it is only our hypothesis that the sun does not shine and heat. In fact, such a thing will never happen in the universe. The star itself is born after the mass meets the conditions for internal nuclear fusion to occur. If the mass is not up to, the celestial body will not become a star.
Once it becomes a star, it will not stop after its central nuclear fusion is ignited until the super-new explosion. Even after 5 billion years, the sun has reached the end of a supernova explosion, evolving into a white dwarf. Then white dwarfs also release a certain amount of light and heat, but they are very weak compared to the sun.
And after the surface of the earth’s ocean is frozen, it does not mean that the entire ocean is all ice. Because of the existence of geothermal energy, heat is dissipated inside the earth, so there will be liquid water under the thick ice layer. This reminds us of some frozen planets in the solar system, the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, whose surfaces are covered with ice, so there may also be liquid oceans under the ice.
Water is the source of life, and the existence of a large amount of liquid water means that life may be born. Therefore, scientists have been speculating that there may be life under the thick ice on some moons of Jupiter and Saturn.
Although it is impossible for the sun not to glow and heat, and the earth will not become a completely frozen dead star, the periodic changes of the sun may usher in an ice age. Every ice age is a big test for life, and many lives cannot survive in such a cold environment. And if it is the Great Ice Age, which lasts for millions of years, even humans may not survive.
Of course, if human technology can go further and develop controllable nuclear fusion, even if the Great Ice Age arrives, humans can rely on the powerful energy of nuclear fusion to create an artificial sun and raise the temperature of the earth. Even if the surface is too cold, we can’t survive, but we can move underground. As long as there is strong energy support, human beings can deal with various natural environments. This is the power and charm of technology.