Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe - What would happen on earth if the moon disappeared?

Episode Date: August 22, 2019

The moon has just been deleted from the simulation. What will happen here on earth? Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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so you can work, create, and boost productivity all on one device. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA. terminal, just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System

on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, luckily, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend's been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That seems inappropriate.

Maybe find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast and the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's your favorite thing about looking at the night sky? You know, I should probably say something inspirational about physics, et cetera. But honestly, being a family man, my favorite thing is that it means my kids are probably asleep. That's what the night sky means to you, that they're safely tucked in bed? Exactly. Or do you mean actually asleep? It's time for the adult portion of the day.

That sounds kind of racy. Trust me, my evening's not that exciting. But do you mean like they're in bed or they're just asleep or what makes it? Well, they're in bed and they're quiet. That's all I really care about, honestly. Whether they're asleep or not is their business. No, but seriously, let's say like you're looking at the night sky, what does it make you think of as a physicist, as an explorer, as a thinker?

You know, it makes me think about vastness, the hugeness of space, of course, you know, but also like the vastness of time. You mean you can see time in the sky? No, but I love that when you look at the sky, it's basically the same sky that people have been looking at and wondering about for as long as people have been looking and wondering. You know, it hasn't changed that much. I have a question for you. What if it wasn't? What have our night sky changed? Well, that would be amazing, but as long as my kids stay in bed and stay quiet, I'd be cool with it.

Hi, I'm Jorge. I'm a cartoonist and the creator of PhD comics. Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist, a parent, and someone who likes to look up at the night sky and enjoy the quiet vastness of space. And something we also share in common is that we are the co-authors of the book, We Have No Idea, a Guide to the Unknown Universe. So if you are wondering about what we don't know, what physicists have no idea about in our great big universe, please check out that book. It's a lot of fun, and it features a lot of Jorge's whole. hilarious cartoons. So check it out. It's what neither a physicist nor a cartoonist knows about the universe.

It also features a lot of Daniel's hilarious physics. So if you're into both hilarities, please check it up. But today, welcome to our podcast, Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, a production of iHeart Radio. That's right, our podcast in which we think about all the things that are surrounding us, all the things up in the sky and down here on Earth, and try to explain them to you in a way that makes you laugh. and hopefully illuminates your understanding of the world around us.

Yeah, and we also think about the big what-if questions in the universe. Or if we can't use what-if because it's copyrighted by Randall Munroof, XKCB, we also tackle the what-would-happin-is of the universe. We consider ourselves sort of a breeding ground for the next generation of disaster movies by Michael Bay. He's done the huge shark, he's done the crazy storm, what's next? Right. the big asteroid. That's right.

He's done that already. So we are just generating ideas for the next summer blockbuster. I think it's something a lot of people maybe wonder about out there, you know? What could be the next huge thing that could happen in this crazy chaotic universe that might affect my life? And you don't have to speculate. I know the people out there wonder because they write to us about it. We get emails people asking us. For example, we did an episode recently about what would happen if the sun became a black hole.

That's an honest question. that a bunch of people wrote in. If people wonder about these things, it's on people's minds, you know. Things around us seem stable, but what if something happened? And so this might be another one in our series of what would happen ifs.

And so today on the podcast, we are going to be answering the question. What would happen if the Earth lost its moon? Goodbye, Moon. Good night, Moon. That's right. Although these days, you know, you have to say, not just say good night to the moon,

you have to say good night to the moon and its first colonizers. By the Chinese? What do you mean? There are living things on the moon now. Because of us? Yes. The Israelis crash landed a probe on the moon, and on that probe were tardigrades, little water bears.

And so now we are just awaiting our lunar overlords, the coming of the tardigrade civilization. Oh, my God. What a disaster. I know. I know. So be careful with your science, folks. You may accidentally cede a new civilization which destroys ours. Oh, my goodness. And tardigrates are super scary.

Oh, they're so cute. We're going to do an episode about tardigrades in the next few weeks. So tune in for that one. But think about it. As we talk about it tonight, remember, the moon is no longer a lifeless rock. It is now home to about 100 little tardigrades. Do you think they deserve their own? country i think donald trump will probably try to buy it yeah

hey if i can buy greenland why can't i buy the moon they'll flash a sign they'll make a formation on the surface of the moon saying we are not for sale we are not for sale exactly but it's an interesting question you know the moon is a big fixture in our lives in our skies in mythology in romance so what would happen sort of to the human psyche and to life on earth if the earth lost its moon it's a totally reasonable question And you're saying this was a listener question as well. Somebody, some people wrote this in.

Yeah, absolutely. People wrote this in and wanted to know. And as soon as I read it, I thought, that's a good question. I wonder how life would change on the service of the earth if we lost our moon. So I had to do some research. It was a lot of fun, actually. So thank you folks for writing in this question. That's an aside, Daniel, I think that's the title of our third book.

What would happen if? What would happen if a physicist and a cartoonist got paid to make three books? It would never happen. It would never happen, but... I just wanted to get a review of our book from one of the tardigrades on the moon. It's a life goal for me. So that's what we'll be talking about today is the question. What would happen if the Earth lost its moon?

Like if it suddenly disappeared, Daniel, or if it, you know, got knocked off and flew off? Or what do you think they were thinking when they asked the question? I don't know. I read a book recently by Neil Stevenson. It's a great book. It's called Seven Eves, in which the moon is demolished and all the rubble rains down on Earth. that's a pretty bad scenario. So it might be that people are reading that book

and wondering about it. Or, you know, just if the moon was like flung out in a space that got hit by an asteroid and deflected, there's lots of different scenarios, but we'll dig into all of them. Wasn't that also a plot point in Avengers Infinity War? Like Thanos reaches out and he grabs the moon and he brings it down on the Avengers?

What? I know you watch these movies. I do watch these movies, but they're like 17 hours long, so I don't remember every plot point. But that's a pretty interesting question. And I imagine people think a lot of things would happen or maybe nothing would happen.

Yeah, so actually before I did research, before I even had an idea of my own, I went out and I asked folks what they thought would happen if the Earth lost its moon. And where were you in the world when you asked these questions? Or even on the world, you were asking tardigraises. I was crash landing on the moon when I asked these questions. No, here these questions were answered in some combination of Heathrow Airport and random cities in Portugal. Cool. So think about it for a second.

What do you think would happen if the Earth lost? its moon. Here's what people had to say. We wouldn't have moonlight? Well, I guess the tides would be out of balance, and we should have floods coming. Yeah, because the whole stability of the whole system will fail, and then the Earth will lose the momentum, and the oceans will, I don't know what,

but it's not possible to have life on Earth without the Moon. Life on Earth could theoretically survive. It is possible. We could survive without a moon. However, climates would be much more unstable. I think it wouldn't be too bad for life on Earth, except for those tidal creatures. Does the moon impact our seasonal change?

No, I don't think so. Although at nighttime, it does make the evening flowers bloom. All right, it seems like I'm only, bad things would happen is what people guessed. Nobody said like, great. I hate the moon. Good riddance. Yeah, that's true. The moon has a good, good, it's pretty favorable, I guess. I wonder if people ever do surveys, like rate the favorability or unfavorability of astronomical objects. What's the most popular planet? If you had to vote for this candidate or for the moon, who would you want to be as your president? But what do you think is the most popular astronomical object? What if you ask

people like, which object in the sky would you delete if you had to delete one? I guess which is the least popular astronomical object. Least popular, huh. It's like those surveys online, like, what's your most unpopular movie that you love or most popular movie that you hate? Yeah. All right. So write in, folks, and let us know which astronomical object do you love to hate. Pluto, probably.

Poor Pluto. But, yeah, people mostly said negative things would happen right now. Nobody would be happy if the moon went away. And there's a big spectrum of possible outcomes here. I like the person who said, we wouldn't have moonlight. Like, that's a disaster. You always like the technical answers, the trivial technical answers, right? Well, if we didn't have a moon, we wouldn't have moonlight.

Technically true, yes. But did you think he meant that more like romantically, like romance would be affected on Earth if there was no moonlight? It probably would be, yeah. It probably would be a different cycle of conception and birth, if it wasn't the moonlight. Oh, my God. But yeah, that's a great question.

We'll be talking about what would happen physically, right? Not necessarily biologically or romantically, but kind of like, well, how would the physics of our everyday life change if the moon suddenly disappeared? Well, Daniel, let's step through it first. First of all, could it happen?

Like, could our moon just disappear or move away or float away? There are lots of ways that we could lose our moon, right? Number one, if something hits the moon, you know, a really big asteroid or something, thing. The moon is an orbit around the Earth, but that's a little bit delicate, right? It's stable, but if it gets knocked out of orbit, it's pretty tough to get back into orbit. So, yeah, it could get deflected. You mean, like, an orbit is a very delicate thing, right? Like,

it's something that you could easily fly away or crash into the planet if you disturb the orbit. Yeah, exactly. Of all the possible trajectories around a planet, there's a very tiny fraction of them that are a stable orbit, right? And so you change your trajectory and, you know, pretty sure soon you're slingshotting around the planet. and then off into space or something. But, you know, the moon is hit all the time. That's why it's covered in craters. Usually, it's just hit by a little rock

and it doesn't change its motion significantly. But there are bigger rocks out there. And if one of them hit the moon, then it could get deflected into outer space, sure. How big do you think of a rock would it take to knock the moon out of orbit? I haven't done any calculations, but, you know, I think it'd have to be pretty substantial.

You know, you're talking something like, you know, hundreds of meters wide, are really a really pretty big, solid rock. And we're sort of, I heard also we're kind of losing the moon anyways. Like the moon doesn't want to be around this, really. It's sort of edging slowly for another planet. It's backing away. Out of the party, they're like, all right, you guys are kind of crazy.

I am going to slowly move over to Mars. Yeah, there's a good party going on on Venus. So see you later. Text you. No, we're losing the moon. it's not actually in a totally stable orbit. It's getting further away every year. But just by a tiny amount, just by a few centimeters.

I looked it up, it's about four centimeters per year. And that's just the way it is. It's like in an orbit that is not stable. It's not in an orbit that self-corrects or stays in its lane the whole time. It's like in a spiral outward away from the Earth. That's right. And you have to remember that the Earth and the Moon are a system, right?

They're both orbiting the center of mass of the Earth, moon. Like, imagine if the moon and the Earth had the same mass, then their center of mass would be between them, literally, and they would both be moving around that point. But they're not the same mass. The Earth is much, much heavier than the moon, and so the center of mass of the two is closer to the center of the Earth. So, but the two are really orbiting this point that's a slightly offset from the center of the Earth, and they're both spinning. So it's a big complicated system, and the energy is moving from one part of it to another. And so the moon's rotation gets further out, right? But that also means it gets more angular momentum. So the angle momentum has to come

from somewhere. So as the moon drifts away, the earth actually slows down a little bit. You mean the days get longer? Yeah, it's complicated. It's complicated. And so this whole system, it's not entirely stable, but it's a little bit stable. It actually turns out it's more stable. You get fewer fluctuations. We'll talk about it more in depth later. But it plays a big role in keeping the earth in sort of a stable rotation and spin. I have been feeling like my days are getting longer. You know, I just don't have the same energy I had before when I was younger. I don't know why.

You need more bananas. Most people feel like as they get older, the days just fly by. So that's one way the moon could disappear. It could literally get knocked off course and fly away, or it is sort of slowly moving away. What are some other ways that the moon, we could lose the moon? Well, the most catastrophic would be if it got hit by a rock and it didn't get deflected into space, but it got like broken up. The moon is, you know, not as like strong as the earth.

It's not as well held together. It's more of a pile of rubble than the earth is because it doesn't have like inner magma and all that stuff. And so it could get broken up. And that's exactly what happens in that novel we were talking about earlier, Seven Eves. Neil Stevenson does like fantastic research for his novels. I've never found a physics mistake in any of them. and I read them very carefully. And in that, people first were like, wow, cool.

Look, the moon is exploding and there's all these shooting stars. But then quickly they realize, oh, this is just a bunch of rocks raining down on the earth. And that's not good. The moon turned into shooting stars. And all that rained down on the earth, it would heat up the atmosphere. And a lot of those pieces would land. And, you know, it's like getting hit by a planet killer. Would it necessarily crash into Earth?

Like, wouldn't, like, if the moon cracked into two, would it necessarily crash down? or would the two halves just keep going around the same orbit? It depends a lot on how the cracking happens. If you, like, exactly crack it in place, then, yeah, they could keep orbiting, just sort of cracked. But if it's a big collision, then some of it's going to get blown out into space, and some of it's going to turn into a ring around the Earth, because some of it will find a stable orbit. But a lot of it will just fall into the gravity well of Earth and land on Earth and kill a bunch of people. So not a happy scenario.

So don't shoot the Moon. Don't shoot the Moon. That's right. Don't shoot for the Moon or at the Moon. moon or unless you're playing hearts you're welcome to shoot the moon but if you are in possession of a moon busting rocket please do not shoot the moon all right so uh it could maybe happen and so let's dig into what would happen if the moon disappeared either by some physical process or just in our imaginations if somebody snapped their finger and their moon just disappeared what would happen to us here on earth but first let's take a quick break

December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently the explosion actually impelled metal, glass. The injured were being loaded into ambival. ambulance is just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, and it was here to stay.

Terrorism. Law and Order Criminal Justice System is back. In Season 2, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight. That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you. you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Oh, wait a minute, Sam.

Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend has been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Now, hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That sounds totally inappropriate.

Well, according to this person, this is her boyfriend's former professor, and they're the same age. And it's even more likely that they're cheating. He insists there's nothing between them. I mean, do you believe him? Well, he's certainly trying to get this person to believe him because he now wants them both to meet. So, do we find out if this person's boyfriend really cheated with his professor or not? To hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hola, it's Honey German, and my podcast, Grasasas Come Again, is back.

This season, we're going even deeper into the world of music and entertainment, with raw and honest conversations with some of your favorite Latin artists and celebrities. You didn't have to audition? No, I didn't audition. I haven't audition in, like, over 25 years. Oh, wow. That's a real G-talk right there. Oh, yeah.

We've got some of the biggest actors, musicians, content creators, and culture shifters, sharing their real stories of failure and success. You were destined to be a start. We talked all about. what's viral and trending with a little bit of chisement, a lot of laughs, and those amazing Vibras you've come to expect. And, of course, we'll explore deeper topics dealing with identity, struggles,

and all the issues affecting our Latin community. You feel like you get a little whitewash because you have to do the code switching? I won't say whitewash because at the end of the day, you know, I'm me. But the whole pretending and coat, you know, it takes a toll on you. Listen to the new season of Grasasas Come Again as part of My Cultura Podcast Network on the IHartRadio app, Apple Podcast,

or wherever you get your podcast. All right, Daniel, we're talking about what would happen if the moon disappeared. And from a physics point of view, what would happen to the Earth? If the moon suddenly flew away or suddenly, I don't know, collapse. If the masters of the simulation just deleted it somehow? Yeah. Well, one of the most immediate things. the effects of the moon on life on earth, of course, is its gravity, right?

The moon is a big ball of stuff, and it has gravity, and that gravity pulls on the earth. And as a lot of people probably know, the moon causes tides on the earth, because it's pulling on the water that's on the earth, and it's literally lifting it up a little bit off the surface. It's like sucking up the water up, right? Yeah, exactly. Remember how gravity works. It depends on the distance, right? So the closer you are to the moon, the stronger the force of the surface.

the moon on you and so on the close side of the earth right things are getting pulled harder than on the far side of the earth what happens is that every object ends up becoming sort of not spherical but more like an ellipse right where the stuff that's on the closer side gets pulled up you know to be closer and the stuff that's on the farther side isn't getting pulled as hard and so it stretches out sort of long ways that way so the earth instead of being a sphere becomes a little obloid both closer to the moon and away from the moon. Wait, that's where tides come from? That's where tides come from, right? It's not because the moon is going around the earth,

or both, both things are happening. Well, the reason the tides change is because the moon is going around the earth and the tides follow it, right? And, you know, the reason it's the water is just because water is easier to move than rock, right? It does also slightly squeeze the earth and change the shape of the

earth, but that's a much smaller effect than just changing the levels of the ocean because obviously water is much easier to squeeze than rock. I always wonder what's actually happening when the tides go up and down. You know, like it's the moon pulling on the water, and so the water becomes less dense? Or, you know what I mean? Like, how does it go up?

It's more about where the water is on Earth, right? The, you have the huge ocean, and all the oceans are basically connected, and sea level is not a constant all the way around the earth, right? sea level is not the same distance from the center of the earth everywhere around the earth because of the tides some of the water is getting gathered together into a bigger deeper pile on some places

and it's getting slurped up from other places so you get less water in the oceans on the sides and more water on the oceans on the moon side and on the opposite side it's like it's recruiting water to where the moon is yeah exactly like say you took all the water and you put it in the Pacific Ocean all the water from all the other oceans and putting in the Pacific Ocean,

obviously that ocean would be deeper and the other ones would be shallower. It's basically that on a much smaller scale. So it's not a density thing? No. Like there's less gravity or more gravity. Yeah, but it's kind of cool. Like the moon is lifting the water, right?

It's like gathering the water together into a pile. That's a real size. You know, it sort of blows my mind. The moon is big enough, given how far away it is, to actually like make piles of stuff on Earth just due to its gravity. Yeah, that's true.

I mean, it's a little certain, in the sky and yet it's pulling a bunch of water into space kind of yeah yeah it's a it's a big effect and you know people um some biologists give tides a big role in the development of life really yeah because one theory goes that you know in the sort of primordial soup where you have these organic materials float around in oceans that the tidal regions are the best place for life to start because the water is sort of mixing a lot right you get the tides coming in and out you're getting a lot of waves into splashing and you get like periods. Like a lot of churn.

Yeah, a lot of churn, exactly. And so, I mean, I think it's just speculation. But I think people think that tides play a role in the development of life. You know, we can't go back and do the other experiment, like delete the moon, run the Earth simulation and see if life takes longer to develop. But it's a cool idea, right? You mean like life wouldn't just develop in a lake or a pond? Yeah, they sort of...

You need that sort of like motion to get things going. And also they notice that these brackish ecosystems where you mix fresh and soft water and those get mixed due to tides, those that have the most diversity. And so I think that's another argument that the origin of life on Earth was affected by tides. All right. So if we didn't have the moon, we wouldn't have tides. Not quite. That's the fascinating thing, is that you delete the moon, tides are not gone.

They're just smaller. And the reason is that we also have tides because of the sun. What? Yeah. The sun, it makes perfect sense, right? The sun is much further away, but much, much huger than the moon. And it also pulls on the earth, obviously. And so it pulls stuff closer to it more strongly and stuff on the opposite side less strongly.

And so it does the same thing to the Earth's oceans that the moon does. But, of course, in a slightly different angle, right? So you have the tides on Earth are complicated because you've got the little tides from the sun and you've got the big tides from the moon. And, you know, that's why the tides sometimes are smaller than others. Wow, I had no idea. I never thought about it before. I guess the sun, it seems so far away and so little in the sky,

but it's really swinging the earth around like a slingshot. And so some of that must affect the water on the surface. Yeah, absolutely does. So we would still have tides without the moon. We just wouldn't have as strong a tide. And the tides would be more regular because we have this complicated two body effects where you have two different things with two different periods,

sometimes adding up to each other, sometimes contradicting each other, right? So we have more complicated tides and larger tides because we have the moon and the sun. So we would have smaller tides or like half as much or like a tenth? What do you think? I think it's about a quarter. Yeah, I think the moon is the majority of the tides, but the sun is a non-negligible effect. So maybe we wouldn't miss it in that way or maybe life could still develop without a moon.

Yeah, probably, probably. And the moon and the tides have a lot of effect on the atmosphere as well, right? not just the water, but it affects the tides and just the gravitational pull of the moon. It squeezes the atmosphere and affects things like global currents. And so you get a lot more mixing just in general in the atmosphere because you have the moon. And so people speculate that if you didn't have the moon, not only would you not have tides, you'd have different patterns of global currents and you'd have stronger regional weather patterns because it wouldn't be as much sort of global mixing and evening out of stuff.

All right. So it would affect the tides, but maybe not. completely. And what else would happen if the moon disappeared? Well, obviously, we wouldn't have eclipses, right? Like, you know, without the moon, you can't get the moon's shadow on the earth. Either kind of eclipse, like a lunar eclipse or solar eclipse. That's true. You need the moon for both. You need the moon for both. And you might scoff at that, but you know, eclipses are, they're kind of amazing events. I had the opportunity to be in the full eclipse region for the last one. And I was shocked at how

how sort of a deeply spiritual event it was for me, somebody who's not really very spiritual at all. And I think that eclipses in history have also inspired a lot of thinkers and astronomers, early astronomers. And so I think without having eclipses, we would have

a bit of a different culture. Do you think it would have affected our scientific development? You know, like with having the moon there got us thinking about planets and orbits and you know, bodies and mass in motion, right? Because didn't Newton sort of used the moon in his thinking about gravity? Absolutely. I think it's vital because there's this incredible step in human history and physics that

Newton accomplished connecting motion of stuff on Earth to motion of stuff in the sky, right? To say maybe the same rules that apply here on Earth also apply to stuff in the sky. And that's a much easier leap to make if you can see stuff in the sky that seems concrete, right? The stars on a less stuff, They're just tiny dots. You have no idea that they're really things or they're just lights up in some ceiling. But the moon looks like a thing, right? It looks like a big rock. It's immediate.

It's there. And so I think it's very helpful for early thinkers to understand that the stuff out there in the sky was just more like the stuff here on Earth. It maybe got us thinking that maybe the sky is not just a big canvas with pinpoints on them, right? Like maybe there are things out there floating around. And we can understand them, right? They follow the rules that we can figure. out. That's an incredible moment in the history of like human intellectual thought, right, that we could understand the cosmos. All right. So no eclipses, smaller tides. What else would

happen if we said good night, man forever? Yeah, well, we would have darker nights, right? The moon is basically a big mirror for the sun. And so when the sun is on the other side of the planet, the moon provides a little bit of reflection of the sun's light. And so, you know, we've all been out on a, on a, on a, on a, on a, the night when you have a full moon. And it's much easier to see. and there are a lot of animals that rely on the moon. But it affects some animals in a good way and some in a bad way, right? Yeah, for example, some animals, like owls, right? They hunt at night, right?

And they use the moonlight. They have very powerful eyes, but they need some light. And so if owls have to hunt by only starlight, then, you know, they're not going to find as many rats. And so conversely, getting rid of the moon would be good for rats. Because they've mostly come out at night to find their food, and their main predator is owls. And so if it's darker, then it's easy to scurry along

and find that pizza on the New York subway or whatever. So if you are pro-rat, this would be a good thing. If you're pro-owls, you make that sound like pro-rat is impossible. I am pro-rat because, no, I am. You're pro-rata or pure pro-rat. You may not be aware, but we actually have rats as pets at home. Yeah, yeah, I think I remember that. Yeah, so rats are very sweet, very intelligent.

On purpose. We got them on purpose, yes. they're very sweet very intelligent very loving very smart little creatures actually all right so you're in the pro retina and also because while the moon played some role in you know helping us think about the cosmos it's actually kind of annoying from an astronomical point of view because it can ruin a nice dark night oh which is you couldn't you can't see the stars very well when the moon is out yeah like i've gone camping sometimes and one of my favorite things by camping is getting to look up at the night sky and seeing a really dark night because it's incredible how many stars are out there, right?

And most people who live in big cities, they have no idea how many stars are visible in the night sky. But when you go out in the middle of nowhere and you're far from everything and you can finally see the Milky Way and all of its beautiful glory, but then there's the moon. And all you can see is the moon and nothing else.

You know, it's washing it out. Exactly. And so... It's an eyesore for romantic physicists. It's beautiful. No, you're right. I was just camping the other day. And, you know, I remember looking up

and seeing the Milky Way and it was amazing and my kids were super impressed and I hadn't thought about it back then but you're right I think it was a moonless night and if the moon had been out we wouldn't have seen these things all right let's get into what else would happen if we lost the moon and this one is a little bit more serious I have to say it would actually affect you on a daily basis but first let's take a quick break December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed.

There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently, the explosion actually impelled metal, glass. The injured were being loaded into ambulances. just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, and it was here to stay. Terrorism. Law and Order Criminal Justice System is back. In Season 2, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight.

That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Oh, wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend has been hanging out with his young professor a lot.

He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Now, hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That sounds totally inappropriate. this person, this is her boyfriend's former professor and they're the same age. And it's even more likely that they're cheating. He insists there's nothing between them.

I mean, do you believe him? Well, he's certainly trying to get this person to believe him because he now wants them both to meet. So, do we find out if this person's boyfriend really cheated with his professor or not? To hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hola, it's Honey German. And my podcast, Grasasas Come Again, is back.

This season we're going even deeper into the world of music and entertainment with raw and honest conversations with some of your favorite Latin artists and celebrities. You didn't have to audition? No, I didn't audition. I haven't audition in like over 25 years. Oh, wow. That's a real G-talk right there. Oh, yeah.

We've got some of the biggest actors, musicians, content creators, and culture shifters sharing their real stories of failure and success. You were destined to be a start. Yeah, that's what I wanted to say. all about what's viral and trending with a little bit of chisement, a lot of laughs, and those amazing Vibras you've come to expect. And, of course, we'll explore deeper topics dealing with identity, struggles, and all the issues affecting our Latin community.

You feel like you get a little whitewash because you have to do the code switching? I won't say whitewash because at the end of the day, you know, I'm me. But the whole pretending and coat, you know, it takes a toll on you. Listen to the new season of Grasasas Come Again as part of my Cultura podcast network on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your approach. podcast. All right, we're talking about what would happen if the moon disappear. And we've talked about smaller tides, no eclipses, which would be a bummer for poets

and ancient civilizations, perhaps, and darker nights. But there is sort of a serious consequence to having no moon, right? Yeah, exactly. bit of speculation based on modeling people have done. But it seems like having a moon plays a big role in the Earth's rotation and in its tilt. So the Earth spins around once a day, but it's also tilted off of its axis, right, which is why we have seasons. Like sometimes you're tilted a little bit closer to the sun, sometimes you tilt a little further from the sun. And so the Earth's rotation controls the length of the day, and its tilt controls the magnitude of our seasons. And as

we were talking about before the earth and the moon are part of a complicated system of angular momentum and and it seems like having a moon makes the earth situation a little bit more stable like planets without a moon it's easier for their tilt to change like we could the way we're spinning around in place not just around the sun could change like we could tilt more towards the sun or away from the sun yeah exactly we're more susceptible to for example being struck by rocks or this kind of stuff and the only way we could absorb the angular momentum of some like impact or something would be by the earth changing its tilt or changing its rotation speed but if you have a moon you have a more complicated system that can absorb it in other ways and so you know if some

big it's like a buffer yeah it's like a gravitational buffer yeah exactly it's like a gravitational buffer and you can dump some of that stuff in the moon like well make the moon spin faster or make the moon go around a little faster or whatever and so without a affecting us. Yeah, and so it seems like having a moon makes the whole system a little bit more stable for the earth. So, you know, we could end up, like, if we lost our moon, we could end up in a situation where we have no tilt, right? Which means we have like no seasons. Right, because the tilt is what gives you seasons, right? Yeah, exactly. The tilt of the earth relative to the sun means sometimes the people in the north are closer to the sun and sometimes

means they're further away from the sun, right? Yeah, so if we lost our moon, we'd lose a bit of our gravitational angle momentum buffer and we'd be more susceptible to some of these big changes which could have like obviously huge effects on the climate and survivability of the earth well beyond whether rats can get gobbled up by owls or whether or not Jorge can see the Milky Way on his camping trip. There would be no seasons or there could be crazy extreme seasons which and maybe those kinds of things wouldn't support life, right? It would be a big deal.

It would be a big deal. All right, Daniel. So those are all pretty cool, but I'm a little bit worried now. Should I be worried? Is the moon going to be going away anytime soon? All these things are fun to think about, you know, interesting to sort of probe the physics of the situation, but none of these things are very likely to happen, right?

We've been watching the skies for a long time. We're pretty sure that there are no big rocks headed for us that are likely to obliterate the moon. It'd be pretty surprising if that happened. As long as we are friendly to the programmers who run the simulation and they don't just decide to delete the moon from our existence, then I think we can count on having the moon for, you know, a lot longer. In fact, I was thinking it'd be kind of a best case scenario, actually,

if like an asteroid hits the moon and knocks it out of orbit, that's like a good thing because it means it didn't hit us. Exactly, exactly, but we'd sort of use up our buffer on that one asteroid and we'd be totally vulnerable to the next one. Be like those movies where the bullet is headed towards you, but then somebody runs in and intercepts it. That's right, exactly. And you lose that person, but at least you didn't get shot.

The target grades are like, we'll save you. That's right. That's right. So maybe thanks to the Israelis for founding the lunar colony. Cool. But I imagine also that even if we lost the moon through whatever reason, it doesn't sound like immediate death for us. You know, it would mean changes in patterns and tides and seasons, but maybe not immediate, like, we're dead in the water.

Yeah, it would not be immediate death. We'd have some time to adjust. And, you know, even if the earth seasons get more dramatic, we'll figure it out. You know, think about the careful, considered way that we're dealing with climate change right now. Doesn't that give you confidence that we'll be able to handle something like that? Sarcasm, sarcasm, sarcasm. That's what a sarcastic physicist is. There you go.

No, but this is definitely solidly in the fun to think about but not actually worry about category. All right. Well, so if you're a rat lover, you can rest at ease that all those rats out there are going. No, wait, you should be worried. You don't need to worry about rats. Sorry, if you're a rat lover, then I'm sorry, we can't get any comment. You know what, rats are going to survive longer than we are, I think.

All right. Thanks for tuning in. And thank you for sending these fascinating questions. if you have a question about a crazy hypothetical situation you'd like us to work out in detail, send it to us at Questions at danielanhorpe.com. So in the meantime, go out there and look at the moon and appreciate its beauty or its absence if you want to look at the stars and the Milky Way. Moons are something you've never appreciated until you lose them.

Hope you enjoyed it. See you next time. If you still have a question after listening to all these explanations, please drop us a line we'd love to hear from you. You can find us at Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at Daniel and Jorge, that's one word, or email us at Feedback at Danielandhorpe.com. Thanks for listening, and remember that Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production of IHeartRadio. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, visit the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Oh, come on. Why is this taking so long? This thing is ancient. Still using yesterday's tech, upgrade to the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, ultra-light, ultra-powerful, and built for serious productivity with Intel core ultra-processors, blazing speed, and AI-powered performance.

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all on one device. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal, just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra. Extra credit. Well, Dakota, luckily, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend's been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone.

Hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That seems inappropriate. Maybe find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Thank you.