posted
Even midway out from the star, you'd need a thick Venus-like atmosphere to retain enough heat, but that leads to a non-breathable and light blocking situation.
Baaad pressure issues as well.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Twenty? Like I said, the monitor on my work PC is really bad with dark backgrounds.
Doubling up on orbits would be the only way to reconcile "dozens" of planets with the CHZ theory. But to have more than maybe two or three planets sharing the same orbit (I'm sure there's a word for it) stretches credibility as well.
posted
Is there's a definate count for planets/moons? In the episode "Our Mrs. Reynolds" Mal says "There's over 70 earths in this verse, and the meek have inherited not a one." Our solar system has 9 planets and 158 moons.
-------------------- I'm slightly annoyed at Hobbes' rather rude decision to be much more attractive than me though. That's just rude. - PsyLiam, Oct 27, 2005.
Registered: May 1999
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posted
So, to reconcile that with Teacher's number, we'd have to say that there are between 71 an 79 inhabited/terraformed planets and moons, with many more not (or not yet) inhabited/terraformed. There could be far distant planets in orbit of the star that the Alliance has no intention of trying to terraform, but are still planets in the 'Verse.
WizArtist II
"How can you have a yellow alert in Spacedock? "
Member # 1425
posted
There is also the possibility that the orbits are not on the same plane. My question would be concerning the gravitational effects of so many bodies in so small a space. You would think that most of the planets would be unstable or have massive tidal or tectonic shifts from all the gravity wells pulling on them from so many directions.
-------------------- There are 10 types of people in the world...those that understand Binary and those that don't.
Registered: Nov 2004
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You know what happens when two planets are in the same orbit? They develop into mirror images of each other but their inhabitants are completely unaware of the others' existence until they launch a probe and crash land thinking they're on their home planet but are actually on the other then are branded cowards for not carrying out their mission but are finally believed and sent on a mission in an attempt to return but a reversed polarity problem means things end badly for all! So not a good idea!!!
-------------------- When you're in the Sol system, come visit the Starfleet Museum
Registered: Oct 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Masao: You know what happens when two planets are in the same orbit? They develop into mirror images of each other but their inhabitants are completely unaware of the others' existence until they launch a probe and crash land thinking they're on their home planet but are actually on the other then are branded cowards for not carrying out their mission but are finally believed and sent on a mission in an attempt to return but a reversed polarity problem means things end badly for all! So not a good idea!!!
Oh, I remember that one...! Journey to the far side of the Sun a.k.a. Doppelg�nger, with Roy Thinnes.
So, does it apply to the Trojan asteroids too?
Registered: Feb 2004
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A disturbing world where Walter Koenig is president of the United States instead of someone that looks like an actual monkey.
...and The New Monkees is their TNG (complete with fan boards discussing every aspect of each episode ad naseum).
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
I'm playing catchup.. but one thing that makes this sort of crazy system work better would be a HUGE sun. That would make for a wider life-zone, making it easier to justify even terraformed planets. Then, it wouldn't take many Super-jupiter's to have a couple dozen small Earth-like worlds. Heh, even Super-Jupiter's in the same orbit.
Registered: Nov 2002
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The problem I see with a giant sun is stability. It's my understanding the flares from a stellar giant would be unpredictable and deadly making the "core worlds" rather inhospitable. That and the fact that the sun always looks pretty normal in the series. I'm still advocating that these planets are just somehow much closer together than the structure of our own solar system and the conventions of science presently predict.
So now I've started going through, episode by episode and noting where the crew is and any time anyone talks about planets, systems, etc, and also taking caps of any planets and moons we see. Coolest find I hadn't noticed before: in the episode "Serenity" Zoe talks about moons in this belt they aint' seen (emphasis mine and it should be noted this deviates from the subtitles), and Mal counters talking about the prospect of the ship getting towed out to something called the "scrap belt" (which I think may have appeared in the comic though I'm not sure if it was named). So maybe belts could be like aggregated asteroid belts with multiple "moons" occupying the same orbit as has been suggested by a few people here. Anyway it's giving me a good excuse to watch this brilliant series again.
Registered: Sep 2000
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Is a giant necessarily prone to worse flare activity? (Of course, our own sun's flares are unpredictable, though at worst they just shut the power off in Ontario.) My search engine wizardry is failing me on this question.
Registered: Mar 1999
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