3 ms·
I don't know...I think it raises an interesting distinction between "What planet is the closest to us right now?" and "what planet gets the closest to us?" and
by abakker 8y ago
I don't know...I think it raises an interesting distinction between "What planet is the closest to us right now?" and "what planet gets the closest to us?" and "what planet is the closest to us most of the time?"
It's cool to be reminded that these are different concepts, even if the actual results should not surprise us too much.
- dmix 8y agoIt's also a very useful statistical lesson. As averages or nearest is not always representative of the day-to-day reality which decisions and intuitions might be based on.
- zuminator 8y agoYes, reminds me of that sf movie/tv show trope where the invaders are coming in from outer space, we see them passing Saturn, then Jupiter, then Mars, then the Moon, on their approach to Earth. As if the planets were all neatly lined up based on their orbits. Because in the minds of most people that's how it "should" look to zoom in from outer space to our planet. Whereas what this is demonstrating is that on average the planet the invaders would be most likely to pass close to on their approach to Earth/Moon system would be Mercury.
- Beldin 8y agoThis is complete speculation: If you're coming from outside the solar system and want to end up orbiting earth, you probably need to change your delta-v significantly. Perhaps passing by the gas/ice giants isn't that bad a way of doing that?