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If Venus wasn't hit with something massive why the weird backwards and slow rotation that no other planet has? I feel like even if Venus had Earth-like atmosph
by montychain 6y ago
If Venus wasn't hit with something massive why the weird backwards and slow rotation that no other planet has?
I feel like even if Venus had Earth-like atmosphere it'll still be hard for life to endure the 121-day long "day" and "night" where temperature would go from like 250°C to -250°C (numbers from the top of my head). Maybe only on poles there would be possible for water to stay in liquid form for long enough so that life could emerge.
- ncmncm 6y agoTidal locking is the normal condition for solid planets. Literally all large and all close-in moons, and most of the distant ones, are tidally locked to the parent planet. Pluto and Charon orbit a common center, locked. Mars and Ceres get a pass being far from the sun and close to Jupiter. Earth gets a pass because it has a massive moon keeping things stirred up. Venus, like Mercury, is not quite locked. As your rotation period gets close to your orbital period, tidal forces are much reduced. Venus could be oscillating around a resonant point, not yet settled into it. Temperature difference between day and night cannot be large with a 250 mph global wind keeping the atmosphere well-stirred. Under an ocean, life would be further protected from temperature extremes, with high wind performing evaporative cooling on the day side, and surface ice insulating on the night side.