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Could you build a giant space straw that sucks out the molten core instead of peeling away layers, and otherwise leave the crust alone so you don't make volcano
by xracy 4y ago
Could you build a giant space straw that sucks out the molten core instead of peeling away layers, and otherwise leave the crust alone so you don't make volcanos everywhere?
- kadoban 4y agoI don't think the Earth is structurally sound enough for that to work, at least if you're hoping to make any kind of a hollow shell. If the goal is just to preferentially remove the dense stuff first, that would likely work. You'd still destroy every part of the biosphere though. The crust bits shifting into place as you remove everything below them would be catastrophic, off the scale earthquakes everywhere and extreme heating and volcanic activity.
- xracy 4y agoWhile it would be nice to maintain the earth's existing setup, given that the original plan didn't do this, I will take "more efficient" :)
- mattnewton 4y agoGood news: the crust is still technically there Bad news: a bunch of it collapsed in the middle and the resulting energy heated it to make more magma and the crust is unrecognizable
- lapetitejort 4y agoLets just hope it swirls in the right direction with the same iron consistency so that we can maintain our magnetic field, or else our distance ancestors (millions of years from now) might have trouble breathing.
- mattnewton 4y agoCosmic rays will finally give them all the super powers we need. I saw it once in a documentary called the fantastic 4
- tsimionescu 4y agoI feel an inescapable urge to point out that our distant ancestors have long stopped breathing, and its our distant descendants who will slowly lose their atmosphere as an unfortunate byproduct of this plan.
- Grimburger 4y agoThere's no solid material that survives beyond the tiniest outer layer of the crust so you won't get far. Perhaps with superheated gas/plasma?