4 ms·

Tidal heating [1] [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_heating https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_heating

Aardwolf 4y ago
Interesting stuff! Made me find that even rogue planets (free floating without orbiting any star) might theoretically be warm enough to support oceans and life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_planet#Warmth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_planet#Warmth
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  Could be either tidal or geothermal. It’s been conjectured that even Pluto could have liquid water inside. The point is that generic small outer solar system bodies have liquid water, whereas the generic inner solar system body doesn’t. If you think liquid water is the most important requirement for life then most of the habitat in the universe is outside the frost line. It’s totally plausible that simple life could form around geothermal vents on such a moon but harder to believe you could support a complex ecosystem enough to evolve intelligent life without sunlight. At the high pressures in such an underground ocean I wouldn’t expect our proteins to work, you can kill bacteria with very high pressure. I suspect that proteins that evolved in that environment could work just fine. I can picture a creature from that kind of world drilling up to the surface somehow, but the low pressure would be deadly and in a system like Jupiter where Io ‘breeds’ radiation (vapor from volcanos gets ionized, gets accelerated, ionizes more vapor) the surface could be a dangerous place. Such a creature though might have a leg up on starfaring as getting into orbit might be easier (never mind building a beanstalk) and rather than being tempted by boring destinations like Mars (smaller planet, smaller civilization) they might go straight to cutting up wet/carbonaceous asteroids to build large (100-1000x more habitable area than Earth) habitats and if they developed D-D fusion they might be quicker to see the advantages of a comet-hopping lifestyle.
  - lumost 4y ago
    One of the Main limiters with underwater intelligent life would be industrialization. How are you going to use a steam engine underwater? What do you burn to heat it? Given that geothermal vents would be the source of life for such a species - capping them for machinery would also be unwise.
    - polishdude20 4y ago
      Why would geothermal vents be a source of life after the species has evolved reproduction?
      - PaulHoule 4y ago
        Source of energy and materials…
      - pc86 4y ago
        In the same way our sun is for us. Life on Earth wouldn't last very long if you plopped a Dyson sphere between it and the sun.
    - awb 4y ago
      Any motion can be used to do work. If there are underwater currents, that power can be captured and used.

Interesting stuff! Made me find that even rogue planets (free floating without orbiting any star) might theoretically be warm enough to support oceans and life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_planet#Warmth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_planet#Warmth

PaulHoule 4y ago
Could be either tidal or geothermal. It’s been conjectured that even Pluto could have liquid water inside. The point is that generic small outer solar system bodies have liquid water, whereas the generic inner solar system body doesn’t. If you think liquid water is the most important requirement for life then most of the habitat in the universe is outside the frost line. It’s totally plausible that simple life could form around geothermal vents on such a moon but harder to believe you could support a complex ecosystem enough to evolve intelligent life without sunlight. At the high pressures in such an underground ocean I wouldn’t expect our proteins to work, you can kill bacteria with very high pressure. I suspect that proteins that evolved in that environment could work just fine. I can picture a creature from that kind of world drilling up to the surface somehow, but the low pressure would be deadly and in a system like Jupiter where Io ‘breeds’ radiation (vapor from volcanos gets ionized, gets accelerated, ionizes more vapor) the surface could be a dangerous place. Such a creature though might have a leg up on starfaring as getting into orbit might be easier (never mind building a beanstalk) and rather than being tempted by boring destinations like Mars (smaller planet, smaller civilization) they might go straight to cutting up wet/carbonaceous asteroids to build large (100-1000x more habitable area than Earth) habitats and if they developed D-D fusion they might be quicker to see the advantages of a comet-hopping lifestyle.
- lumost 4y ago
  One of the Main limiters with underwater intelligent life would be industrialization. How are you going to use a steam engine underwater? What do you burn to heat it? Given that geothermal vents would be the source of life for such a species - capping them for machinery would also be unwise.
  - polishdude20 4y ago
    Why would geothermal vents be a source of life after the species has evolved reproduction?
    - PaulHoule 4y ago
      Source of energy and materials…
    - pc86 4y ago
      In the same way our sun is for us. Life on Earth wouldn't last very long if you plopped a Dyson sphere between it and the sun.
  - awb 4y ago
    Any motion can be used to do work. If there are underwater currents, that power can be captured and used.