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Why does one random Jovian moon have so much water? And why not all similarly sized rocky bodies in the solar system? Isn't this even stranger than Earth's wat
by ijidak 3y ago
Why does one random Jovian moon have so much water? And why not all similarly sized rocky bodies in the solar system?
Isn't this even stranger than Earth's water?
- harph 3y agoThere's also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enceladus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enceladus so it's not just one random moon.
- spartanatreyu 3y agoSticking with just the Jovian moons, both Ganymede and Callisto are thought to have subsurface oceans too. Ganymede's oceans might be the largest in the entire Solar System. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganymede_(moon)#Subsurface_oceans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganymede_(moon)#Subsurface_oce... 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Callisto_(moon)#Internal_structure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Callisto_(moon)#Internal_struc...
- jcims 3y ago800km deep. Oof. Seems like an ocean world could develop intelligence but technology would be quite difficult.
- jayGlow 3y agothere are some pretty cool scifi books that look at how an aquatic species might develop technology. the "ringworld's children" involves a species that develops on a frozen world with an ocean beneath the ice.
- developer93 3y agoOur technology would be quite difficult, we might not even be able imagine what form an alien race's might take.
- sharlos201068 3y agoTechnology is technology, it's about exploiting the laws of nature to do things. If you want to create refined metals you'll need to heat it, you'll need a source of heat, and you'll need to isolate it from the surrounding water long enough to finish the process. Being underwater makes a lot things much much more difficult or impossible. That's even ignoring your species won't be incidentally exposed to sources of easy energy like fire occurring naturally before learning to create it yourself. There's certainly workarounds and alternatives that could make it _possible_ to develop technologies like fire, metallurgy, complex chemistry, etc. but they'll all be so much harder to discover and do that no early civilisation would consider the required experimentation worthwhile.
- developer93 3y agoAgain, you're thinking human centric. Maybe they could do amazing things with non metallic materials which we haven't needed or which haven't been practical for us due to the different circumstances.
- prawn 3y agoDoes material tend to settle and accrete at different orbits due to weight/density?
- BurningFrog 3y agoThere is a lot of water in the solar system. Comets are mostly water, for example.
- hanniabu 3y agoProbably came from elsewhere and got caught in jupiters orbit
- Phrenzy 3y agoHere is a great series about the water in the outer solar system & the rest of the Universe.
- pests 3y agoYou might have forgot something.
- swagempire 3y agoHi, a link? :)
- gorgoiler 3y agoA recent episode of Planetary Radio discussed this. Io could have been a water world as well, once. https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/2023-lost-oceans-and-found-signals https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/2023-lost-oceans-a... Rocks can consume a lot of water as well. Their chemistry means they can absorb a lot of water in their mineral structure so water isn’t just about surface oceans but also how much is inside a celestial body as well.