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[Frumple]

Where are you hearing that from?

[Lord Shonus]

Almost certainly not. The atmosphere is extremely good at keeping most rocks out - even the biggest "impacts" in recorded history were stopped in the upper atmosphere and killed nobody even when they airbursted directly over a city. One large enough to actually reach the ground is a multi-millenial event, and most of those are more likely to hit empty ocean than populated land. Real killers haven't happened in human history, but are rare enough that an equal amount of history is likely to pass before they're "due".

[JoshuaFH]

Man I just love outer space, there's so much shit that could annihilate us instantly, but it's so vast and empty that it's pretty unlikely we'll ever run into any of it. Meteorites moving at relativistic speeds, gamma ray bursts, something going supernova just slightly too close to us, a quasar jet momentarily grazing us, a hypothetical alien species infecting us with a super virus, an orphaned planet drifting through space colliding into our solar system, the sun getting gassy one day and farting in our general direction (via a solar flare) and stripping the Earth of its atmosphere. Really just any number of things.

IIRC, something wouldn't even need to necessary hit the Earth. If something catastrophic happened to any of the 9 planets, like if a meteor hit Venus or Mercury with enough force to upset its orbit, then the delicate gravitational balance of the Solar System might be disrupted enough to pull the Earth closer to the sun, or whip it further away; both death sentences for us.

Man space is so cool, despite being so deadly.

[Sirus]

These are all excellent reasons to establish off-Earth colonies as soon as feasible. It won't stop something like a nearby supernova sterilizing the entire star system, but the sooner we can't all be wiped out by a single stupid rock from space the better our long-term chances are.

[Egan_BW]

Problem. Any offworld colonies we could build currently would be very dependent on earth anyways. It's something to work towards, but "get better at living outside of any biosphere" is a tall order. Might be easier to fit the human to the environment than the other way around such as by turning ourselves into star whales with peanut sized brains who just drift and absorb the sun in solar orbit

[Lord Shonus]

IIRC, something wouldn't even need to necessary hit the Earth. If something catastrophic happened to any of the 9 planets, like if a meteor hit Venus or Mercury with enough force to upset its orbit, then the delicate gravitational balance of the Solar System might be disrupted enough to pull the Earth closer to the sun, or whip it further away; both death sentences for us.

While that's technically true, the amount of energy needed to disturb the orbits of any of the eight planets is absolutely ludicrous. Pretty much anything that could do it would either be massive enough to distort orbits by sheer passage, or traveling at many, many nines. Sheer mass would be detected centuries in advance (we'd be able to detect shifting distortion in starlight), and pure speed would cause significant erosion or even destruction from simple space dust.

[Loud Whispers]

Problem. Any offworld colonies we could build currently would be very dependent on earth anyways. It's something to work towards, but "get better at living outside of any biosphere" is a tall order. Might be easier to fit the human to the environment than the other way around such as by turning ourselves into star whales with peanut sized brains who just drift and absorb the sun in solar orbit

I'm thinking we terraform a planet before we colonise it

e.g. we identify a suitable planet, make sure there's no life on it before we arrive, then drop loads of pioneer leafy grasses on them. Then the ferns and trees. Then we start dropping the insects and fungi & meaty animals. Then the humans arrive to a planet that is like Earth but not fucked up

[Robsoie]

Space is awesome

Spoiler: But sometime it's scary (click to show/hide)

[King Zultan]

I wonder how people would feel if the sun suddenly grew a face?

[hector13]

I wonder how people would feel if the sun suddenly grew a face?

I can’t imagine many would notice.

[Eric Blank]

It looks like the sun did grow a face.

Its shit eating grin irritates me.

[Frumple]

I wonder how people would feel if the sun suddenly grew a face?

I can’t imagine many would notice.

Not immediately, anyway. Once the astronomers noticed and started screaming at people that something incredibly strange has happened, more folks would figure it out.

Exactly what the overall response would be would have a lot to do with what the sun did with its new face, though.

[ChairmanPoo]

[scriver]

They hated him because he spoke the truth

[Loud Whispers]

I always find it interesting how the dark spots on the sun are actually blindingly bright, but the areas around it are just brighter yet still