I was taught years ago that one of the many conditions that make the Earth stable enough for complex life is that our “big brother” Jupiter works as a vacuum cleaner, clearing out wayward comets and asteroids from the inner solar system so fewer of them have a chance to contact Earth. Makes sense, Jupiter is big.
I recently learned, however, that Jupiter’s “surface gravity” is only 2.5x that of the Earth. No offense to Jupiter, but that feels less like a Kirby and more like a Swiffer.
Is there some different measurement of gravity (other than “surface gravity) that I’m not aware of that’s doing the heavy lifting? Or is it possible that in another, hypothetically similar solar system, a rocky planet 2.5x the size of earth positioned roughly the same distance Jupiter is from Earth would do the same “vacuuming” work?
In: 1661
> I was taught years ago that one of the many conditions that make the Earth stable enough for complex life is that our “big brother” Jupiter works as a vacuum cleaner, clearing out wayward comets and asteroids from the inner solar system so fewer of them have a chance to contact Earth.
In recent years this hypothesis has been disputed by some of the experts, but there are still some experts — people that know better than you or I — that say it still holds water. So take that for what it’s worth.
From what I understand about the only things most of the experts agree on that support complex life are: A star that doesn’t tidally lock its planets, the host planet being large enough to retain an atmosphere, the host planet being at the right distance to support liquid water, the host planet containing phosphorus in the mantle, the host planet containing a certain amount of oxygen, and the host planet having a moon to stabilize its rotation.
Latest Answers