What if the sun stopped shining?

[Rob Wood]

Originally Posted by Mike Horrigan

I'm making a new short film and I would like to pick a few brains.

If the Sun shut down... how long would Earth have until the temperature became uninhabitable for life as we know it. From what I've read... we would have a few weeks. Just go with the the question, don't debate over how the Sun died. Opinions needed! Thanks, Mike

Ummm, if "the sun shut down" there would be big problems much quicker than a few weeks... the most significant one being we would (from the sun's perspective) be like a rock slung from a sling. Even ignoring the immediate and escalating cooler temperatures (a modest understatement), the atmosphere of our planet would steadily dwindle as centripetal force drops and the earth begins journeying out of our now non-solar system.

Freezing temperature, perpetual darkness, rapidly depleting air... the more I think about it, the worse the implications become. Sounds neat!

So hiding in a cave isn't gonna be enough... tho it would make a great visual metaphor for burying one's head in the sand.

Mr. Happy huh? On the plus side this is just idle speculation: I haven't bothered to verify any of it. So here's some fairly useless solutions you didn't ask for but I now feel obligated to provide as a counterbalance.

Perhaps aliens would rescue us. Or we drop icebergs into volcanoes to get more oxygen (I think Inconvenient Truth suggested this might also solve greenhouse problems, so doubleplus good for that idea). Or we nuke Jupiter instead of ourselves (it's been suggested Jupiter is a failed sun: enough things going boom might trigger it)... course, we'd have to find a way to get Earth to Jupiter, but one problem at a time.

[Michael Wisniewski]

Well it's certainly a good argument for making camcorders more sensitive in low light ... "Yeah but what if the Sun goes out? ... that's why I need a 1/2" chip in my camcorder. So it's better in those low light situations."

[Mike Horrigan]

Thanks for the help guys! I finished the short.

You can check out my latest short here based on the original topic... JOEL 3:15

Let me know what you think.

Thanks,

Mike

[Chris Klidonas]

I was reading and thinking why must the sun shut down? Why can't man have created something that when it gets to the ozone it causes a chain reaction which creates a solid/or gaseous dark layer around the planet which then causes the earth to lose all sunlight, this would mean no instant freeze or explosion or gravitational changes but the earth would start to cool since the heat from the sun hitting the oceans/land would cease. That may be a very plausible reason why it occurs, and it also allows for a longer timeline that can be believed. Just a thought, this I could see us doing.

[Chris Klidonas]

Originally Posted by Mike Horrigan

Thanks for the help guys! I finished the short.

You can check out my latest short here based on the original topic... JOEL 3:15

Let me know what you think.

Thanks,

Mike

Very nice work, sorry I jumped in late and did not get to the last post when I first responded, but now I have, very nice.

[Mike Horrigan]

Originally Posted by Chris Klidonas

Very nice work, sorry I jumped in late and did not get to the last post when I first responded, but now I have, very nice.

Thanks!

Mike