Running interference [Safely Endangered]

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Nah. Jupiter would be like "Yummy! Moar!!!"

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agree, would make more sense a comet asking Neptune for directions, and then colliding with Jupiter with Pac-Man face

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Here's a <1pg read about Jupiter and comets.

Jupiter’s gravity is thought to sling most of these fast-moving ice balls out of the solar system before they can get close to Earth... Without Jupiter nearby, long-period comets would collide with our planet much more frequently.

Consider that its powerful gravity prevented space rocks orbiting near it from coalescing into a planet, and that’s why our solar system today has an asteroid belt, consisting of hundreds of thousands of small flying chunks of debris. Today, Jupiter’s gravity continues to affect the asteroids – only now it nudges some asteroids toward the sun, where they have the possibility of colliding with Earth.

Editorial: It's a double-edged sword that favors us far more often than it doesn't. The human problem is that it only takes one collision to end us.

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I mean it's a mathematical inevitability that earth will get hit eventually. Having Jupiter there just gave us better odds. Luck doesn't last forever though.

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The moon doesn't actually protect the Earth from asteroids. It's a net-zero because the extra mass attracts more asteroids.

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I think the odds are better that we kill ourselves before a comet does it for us

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Oh I've felt that way for decades. Humanity is never escaping this rock.

OhStopYellingAtMe

Your mom’s extra mass attracts more asteroids.

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All we need to do is make sure we keep talking.

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To clarify, we likely wouldn't end as a species.

Dinosaurs were ended with a roughly 10-15km meteroirite hitting earth, and causing months of distortions and damage to the ecosystem that disrupted their way of life enough that they starved or died of other causes.

They were not nearly as adaptable as we are in modern times.

To be sure, a lot of progress would die, and life would be greatly disrupted, but we, as a species, would almost certainly survive a similar event.

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~~How did you kn...~~ uh I mean, nuh-uh!

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Jupiter is "the big one".

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If we humans did not chronically overestimate self and underestimate risk then we'd all choose to kill ourselves. Individuals can be smart. But, when pressured or at scale we're really fucking stupid.

causing months of distortions and damage

It wasn't months. It was centuries of upheaval before systems restabilized, double digit human generations.

Sure, the asteroid wouldn't kill all of humanity. The subsequent choices of the few that remained almost certainly would. We're fragile, ordinary creatures that just got here and immediately set about killing one another and the planet itself.

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How do the exacerbaters and mitigators cancel each other out to yield exactly net zero?

Hell, you can even have a 1% allowance. Just explain how it's even close.

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In the bando of the Solar System, Jupiter is the pitbull

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Now we still have to go to work tomorrow!

FUCK YOU Moon

The Picard Maneuver

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That is certainly one way it could go.

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Sir, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid field is approximately three thousand seven hundred and twenty to one!

Never tell me the odds.

A very human response.