Recent content by timken

At the latitudes of the UK and Northern Europe we would expect a climate similar to that of Alaska or central Canada. Thanks entirely to the gulf stream, which bathes our shores with water carrying the heat equivalent of one million power stations, we currently have a much warmer climate. The...

I had a look around the net to see if I could find info on the proportion of stars investigated for planets which had revealed planets. I couldn't find what I was looking for, but I did uncover one reference from a team using the transit method who have detected some planets to date. Sorry I've...

I have a question that someone out there might be able to help me with. We have currently detected around 140 extra solar planets, but most of these systems are a bit weird with gas giants orbiting close to their stars. It’s fairly obvious that we are finding these systems first because they...

This is a great question. As it is one of the great unknowns I can talk a load of twaddle, and no one can prove me wrong. If only our universe was closed it would be easy to answer the question, we just cycle between big bang and big crunch. Much to my annoyance the universe is open. Is...

Armagedon Hey, don't give up panicking just yet. There are still several million objects in the asteroid belt in the 50-100 feet diameter range, and how many countless billions of comets are there waiting to fall on your heads from the Oort cloud. I have read references to perturbed...

One thing has always puzzled me when IQ or "g" are being discussed. When comparing largely isolated breeding populations that display clear differences in numerous genetically influenced factors I would find it incredible if measures of intelligence (geneticaly influenced?) were to give...

Re-Planet Formation I've not seen any theory like the one you are looking for, and to be honest, I would not expect to see one either. I assume that such a theory would have to assume that a gas giant is all gas, after all if it is to "change into a rocky planet", then it would not have...