Step right up for one of the universe’s worst tours, this side of Kalibak’s personal guided tour of Apokolips. Yes, that’s right, it’s time for Some Geek Told Me’s Tour of the Solar System! This is now our sixth stop, and for those of you that are joining us for the first time, firstly I’m sorry. Second, here is the list of our previous stops, so please feel free to brush up on some nonsense.
1.) Introduction
2.) The Sun
4.) Mercury
5.) Venus
As I so gracefully explained last week, we will be visiting the planet Earth, for the next stop. Now, I know what you’re thinking. Yes, these are my real socks. No, I can not control my eyebrows. And finally, yes, I do realise we already live on Earth, so why would we be visiting it?
The reason that we’re going to look at Earth, is because why would we not? As I said last week, not only is Earth the single source of Salt and Vinegar chips in the observable universe, but it’s pretty cool as well.
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, after Mercury and Venus. And just like Mercury and Venus, Earth is about 4.5 billion years old, though it doesn’t look a day over 2 billion. And in another stroke of terrestrial planet bonding, Earth also has no planetary rings.
However, there are a few differences between the siblings. Earth actually has a moon; which is called, surprise, surprise, The Moon. Remember this, because I’m going to come back to the Moon, just like NASA in 2025.
And just so everybody is on the same page, the Earth’s shape is not a perfect sphere or ball. It’s more like an oblate spheroid, or oblate ellipsoid because it bugles slightly at the equator and flattened at the poles. Having said that, calling Earth a sphere is still fine…because THE EARTH IS NOT FLAT.
Movin’ right along (doog-a-doon, doog-a-doon), Earth has a diameter of 12,756 kilometers (7,918 miles), which is exactly what Flat Earthers dare to say five times in front of a mirror. This makes it the fifth largest planet in the Solar System; just don’t say it in front of Venus.
Earth’s orbit of the Sun is elliptical, so it has a range of about 147,098,450 km (Perihelion) to 152,097,597 km (Aphelion). This is interesting because we recently passed Aphelion on Friday 7th July at 8:06 a.m. (NZST/UTC +12). Aphelion is when Earth reaches its furthest point from the Sun in its orbit, with Earth’s orbital speed being about 29 km/s.
The average distance from the Earth to the Sun is about 150 million km, otherwise known as one astronomical unit or AU. You know how important it is to differentiate between Vulcans and Klingons, well it’s important to know why 1 AU is relevant and important to our beautiful and crazy planet. This means it only takes about eight light minutes, for the light radiating from the Sun, to travel to Earth.
Because of Earth’s average distance and location to the Sun, we have something that our siblings, Mercury and Venus don’t have: liquid water on the surface. Basically, if Earth’s orbit extended well past Aphelion, then our liquid water like oceans and lakes, would freeze. The opposite is true; if Earth’s orbit extended well past Perihelion, then our liquid water would boil and evaporate.
We have one global ocean, but it can be divided into five oceans, which are the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Arctic, and Southern Oceans.
We are lucky enough to be sitting in just the right place for water to be liquid on the surface; we are not too cold, not too hot, we are just right. This is why scientists refer to our location as the Goldilocks Zone. There is so much liquid water on our planet, that it covers 71% of the surface, with 96.5% being found in the oceans.
Earth also has an atmosphere to go along with liquid water, sort of like a Salt and Vinegar combination, which is perfection by the way. Earth’s atmosphere is generally made up of Nitrogen (78%), Oxygen (21%), and other gases like Argon, Carbon Dioxide, Neon, Helium, Methane, Hydrogen, and Krypton1; along with Water Vapour.
Travelling through space can make things interesting for Earth. The planet spins on its axis, at 23.5 degrees, which gives us the four seasons of Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter. Seasons are not caused by the Earth’s location, relative to the Sun; it’s actually the axial tilt.
It takes 24 hours for the Earth to rotate once on its axis, thus one day equals 24 hours.2 But it also takes about 365 days, 5 hours, 59 minutes, and 16 seconds, for Earth to orbit the Sun.
To also make life crazy, since the Moon orbits the Earth, and the Earth orbits the Sun, different eclipses can be created. A Solar Eclipse is when the Moon travels between the Sun and the Earth, and blocks the Sun’s light, for a short period. A Lunar Eclipse is caused when the Earth travels between the Sun and the Moon, which casts the Earth’s shadow onto the Moon. There are variations of these two eclipses, but these astronomical events are beautifully stunning for different reasons.
Underneath the Earth is just as spectacular as above. The Earth’s interior is made of the Crust (Lithosphere), Mantle (Upper Mantle and Lower Mantle), and the Core (Outer Core and Inner Core). The Inner Core is a ball of solid iron and nickel and can reach insane temperatures like 5,500°C (9,900°F), which is like the surface of our local star.
The geology of Earth has a few more quirks, like the spinning iron core creating a magnetic field, known as the magnetosphere, which is vital to Earth’s survival. Earth’s interior is also active and moving, which drives plate tectonics, the creation of mountain ranges, subduction, earthquakes, and of course, volcanoes.
Earth’s land mass covers different regions, like polar, tropical, dry, mild, and continental; which include deserts, and rainforests. The top and bottom of Earth are known as the North and South Poles, which are typically the coldest regions on the planet. The hottest regions are mainly close to the Equator, which is an imaginary line that runs around the middle of the planet.
In addition to this, there are seven continents, which are Africa, Europe, Asia, Oceania, North America, South America, and Antarctica.
This brings us to the crescendo of this rant. There are only two planets in the known universe that contain life: one is Mars because it has robotic life, in the form of probes, rovers, and landers. Let’s get real here, it’s a planet populated by machines.
The other planet is Earth, because it has organic life. It has us humans of course, but we’re not the only organisms here. There are ravens, pythons, goblin sharks, dung beetles, chimpanzees, kiwis, redwoods, the platypus, fungi, dogs, anglerfish, tarantulas, bees, oak trees, zebras, bacteria, worms, bumblebee bats, nautiluses, and maybe the most important of them all: phytoplankton.
I believe that the Earth doesn’t belong to humans. We actually share it with the non-human residents of this planet. But we are the ones doing the greatest amount of damage, so if we want to keep this beautiful place; along with our neighbours, we really need to change the way we think and act.
Earth is so rare and unique, we need to take a lot better care of it.
And with that, this part of the tour has finished. Did I miss anything out? Did you like it? Please let me know if you did.
Do you remember what I said about the Moon, and that I’ll be coming back to it? I meant it because the Moon will be the next stop on our Tour of the Solar System; which I think will be in five weeks.
I hope you’re still enjoying the tour because the quality of the tickets aren’t the best. Thanks once again for reading, following, and subscribing to Some Geek Told Me. Don’t forget to walk your dog, read a banned book, go play some football, and I’ll see you next week.
1 It’s a real element, I promise.
2 I’m not going into the difference between stellar day and sidereal day, because that is another rabbit hole for another time.
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