Hi folks,
OK, I'm going to take my Moderator's hat off for this one as it pretty much breaks the section guidelines but as a lot of astrophotographers inhabit this section I'm hoping that the link I'm about to share will be welcome.
Since I was old enough to understand the question I've been fascinated about how our solar system formed and why it looks the way it does. Of course back in my childhood ephemera such as
Bode's Law were almost state of the art (how embarrassing) but as the knowledgebase expanded so the theories got better and better but then (even more embarrassingly) they got to the point where they seemed to show that our solar system shouldn't exist in the form it does at all!
But finally, and only very recently, there's a narrative which naturally accounts for the four rocky inner planets, the asteroid belt and the four gas giants. Science is always a work in progress but this narrative is so beautiful I just had to share. It's an easy read but, for some, it may be helpful if I refresh the memory and explain that 1 astronomical unit (or "a.u.") is the distance of the Earth from the Sun. So here it is - if you weren't aware that planets can change their orbits significantly over time then prepare to be amazed. As the author says, "
Fasten your seatbelts, folks — I'm about to take you on a wild ride!"; read, digest, enjoy and then wallow in just what a spectacular universe we live in:
Things might have been very different if Saturn had not been able to grow as massive as it did, but if it hadn't we wouldn't be here to talk about it or take photographs of it. There, I got a photography refererence in after all.
Bob.
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