• Question: when the sun explodes , would we be on another world by then?

    Asked by to Angus, Christian, Hannah, Laura, Simon on 18 Jun 2013. This question was also asked by .
    • Photo: Simon Holyoake

      Simon Holyoake answered on 18 Jun 2013:

      Well the sun is due to die off in about 4-5 billion years time, that’s a lot of time to travel to a suitably young star and colonise a planet, so it’s certainly possible in theory…

      whether we as a species will survive another 4-5 billion years is a very difficult question, we will either die out in much the same way as the dinosaurs, or we will continue to evolve and change so that in 4 billion years time we will bear little resemblance to humans as they are now… the average lifespan of a species is approximately 2 million years, so we’d be at the upper limit if we were to survive for 4 billion or more!!

      This is still only a temporary solution however as eventually the universe will stop creating new stars, and the ones in existence will eventually burn out…. bleak but inevitable!!

    • Photo: Angus Ferraro

      Angus Ferraro answered on 18 Jun 2013:

      I think by the time that happens humans will have changed so much they would be unrecognisable. As Simon says, species don’t tend to last that long, so we might have evolved into other species (perhaps many).

    • Photo: Christian Maerz

      Christian Maerz answered on 18 Jun 2013:

      I would hope so, otherwise we will all die 🙂

    • Photo: Laura Roberts Artal

      Laura Roberts Artal answered on 19 Jun 2013:

      I agree with Angus and Simon! 4-5billion years is the same age as the Earth, look at all that has happened since the Earth formed:we got an atmosphere, we got water, life formed, life grew into complex forms, dinosaurs, meteorite impacts, we came along! I think it is likely lots of things will change before the sun explodes, who know if we will be the same?

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