Earth’s Death in a Hundred Years or a Billion Years?

On one site on the internet, I had this argument with a guy who “informed” the people on that forum that the earth is going to be swallowed by the sun in a billion years – he was absolutely terrified that I had to laugh at him. Oh, I know about that theory but the guy had just discovered it and it was really funny how he could panic at the thought when the deadline is a billion years. Did he think that he could live until then? Anyway, I told him that instead of worrying about that eventuality that we can never correct, he should worry about global warming because that can possibly ruin the Earth in 10 years – if we are not careful. Scrap those predictions by scientists that the Earth may still have a few more hundred years because if the ozone layers gets really busted then we go along with it because the planet will be fried to the core . He was, of course, mad at my suggestion – he prefers that we deal with his dilemma {sigh}.

So, I just wanted to ponder on the horrifying (?) thought that the Earth will somehow perish some time in the future – a billion years, a hundred years, ten years? When will it be? Nope, we can’t play God with the universe and think that it will not die out on us because we are so good with our technologies to make it live. But, can we really save the Earth?

A lot of people are scared that the Earth will be swallowed by the Sun in a billion years when we really should think of what will happen if the ozone layer becomes really depleted and the inhabitants of Earth will be fried daily until the Earth turns into a planet of no life (except for thermophiles, perhaps) and a gas planet. Am I a pessimist? Nope. I just think like a scientist LOL

Let’s look at the matter in specific points.

Threat 1 – Billion Years or more/less

• The Earth will be swallowed by the expanding Sun.
• All life on Earth will die due to the extreme heat.
• Earth and planets close to the Sun will surely become part of the sun.

The Sun had Swallowed the Earth

Threat 2 – Hundred Years or less/more

• The ozone layer depletion becomes really pronounced that a large part of the world receives very intense and direct UV rays on a daily basis.

Image of the largest Antarctic ozone hole ever recorded (September 2006). Courtesy of wikipedia.org.

• The world’s Greenhouse gases have achieved amazingly high levels that global warming is a thing of the past because the globe is almost on fire.
• The world’s ice poles and ice caps will melt – causing the water levels to rise to amazingly high levels that most of the world’s countries will be drowned in water.
• The Sun continues to fry the Earth so that the waters will be unusually hot – or boiling.

I’m still convinced that the threat of destruction in a billion years is too far away for us to be really afraid of it. What we should be afraid of is the earlier threat of our planet dying in our hands.