I've come to the realization that humanity's presence won't mean anything

@sunriselover That's not the normal model, which does work very well.

The developing Sun's gravitational field accreted all sorts of materials around it, as you say those having been made by dying, older stars. Some would have fallen into the star but most formed an "accretion disc" orbiting it.

The Sun if too massive to have expelled enough material to form the planets. It can only eject very low-density, very energetic sub-atomic particles, and it does that in vast quantities; but those are not elements or compounds..

In time this accretion disc broke into the globules, partially but imperfectly sorted by density, that became the planets.

The moons may be from their parent planets or from material collected by the planets.

I don't know why you try to compare that with the "flat Earth" idea.

@ArishMell Because all theories are superseded by new ones.

@sunriselover Yes, when sufficient evidence emerges to support the new ones and suggest the previous were wrong.

My understanding of the Solar System is long-established, but if you've come across some new hypothesis, can you cite it?

@Zaphod42 Assuming our own species actually exists by then, by normal evolution, our descendants would be unable to survive that. Eventually all life on the planet would be destroyed.

@Zaphod42 We ain't gonna figure anything out. Money is too important to do any kind of research on how to leave this rock we live on. Guarantee you in 100 years we're all either already gone or struggling to survive with no kind of research done on interstellar travel. It's a pipe dream and that's all it'll ever be, because money. It sucks that's how it has to be, but you can't tell these people common sense.

@twiigss It's not just money, although that is an immediate barrier, that stops this romantic idea of colonising other planets being no more than a pipe-dream.

Apart from the sheer impracticality largely imposed by the physics, it does not address humanity's fundamental problem: not technical or financial wants, but its own nature.

@sunriselover We are [i]in[/i] an Ice Age. This is a long period of oscillating temperatures about a mean that is relatively cool over the Earth's life so far, and marked by terrestrial ice cover in high latitudes and on high mountains.

If Nature had been allowed it own way, the temperature would still be rising but very much more slowly than mankind is now forcing it; probably slowly enough for us to adapt over many centuries although it would bring sea-levels possibly a few tens of metres higher than now. The tropics would be much hotter.

If the Ice Age continues the temperature would slowly fall again to introduce a new glacial phase. In NW Europe, ice-sheets extended about as far South as the latitude of the River Thames, South of that was a wide band of Arctic Tundra and the English Channel was occupied by a major river valley.

Each major phase lasts many tens of thousands of years.

If the Ice Age is in fact ending, the eventual result would be vast arid areas, far higher sea-level and little or no high-latitude or high-altitude ice.

We can[i] not [/i]control [i]fully-[/i]Natural climate oscillations, just as we cannot control earthquakes (different causes, of course). We [i]can[/i] though avoid what we are doing - artificially accelerating them.

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Could humanity survive another full interglacial, in perhaps another 10 000 years time? Lots of presently-low-lying land would be under the sea so everyone would have to move inland to higher ground; bringing considerable pressure on land, agriculture and other resources.

Can humanity survive another glacial phase? Well, it has done. Early Man lived through it, simply staying in the more equitable latitudes although apparently venturing Northwards into the tundra. The sea-levels would be considerably lower than now, leaving all our present harbours high-and-dry inland. The high latitudes would be uninhabitable, forcing huge numbers of people to move to warmer regions.


Crucially though, it was far easier for our ancestors twenty thousand years ago than it ever could be now. There were far, far fewer people on Earth, their societies and ways of life were far, far simpler than ours now; and it was relatively easy for them to move about and adapt as conditions changed over many generations.

@Magenta I think we've suffered for too long with an idea that whatever happens we can solve our way out of the problem by simply throwing more science and engineering at it.

Whilst Science and Engineering undoubtedly have brought us untold benefits - and some things we all wish had better not been invented - that often misses that one of the biggest causes of many problems is human behaviour!

However, as Twiigss points out, some things are far greater than humans ever can be, and are beyond any possible human control.