What Would Earth Be Like With No Moon?

Bright Side

Earth with no moon—sounds kinda eerie, right? Without that big ol' rock in the sky, our nights would be way darker, like, seriously spooky. Plus, tides would be way less dramatic without the moon's gravitational pull, so no epic beach waves, sorry surfers. But here's the kicker: our tilt would be all wonky without the moon to stabilize it, so say goodbye to those consistent seasons. And don't even get me started on how it'd mess with wildlife and ecosystems—talk about a total game-changer for planet Earth! So yeah, life without the moon? Definitely not your average day in the universe.  Animation is created by Bright Side. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Music by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com   Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV   Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our Social Media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brightside  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brightside.official TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brightside.official?lang=en   Stock materials (photos, footages and other): https://www.depositphotos.com https://www.shutterstock.com https://www.eastnews.ru ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me

Transcript

00:00 Do you know how it all started 13.8 billion years ago with the Big Bang?

00:05 BAM!

00:06 No, no, wait, I can do better.

00:09 Pfft, never mind.

00:11 And the Universe has been expanding ever since.

00:14 At its young age, it was all made of gas, mostly helium and hydrogen.

00:20 For billions of years, the gas has expanded and cooled down.

00:24 Meanwhile, galaxies, stars, and other mysterious things in space we try to explore today formed

00:31 because of gravitational forces.

00:34 And in that chaos, just like in middle school, about 4.6 billion years ago, our magnificent

00:40 planet was born too.

00:42 It all started as a disk of gas and dust that orbited the young Sun, just the same way it

00:48 was with the rest of the planets in our solar system.

00:51 This disk consisted of dust particles of different sizes and gas.

00:57 They were circling the Sun at different speeds and in orbits that weren't stable and predictable.

01:02 They were bumping into each other all the time.

01:05 These particles grew from very small grains of dust into boulders, then later into bigger

01:10 objects called planetesimals that had a range from miles to hundreds of miles in diameter.

01:17 And these planetesimals that were orbiting the Sun within the disk had gravitational

01:22 force strong enough to pull other objects from the neighborhood out of their orbits

01:27 and collide with them.

01:29 As they were constantly hitting each other, they got bigger and bigger, until some got

01:34 to the size of thousands of miles in diameter.

01:38 That's nearly the size of Mars and the Moon.

01:40 We know these things because of meteorites.

01:43 They come from different places all over our solar system and bring all kinds of materials

01:49 to our planet, giving us something cool to study and learn about our solar system and

01:54 how it formed.

01:56 These materials include very small pieces of dust and rock that have gone through the

02:01 chaos and survived those rough times even before the planets were created.

02:07 Meteorites also brought pieces of asteroids and planetesimals left behind after the planet-forming

02:12 process ended.

02:14 As these objects were forming, some radioactive elements were left trapped inside the minerals

02:20 that, again, were part of them.

02:22 That's how scientists could tell how old they were.

02:26 But the final stage of Earth's formation, and generally this whole chaos that was happening

02:31 in our solar system, may have taken a little bit longer.

02:36 Possibly even up to a hundred million years more.

02:39 That's when the last enormous impact was, and the Earth finally reached its full size.

02:45 What actually happened is that it hit another object which was nearly as large as Mars.

02:51 This collision was so strong that the impact produced enough energy to vaporize some of

02:56 the metal and rock both from the Earth and the Mars-sized object.

03:01 And this vapor created a disk that was surrounding our planet.

03:05 It discooled and clumped together at some point, which is when we got our Moon.

03:11 Our Moon was the result of impact debris, which was a combination of hot gas and molten

03:17 rock.

03:18 There are some theories of how the Moon formed, though.

03:22 One claims it broke off from the Earth.

03:24 Another one says the Moon formed somewhere else in our solar system, and at some point,

03:30 as it was wandering around, it got so close to Earth that it ended up captured by its

03:35 gravity.

03:37 And fans of the third theory believe the Moon and the Earth formed at the same time, from

03:42 the same protoplanetary disk.

03:45 Before the Moon formed, the Earth was a much different place.

03:49 If you could have just one day on Earth without the Moon, you'd be first surprised by the

03:54 days and nights.

03:55 They wouldn't be as stable as they are today because the Moon helps to keep the Earth's

04:00 axis stable.

04:02 Days were shorter back then.

04:04 The Earth had been rotating much faster before the Moon formed.

04:08 Its gravitational pull slowed the rotation of our planet, which means days got longer.

04:14 The Earth's rotation is getting slower through time, but at a really small rate.

04:19 Some predictions say that in a billion years, a typical day will be between 25.5 and 31.7

04:28 hours long.

04:29 If 24 hours is not enough time for you, just wait a billion years.

04:34 But yeah, if you're the type of person that likes to take things slowly, you'd definitely

04:40 have to hurry back then.

04:41 Although there weren't many things you could do back then than to fill your time besides,

04:47 you know, sailing across the hot lava, collecting rocks, or hoping not to get hit in the head

04:53 by some fierce meteorite falling onto our planet.

04:59 But if you were patient enough, maybe you'd see something really cool – water coming

05:04 onto our planet for the first time.

05:07 There was a rain of fiery meteors coming from the sky, and they kept slamming into our young

05:12 Earth.

05:13 It looked devastating at first, but some of this falling debris probably held water.

05:20 Many believe the asteroids and comets that bumped into our home planet carried tiny amounts

05:25 of water, but considering this meteorite shower lasted more than 20 million years, maybe even

05:31 up to 200 million years, it's not that unusual that after a while puddles of water started

05:38 to collect across the surface.

05:41 And as the water evaporated within the atmosphere, it would fall back down, forming lakes, rivers,

05:47 seas, and eventually oceans.

05:50 Only at that point, there was a chance for some primitive life to evolve sometime in

05:54 the future.

05:55 Earth started its transition from a hot ball of magma to the world we know today.

06:02 Before that, it would be too hard for life to exist there.

06:06 Even if it had happened somehow, all those meteor and asteroid collisions would have

06:11 probably destroyed it.

06:13 Also, you wouldn't be able to survive without an oxygen tank.

06:17 The Earth did have an atmosphere, but it wasn't like the one we have today.

06:22 Scientists believe it was composed of water vapor, methane, ammonia, and some other gases

06:28 released from volcanic activity.

06:30 Basically, it was too toxic, since there were volcanic eruptions all the time.

06:37 And the temperatures were way higher, so just standing at these early stages of Earth wouldn't

06:42 be such a pleasant experience.

06:44 Also, there could even be some form of life at that time.

06:49 In its early stages, when everything was so chaotic, it wasn't covered in oceans, trees,

06:55 or stunning landscapes like today, but in molten magma.

06:59 I mean, the earliest form of life we know about are fossils of microorganisms found

07:05 in hydrothermal vents.

07:07 And they're thought to be 1.4 billion years old.

07:11 And scientists assume the earliest time for life to show on Earth could be 4.2 billion

07:16 years ago, give or take.

07:19 So with the right equipment, you could even see some single-celled organisms, like bacteria,

07:25 somewhere across our chaotic planet, even before the Moon was there.

07:30 The Moon's gravitational pull on the Earth creates tides in the ocean, which means it

07:35 probably helped mix and circulate ocean water, maybe even shape them.

07:41 The tides without the Moon would be much smaller, because the gravitational pull is what causes

07:46 the tides to rise and fall.

07:49 The Moon also affects life in the ocean.

07:52 Over time, animals in the ocean have changed and adapted to the changing water levels caused

07:58 by the Moon's gravity.

08:00 Even just the moonlight has a big effect on sea creatures.

08:04 For example, corals use the Moon's cycle to release their eggs at the same time and with

08:10 stronger tides to help carry the eggs.

08:13 Baby sea turtles use the Moon's light shining on the water to guide them from their nest

08:18 to the ocean.

08:19 Who knows which directions life on the Earth would've taken if, at some point billions

08:25 of years ago, we didn't get our lunar buddy to follow us along the way.

08:35 That's it for today!

08:36 So hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like and share it with your

08:40 friends!

08:41 want more just click on these videos and stay on the bright side.

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