What will happen to the human race when the sun super nova's?

Question

Will humans have the technology to live in or travel to another galaxy, or the technology to live in outer space?

Answer 1

Man, the way we are going, I don't even believe the human race will be around for the next century. I don't think technology can go as fast as our self-destructive nature. Just take a look to this whole thing with North Korea. We are all (human race) one mad man's finger away from going to hell. So if you want some advise, live life to the fullest. Find a girl, have a kid, write a book or do whatever it is that you think will bring you satisfaction and stop worrying about super novas and s**t.

Now technically speaking, or sun is a midget star so it will never become a super nova. Actually it will only get to be what astronomers call a white dwarf.

Take care

Answer 2

The Sun is too small to supernova. That scenario will not arise. So there will not be an explosion, with all the uncertainty and paranoia that that implies as to when it will go bang.

What will happen is that as the Sun reaches old age (the average life expectacy of a Main Sequence star is about 10 billion years, and it has already lived for nearly 5 billion years, and so it is already middle-aged) it will slowly swell up and become a red giant, as it starts to run out of hydrogen to fuse to helium.

It will then start to fuse helium in its core to make carbon, nitrogen and oxygen. These nuclear reactions involve more mass being turned into energy (e= mc^2) than in hydrogen fusion and as a result the Sun will get hotter but it will also lose some of its gravitational pull on the Earth, which will spiral outwards to an orbit of larger radius than at present.

The red giant phase of the sun's old age will last about 100 million years. As it expands, it will swallow up Mercury and Venus but it is anticipated that the Earth in its new orbit will escape being similarly engulfed, It will however have its water and atmosphere boiled off and become uninhabitable in the process.

In its dotage the sun will then start to fuse carbon to make heavier elements and cool and shrink to become a White Dwarf star. Not much bigger than the earth.

So, you are right, we will have to decamp to find pastures new. The question is where?

Going to another galaxy (the Andromeda and Triangulum Galaxies are 2.5 and 2.6 million light years away) may well be overkill, however when there are 200-400 billion stars in our own galaxy to explore first.

And we have by no means ruled out the possibility of making moons of Jupiter and Saturn. such as Europa, Enceladus and Titan into habitable, if rather cold, colonies, through terraforming. If they have water and enough gravity to retain an atmosphere, that is a good start.

In effect we have been handed a cosmic Notice To Quit by our landlords that they will be wanting Vacant Possession of our current home in about 4 billion years' time. We will; need to have the removal vans ready and packed but we do have the time and opportunity to scour the solar system and the nearer parts of the galaxy for a des res that might suit us.

The big issue is that there may not be the berths on the Mayflower to take us all to a new world, In which case, who goes and who says?And who gets to decide who goes and who stays?

I don't think the technology will be the problem. After all, if it only took us 66 years from putting two men in the air, to putting two men on the Moon. what can we not do when we have 4 billion years to solve the problem?

Answer 3

First, our sun will NOT supernova -- it is too small to do that. This is how our sun will die:

">As the hydrogen is exhausted, the surface temperature on the Sun will start to cool down.
>The outer layers of the Sun will billow outward, probably expanding as far out as the orbit of Mars, which today is about 140 million miles from the Sun.
>The expanded Sun will be 10,000 times brighter than its present luminosity.
>It will become what astronomers call a red giant.
>After a time as a red giant, the Sun will shrink to a become a white dwarf. It will deflate to about the size of present-day Earth.
>From then, the tiny dying Sun will cool slowly for billions of years. "

Second, at the rate that we are going -- we won't be around when it happens, anyway!!

"The Sun is a yellow, G2 V main sequence dwarf. Yellow dwarfs live about 10 billion years (from zero-age main sequence to white dwarf formation), and our Sun is already about 5 billion years old."

Sorry! See ya in the afterglow!

Answer 4

The sun isn't massive enough to explode in a supernova. It will expand to a red giant though and engulf all the inner planets out to Mars. That's so far in the future that the human species will probably be long extinct, or if we're lucky will have already found a way to migrate to other solar systems light-years away from this one.

Answer 5

In order for a star to supernova, it must be 1.4 times the mass of the Sun. This is called the Chandrasekhar limit. When the Sun starts to run out of fuel it will expand and glow red. Then it will shrink to a white dwarf.

Answer 6

actually... it's not likely the Sun will ever nova... it is more likely that the Sun will become a white dwarf star... its kinda like imploding...it is shrinking at an alarming rate as it uses up its limited supply of fuel... anyway, we have aproximately 1/2 a billion years to figure it out... probably long before that happens, a race far more advanced than ours will see what a mess the humans have made of their planet and either exterminate us or transplant us elsewhere in the universe... possibly breeding us to be used as food to replace their own dwindling resourses...

Answer 7

Will the sun supernova?
It may or may not the question is not if it will supernova.

Suppose it supernova's
Humans will long be gone and would have colonized some other planets. We would know at least a couple of million years before the sun starts to go supernova.

Answer 8

The race will be called on account of vaporization.

Answer 9

No... ALL would Die