What if our sun...?

Question

I don't know anything about stellar physics, but let's just say (for the sake of this question) that *something* happened to cause the Earth to be in constant darkness. How much time (days, weeks, months, years?) would the Earth have left if the Sun ceased to shine? And what would we go through before the death of everything? Would it be quick? Or slow and painful?

This actually came up while I was at work today. Thanks.

Answer 1

if the sun just went out (impossible even if fusion stopped in the sun's core it would take over a million years for the photons to escape from the surface) but for the time being let's just look at what would happen if the sun did go out like that.

as someone else said 8 minutes later we would be in darkness.

(keep in mind that no one on earth would know about these eight minutes they would just see the sun stop shining suddenly)

without the sun to power the weather systems it would eventually calm down, there might be wind at first but before too long everything would be cold. there would be some warmth from the earth's core, but that wouldn't be enough. if we relied on nuclear power we could survive with that for a while. but it would get extremely cold. it wouldn't drop to absolute zero because the earth would still be producing its own heat but it would get extremely cold.

everything outside of the shelters would freeze, nothing would survive, no insects, no mammals, no cockroaches, maybe some bacteria, but that would be it.

humans would have to keep growing things in special chambers heated up by nuclear power. it would be a miserable existence. eventually the uranium would be used up, and the crust might cool down so much that it would be very difficult to dig through to find any more fuel.

as years go by the shelters would die off.

it would be both quick and slow, the initial freezing and extinction of almost everything would take maybe a year, but by the time the shelters go it could be a few centuries.

Answer 2

Without suficient Sun Energy the World would experience a serious Global Cooling. This could really happen if countries like china, Usa etc.. dont do somthing to filter out the particulates released to the atmosphere poluting it which would create a Sun screen and block of the necessary Sun energy to heat the oceans to create rain clouds.Also the sun's energy is needed for photosythesis of all plants on Earth.Without it there would be no crops to feed the population. The world would die a slow death starvation.
There would be no global warming.

Answer 3

if the sun ceased to shine (as in suddenly disappeared) we'd have light on earth for another 8 minutes or so, as light takes just about 8 minutes to get here from the sun...

then it would get cold, really cold...

the earth does generate some heat because of the internal geothermal forces, but i doubt that these are sufficient to heat the planet to a livable temperature

also, without the sun, there would be nothing large enough to pull the planets into orbit, so they would go in a straight line trajectory into "deeper" space

cold...

and dark...

plus, without the light, the plants would die because they could no longer do photosynthesis

in short, the sun provides most of the energy to earth, and we would be helpless without it!

Answer 4

IF the sun did go out and we lost the heat from the sun.. We would be in Total Darkness in exactly 8 minutes.. The speed of Light and the distance between us and the Sun would equal 8 minutes......

mainly It would freeze everything, but a few insects and creatures, but they would die with nothing to eat and drink.

Mainly it would be painful, because we would freeze to death or we would starve to death

Answer 5

It's about eight minutes not exactly. The earth is at different distances from the sun during its orbit. In practical theory we would never know. In solar system term we are in to close proximity and the sun would take us with it. The good news is the sun is at a healthy mid life with about 8 more billion years to go.

Answer 6

Yes, it would get cold very quickly! As far as how long till everything dies; with no sun, I'd say everything would be gone in one night! The first (and last) night. Yep, with the whole planet in a deep freeze, the only things that will survive in that kind of environment are cockroaches and lawyers.


And my mother-in-law of course!

Answer 7

We'd freeze to death before anything... but I don't know how long it would take, but not long at all.

If I were to guess... I would say we'd have a few months at MOST. And the only people to survive that long would be those who are in bunkers near water, with fuel and excellent insulation.

Answer 8

The bible actually states that the world will be dark for 3 months. It is actually based on a volcanoe eruption that we are expecting. This eruption will be so big that it will be able to cover the world with darkness for about 3 months. But don't expect it in our life time. It's supposed to happen in about 1500-2500 years from now. The world would also reach a minimum temperature of about -300 degrees farenheit. It's at a liveble temperature.

Answer 9

i reckon about a week at most and it would be a slow and painful death