Vsauce, I’m Jake and recently I’ve been playing a lot of Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel
which takes place on a Lunar colony that has similar characteristics to our own moon. And
it got me thinking about how mankind has always dreamed of colonizing the moon. Back in 1638
Bishop John Wilkins wrote about future humanity living on the moon. In the 1950s and 60s the
US Government created numerous proposals detailing just that like the US Army’s Project Horizon
in 1959 which outlined a military base on the Moon by 1966. Or the US Air Force’s
Lunex Project to create an underground air force base. And in 2006 NASA proposed to build
a lunar outpost by 2024.
But what if we actually did...what would it be like on Earth’s only natural satellite...”What
if We Lived on the Moon?”
One of the first things you’d notice is the Sun and how it would be white. Because
there is only an extremely thin layer of gas surrounding the Moon, an exosphere, there
is no real atmosphere to absorb and scatter sunlight… which is also the reason why the
lunar sky is just black. You’d also have a hard time seeing any stars since the Sun
is so much brighter than they are. It is the reason why there are no visible stars in the
background of photos from the Apollo missions.
A lunar day would be a lot longer, as well. It would last 29 Earth days with 14.5 of them
being in sunshine and 14.5 in darkness. And even though the Moon and Earth are pretty
equal in terms of distance to the sun, the lack of atmosphere on the Moon means that
the temperatures would change dramatically - going from 240 degrees F during the day
to -280 degrees F at night. And then there are parts of the Moon where it’s perpetually
dark.
Deep craters around the poles may never see sunlight and the coldest temperature ever
recorded in our Solar System so far was inside one of them, the Hermite crater, at - 413
degrees Fahrenheit. The coldest natural recording on Earth was in Antarctica at -135.8 degrees.
It is thought that within these craters there is water ice which would allow us to get H20
directly from the moon instead of the incredible cost of having it sent from Earth.
On the opposite side of the spectrum are parts of the Moon that are exposed to direct sunlight
over 80% of the time. These extremely long hours of daylight and darkness would not only
put us out of sync with the Earth, but could mess with our bodies. Midnight suns can cause
sleep disturbance, hyperactivity, fatigue, and irritable moods; whereas polar nights
can lead to feelings of sadness, lack of energy, difficulty concentrating, difficulty staying
awake and cravings for carbohydrates.
Since we’d be on a different time than the citizens of Earth, we’d need a way to keep
track of it. In 1970 Astronomer Kenneth L. Franklin created a watch for people who visited
the moon. It told time in “lunations” which were equal to 29.5 Earth days.
If you didn’t have a moon watch, another way to tell time would be by using the cycles
of the Earth’s phases. Just like how we used the Moon’s to create a lunar calendar,
we could use the Earth to create a calendar for the moon. Since both celestial bodies
are tidally locked to each other, we would see all phases of the Earth in one full Lunar
day and it would look something like this…
The Earth is almost 4 times bigger than the Moon, so during an eclipse the sun becomes
makes a red ring around the Earth for hours…
Besides the effects the long days and nights would have on us mentally, the difference
in gravity would change us physically. We know that the human body in microgravity causes
bone loss, and the wasting away or atrophy of muscles. Luckily the moon has 1/6th the
gravity of Earth, so you’d not only be able to lift a small cow but these effects on your
body would happen less quickly than say to the astronauts on the International Space
Station...but one of the benefits of being on the ISS is that you age less.
After 6 months on the ISS, the astronauts are .0007 seconds younger than if they had
stayed on Earth. However, on the Moon you would age faster. Einstein said that “time
is a river”. It can speed up at certain points and slow down at others. Because of
time dilation, time would be going faster on the Moon so if you stayed there for a year
you’d be .002 seconds older than on Earth and after 80 years you’d be .16 seconds
older. Also there are the doses of radiation you’d be blasted with because of the whole
no atmosphere thing. So why not make an atmosphere on the moon?
The big issues would be the solar wind that would slowly whisk it away and according to
the Hoekzema Study, that looked into creating a Lunar atmosphere, it would take about a
century to create one that was stable...however it wouldn’t be breathable at a pressure
one ten-millionth that of the one on Earth’s surface. It would actually be the same as
the Karman line, the altitude at which “outer space” technically begins. Even if we could
create a breathable atmosphere on the Moon, it would only last for 100 years until it’d
need to be replenished.
So we’d have to stick to space suits and bio-domes for our moon adventures and not
have a breathable atmosphere. The silver lining to all of this though would be climbing the
moon’s highest point, which at 35,328 feet makes it 6,299ft taller than Everest, and
firing a tank. Why fire a tank you ask? Because the bullet you just shot would then orbit
the moon. Just be sure to move out of the way an hour and 49 minutes later when it comes
back around...and as always, thanks for watching.