We’ve covered a lot of the weird and wonderful cosmic mechanics of the universe over here
at Life’s Biggest Questions - from Black Holes to White Holes to Dark Energy and Neutron
Stars, and seemingly - it’s relatively entertaining to fit them into differing hypothetical models
to ponder on what impacts these cosmic wonders would have for life down here on Earth.
Perhaps one of the most perplexing of these then, are the notoriously rare Pulsar’s
- the product of a cosmic event that occurs under extraordinarily rare circumstances in
the life cycle of a neutron star.
But - what would happen if our planet had hit the inter-galactic jackpot?
What would happen - if Earth found it’s home amongst these weird enigmas of physics?
Well, let’s find out.
Hello Internet - what’s going on, and once again welcome back to the most inquisitive
channel on YouTube - Life’s Biggest Questions.
As per usual, I’ll be your disembodied floating voice Jack Finch - as today, we curiously
ask the question - What If Earth Orbited A Pulsar?
Roll the clip.
For the curious amongst you, that clip was from Terrence Malick’s mind-bending cinematic
depiction of existence in the universe, Tree of Life - and hey, what can I say - I’m
a stickler for visuals, and it’s not exactly the easiest thing to do, is it - finding a
visual interpretation of one of the rarest cosmic events in the universe.
Pulsar’s man, pulsar’s.
They’re crafty little fellas.
Anyway, it leads us to an important opening notion - are there, in fact, any known planets
that have ever orbited or are already in orbit of a pulsar?
Well, yes - in fact, perhaps only one that’s ever been discovered by science - but before
we blast off over to that insanely awesome cosmic phenomenon, let’s first take a look
at exactly what these things are.
In our last video, we spoke about what would happen if our sun ever turned into a neutron
star - the life cycle of a particularly large solar body, that after going supernova, turns
into one of the strangest entities in the known universe.
If you’d like to find out more about that particular neutron star in question - then
make sure to head over to our playlist to find out more - but for those of you that
aren’t so inclined, we’ll rush through the basic mechanics.
Every star in the universe has a life cycle, and under certain circumstances, particularly
large stars have a habit of getting so big that they explode in a supernova of celestial
destruction, leaving behind a neutron star - that’s incredibly small, but also incredibly
dense - and has one of the strongest gravitational forces in the known universe.
There are thought to be about one million neutron stars in the known universe - but
an even rarer version of a neutron star, is known as a Pulsar.
And if you thought neutron stars were weird - then these guys are much, much more bizarre.
In exactly the same manner that neutron stars spin rapidly and produce incredibly strong
electromagnetic radiation - a pulsar releases that radiation along a narrow beam - almost
like a lighthouse.
And because a pulsar spins at such a consistent speed - they produce a very precise interval
between pulses - hence the name, and function like some weird, cosmic lighthouse out there
in the void of space.
Now obviously, we’re teetering on the edge of theoretical physics here, but there’s
actually quite a lot of evidence to support the mechanical workings of a pulsar.
In fact, the first ever pulsar was discovered way back in 1967 by Jocelyn Bell Burnell and
Antony Hewish at the University of Cambridge, who noticed that a solar entity under their
observation flickered with precise pulses, and deduced that it must have something to
do with the rotational spin of the star under some kind of emission of wavelength energy.
Obviously, there was much more to their work - and their efforts even earned them a Nobel
Prize in Physics.
Good job guys.
It leads us to an interesting point for our theoretical planetary orbit though - because
the pulsar that Bell and Hewish first discovered - which is now named CP 1919 - produces radio
wavelengths as it’s bright burst of magnetic radiation - but in fact, pulsar’s have also
later been found to produce radiation in the form of both X-Ray and Gamma Ray wavelengths.
Well, you may think that’s a bad thing - and it is, because any solar body that produces
narrow beams of deadly radiation spells bad news for any exoplanet caught in the pulsars
orbit - and it quickly makes things incredibly difficult for us as a hypothetical species
to survive.
In fact, it’s incredibly rare for any kind of planet to orbit a pulsar - but they *do*
in fact - exist.
Hold on to your hats, but PSR B1257+12 is a pulsar star located around 2300 light years
away from our Sun, in the constellation of Virgo.
Thankfully for us though - it’s also referred to as Lich - as in, yes, the undead necromancer
of myth and legend.
What makes Lich so damn interesting though, is that it’s a Pulsar star that has three
different planets in its orbits, an incredibly rare celestial phenomenon.
Those planets are known as Draugr, Poltergeist and Phobetor - pretty damn heavy metal, right?
Well, actually - it’s funny we should say that, because life on any one of these planets
would be damn scarier than any Lamb of God and Cradle of Filth album combined - and we
can only imagine the terrifying events that would occur if Earth was one of those unlucky
planets in orbit.
Because of the mechanics of a pulsar star’s orbit - having a pulsar as a solar entity
would be like a giant strobe light flashing on and off.
For eternity, every day would be day, night, day, night, day, night - every second passing
by as light and dark in an instant.
That would only be during the *actual* day though - and if we accept that our Earth would
have a similar orbit that it does now, night would be pretty much the same - giving everyone
on Earth 12 precious hours to rest their eyes from the constant strobing chaos and chance
to figure out how on Earth we get back to our warm, loving - life giving sun.
It would be like being imprisoned in a really crap disco, that you didn’t ever want to
go to, with a terrible DJ and no friends - only forever - endlessly - and you can’t escape.
Also, it’s pretty important that we mention the light that’s hitting you during the
day, is perhaps some of the most deadly radiated energy forces in the universe.
Supercharged x-ray and/or gamma radiation that would certainly strip the very iron from
your blood, turn your eyeballs to jelly, vaporise you at a molecular level - and all of the
above.
Err.
Yeah.
I know we’ve been trying our hardest to steer away from this particular hypothetical
conclusion, but if Earth orbited a pulsar, it’s very likely that everyone would die
and our civilization would be over in a matter of seconds, vaporized by a cosmic tornado.
Not only that though, but once we’re all fried to oblivion - it would happen over,
and over again - frying us with super-intense electromagnetic radiation at regular, precise
intervals.
So precise, in fact - that our molecularly charred civilization would be potentially
more accurate than an atomic clock - and hey, perhaps we could even serve as some form of
time-telling device for a far advanced alien civilization, that were wise enough to know
that orbiting a pulsar would be a really - really, really bad thing to do.
Well - there we have it folks - one cautionary tale, and our long and short answer to the
question - What If Earth Orbited A Pulsar?
It would be a beautiful cosmic sight to behold - but only from an incredibly far and safe
distance.
Pulsar’s, guys.
Not even once.
Before we depart from today’s video though, let’s first take a quick look at some of
your more entertaining edifications from over the past few days.
First up - Mo Playz says --
Is the earth flat?
-- Nope!
Next up, Joshua HD says --
What if NASA has the same budget of the United States Military?
-- Well Joshua HD, that would be absolutely awesome - given the fact that NASA’s current
budget is 0.4% of the 4.4 trillion of the USA’s planned expenditure - 54% of which
is for the military.
It’s safe to say that we need to construct additional pylons.
Well - I guess on that note, it’s time we departed from today’s video.
Cheers for sticking around all the way until the end.
If you were a fan of this video, make sure to hit that thumbs up button - as well as
that subscribe bell, and I’ll be seeing you in the next one.
As per usual, I’ve been your disembodied floating voice Jack Finch - you’ve been
watching Life’s Biggest Questions - and until next time, you take it easy.