Time on other planets

[DRU]

Lets say that one day on mercury is 2 earth years (i think this is right, but if its not, it doesnt really matter) If you traveled to mercury, would one day FEEL like 2 years, or would it feel like one day?

 

this may be a stupid question, but please no flaming.

[Klaynos]

24 hours would feel to our body clocks like 24 hours, we've evolved to live on a system of 24 hour periods, so we'd still get tired in the same way etc. I'm not sure as to the psycological effects though. Someone might have done some research with people who move to areas where it's dark/light for several months at a time at the polls...

[RoyLennigan]

Lets say that one day on mercury is 2 earth years (i think this is right' date=' but if its not, it doesnt really matter) If you traveled to mercury, would one day FEEL like 2 years, or would it feel like one day?

 

this may be a stupid question, but please no flaming.[/quote']

one mercurian day (the time it takes for the planet to make one full spin) would feel like 2 years because, on earth, the same amount of time would be two years. the way we percieve the world does not depend on which planet we are on. in space we percieve time exactly like we would on earth.

 

btw, one day on mercury is 58.64 earth days.

[ecoli]

Lets say that one day on mercury is 2 earth years (i think this is right' date=' but if its not, it doesnt really matter) If you traveled to mercury, would one day FEEL like 2 years, or would it feel like one day?

 

this may be a stupid question, but please no flaming.[/quote']

 

An hour is an hour no matter where you are. But just because there 24 hours in a day on earth doesn't mean the same is true on other planets. The passage of time will not change, only the amount time between sunrises and sunsets.

 

Even if you were traveling near c time would appear constant. It's relative, baby!

[DRU]

one mercurian day (the time it takes for the planet to make one full spin) would feel like 2 years because' date=' on earth, the same amount of time [i']would[/i] be two years. the way we percieve the world does not depend on which planet we are on. in space we percieve time exactly like we would on earth.

 

btw, one day on mercury is 58.64 earth days.

thanks for the correction;)

but isnt there that whole thing about the twins aging when one is on earth and one is in space? basically, how fast you age depends on how fast youre traveling. so, im assuming mercury does not rotate at the same speed that earth does. so does that mean that you would age differently on mercury?

[Xyph]

Time is only distorted to that extent at relativistic speeds (ie, significant fractions of the speed of light), which could result in one twin aging faster than another (if one travelled at near the speed of light for a while and the other stayed on Earth). On (or in orbit around) planets, though, rotational/orbital speed is negligible as far as time dilation is concerned.

[DRU]

Time is only distorted to that extent at relativistic speeds (ie, significant fractions of the speed of light), which could result in one twin aging faster than another. On (or in orbit around) planets, though, rotational/orbital speed is negligible as far as time dilation is concerned.

ok

thanks for clearing that up:-)

[Red_Ninja]

Greetz folks, first post.

 

As I recall, and I found this interesting at the time, (I was only a youngster and couldn't keep my head out of a book on the Solar system by Patrick Moore) Venus has the odd distinction of having a day that lasts longer than its year i.e. Venus orbits the sun in less time than it revolves on its own axis. Its motion is also retrograde in that the sun rises to the west and sets to the east.

 

Is the best theory for explaining this still that Venus underwent an impact with a massive body well back in its history ?

 

Cheers

[DRU]

ok i have one more thought on this topic. what if the question were applied to residents of mercury? wouldnt it make sense for their cycle to be based on the mercurian day? so would this mean that a mercury day would feel to them like 24 hours feels to us?

[[Tycho?]]

Greetz folks' date=' first post.

 

As I recall, and I found this interesting at the time, (I was only a youngster and couldn't keep my head out of a book on the Solar system by Patrick Moore) Venus has the odd distinction of having a day that lasts longer than its year i.e. Venus orbits the sun in less time than it revolves on its own axis. Its motion is also retrograde in that the sun rises to the west and sets to the east.

 

Is the best theory for explaining this still that Venus underwent an impact with a massive body well back in its history ?

 

Cheers [/quote']

 

Yeah its still the best explanation (only one that I know of).

[Xyph]

ok i have one more thought on this topic. what if the question were applied to residents of mercury? wouldnt it make sense for their cycle to be based on the mercurian day? so would this mean that a mercury day would feel to them like 24 hours feels to us?

All the factors that make Mercury unsuitable for the evolution of life notwithstanding, it's safe to assume that Mercurians, if they existed, would be comfortable with their day length.

 

That doesn't mean it would be an exact correlation, though. Animals on Earth go through very different sleep cycles, for example, and presumably all experience the passing of time at a different rate as well - flies, for example, have lives that last much longer from their perspective than the few days they seem to us. The apparent rate of time's passing varies even within individual humans, too, so you wouldn't get a replica of Earth with the only difference being longer days, but you would get Mercurians adapted to such long days and experiencing the passing of time in whichever way worked best for them.

[ecoli]

ok i have one more thought on this topic. what if the question were applied to residents of mercury? wouldnt it make sense for their cycle to be based on the mercurian day? so would this mean that a mercury day would feel to them like 24 hours feels to us?

 

You'd have to define "feel like." Maybe, if the sentinent being sleep cycle is like ours ~16 hours awake and ~8 hours of sleeping, and if that being was completely non-conscious and unfunctioning during sleep, so that going to sleep and waking up feels like no time has passed, then I suppose so. But probably not.

[Halucigenia]

Someone might have done some research with people who move to areas where it's dark/light for several months at a time at the polls...

I do seem to remember a similar study, it was conducted on a guy who lived in a cave, with no access to sunlight. His biological clock got out of sync with the 24 hour clock.

As far as I understand it day length is increasing due to the tidal effect of the moon and our biological clock has not updated with the change. It seems that our biological clock was set a long time ago someone forgot to adjust it.

[CanadaAotS]

Imagine this : To mercurians coming to Earth the switch from night to day would seem to them the equilavent of night and day switching every 1.02 minutes for us... crazy eh?

[al93535]

From what I have read this is my idea. Of course this is a little off-topic. A change in speed, or a change in gravity can affect time. Our time clicks by as it does on earth because of the gravity field we are in, and the earths spin, our revolution around the sun, the suns revolutions around the milky way, the milky ways revolutions around the local group, and the local group around a larger group, and maybe that larger group around the center of mass of the universe.

 

All of those motions add up, perhaps on another planet in another galaxy, time could move along alot faster, or slower then ours does. Simply because they are moving at an incredibly different speed then us. The tiny amount of change a different amount of gravity would provide could almost be negligible.

[Glider]

I do seem to remember a similar study' date=' it was conducted on a guy who lived in a cave, with no access to sunlight. His biological clock got out of sync with the 24 hour clock.

As far as I understand it day length is increasing due to the tidal effect of the moon and our biological clock has not updated with the change. It seems that our biological clock was set a long time ago someone forgot to adjust it.[/quote']

Our own circadian rhythm is closer to 25 hours than 24. The guy in the cave lost touch because in that environment there were no zeitgebers (external cues, such as dawn, dusk etc.), which are what keep the rest of us on a (more or less) 24 hour rhythm.

[insane_alien]

i timed it once and my body appears to switch to a 27 hour cycle when i have no darkness

[Glider]

You would have to get a mean reading over a period of months (as happened in the cave experiment) to get close to an accurate value.

[aj47]

I think most people would probably go insane with one long day and even worse one long night. Also it would completly mess up our sleep pattern as melatonin the neurotrasmitter responsible for deep sleep is broken down in light. but i guess most people would probably adjust after time, who knows

[insane_alien]

i suppose. but i was way out of whack when i returned to a night/day cycle. couldn't think straight at all.

[[Tycho?]]

I think most people would probably go insane with one long day and even worse one long night. Also it would completly mess up our sleep pattern as melatonin the neurotrasmitter responsible for deep sleep is broken down in light. but i guess most people would probably adjust after time, who knows

 

People far in the north live with having the sun constantly up or constantly down for weeks or months at a time. So people can definately adjust.

[CanadaAotS]

From what I have read this is my idea. Of course this is a little off-topic. A change in speed' date=' or a change in gravity can affect time. Our time clicks by as it does on earth because of the gravity field we are in, and the earths spin, our revolution around the sun, the suns revolutions around the milky way, the milky ways revolutions around the local group, and the local group around a larger group, and maybe that larger group around the center of mass of the universe.

 

All of those motions add up, perhaps on another planet in another galaxy, time could move along alot faster, or slower then ours does. Simply because they are moving at an incredibly different speed then us. The tiny amount of change a different amount of gravity would provide could almost be negligible.[/quote']

 

yup, their time dialation would be different then ours on Earth...