Kind of an odd request but I have a writing idea that's more in the hard science fiction variety I want to do for fun. I would like to try and be as scientifically accurate as possible with it. In short though the premise is just the idea that there is another planet behind the sun that's a super earth in the habitable zone. This is where my request for help comes in. Planets in our solar system have been moving at a constant pace around the Sun for the most part for the past 4.5 billion years and are set in their ellipses around it. Is it even possible for a planet to be around the same distance as our Earth is to the Sun while constantly being behind the Sun out of Earth's view? My intuition is no as the 3 body problem so eloquently demonstrates how chaotic adding an extra variable like a planet in this case can radically alter a system. I'd still like the write this idea out under the assumption that it is possible regardless but if it was possible, I'd like to get the distance of the super earth from the Sun and how to draw the Solar System with an extra planet in our solar system. Right now I just want to wing it and say this super earth is about 150 million miles away from the Sun like Earth. If anyone has a suggestion on where to ask this question to get an answer, I'd appreciate being pointed in the right direction. Tempted to just email a college professor in Astronomy at ACC or UT and see if they'll entertain the idea enough to provide an accurate answer.
Thanks google. Answer is no. http://www.astronomy.com/magazine/ask-astro/2017/09/the-hidden-earth Would be nice to contact someone that could create a solar system where it was possible.
You're talking about Counter-Earth. If you scroll down the Wikipedia article there are culture (scifi) references.
doesn't seem like it's scientifically possible. how about setting up a newly discovered wormhole that's so small (behind the sun) that it was barely noticeable and scientists discovered it by sheer luck. this wormhole takes a small spaceship to some alternate universe of our solar system where the earth is a superearth with dinosaurs and superhumans living side-by-side. in the end jontro becomes supreme king and gets to marry 700 pr0n stars.
I hear Counter-Earth is ruled by sentient dogs, who have evolved to harness a single consciousness within each pack. And the subordinate humans have evolved to learn how to lick their balls, and be blissfully happy.
Somehow I was the first like in this post 12+ hours later. Cmon clutch fans. This is gold. Somebody needs to write this story up Jontro and the Hidden Hole
Google "Lagrange Point L3". It is actually one of very few semi stable orbit points where asteroids and the like can get captured. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrangian_point A planet the size of Earth for 4.5 billion years is a stretch, but smaller stuff could stick for millions of years - a moon sized planitessimal could fall into that orbit for maybe 100 million years? Earth's orbit 60 degrees leading or trailing are much more stable Lagrange points.
Yes, adding to this and to your goal, @London'sBurning : If you had a solar system with a sun-like star and then just two similarly-sized earth-like planets in the same basic orbital path (very circular), it could totally work. This is a problem I sometimes assign to first-year physics majors. The orbital period is different because of the constant, extra gravitational tug of the hidden twin. So in your science fiction world, if they didn't know about the hidden twin, they might come up with some wrongheaded version of Kepler's laws or Newton's gravitation. Fun idea anyway. But as links in the posts above describe, if you have a bunch of planets, it would become pretty obvious that something was over there and eventually it wouldn't be hidden at all.
I figured it couldn't be a unique idea but didn't know there were comic strips and See I don't mind it being detected based on astronomical observations. I know early 16th century physicists/mathematicians and possibly even earlier than that had some idea of other planetary bodies out there and how to predict them. They just never had the tech to go and see if the math was right on their predictions. For all intents and purposes without spoiling too much, I plan on referring the Mariner 2 space probe as the probe to see if there really is a planet on the other side of the sun instead of the historically accurate Venus mission. So the initial setting would be in the 1960s and 1970s.
Cool premise! To maximize plausibility, make it a smaller planet and have hotly debated antiquity accounts that mention some extra planet that only appeared near the horizon of a very clear sunset.
Good idea. Some stuff I read says that since planets orbit in an ellipsis instead of a circle, it'd be inevitable for Earth to eventually spot Planet X. Horizon suggestion would be a good explanation perhaps as well.
