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Contents

[edit] Orbit and rotation image

Earth's axial tilt (or obliquity) and its relation to the rotation axis and plane of orbit.

I'd like to suggest that we consider replacing the rotating Earth image in the above-named section with the illustration to the right. The latter seems more informative and it may help the reader better understand the text.—RJH (talk) 19:32, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Looks much better to me. The rotating Earth image doesn't add much besides bandwidth. —Alex (ASHill | talk | contribs) 01:58, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Why all the "Earth is the only known..." speech?

Isn't one sentence in the intro saying Earth is the only known planet with life and liquid water currently on its surface enough? It seems most facts are followed by how unique the Earth is; we only know of about 200 extrasolar planets, and we have only very rough estimate of the atmosphere of 1 or 2 of those 200. This is an article about earth, not the article on the probability of life in the universe. Lets make those statements a little more concise. 98.202.48.28 (talk) 23:43, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're suggesting; could you clarify? There is only one sentence on that topic. If you're referring to the second paragraph of the intro section, I think the rest of the paragraph is good summary material. —Alex (ASHill | talk | contribs) 03:02, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Etymology

Etymology: Middle English erthe, from Old English eorthe; akin to Old High German erda earth, Greek era. Date: before 12th century earth. (2008). In Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. Retrieved October 6, 2008, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/earth Pawyilee (talk) 12:11, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Earth_in_culture#Etymology. —RJH (talk) 14:48, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Moons

There are 7 moons —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.67.160.50 (talk) 17:57, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. Care to clarify?—RJH (talk) 19:35, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
Are asteroids moons?--Jakezing (talk) 23:43, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Only if they orbit something larger, as with Phobos and Deimos orbiting Mars. kwami (talk) 23:53, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Though one is getting farther away and the others gonna come crashing into mars. is the ISS a moon? how bout all the satelites we put into orbit? can we consider that giant black hole a moon?--Jakezing (talk) 23:55, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
The ISS is an artificial satellite. 'Moon' normally means a natural satellite. There is no black hole. kwami (talk) 00:06, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
Moon is synonymous with natural satellite, mystery solved. LonelyMarble (talk) 01:19, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
... idiots?--Jakezing (talk) 03:03, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
Either explain what you still don't understand or stop the BS. LonelyMarble (talk) 03:09, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
When did i ever say i didn't understand anything?--Jakezing (talk) 04:15, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
Jakezing, your behaviour is becoming increasingly inappropriate for a wikipedia talk page. Please take a look through Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines and Wikipedia:No personal attacks. Thank you.—RJH (talk) 16:30, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] There is no valid proof that the Earth or this universe is as old as the article says

I still can't believe things like "the earth is such and such million or billion years old" are still being accepted as fact. I myself believe in the creation described in the Bible, but there is no proof to make either my belief, or these other beliefs SCIENTIFIC. Science has NO part in this, and can NOT prove how old our world is, OR how it was created. Who's to say that the laws of physics were EVEN THE SAME those millions or billions of years ago?! I'm quite frankly appalled that this is in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.108.171.211 (talk) 21:12, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines.—RJH (talk) 22:18, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for projecting the christian veiw of creation, now, may i point you into the direction that we use the scientific way as that is nuetral.--Jakezing (talk) 01
52, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Earth's Adjectives

I think that the word "Earthling" is also appropriate as an adjective. What are your thoughts? Fireleaf (talk) 21:29, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Apparently Earthling has a valid meaning in a religious context, so that seems reasonable.[1]—RJH (talk) 18:20, 11 October 2008 (UTC)
On second thought, Earthling is not an adjective so I don't think it would be appropriate. Sorry.—RJH (talk) 15:56, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Longitude of ascending node

Can someone explain to me why the longitude of the ascending node is not zero? Isn't the ascending node the same as the vernal equinox and isn't the vernal equinox at longitude zero by definition? Thanks for any help. PAR (talk) 10:42, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

An equinox is a property of the tilt of the Earth's axis, just as the timing of summer and winter are controlled by the tilt and not by orbital position. The ascending node position is property of the orientation of Earth's orbit. There is no reason they have to be related at all. They are close for the Earth, but that is coincidental. Dragons flight (talk) 11:10, 20 October 2008 (UTC)
Hi - thanks for the reply. Im still baffled tho - Looking at the article on the orbital nodes, it says that heliocentric orbits use the plane of the ecliptic as the reference plane for determining the nodes. I would say the earth's orbit is not inclined at all (inclination=0) and thats borne out by the value in the Earth article. So really, there are no nodes, ascending or descending. The article on the longitude of the ascending node says "For non-inclined orbits (with inclination equal to zero), Ω is undefined. For computation it is then, by convention, set equal to zero".
But ok, maybe it should be the earths equatorial plane that is used as the reference. If this is the case, then, according to the same article, the first point of Aries is the origin of longitude, which is just the vernal equinox, the point at which the sun lies on the earth's equatorial plane, which would also be the ascending node, since the nodes are where the orbital and reference planes intersect. If that is the origin of longitude, then the longitude of the ascending node is again, zero. Im sure I'm missing some simple point, but I cannot find it. PAR (talk) 03:46, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Article issues

I have just began careful reading of this article and I've already noticed some major problems:

  • Age of the Earth - 4.54 billion years ago - there is no uncertainty error given as shown in sources, also it's different than the value given in the article History of Earth
    • Okay, we can add an uncertainty value. However, the age in History of Earth is not properly sourced, so I believe that is not a valid concern for this article.—RJH (talk) 16:40, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
      • Cool. Two sources provide uncertainty value as plus/minus 1%. Would "4.54 ± 0.05 billion years ago" be okay? History of Earth article should be taken care of though, as there is link to it right in the first section of this article. That inconsistency can definitely be confusing to the reader.--Adi4000 (talk) 04:08, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
        • Yes that seems okay. Planet formation took at least 10 million years and possible up to 100 million, so I think the value is always going to be a little fuzzy. The 4.6 value may come from some sources that list 4.57 billion years, followed by rounding. Personally I don't think they're all that different.—RJH (talk) 17:25, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
          • I think this has been addressed. I left a message on the Age of the Earth discussion page regarding the 4.6 value.—RJH (talk) 23:23, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
  • History of Earth - the "earliest known continent" is in conflict with Vaalbara article.
    • "earliest known supercontinent"; there's a difference between continent and supercontinent. It is already referenced.—RJH (talk)
      • Sorry, I meant supercontinent. The need for reference referred only to that phrase. I have read it and didn't find anything about "earliest known". Quite the opposite, it states: there is general acceptance of the existence of the supercontinent Rodinia about one billion years ago. Another supercontinent, variously termed Nuna or Columbia, is thought to have amalgamated about 1.8 billion years ago. Two others, Kenorland and Ur, are believed to have assembled 2.5 and 3.0 billion years ago. I'd suggest mentioning Vaalbara based on the refs given in the article about it, or changing the phrase to "one of the earlier".--Adi4000 (talk) 04:08, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
        • Okay sorry, my misunderstanding then. Vaalbara looks to be hypothetical at this point. Probably best just to add "One of the earliest..." then, as you suggested.—RJH (talk)
          • Done.—RJH (talk) 23:23, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Ref #24 - Ward and Brownlee (2002) - I'd like to verify this and don't even know if it's a book or an article as there's no title.Forgot about Bibliography :)--Adi4000 (talk) 08:55, 3 November 2008 (UTC), the book states big things and there are no pages given when referenced. Having to look through the entire book is not appropriate for FA.
    • I'll need to get it out of the library again, unless somebody has a copy.—RJH (talk) 17:11, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
      • Selected parts are available here.--Adi4000 (talk) 04:08, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
        • I added a second ref, so this is done. I'll take care of the pages issue later.—RJH (talk) 23:23, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Ref #17 doesn't have Cite template & lacks info.
    • It was an improper reference to Yoder (1995). I updated it.—RJH (talk) 17:02, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
  • I think there should be an extra paragraph in the Introduction about the influence on culture, something about modern perspective (for ex. exploration of Earth from space) and the ultimate future of the planet. Also, there is practically no mention about exploration of Earth from space in the Cultural viewpoint section and "Earth in culture" is hardly an appropriate title for it.
    • Yes, the lead should cover also the habitability section. The cultural viewpoint section is written summary style, and I think a two sentence summary is fine. What else would you add? More than that seems like fluff. I disagree about the "Earth in culture" remark, but that is a different article and so irrelevant to this page's status.—RJH (talk)
      • Done.—RJH (talk) 23:23, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
  • The biggest problem - one little paragraph on Internal Structure section. I don't think that gives due weight as required in featured articles, since "Orbit and Rotation" is about 8 times bigger. I know there's a separate article but Orbit and Rotation provides 2 separate links. Also, this is much less than "Internal Structure" sections of other planets, such as Jupiter, Mercury, etc.
    • Well, "Internal Structure" is actually two paragraphs plus a table and plot. But the real problem (to me) is that "Orbit and Rotation" has undergone bloating since this article went FA. I think that section should be sub-divided.—RJH (talk)

I'll update as I find more.--Adi4000 (talk) 07:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback.—RJH (talk) 16:49, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for answering. I am actually in the process of translating this article to another wiki, that's why I'm paying so much attn. to its accuracy. These issues aside, nice article :)--Adi4000 (talk) 04:08, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
I believe I've address your concerns about this page. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 23:21, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] polution of ozonelayers

polution of ozonelayer occered because of old refrigirators,the rays of the refrigirators can easyily defeat ozone. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.200.129.115 (talk) 13:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rotation

This section has a couple of sentences that I'm not sure are in keeping with WP:Summary style:

  • The mean solar second between 1750 and 1892 was chosen in 1895 by Simon Newcomb as the independent unit of time in his Tables of the Sun. These tables were used to calculate the world's ephemerides between 1900 and 1983, so this second became known as the ephemeris second. The SI second was made equal to the ephemeris second in 1967.
  • Recently (1999–2005) the average annual length of the mean solar day in excess of 86400 SI seconds has varied between 0.3 ms and 1 ms, which must be added to both the stellar and sidereal days given in mean solar time above to obtain their lengths in SI seconds.

Will anybody object if these are moved to the Earth's rotation article? Thanks.—RJH (talk) 16:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I added those sentences to both this article and the Earth's rotation article at the same time, but I have no objection to their removal from this article. — Joe Kress (talk) 00:59, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
Thank you.—RJH (talk) 22:59, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Expanded lead

Per the above review, I put together a tentative fourth paragraph for the lead. Does anybody have issues or concerns with the wording? Perhaps somebody has a better proposal?

The physical properties of the Earth, as well as its geological history and orbit, allow life to exist on the planet. Both the mineral resources of the planet, as well as the products of the biosphere, contribute resources that are used to support a global human population. The inhabitants are grouped into about 200 independent sovereign states, which interact through diplomacy, travel, trade and military action. Humans cultures have developed many views of the planet, including personification as a deity, a belief in a flat Earth, and a modern perspective of the world as an integrated environment that requires stewardship. Humans first left the planet in 1961, when Yuri Gagarin reached outer space. The world is expected to continue supporting life for another 1.5 billion years, after which the rising luminosity of the Sun will eliminate the biosphere.

There may be a need to modify the second paragraph accordingly. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 21:44, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Support - according to FA Criteria, lead section should summarize the topic and prepare reader for details, and up to now, these later sections were treated as if they've never even been there.--Adi4000 (talk) 04:24, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

A recent picture to replace the blue marble image would be really nice, since we now have the technology to observe the Earth with highly advanced cameras. While that older image is recognized (it should be moved to a more appropriate section), it is 2008... we at Wikipedia could be help promote a new image for the next generation now in school. My specialty is not images though, so someone with that expertise might be able to accomplish this if we have consensus. This is one of the most important leads in all of Wikipedia. Two examples are listed below: All Is One (talk) 16:25, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

"View of the Earth as seen by the Apollo 17 on December 7, 1972.
Satellite photography can be used to produce composite images of an entire hemisphere... a 21st century view.


It sounds like you are arguing to make a change for the sake of change. The current image is of excellent quality, fine aesthetics and is an accurate representation. A higher resolution camera is not going to improve the image quality, given that we're only displaying it with a width of 240px. As far as I know, bits don't rot: the image is as good now as the day it was published. Thus I'll have to disagree with your suggestion. Sorry.—RJH (talk) 19:08, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
Yes the second image is nice, even though it's a composite rather than an actual picture. It's a matter of personal preference, I guess. We can probably use both in the article. Note, however, that the image is so huge (3000 × 3000 pixels) that it takes many minutes to scale it down to 240px. Somebody needs to resize it for use.—RJH (talk) 16:42, 6 November 2008 (UTC)
The second image, from 2000, is a false-color composition based on GOES imagery. (Don't the colors just look too bright to anyone else?) Since 2002, NASA composites have been using true-color MODIS imagery. Oppose the use of the false color image. Dragons flight (talk) 23:21, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
I agree that a true-color image would be really nice in the article. Ideally, this would be a view of the Mid-Atlantic showing North America and Europe, since we are using the image on English Wikipedia. This view would show some daylight and night time, possibly some city lights. My thoughts with this are to illustrate what Earth truly looks like from space, human presence included (we are part of the natural environment and have transformed Earth to look like that). The composite photo would be a possibility for a more scientific section, just an example though. Maybe we could have the blue marble photo and a true-color photo in the lead to show our advancement in technology with Earth observation... All Is One (talk) 15:46, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Oxydizing Atmosphere

The article claims that the atmosphere is oxidizing due to the escape of the rudcing element hydrogen. Although this might be considered true in some tortuous sense, free oxyegen is generally considered to be a result of photosynthesis - and ideed, the reference for the se3ntence about reducing and oxydizing atmosphere states this clearly. The sense the escape of free hydrogen could be considered to lead to free oxygen is that if there were more hydrogen in the biosphere, there might be enough to reduce all the oxygen (that is oxidize the hydrogen) to form water.

151.195.3.100 (talk) 20:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I think that the point being suggested is that, if he atmosphere had a solar abundance of free hydrogen, the oxygen being generated through photosynthesis would be locked up into water (perhaps by alternate life forms). Thus it would not be oxidizing. If photosynthesizing life could somehow evolve in the atmosphere of Jupiter, it would not create an oxydizing atmosphere because most of the hydrogen has been retained.—RJH (talk) 22:44, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
The light reactions of photosynthesis split water into H+ + O2 + energy. That O2 usually enters the atmosphere. The dark reactions take H+ + energy + CO2 to build hydrocarbons + H20. However, if every O2 that enters the atmosphere were allowed to break down the same hydrocarbons it created, either via oxygen-mediated metabolism or burning, then there would be very little net accumulation of oxygen. To move the Earth as a whole from a highly reduced initial state to the highly oxidized state we have today, so the argument goes, you have either sequester or remove a substantial abundance of reducing agents in order to create an imbalance that pushes the system toward oxygen accumulation. A common view is that this occurred in large part via the removal to space of free hydrogen from the pre-oxic atmosphere (e.g. [2]). By comparison, in the modern world most hydrocarbons are ultimately degraded by oxygen. Of the ~60 GtC bound in hydrocarbons by plants each year, only about 0.02 GtC / yr is ultimately buried in geologic deposits; the remaining 99.9% is eventually oxidized to feed some form of life. So the modern world is in balance such that oxygen is neither accumulating nor decreasing in the atmosphere, but rather the same amount is being created as is being consumed (to rough approximation, and ignoring the bias created by fossil fuel burning). To accumulate oxygen you need an instability such that some of the oxygen released is not used to break down the other resulting compounds. Though photosynthesis is the source of oxygen, the large scale accumulation of oxygen also required a reduction in the availability of reducing compounds. That instability may have been provided by the escape of hydrogen. Dragons flight (talk) 23:43, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Sol-3

Sol-3 redirects here. Could some discussion on this term be included in the article? __meco (talk) 12:34, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

The explanation of that name was already there in the first sentences, stating it is the 3rd planet of the Sun. Added the name in the list (no link, which would be circular). −Woodstone (talk) 16:15, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
Sol-3 is a neologism; at best it may have been used in a sci-fi context. It is not a common name for the planet. Sorry but I removed your edit per Wikipedia:Avoid neologisms. It needs further discussion before it can gain acceptance.—RJH (talk) 22:47, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
Sol is a scientfic name for the sun; sincecalling it "the sun" wouldn't work and would lead ot confusion once we have people in other star systems who would call their star "the sun". It also is the name of the solar system ussualy. logical deduction shows SOL-3 is another name, a scientific name for earth. Mars is therfor SOL-4, jupiter 5, and pluto Sol-... i don't know probably something like SunbSol-2.--Jakezing (talk) 21:42, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
Actually no, "The Sun" is the proper name for precisely one star. The proper names for other stars are things like Betelguese, Beta Pegasi, and Alpha Centauri. Strictly speaking, calling any of those the sun would be wrong. Whether colonists might one day choose to refer to them as "The Sun" as well is back in the realm of sci-fi, and not something we are going to indulge here. Scientists use name, e.g. Mars, Jupiter, Pluto, and not silly designations. Dragons flight (talk) 22:53, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
Yesd but from a scientific standpoint the name for the planets besides the traditional onesl; is the scientfic name for our star with the number after it. Our sun is no different from all the other stars, it just happens to have a planet with life as we define it.--Jakezing (talk) 03:23, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
You'll need to find valid scientific or otherwise solid references that use "Sol-3". Otherwise it is something made up and doesn't belong here. See Wikipedia:No original research for example. Sorry.—RJH (talk) 16:05, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
No, the scientific names are those endorsed by the IAU (Mercury, Venus...), while the IAU does not recognize the sci-fi naming conventions. "Sol-3", etc. are not scientific names for our planets. For that matter "Sol" is not an officially recognized name for our star, and has no more standing than "Helios" (the equivalent Greek), or any other translation. Dragons flight (talk) 17:21, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Scrolling problem?

Is it just me, or does this article seem to have lag issues with scrolling?—RJH (talk) 01:50, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

This IS big ass article.--Jakezing (talk) 03:24, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
Well whatever was causing the problem appears to have cleared up.—RJH (talk) 16:03, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed modification to the 'History' section

I'd like to propose a modification to the 'History' section that will incorporate the 'Future' section. Right now 'Future' seems stuck out on its own, past the culture and geography information, and I think it would provide better article flow by being included with the history. Here's what I'm suggesting:

  • The first part of 'History' will cover the non-biological information. It would include Paragraph 1, the first sentence of paragraph 2 and the fourth paragraph ("Beginning with almost no dry land...").
  • A section titled 'Evolution of life' would cover the biological information, which is the remainder of the 'History' section, plus the ice ages.
  • A second section would result from the merger of the 'Future' section.

Any thoughts or concerns about this? Thank you.—RJH (talk) 22:51, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't see how you can make the words future and history merge.--Jakezing (talk) 22:52, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
Well the section could either be renamed to 'Life span', or the sub-section changed to 'Future history'. But the latter may conflict with the MoS guidelines.—RJH (talk)
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