What would happen if there were an eternal solar eclipse?

THE BLACK SUN RISES

THE FIFTH CYCLE DRAWS TO A CLOSE

GLORY TO TEZCATLIPOCA

GLORY TO HUITZILOPOCHTLI

JOIN ME IN THE END OF DAYS, MY BROTHERS

>ain't nothin' gettin' light
>ain't nothin' gettin' heat

The end of the earth was we know it, seafloor silicon-based life takes over the universe?

Relative to what part of the planet? There's a reason different parts of the world get eclipses at different times.

Okay, so prolonged no sun will destroy the planet. Makes enough sense.

How devestating would this be after about a decade? (which would be when the big bad that causes it is defeated)

On Earth, solar eclipses are not global. You have to be at specific spots on the planet at specific times to observe them.

You are going to have to specify how much of the planet is shaded and to how much occulting of the sun.

>BBEG blocks out the sun
>party members must defeat bbeg and destroy his sunblocking device

If I ever GM then this would be my main story

It's possible.
youtube.com/watch?v=CFrP6QfbC2g

>it adjusts course

In this case it's almost certainly an alien object, since a captured planetoid sticking to a legrange point would be impossible naturally.

So first of all the eclipse itself is only visible from a certain part of the world at any given time (the area it's visible from changes as the world rotates), but that doesn't mean it doesn't have worldwide ramifications. The amount of energy coming from the Sun is greatly reduced, which causes plant life to start dying off. It should be the greatest mass extinction event of all time, taking place over the course of a year.

Life doesn't disappear entirely, though. The planet should still be getting something like 2/3 the sunlight it got before, so you might expect about 2/3 of it's previous population level to survive. In the initial extinction event probably far more than that would die off because of the much lower temperatures and eating their now-reduced food sources to extinction, but the species that are capable of surviving in the new environment will propagate over the next thousand years and eventually the world will reach it's new greatly reduced equilibrium.

Intelligent life of any description is basically fucked, though. Civilization can no longer produce the resources it needs, and the result is apocalyptic.

>Civilization can no longer produce the resources it needs, and the result is apocalyptic.
It would take some work, but if the event was foreseen to a reasonable degree, artificial greenhouses could be lit via nuclear, fossil fuel, or even wind power. There certainly wouldn't be enough for the whole world, but you could have surviving colonies.

Fuck off with this shit

It's obvious that he's referring to the main planet of the setting, don't be a faggot

The moon isn't big enough to cover the entire earth, so the total eclipse would essentially block all light as though it were night time on one 'small' section of earth. This small section would eventually freeze as there would only be residual heat from outside the shadow and from the thermal radiation the planet exerts.

Astronomy is a joke and people who majored in it should just politely kill themselves.

>t. non-stem major

>t. literal retard

...

Sorry I hurt your feelings with your garbage major. Maybe in 10 years, you might be able to contribute one thing that's useful to society as a whole besides theories you spend all day pulling out of your ass to explain shit that literally doesn't matter.

At least Math majors can become professors to teach other students the shit they need for the REAL majors.

If you had put "astrology" instead of "astronomy," that'd be some pretty good bait.

Fucking engineers. You're just salty that you're a glorified trades school.

OP did not specify until after two replies (mine being written at the same time so I couldn't see) that this was a realistic modern-day setting.
It could've been a very high-tech or high-magic setting where keeping some amount of civilization under an artificial sun is feasible.
It could've been a setting with mostly undead or very non-humanoid characters who don't really care if the sun shines or not.
As long as OP doesn't provide context for this what-if question, it cannot be answered.

I'm an anthropology major, I don't have a horse in your dick-waving race. Math is important, astronomy is important, biology is important, chemistry is important, geology is important.

He shouldn't have to specify, it;s obvious from context. Are you literally autistic? I mean in the literal sense, in that you have significant difficulty in understanding subtext and nuance? The intent behind OP's post was flagrantly clear to everyone else, as it should be to anyone with a basic grasp over human conversation.

Your original post didn't even make mention of a lack of information regarding tech level, resorting instead to feeble nitpicking: "You mean an eternal solar eclipse on one arbitrary planet in the universe that may or may not have life or even be Earth-like?
Sucks to be there I guess, but you didn't specify this was the "main" planet of the setting so who cares."

It was obvious from context that that was what was meant.

If you had led instead with questions over tech/fantasy/etc, it would have been valid.

>It could've been a very high-tech or high-magic setting
I know you have autism, so I'll politely explain this to you.

Whenever someone suggests a hypothetical situation, you're meant to take all unspecified variables at the most normal and usual values that would directly affect the speaker unless otherwise noted.

Example:

"What would happen if there was a volcano?"

Correct answer: Assume the speaker means that there is an active volcano near his home location/city and that it were to erupt at some time in the nearby future.

"Oh, we would have to build shelters and seek higher ground away from the lava flow."

Incorrect answers: Assuming the volcano is dormant, or that the volcano is somewhere that would not be relevant to the speaker's concerns, or that the volcano never erupts.

"Nothing because it's on Venus."
"Nothing, it would never erupt."

I hope you've learned a valuable life lesson about human interaction from this.

If we're talking about an object like the moon eclipsing the sun on earth, then the entirety of the planet wouldn't be cast into darkness.

Life would be the same outside the penumbra of the eclipse. The land within the penumbra and the umbra would literally become a shadowland. A nice location for a BBEG's doom fortress.

As you get closer to the seat of evil, the light gradually fades. With it, the vegetation gives way to wasteland and the warmth of the sun dwindles towards memory.

I wonder how the weather patterns would be affected by a large segment of the planet continuously failing to be warmed by the sun? Probably stormy with the abrupt cold spot near the warmth of normalcy.

>astronomy is important
It's literally not. Astronomy has offered us nothing of any importance in the last 70 years. All of their "real science" they teach is actually just physics, chemistry, and geology applied to what little they know about other planets which we can't even actually step foot on. Pick up a text book sometime and just read through it. 90% of the shit is tangentially related hard sciences that doesn't actually have to do with astronomy used as a justification for why their field matters.

There's a textbook I've read through which, I shit you not, actually explains that most high-ranking astronomers don't spend their time watching or observing the skies. Instead, they sit around building scientific models. They spend most of their job just trying to justify what their field is wasting tax and tuition on.

Fuck, even parapsychology, a made up field investigating ghosts, has done more service to mankind by simply providing plausible explanations for "ghostly" occurrences on earth through general skepticism. The only useful thing Astronomy ever did was prove the Earth was round and we rotate around the sun, and that was ages past.

as already noted, the earth would not be totally in shadow.
Look at this picture for an example, the total eclipse in march this year. totality - absolute night, is the darkest line - a pretty thin streak. partial eclipse covers a much wider area, but that is not darkness. Being in a partial eclipse of that sort the light is odd - its colder out, and the light feels slightly like evening, or your wearing tinted sunglasses and everything's a bit dimmer than it should.

The fact that the planet rotates means that the place which is in shadow is constantly moving, as the earth rotates, in reference to the sun. So this area of darkness will constantly track across the surface of the planet, and no one area would be in permanent darkness.

So when did some Astronomy nerd take your crush out under the stars and have sex with her?

Because this is literally the only explanation I can think of for your weird rage against a science dedicated to the exploration and investigation of bodies and phenomena outside of Earth, probably the most fascinating shit humans will ever see or do. Not to mention the astronomers out there keeping an eye on local Earth space to make sure we're not suddenly going to go the way of the dinosaurs.

> Astronomy has offered us nothing of any importance in the last 70 years.

"nothing of importance".

So, lets see. the discovery of exoplanets. the discovery of black holes, pulsars, quasars, discovering the furthest known objects in time and space, the discovery of redshift that proves the expansion of the known universe, discovering the cosmic background radiation that proves the Big Bang, discovering water on Europa, oh hell, I cant even begin to list all the discoveries...

and you think they're "nothing of importance".

You are an ignoramus. A scientific illiterate who has a stunted understanding of the learning we have in the world. I pity you.

>"What would happen if there was a volcano?"
Eh, without context I think most people would respond with "What?" and not launch into an explanation of disaster mitigation strategies.

At this point you're being nit picky, I thin their intent was clear but yes you're right. Most people would probably ask "What if there was a volcanic eruption?" in which case their argument for you still holds up

I get angry at any inefficient waste of money on our tax and tuition. Why wouldn't you? Astronomy isn't even as interesting as our deep sea, which is accessible and has yet to be fully explored.

But no, lets waste money on launching highly complex machinery and robotics out into a big black void we will never get ANYTHING out of. Great plan.

>So, lets see. the discovery of exoplanets. the discovery of black holes, pulsars, quasars, discovering the furthest known objects in time and space, the discovery of redshift that proves the expansion of the known universe, discovering the cosmic background radiation that proves the Big Bang, discovering water on Europa, oh hell, I cant even begin to list all the discoveries...
None of those things are important in the slightest.

Go on then. Explain to me why they are important? I'll wait.

>Your next line is "You're a retard! I'm not going to answer your question!"

>None of those things are important in the slightest.

You are an illiterate moron.

Seriously. You are scientifically illiterate, you have no more comprehension of the importance of those discoveries than a caveman handed a printed book on farming techniques and metallurgy.

your breadth of comprehension is almost non-existent, and your inability to realise the importance of some of the most ground-breaking discoveries of the last century is spectacular, for all the wrong reasons.

You are an idiot, there is no other way to put it. I honestly pity you for the intellectual black hole you live in.

Well let's take a look here; black holes, pulsars, quasars, the redshift, and the cosmic background radiation all have a direct informative effect on our knowledge of physics answering questions that we could only have theorized on if we had never looked past our own atmosphere and the exoplanets and discovery of water on Europa all have a very important effect on our capabilities of ever getting our tiny asses out into space. Unless you would like humanity to die on this rock.

>all have a direct informative effect on our knowledge of physics answering questions that we could only have theorized on if we had never looked past our own atmosphere and the exoplanets
Such as? And I do hope you are referring directly to Earth physics, not astrophysics.

>Unless you would like humanity to die on this rock.
Here's the short version for you, because you seem to be holding onto a very bleak and grim denial.

We are never going to leave Earth. Ever. The technology we have today is slowly approaching an event horizon where increased productivity is no longer giving us the returns we used to get, and that means we're approaching a thin line of the possibilities of man kind. We can barely even get shit to land on mars. We, mankind, are without a single doubt going to die on this rock. Sorry to have to be the one to break this to you.

this

>All of their "real science" they teach is actually just physics, chemistry, and geology
You're right, but literally every science besides physics is applied physics. This isn't a flaw, it's a strength.

>most high-ranking astronomers don't spend their time watching or observing the skies. Instead, they sit around building scientific models.
Do you understand the scientific method?
If so, why would you criticize a group of scientists for building and refining scientific models? Would you rather they stare at the monitors attached to their digital telescopes? Because that's what you just suggested they do.

What reason do you have to consider astronomy a waste? Do you ignore meteors? Do you pretend that solar flairs have no impact?

>This isn't a flaw, it's a strength.
No, I'm not talking about things like in a real science where they borrow certain elements which actually explain how they work, like how biology relies a lot on chemistry to explain the happenings inside of the body. I mean they wholesale jack full theories from other bodies of sciences and then use that as smoke screen to hide the fact that they're actually using very little of it. In the same textbook from earlier, one entire chapter was dedicated JUST to meteorology. The fuck does that have to do with astronomy? I'm not even talking about meteorology on other planets, I mean just talking about EARTH.

>If so, why would you criticize a group of scientists for building and refining scientific models?
Because there are no experiments done not only to REALLY verify the models that they do have, but there are also no real dividends attached to their models to begin with. Most other sciences spend only some of their time modeling, and the rest of their time verifying the accuracy of these models and then applying the science to useful technologies. Sitting around all day making models sounds to me like they're trying to figure out a way to keep that grant money rolling in.

>Do you ignore meteors? Do you pretend that solar flairs have no impact?
I'll assume you mean meteors that strike the earth, which is already a fairly rare occurrence. But I ask to both questions: So what? What changes if I don't ignore them exactly? We literally can't do anything to prevent them or protect ourselves from them unless you want the entirety of technology to bury itself underground deeper than we have the technology to dig. The knowledge is meaningless if you cannot apply it to something useful.

"Everything that can be invented has been invented." ~ Charles H. Duell, Commissioner of the US Patent office, 1899.

Just because you're too stupid to design the future or understand the science behind it doesn't mean the rest of us are.

> I do hope you are referring directly to Earth physics, not astrophysics.
Physics is physics, they're the same thing. Any improvement in our understanding of reality could have great application in the future.

>The technology we have today is slowly approaching an event horizon
You're right, but in the wrong direction. The asymptote is vertical, not horizontal.

>Just because you're too stupid to design the future or understand the science behind it doesn't mean the rest of us are.
Just because you use a quote from an old nobody doesn't mean we aren't approaching a the technological event horizon.

>Any improvement in our understanding of reality could have great application in the future.
No, I assure you, knowing anything outside the radius of mars is insipid and just wankery for sci-fi nerds to get off to.

Also, you didn't really answer the question. Does that mean you know that astronomy hasn't helped us in the slightest?

>You're right, but in the wrong direction. The asymptote is vertical, not horizontal.
Which means it can actually go down. And since the progress has been slowing for the past couple of years means that it's likely to crash rather than explode.

>I'm not even talking about meteorology on other planets, I mean just talking about EARTH.

If there's a significant solar flare, everything that keeps your lights on and heats your tendies and provides the infrastructure so you can broadcast your particular blend of ignorant and smug to the rest of humanity will die. In an eyeblink. Turning off some of it might maybe leave enough surviving for us to bootstrap past the disaster.

Astronomy articulated that, gives us the tools to observe and predict that, gave us people who cared enough to measure and forecast that. The limit of your imagination is not the limit of what others can do and are doing.

...and now I've engaged Luddite user. Goddammit, I know better.

You said they spend most of their time making models. Now are you saying they spend all of their time on models? Also, they digitally record their data, so they don't need to look at the sky unless they want to.

>We literally can't do anything to prevent them or protect ourselves
I'm talking about the ones that happen yearly, not some world ending one. Has no one told you about those?

I'm all for Depends on the Setting but you're just being a cunt.

You have no concept of how the process of discovery goes, do you? The vast majority of inquiries, scientific or otherwise, lead nowhere and end up being a waste of time. Only a tiny portion actually yield results. But if you only go down paths that are certain to give results, you won't get those few successes, and humanity would still be back in the bronze age at best.

You want a real-world application? Alright, studying astrophysics has helped us greatly refine our understanding (such that it is) of gravity. That precision in understanding is critical to the proper functioning of satellites, and I hope I don't have to explain how important those are for our society.

How about this, continuing developments in space tech means that in a few decades we'll likely be able to capture a small asteroid and bring it into earth orbit for mining. That alone would provide more gold, platinum, and rare earth metals than have been mined in the entire history of the human race combined.

But most Math Majors become Programmers.

"maybe" is the best answer you can come up with? We might avoid getting our shit fried by a natural occurrence (that could have the potential to fry human beings and the rest of the planet) if we turn them off and unplug them and hope for the best?

Sure, the solar flare has been the best answer you've given so far, but we've come this far and all you can supply is a "maybe"? We need better answers than that.

>Luddite user
Unlike you, I'm for the advancement of important technology. Not wasting money throwing it into space.

>Now are you saying they spend all of their time on models?
The second time I said that was a hyperbole, but I stand by the assertion of what their own authorized text book told me, which is "they spend a majority of their time building models".

>I'm talking about the ones that happen yearly
Right, so the tech we have installed to prevent the ones that basically do nothing is. . .what exactly?

>But if you only go down paths that are certain to give results, you won't get those few successes, and humanity would still be back in the bronze age at best.
You're really trying to oversell it here. I'm not talking about a science that "might" not yield dividends, I'm talking about a science that I'm 100% certain won't yield dividends. According to their own science, it just simple cannot. Our surrounding planets are dead and would kill us on the spot. The BEST we can hope for is an over glorified tent on mars and hoping that it doesn't rupture just once and kill everyone there. And considering the sandstorm activity on there, it's more than likely to happen.

>Alright, studying astrophysics has helped us greatly refine our understanding (such that it is) of gravity
Kepler's laws? Alright, I'll give you that one.

>That alone would provide more gold, platinum, and rare earth metals than have been mined in the entire history of the human race combined.
Oh sweet, we can crash the market!

>So this area of darkness will constantly track across the surface of the planet, and no one area would be in permanent darkness.
Unless the moon is magically propelled to match the planet's movements in such a way that the eclipse's umbra remains centered on a specific point.

>Oh sweet, we can crash the market!
so which is more important, 'proper' market manipulation or an abundance of scientifically valuable materials?

The moon's umbra during a solar eclipse is at most 267 km.

The earth's circumference is 40,075 km.

The earth rotates at 1670. For different latitudes, you multiple that by the cos of your latitude (cos (45) degrees = .707, 1670 * .707 = 1181 km/hour). So you end up with the umbra only sticking on any given point on the globe for less than an hour even at high altitudes. That means effectively one extra hour of darkness, at most, per day, with a little less light than daytime for a bit more than that.

I doubt this effect will have any significant effects in the short-term.

>we can crash the market
I can't even begin to plumb the depths of the inherent retardation in this statement. THAT is your fucking complaint?

Fuck, I just popped in to see a neat thread hoping for echoes of Asimov's Nightfall and instead there's some sperg whose parents were murdered in a back alley by a rogue astronomer.

...

Water on Europa is technically important in a fiscal sense, as it means that it would not require us to ship water there in the case of a colony

>they spend a majority of their time building models
Shouldn't any scientist do this? Build models and test the simpler ones?
Can you name any science where the majority of scientists' time isn't spent building models?

>basically do nothing
I guess after seeing some things sometimes fail, we would stop doing those things. So we could ignore meteors and solar flares, but we would have to learn how by trial and error.

Add the discovery of calculus and Helium to the list of things astronomy has helped with, too.

I think we're forgetting the most important thing. This planet would have to be bigger than the Earth, and relatively close to it.
I have no idea if they'll be able to stably tug the Earth into their L2 point (but I doubt it), or if the two planets will collide, or one ends up being flung way out of its orbit.

Regardless, there's going to be some pretty strong tidal forces. Things like earthquakes, volcanoes, cities sinking under the waves, and the moon getting tossed out of the Earth-Nemesis system are pretty likely.

"Realistically", an eternal night would be as much from all the volcanic dust blocking out the sun than it being occluded by the other planet.

>>Anything I don't understand is obviously dumb and stupid.

>> I don't understand why anyone would ever disagree with this or with me.

>>Therefore anyone who disagrees with me is dumb and stupid.

>>It's a good thing I am the only person who isn't dumb or stupid or I'd look pretty silly believing this.

You are the stupidest person on Veeky Forums right now.

Rest and be glad; at last you have achieved something in your tormented, squalid existence.

I don't think the moon could orbit properly. At the beginning of each day a God would have to position the moon in front of the planet, curving it's orbit a bit for the planet's tilt, and then guide it in that position across the sky until the end of the day, where he would have to either push it constantly so it got around faster, have a really low orbit, or pull it back to the starting position.

>so which is more important, 'proper' market manipulation or an abundance of scientifically valuable materials?
Oh boy, do we risk already frail global relations and suffer a great depression, or do we make it so we can increase the speed on our electronics slightly?

Do you even have to ask.

>I can't even begin to plumb the depths of the inherent retardation in this statement. THAT is your fucking complaint?

>Crashing the economy
>Not a valid concern
Okay.

I reiterate my tent scenario on Mars. I honestly think Titon is more interesting as a colony than Europa.

>Can you name any science where the majority of scientists' time isn't spent building models?
All of them? Like I said before, most sciences do more research and experimentation than they do modeling. Then applying those discoveries and inventions to modern day life as well. Something that most astronomy in general can't even begin to complain.

>Add the discovery of calculus
Sorry, you'll have to educate me on that one.

>Wah wah, don't call my useless degree useless!

Continuing to say a stupid thing, while getting louder and louder, is not going to suddenly make you not stupid.

>I've run out of arguments, so I'll just call you stupid!

k.

Taking pride in your own ignorance does not make it wisdom.

God looks down on you

son when a guy comes in and tells you that you are surrounded by the floating ghosts of the ancestral lizard people from planet zippityzop, you don't sit down and debate him over the truth of his claim.

what's more likely here. every other person in this thread, as well as a highly respected science that goes back centuries is wrong and dumb and you are the only one who knows the truth, or maybe you're talking out your ass about something you know little about?

but who am I kidding, you'd never have gotten this far if self-awareness was a thing you were capable of.

the warp saturates the the material world and life suddenly gets a whole lot more intense

>When people come in and tell you things, you shouldn't believe them at face value, you should ask them for evidence!

>Oh, but disagreeing with me and a bunch of other people who could potentially be lying to keep a cushy source of income is inherently wrong.

>Also you're stupid and unaware.

The sheer irony of your post astounds me.

To improve yourself, you must first understand yourself.

In your case I would suggest studying oncology.

I know anti-intellectualism is real in America and all but I just. don't. understand.

BUT WHO SHOT MR BURNS?

This is why we hate your meme.

The Night Land by William Hope Hodgson is the Veeky Forums answer to this question. It's even in the recommended reading list in the PHB.

If you want to pretend to be knowledgeable, you have to be able to answer the hard questions, like "What is it exactly that you do around here?"

If I ask a physicist why his field is useful, he gives me reasons that directly affect me and my life.

If I ask a chemist why his field is useful, he gives me reasons that directly affect me and my life.

If I ask an astronomer why his field is useful, I get this: Literally the only things that have been brought up that Astronomy has legitimately been helpful towards human life are Satellites and maybe Solar Flares. There is also an assertion that it might have helped with Calculus that I'm was waiting on evidence for.

I'm sorry, but if the majority of people in your field of study can only respond to direct inquisitions of their field's usefulness with defensive reactions void of fact, logic, or reasoning, I think that speaks for itself on how useful the actual field is.

You'll have to excuse me, I've spent far too much time here. Hopefully, you'll rethink your major and actually contribute to society sometime in the future.

Go away.

>If I ask a physicist why his field is useful, he gives me reasons that directly affect me and my life.
except pretty much all physics research these days is absurdly theoretical and dealing with forces and particles that have 0 impact on humans, or really anything on the macro scale

Sure an astronomer measuring the light from X nebula doesn't directly affect your life, but neither does a physicist finding the 280th new subatomic particle that exists for 1 trillionth of a second

>All of them?
The only statistics I could find were for data scientist, who spend most of their time cleaning data.

The Bureau of Labor statistics list several duties of environmental scientist, only one of which is data collection.
bls.gov/ooh/life-physical-and-social-science/environmental-scientists-and-specialists.htm

>Sorry, you'll have to educate me on that one.
Newton invented calculus to prove his theorems on planetary orbits.

>Oh boy, do we risk already frail global relations and suffer a great depression, or do we make it so we can increase the speed on our electronics slightly?
IF the importing of extraterrestrial minerals was to become a thing, it wouldn't be a magical instant market flood. It would be an entire industry in itself, and given the difficulty of the process it would most likely be a matter of giving access to more of a depleting resource than it would be changing the market value.

NASA's budget is about 0.5% of federal spending. If you buy the new Star Trek RPG that's coming out next year, you'll probably spend more on that one book than the portion of your money that goes to real life space exploration in 2017.

>just satellites
You mean those things that totally altered communication in about fifty years? Let us predict the weather? Study the physical laws that underlie existence? Study the deep past and explore the nature of matter, energy, and spacetime? Search for killer asteroids and other existential threats?

If you want to start shitting on professions, there's dozens in line ahead of astronomy...

>tfw you will never have a job title like "EPIC Lead Scientist"