Moon Theory

I know that I've talked about this before but I like this idea because it shows how alternate theories can be proposed and discussed.

The Earth has a fairly large moon for its size. The current theory is that the moon was formed when a Mar's sized planet hit the Earth with a glancing blow that blew out a lot of material that began to orbit what was left of the Earth and then condensed into the moon. This supposedly happened 4.5 billion years ago, not long after the primitive Earth was formed.

That theory was okay until the other side of the moon was finally seen. Since the moon is tidally locked to the Earth and only reveals one side, the other side was assumed to be the same. However, it turns out that it's completely different. Instead of having large plains, which are obviously from magna spilling out on the surface and flowing around, the opposite had no planes. It simply a surface loaded with craters. The side we see is not that like.

When NASA measured the back side of the moon , they found that its crust is 30 miles thicker than the side we see. How is this possible? One theory is that two moons were formed from the original collision. One was smaller than the other and since it was in the same orbit it eventually caught to its larger brother and merged with it. This slow collision didn't blow stuff out into space but instead literally flowed out onto the back side and resulted in a thicker crust.

Another theory is based on NASA observations of an alien planet that's too close to its sun and is tidally locked. This causes the side that faces the star to melt and thus would explain that this side would smooth and also allow the melted magna to flow the back side where it would cool, causing a thicker crust.

Applied to the moon, this theory would explain why the side we see is soother and thinner. This would depend on the early Earth being molten and thus would heat the moon when it orbited much closer. The problem is the time it takes for the moon to become tidally locked. Computer simulations indicate it only took 100 days. This would fit the theory because if it took a much longer time, then the Earth would have cooled and would not melt the moon's surface. Keep in mind the smaller moon would cool faster than the lager Earth.

Which of these theories is the one that fits the observations? Flip a coin. More data is needed to determine just what might have occurred back then. That's science for you!

Thanks for reading.