On Thu, 18 Mar 2004 18:50:58 -0800, Chris wrote:


"Greg D. Moore (Strider)" wrote in message
...

"meat n potatoes" wrote in message
om...
obviously for the sake of life, better positioned than venus or mars.

[snip]

okay, now imagine a sci-fi scenario. can we build a device on earth
that takes us a little further away from or closer to the sun? let's
say a giant rocket launcher with the blasters facing against the sky.
so when we blast it, the earth moves in one or other direction? or is
this just ridiculous?

I heard that the earth get warmer the further the sun is from the earth
(summer) and colder the closer it gets. So if the sun fell on the earth we
would freeze to death?


Heh!

Well, if a giant rocket blaster was positioned to push the earth even the
smallest amount away from the sun (elongating the orbit which is
reasonably stable right now) would there be a bigger risk that a
it would only serve to bring the earth closer to the sun at another point
of the orbit by the law of conservation of momentum? If you pushed hard
enough would our nice gentle orbit turn into something else altogether different?

O'