Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

gjennomamogus t1_ixrk6te wrote

Reply to comment by Bigjoemonger in Whats going to happen to our solar system when the sun dies? by G10V10

is a billion years long enough for complex life to evolve on said moons and leave before the supernova?

2

Baby_Legs_OHerlahan t1_ixrnill wrote

From my limited understanding, no probably not.

It took billions of years for simple single celled life on earth to take the step to multi-cell (complex) life.

Once life on earth did achieve the multi-cellular stage, evolution took off pretty fast after that.

But if some of the Moons of Saturn and Jupiter do currently harbour uni-cellular life in the oceans under the ice like some believe, in a few billion years who knows what might evolve from that

2

Bigjoemonger t1_ixrpqkv wrote

Much of the time it took for life to form was because the planet was still forming. It was highly volcanically active and was being constantly bombarded with cosmic debris as it was clearing its orbital path. All of that would be a significant hindrance to complex life evolving. As the planet settled and orbital impacts waned then life evolved.

But consider that the moons of Jupiter and Saturn are already formed and have been for some time, and have already cleared their orbital paths. I would imagine the time to evolve life would be much shorter than it was for us. Especially if the time between now in then is full of us sending probes and robots that are contaminated with earths biological materials. All they need is the right conditions.

2