Somersaults of the earth. How will the Earth turn over? Dzhanibekov effect on a planetary scale
Recently, television broadcasts have literally flooded with programs and programs, foreshadowing in the near future a series of planetary and cosmic catastrophes that can erase humanity from the face of the entire planet in the shortest possible time. “It can happen at any moment!” - say the presenters and participants of such programs, describing the terrible scenarios of the Apocalypse, from which any sane person begins to move the hair on his head.
I'll make a reservation right away - I'm not one of the rampant optimists who can make fun of this topic and don't take it seriously. But I also try to treat the content of such Doomsday TV versions pragmatically, considering them as important food for further reflection.
In this small publication I will try to summarize a small intermediate summary of such reflections. I did not sit under the apple tree, and the apple did not fall on my head (not in season yet). And, nevertheless, maybe someone will be interested in the reasoning indicated here.
So, in one of the TV programs (perhaps it was “Secret Signs” on TV-3), it was told about the so-called “Dzhanibekov effect”. Our cosmonauts, while in Earth's orbit, found that any object freely moving along an arbitrary trajectory in zero gravity, for inexplicable reasons, with a certain regularity makes a complex roll around its axis. Indirectly, it was suggested that all the major planetary catastrophes that happened to our planet during its existence with an enviable periodicity, entailed dramatic climate changes, the death of civilizations, caused a radical turn in evolution, could be associated with this "Dzhanibekov effect" , the change of geographical, magnetic poles and the consequences caused by these truly apocalyptic phenomena.
On impressionable people, it works, I must say, one hundred percent. Hit, as they say, "in the top ten". Humanity now lives with a pistol pointed to its temples, which can shoot at any moment. However, the author of these lines is interested in the not possible latent mass psychosis and its consequences.
The experiments in question, and which were shown in the television program, were carried out with a round object consisting of a homogeneous substance (something like a plasticine ball). The spectacle is really fascinating: the ball moves in zero gravity in a straight line evenly and evenly, and suddenly, without any influence from the outside, it makes a difficult somersault (something like a "figure eight"), and then continues to move evenly further. And again - somersault - movement - somersault - movement (see Figure 1). The rhythmic change of these states for no apparent reason, at least, testifies to the fact that we still know little about the properties of the space around us and the forces acting in it.
However, does this effect apply to our planet? In short, will we tumble to the full with all the ensuing consequences?
Assumption 1.
The experiment on the space station was carried out with an object of a homogeneous substance, while our Earth consists of matter of different densities: a relatively hard metal core floats in molten magma, like a chicken yolk in a chicken white of a raw egg. A good housewife knows how to tell if an egg is raw or hard-boiled. You need to spin the egg on the table. The boiled one will spin, and the raw one will quickly stop, because the yolk, dangling in the protein, will prevent this rotation, "minify" it.
From all of the above "culinary" example, I dare to draw the first conclusion: the metal core in the center of the Earth is a kind of balance regulator that will not allow the planet to make a somersault (after all, there are forces that cause a similar effect) or, at least, will significantly reduce the consequences a similar roll.
The same principle of damping vibrations was used in the construction of the Taipei skyscraper in Taiwan. Between the 87th and 91st floors of this 101-story building total height 500 m suspended on cables 660 ton steel ball, which acts as an inertial vibration damper and contributes to the building's stability against earthquakes or hurricanes.
Assumption 2.
The experiment was carried out on the space station not only with a small object, but also at such a small interval of its motion, which allows us to consider it as motion in a strictly straight line, and, importantly, to consider the gravitational influence as a constantly acting, uniform factor (intervals between somersaults occur more often than the position of the object changes relative to the dominant gravitational fields (see Figure 1).
When we consider the movement of the Earth around the Sun in an elliptical orbit, we will see that when the earth is positioned at different points of the orbit, the gravitational forces affect mainly different points of the earth's surface (see Figure 2). In addition, we will have to take into account the combination formed when centrifugal and centripetal forces merge, which is clearly not observed when a small body moves inside the space of the space station (again Figure 1).
For example: a person who is on the surface of the Earth is small enough in comparison with the entire planet, so he perceives its surface not as a sphere, but as a plane. If a person climbs onto a ball with a diameter of, for example, 10 m, then the ratio between the size of a person and the size of the ball can no longer be neglected, and the person will perceive the surface of the ball as a sphere.
From all of the above, I dare to suggest that the "Dzhanibekov effect" discovered by our cosmonauts is not applicable to all coordination systems and should take into account changes in body position relative to the dominant center of gravity if the relationship between the body and the dominant center of gravity cannot be neglected.
P / S /
However, the astronomical fact known to everyone from school that the earth's axis is not static, but constantly fluctuates, is possibly just a manifestation of the "Dzhanibekov effect" on the scale of the entire planet.
(Drawings will be added later)
Reviews
The equations describing rotational motion and the "complex somersaults" related to it were derived as early as the 18th century. Euler. The theory can be read here:
L. D. Landau, E.M. Lifshits. Theoretical physics. T. 1. Mechanics. Moscow: Nauka, 1973 (paragraph 37 - Asymmetric top).
So there is no mysticism in the Janibekov effect. You can be sure that this effect does not threaten the Earth.
New on the topic of global catastrophes and immortality of the soul .
In the summer of 2012, a book by A.M. Panichev and A.N. Gulkov, entitled "The Absolute and Man", in which the authors present their own vision of the foundations of the universe. I contacted one of the authors on the Internet, Doctor of Biological Sciences Alexander Panichev, asking him to answer some questions. Within the framework of a small newspaper article, it is difficult to cover all the material presented in the book, so I have touched on only one topic developed in the book - about biospheric disasters.
Alexander Mikhailovich, you single out biospheric catastrophes of different orders, including those associated with the revolutions of the Sun and the Earth. When I read your ideas about what would happen at the moment of the "somersault of the Earth" it became somehow uncomfortable. This is some kind of horror of horrors, before which any human fantasy fades. Earlier on the Internet I have already come across the thoughts of other authors who also adhere to the idea of \u200b\u200bperiodic "revolutions of the Earth". For example, Valery Kubarev develops similar ideas, calling such coups "over-keel" (www.kubarev.ru). Kubarev believes that such a catastrophe may happen in the near future, and speaks of the need to "counter the elements and save the people of Russia." In this regard, my first questions are: how likely is such a catastrophe, and is it possible for human civilization to survive at all, if it happens?
- Scientists first started talking about global catastrophes 250 years ago after a systematic study of the remnants began ancient life... At the same time, the researchers faced numerous facts indicating the existence of sharp inexplicable changes in lithogenetic environments and synchronous changes in fossil forms of organisms that have repeatedly occurred on Earth in the past. The first to try to explain such facts was the French naturalist Georges Cuvier. Based on the collected geological and paleontological facts, Cuvier formulated a hypothesis about catastrophes periodically repeated in the history of the Earth. He believed that in the history of the Earth there were relatively long periods of rest, broken by global catastrophes, during which there was a significant restructuring of the face of the Earth, accompanied by mass extinctions many representatives of the organic world. After catastrophes, new species and genera of animals and plants appear on the renewed earth's surface that have no connection with extinct forms, which remain unchanged until the next catastrophe. Such ideas of catastrophism were supported and developed by many, including major, researchers. Among them were the Russians. For some time now, when discussing the reasons for such disasters, they started talking about the possibility of periodic revolutions of the planet Earth. This idea seemed interesting to us. In order to assess its probability, we tried to analyze all the available facts collected by geologists, biologists and geophysicists, and came to the conclusion that such catastrophes could occur every 25-30 million years. Our attempt to simulate the process of the revolution of the Earth indicates that if such a catastrophe occurs, then humanity has no chance of surviving.
Thus, to one question (whether earthly humanity can survive in the event of a revolution of the planet) our answer is unequivocal - it cannot survive. The question of when this will happen is more difficult to answer. First, the periodicity of the coups is not exactly known (this issue has not yet been sufficiently studied), in addition, the periods between the coups can constantly change, sometimes lengthening, sometimes shortening under the influence of a number of interdependent cosmic cyclic processes.
The fact that the next earthly humanity is doomed to disappear has long been discussed within the framework of all great religious teachings, including Buddhism, Judaism and Christianity. In Christianity, for example, there is a special section of canonical knowledge called eschatology, which means "the doctrine of the end of the world." Thus, we are convinced that science has come to substantiate the "doctrine of the completion of the cycles of life on planet Earth."
In recent times (more precisely, in the last centuries), more and more often there are predictions about the imminent "end of the world." Can such predictions come true, and how compatible are they with the idea of \u200b\u200bthe Earth's upheavals?
- We are convinced that modern mankind has sufficient time to implement the entire program of its development. The next revolution of the planet Earth will not happen so soon, maybe in a thousand, and maybe in a few thousand years. What is our optimism based on? First of all, on the idea of \u200b\u200buniversality and rationality of all forms of life, the crown of which everywhere in the Universe is Man. In order to clarify this idea, it is necessary to touch upon the entire cycle of questions raised by us in the book "The Absolute and Man". The chapter on global catastrophes is only a basis (seed) for discussing other, no less urgent, questions that modern natural science poses before us.
In support of your hypothesis about the revolutions of the Earth, in addition to geological data, you use the so-called "Dzhanibekov effect". More recently, in mid-May 2012, there was a TV program about the most famous Russian space survivor, who was in orbit 5 times - cosmonaut Vladimir Dzhanibekov. In this program, the effect with the "Dzhanibekov nut" was shown. Tell us more about this effect.
The effect in the form of periodic flips of bodies moving in zero gravity with rotation was first noticed by the cosmonaut Vladimir Dzhanibekov. All those who are interested in the details of the experiment with the nut, which was carried out by Dzhanibekov, can watch them on the Internet. There are also many sites that discuss various aspects of this phenomenon. At the same time, most of the participants in such forums are trying to refute the legitimacy of the transfer of this effect to such objects as planets, relying on the foundations of classical physics. We are not physicists, nevertheless, we have serious reasons to doubt the applicability of classical concepts of physics when it comes to cosmology. We are convinced that the branch of physics within which the “Dzhanibekov phenomenon” should be considered has not yet been finally formed. Most likely, here we are dealing with a still poorly studied area of \u200b\u200bquantum physics - the quantum physics of macro-objects. The existence of such a field of physics is evidenced by the results of physical experiments with rotating bodies carried out by us over a number of years. Some of these experiments are presented in our book. The essence of what we have identified is as follows: all bodies that have reached certain specific speeds of rotation (there are such critical frequencies in the entire range of speeds of rotation) are acted upon by external forces that tend to bring the rotating bodies out of balance. The nature of these external forces has not yet been established by science.
We are convinced that all bodies moving in space with rotation periodically make revolutions. By this we want to say that not only the Earth, but also all the planets are periodically turned over Solar systemlike the sun itself.
According to your logic, the Sun, as a rotating celestial body, also periodically turns over. Moreover, in your book you develop the idea that the axial inversion of the Sun is the main factor in the emergence of planetary systems and the development of life on them. What happens to the solar system at the moment of the "somersault of the Sun", and how can this be reflected in the development of life in it?
As noted earlier, if we follow the logic of macroquantum effects, the Sun, as a rotating body in space, also periodically turns over. The period of its revolutions is much longer than that of the planets of the solar system, since the mass of the sun is immeasurably greater than the mass of any of the planets. Judging by the general geological data, the period between the revolutions of the Sun is at least 1 billion years. During this time, the Earth (like other planets of the solar system) manages to turn over at least dozens of times (and possibly hundreds).
- We assume that with the next revolution of the Sun, a part of the solar plasma is detached, which gradually separates, turning into another planet, which occupies the closest "allowed" orbit to the luminary - the orbit of Mercury. At the same time, all other planets of the solar system, receiving a powerful energy impulse, synchronously jump to more distant orbits permitted by law number series Fibonacci. If we follow the logic of the concept being developed, the Earth has already twice jumped from orbit to orbit, first to the orbit occupied by modern Venus, then to its modern own orbit. With such a jump, most likely, there was a rapid expansion of the Earth's volume twice due to the decompaction of the core and mantle of the planet with an exponential decay of the process. At the same time, initially the radius of the Earth was comparable to the radius of modern Mercury (that is, the original volume of the planet was at least a third less than the modern one). With the next expansion of the planet, the earth's crust parted. This explains the similarity of the lines of the adjacent continents. The spaces between the parted continents were filled with water. This is how the modern oceans were born. These ideas are well connected with the ideas of the expanding Earth, developed by many prominent scientists, such as W. Carey.
Obviously, our concept contradicts the modern concepts of the theory of mobilism, according to which modern continents are fragments of a lonely island-mainland (Pangea) in the ocean that once existed. We consider Pangea's idea to be wrong. Most likely, most of the constructions based on the theory of mobilism are erroneous, including the concept of terranes - fragments of continents moving along the asthenosphere, like ice floes in the ocean. What the adherents of the ideas of mobilism call the spreading process is nothing more than local geodynamic processes characteristic of the stages of almost complete attenuation of the planet's expansion process.
Now about the influence of solar revolutions on life in the solar system. If we follow the logic of the concept we are developing, all biological life forms in the immediate environment of the Sun (possibly up to the orbit of Jupiter) at the moment of its revolution burn out under the influence of solar plasma flows. After another revolution of the Sun on the planets terrestrial group the next new bioevolutionary cycle begins. In other words, in addition to periodic "ends of the world" on the scale of the planets, sometimes there are "ends of the world" on the scale of the entire solar system. This point of view does not contradict common sense. Any material systems have the moment of their birth, sooner or later the time inevitably comes when they die.
In this regard, any person is obliged to think not only about life, but also about death. Thoughtlessness of a person in relation to the topic of death gives rise to an insecurity of the psyche, infantilism, leads to a distortion of the worldview, and even - to a deformation of consciousness. In order to live correctly, one must always remember about the death of everything material, as well as the immortality of the human soul, as a universal essence. This is the main idea of \u200b\u200bour book. In order to perceive this main idea, it is necessary to read the book and seriously think about what is written in it.
At this point, I just have to thank my interlocutor.
The Internet conversation was conducted by Alexander Lotov.
What will happen when the Earth is inverted (somersault)?
“… To begin with, let's try to very briefly describe the series of events, which, most likely, should unfold on the surface of the Earth at the moment of axial inversion.
Considering the computer models of flips of various bodies that are presented on Internet sites, we concluded that the period of axial inversion is most likely comparable to the period of revolution of a rotating body. That is, for the Earth, the period of axial inversion should be comparable to the daily period. If we proceed from this assumption, then it becomes clear that the maximum linear speed that a certain conditional point on Earth can reach at the moment of the planet's upheaval will be comparable to the linear speed with which any point on the Earth's equator is currently moving in space. It is not difficult to calculate that this speed is about
460 m / sec. It is also obvious that after the start of the revolution, the maximum speed of the planet's surface in the direction of the turn will occur, although not instantly, but rather quickly. In this case, the maximum speed can be reached within an hour or two hours. What does it mean?
This means that within an hour after the beginning of the inversion, powerful forces of inertia will begin to act on all bodies on the Earth's surface. These forces will be comparable to those experienced by any object when exposed to a shock wave. The degree and direction of the impact will depend on the remoteness of a particular area of \u200b\u200bthe Earth from the equator and poles. In this case, at the equator, the inertial force, acting like a shock wave, will be directed towards the previous rotation of the planet, at the poles - against the beginning of the revolution of the planet along a trajectory that has a rather complex cycloid-like shape.
Thus, as the process of axial inversion develops, all objects on the planet's surface will experience a sharply increasing impact of multidirectional inertial forces.
Under the influence of such forces, most of not only forests, but even soils and loose sediments will be lifted into the air, transported over considerable distances and then randomly dumped in heaps into the nearest "ravines" (comparable in scale to such heaps). Later, after millions of years, these giant "ravines", filled with countless torn from the roots, broken and compressed by the weight of the rocks lying on them, will turn into deposits of coal. To support this idea, just look at the world map, which shows the locations of the largest coal deposits.
At the same time, under the action of inertial forces throughout the Earth, air masses and waters of rivers, seas and oceans will start moving. A giant wave of sea water will sweep several times around the globe, rising in places to heights of 5,000 m. The average flooding level is likely to be 2,500 m above sea level. m. As a result, only small areas of high mountain areas protected by high ridges will survive from flooding.
The ice fields of the Arctic and the ice shelf of the Antarctic, torn by waves of unprecedented heights, will fall in countless ice blocks on the continents, crushing everything in their path.
Almost simultaneously with the beginning of the inversion, the surface of the Earth will tremble and be hammered in convulsions, "play" first down and then up with giant keys. Tongues of flame and fiery lava will burst from the depths of the earth along the cracks. Numerous volcanoes will fly up into the sky like ash fireworks.
Within a few hours after the start of the catastrophe, the entire atmosphere of the Earth seems to go berserk, turning almost entirely into a dust storm of unprecedented scale and strength. Gigantic air vortices with a roar will begin to suck in huge masses of volcanic ash and earthly dust.
In about a day, the force of inertia, sweeping away everything from the planet's surface in a terrible rush, will dry up. The earth will stop trembling and roaring with endless thunder. However, the violent storm of air and water elements will continue for many more days. Volcanic ash ejected into the stratosphere from numerous volcanoes will completely close the Earth from sunlight... From now on, darkness and cold will reign on Earth for many millennia.
Most of the highly developed animals will die on the first day. Only the smallest and most unpretentious will survive. And they will remain only in refugia, which have survived from the raging elements. The main inhabitants of the Earth from now on and for millennia will be unicellular algae and bacteria ... The next revival of the biosphere will begin only after the end of the era of the next Great Glaciation.
But what about humanity? Humanity, if it found itself in a similar situation, could henceforth be forgotten. For a very short time, only "chipped concrete jaws" stuck in the middle of the mountains, remnants of hydroelectric dams, and isolated wastelands still visible among the mountain plateaus with characteristic regular polygons from foundations in place former cities and settlements. At low hypsometric levels, where until recently fashionable cities sparkled with neon light, there are only shapeless mountains of brick and reinforced concrete structures half-buried with earthly ashes, strewn with multicolored tin of crumpled cars. They look like pieces of gum, flattened by the giant Nature and spit out as unnecessary.
The picture painted is not very optimistic. Nevertheless, it seems to us quite plausible. We are convinced that someday such a chain of events will certainly happen, although it will certainly not happen soon. We are convinced that other, less dramatic, tests are prepared for modern humanity ... "
(From the book "Absolute and Man", A.M. Panichev, A.N. Gulkov, publishing house "Folium", M. 2012)
Addition:I would like to note that this is already the second conversation with A.M. Panichev. The first conversation was called "The Altai period of Alexander Panichev's creativity", and was devoted to photography (it can be found on the page Creativity, and Postscript # 34 (895) of 08.24.11). On the same site, photography lovers can also get acquainted with the beautiful portrait and landscape photographs of Alexander Panichev (Photo exhibition page).
The book "The Absolute and Man", which is discussed in this conversation, will appear on the Internet in the fall of 2012. For information about this (link), see the Yailu website.
Methodological materials, articles
Cambrian Paradox - Planet Roll (article two)
The continental plates of Australia and America, which were formerly in the region of the poles, made a turn and movement towards the equator in some 15 million years - a period on a geological scale is negligible. It was a real "somersault" of the entire planet.
The mystery of the "biological Big Bang" - the sudden and simultaneous appearance of all modern biological types in the Cambrian era - continues to intrigue many researchers. Two of the newest hypotheses - "oxygen" and "earth roll" - explain this evolutionary leap by a sharp change in physicochemical conditions on the entire planet. In contrast, biologists have put forward different assumptions linking the Cambrian explosion with abrupt ecological or genetic shifts.
Among the hypotheses proposed to explain the Cambrian riddle, the most serious until recently was the so-called oxygen. It is based on the assumption that the Cambrian explosion was caused by a sharp change in the chemical composition of the earth's atmosphere and oceans that preceded it.
Physicochemical conditions influence the rate of biological evolution - this has been known for a long time. Many biologists are convinced that the unusually slow change in biological forms during the first three billion years of their existence was due to a lack of free oxygen.
In the primary atmosphere of the Earth, there was no oxygen at all, because it immediately reacted with other elements and remained bound in the earth's thickness and atmosphere in the form of oxides. But with the advent of the first unicellular algae - about half a billion - a billion years after the formation of the Earth - the process of photosynthesis began, in which carbon dioxide (absorbed by algae from the air) and water, with the assistance of sunlight, were converted into free oxygen and organic matter. However, even here the oxygen was “unlucky” - it was greedily seized by the iron dissolved in the ocean water. The resulting iron oxides slowly settled on the ocean floor, leaving the chemical circulation, the world, as one of the geochemists put it, was constantly rusting, and free oxygen was not added to it.
In the absence of free oxygen, the organisms were forced to remain anaerobic. This meant that the processing of products in them, metabolism, or metabolism took place without the participation of oxygen - slowly and ineffectively. This, according to biologists, slowed down the evolution of the first organisms. The situation changed somewhat only from the moment when the iron dissolved in the oceans was saturated with oxygen and the concentration of this gas in the atmosphere, thanks to all the same photosynthesis, finally began to gradually increase. This made possible the appearance of the first aerobic organisms. They were still unicellular, but their metabolism was much more efficient, and therefore they multiplied faster and populated the oceans more densely. So passed the first 3.5 billion years, by the end of which the oxygen content in the atmosphere was believed to have reached about one percent. At this point, evolution took the next important step - the first multicellular organisms appeared. And then, after another half a billion years, the Cambrian explosion came and at once laid the foundation for all the complex diversity of modern life.
We can say that the history of biological evolution was - in a sense - the history of oxygen. So wasn't the Cambrian "leap in evolution" a consequence of the abrupt increase in free oxygen in the atmosphere?
This is precisely the assumption made in 1965 by two American physicists, Berkner and Marshall. They reasoned as follows. Complex multicellular organisms need a large amount of oxygen, and in two of its types at once - firstly, in the form of free oxygen, which is necessary for respiration (that is, for metabolism) and building collagen, this most important element of the body structure, and secondly, in in the form of an ozone layer, which is necessary to protect against harmful solar ultraviolet radiation. Since such organisms did not appear before the Cambrian era, it means that their appearance was delayed by the lack of the necessary concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere. On this basis, it can be assumed that it was in the Cambrian era that such quantities first appeared. This unique event - overcoming the "oxygen line", a sudden rise in the oxygen level in the atmosphere to the current 21 percent - was, according to Berkner and Marshall, the main cause of the Cambrian explosion.
At first, this "oxygen hypothesis" did not have sufficient confirmation. But literally in last years (1994 - 1996) the situation changed dramatically. The reason for this was the discovery of the American explorer Knoll. Studying the ratio of two carbon isotopes, C-12 and C-13, in the rocks of the Precambrian and Cambrian times, Knoll received irrefutable evidence that at the very beginning of the Cambrian era this ratio changed dramatically - the C-12 isotope "at once" became less than before ... And such a "carbon jump" had to be accompanied by a corresponding "oxygen jump", which exactly corresponds to the assumption of Berkner - Marshall.
After Knoll's work, the presence of the "oxygen jump" in the Cambrian period is recognized by most scientists. But it remains unclear: what could be the reason for the “non-return” of the C-12 to the environment, which led to this “oxygen jump”?
A different hypothesis was proposed by the American geologist Moore in 1993. According to Moore, the reason for the loss of C-12 was sharp tectonic shifts, such as the movement of continents, that occurred on the very eve of the Cambrian era. Such shifts, says Moore, could lead to the fragmentation of the oceans into smaller and more enclosed bodies of water - seas and lakes, and this should reduce the intensity of water circulation. As a result, the organic remains of algae, along with their carbon, remained on the seabed and did not rise to the surface where bacteria could decompose them. Thus, carbon was released from the circuit, allowing the oxygen synthesized by algae to quickly accumulate in the atmosphere.
Moore's "tectonic hypothesis" also initially had no actual confirmation. But three years later, she received a completely unexpected, one might even say - sensational development. In the middle of last year, the scientific, and then the mass press, suddenly filled with headlines like: "Earth Tumbling explains the mystery of the Cambrian explosion!" The most surprising thing is that the notorious "somersault" (or "somersault", as it was also called) was not some kind of journalistic exaggeration. As follows from the texts, it was a very serious (albeit radical) scientific hypothesis that explained the Cambrian mystery by precisely those "tectonic shifts" that we just spoke about, only of a much more grandiose scale - something like a one-time shift of the entire earth's crust ... Truly "somersault"!
His work made it possible to build a visual picture of the geological changes that took place on Earth at the beginning of the Cambrian era - 550-500 million years ago. This picture turned out to be very unexpected and truly sensational. This is how, according to Kirshvink, the geological events of that time developed.
Shortly before the beginning of the Cambrian era, the split of the oldest supercontinent, which consisted of most modern continents, was completed (paleogeologists gave this supercontinent the name Rodinia). Almost immediately after this, the divided mainland masses began to regroup, uniting into a new supercontinent - Gondwana. In the last stages of the formation of Gondwana, a sharp imbalance arose in the distribution of continental masses relative to earth axis... The earthly "top" has lost its stability. A rotating body is most stable when its masses are concentrated on the equator (which gives it the maximum moment of inertia) or distributed more or less evenly relative to it, while Gondwana was located too close to the pole.
Restoring the stability of the Earth required a rapid redistribution of continental masses. Therefore, the entire solid shell of the planet began to slide along the mantle as a whole, until it shifted ninety degrees relative to the axis of rotation. As Kirschvink's data show, the continental plates of Australia and America, which were previously in the region of the poles, made this turn and move to the equator in some fifteen million years - a period on a geological scale is insignificant (three ten thousandths of the total age of the Earth). It was a real "somersault" of the entire planet. Its result was that the axis of its rotation, keeping the same direction in space, now turned 90 degrees relative to the solid shell. The rotation of the Earth's top became stable again.
According to Kirschvink's paleomagnetic data collected in the rocks of America and Australia, both of these continental plates (making up almost two-thirds of the entire earth's crust in total) moved about the earth's axis almost simultaneously, between 534 and 518 million years ago. Such grandiose geological events are extremely rare. In any case, over the past two hundred million years, since the end of the Permian epoch, they probably never happened. Kirshvink, however, does not exclude that something similar to the geological cataclysm he described could be repeated in the interval between the Cambrian and Permian eras.
No matter how unusual the picture drawn by Kirshvink is, it is very solidly substantiated by the author's data, and in addition, it immediately received a number of independent confirmations, so that geologists in general expressed their readiness to accept it. But this picture also interested biologists. As already mentioned at the very beginning, according to the authors, it was this "somersault" of the planet that could be the main cause of the Cambrian biological explosion. “The rapid movement of continents,” says one of the co-authors of Kirshvinka Ripperdan, “could not but lead to the closure of some water basins and the formation of other water basins - these were then the only habitats of life, to a change in the then ocean currents, to abrupt climate changes and to others, equally catastrophic. phenomena. All these catastrophes were supposed to give an impetus to the rise of new forms of life, adapted to the changed conditions. But it was precisely this rapid emergence of new forms that was characteristic of the "Cambrian explosion."
According to Kirschvink himself, the rapid changes in the ocean area caused by the sliding of the continents should have led to rather frequent and abrupt changes in ocean currents. “Each change was global,” he says. - It destroyed the existing regional ecosystems into smaller areas. In these small areas, new life forms were more likely to survive than in large regions. Our data show that such changes in currents occurred then almost every million years or so. For a million years, evolution has managed to select the best from the surviving cycle and create new regional systems. But then this process began again, and so one and a half to two dozen times during the entire cataclysm. These are the best conditions for the emergence of great biological diversity, especially since all this happened soon after the appearance of those genes that control the main stages of embryonic development of multicellular organisms. "
Let's pay attention to the last phrase. At first glance - the glance of an uninitiated person - it sounds rather mysterious: what are these "genes that control the main stages of embryonic development", and what do they have to do with the Cambrian explosion? There were, however, people who heard in this phrase the long-awaited recognition of those radical biological ideas that they put forward over the past two years, hoping to draw attention to them. the scientific world... And not just recognition, but also a completely transparent allusion to the possibility of combining these ideas with the equally radical geological ideas of the "planetary somersault" within the framework of the new physico-biological theory of the Cambrian explosion.
We will devote the final part of our essay to a story about these biological explanations of the Cambrian riddle.
The first of the "purely biological" hypotheses put forward to explain the Cambrian explosion was the "reaper hypothesis" formulated in 1973 by the American Stephen Stanley. Stanley proceeded from the "thinning principle" well-known in ecology. It has been observed that the introduction of predatory fish into an artificial pond leads to a rapid increase in the diversity of zooplankton in this pond. On the contrary, it is enough to remove from the accumulation of various algae that feed on them sea \u200b\u200burchinshow this diversity begins to diminish. In other words, the “thinning” of the ecological niche by the “reaper-predator” feeding on its inhabitants is necessary to maintain or expand its biological diversity.
At first glance, this is contrary to common sense. It seems that such a "reaper", destroying the population of a niche, will reduce the number of species inhabiting it, and some, the smallest, and generally reduce to nothing. But, as we see, reality refutes this intuitive reasoning. And that's why. In any niche inhabited by so-called primary producers (that is, organisms that get their food directly from photosynthesis, and not by eating others), one or more species inevitably become "monopolists" - they capture all the living space and nutrients of the niche and do not allow other species to develop. The “reaper” that appears under these conditions will most likely feed on these dominant species (if only because they are able to provide it with the greatest amount of food) and, therefore, will primarily reduce their biomass. But thanks to this, he will clear part of the living space and thereby make room for new species. And this will lead to an increase in the biological diversity of the entire niche. The same principle, as seen in the examples above, applies to other ecological systems as well. Stanley applied the "thinning principle" to explain the mystery of the Cambrian explosion.
It is easy to see that this explosion fits well into this scheme. In the pre-Cambrian epoch, the earth's oceans were almost exclusively inhabited by unicellular bacteria and algae of several few species. For billions of years, no one "thinned" them, and therefore they did not have the opportunity to quickly evolve. If some unicellular herbivorous "predator" suddenly appeared in such an environment, it would have to - according to the "thinning principle" - cause the rapid appearance of new species. This, in turn, should have led to the emergence of new, more specialized "reapers", clearing space for the next new species, so that the diversity of biological forms would begin to grow like a snowball - and this is the situation of the Cambrian explosion.
Thus, according to Stanley, the “trigger” of the Cambrian explosion was the accidental appearance of a certain “predator” among the simplest unicellular organisms of the Pre-Cambrian era. And the fact that this explosion was in the nature of a sharp jump does not pose any particular mystery. The development of many biological systems in the presence of sufficient free living space and a sufficiently abundant amount of food has exactly the same character. If, for example, you plant a small colony of bacteria on a nutrient medium in a laboratory Petri dish, it will multiply according to the same law of "snow avalanche", and this spasmodic reproduction will stop only when all the available space is filled and the nutrients are exhausted. The Cambrian oceans were such a natural "Petri dish" for new biological species. When they filled these oceans, the conditions for the jump disappeared and never repeated again, which explains, according to Stanley, the uniqueness of the Cambrian explosion.
A completely different biological explanation of the Cambrian explosion was proposed in 1994-1997 by American biologists Valentin, Erwin and Yablonsky. In their opinion, this explosion occurred due to the fact that some primitive pre-Cambrian organisms, as a result of random genetic changes, had the ability to dramatically expand the range of possible bodily structures. Indeed, one of the most important features of the Cambrian evolutionary leap. Was just such a sudden appearance of many biological forms with completely new bodily characteristics. Some of these new organisms acquired well-defined heads and tails, others had distinct segments and abdomens, still others developed limbs, some others dressed in shells, some acquired antennae-antennae or gills - and so on. In total, researchers count as many as 37 new bodily plans that arose - and moreover, almost simultaneously - in that era of rapid evolutionary activity. And all the basic principles of the bodily architecture of modern organisms were born just then.
What have genes to do with it, however? The idea of \u200b\u200bthe connection of this "architectural leap" with the genes of the authors of the new hypothesis was prompted by the latest achievements of the so-called developmental biology. It was already known earlier that in the course of embryonic development of any multicellular organism, its cells undergo specialization - from some, for example, legs, from others, for example, muscles, gills or eyes. It was also known that certain genes give commands to specialize cells. But in recent years it has been established that in order for development to proceed according to a certain plan - for example, the eye does not grow where the leg should be - it is necessary that these genes "turn on" in a certain sequence, one after the other, at the right time, and special, so-called regulatory genes control such a systematic activation. The most studied variety is the genes of the "hox" group. They were first discovered in the study of fruit flies.
It was found that the genes of this group regulate the process of laying the most basic and most general principles of the body's structure. Eight genes of this group, found in Drosophila, are located in one of the chromosomes one after the other, sequentially. They work in the same way: the first gene gives the command to build the head, the second orders to build the next segment of the body along its axis, and so on, up to the tail. When the researchers artificially altered the sequence of these genes, they produced flies with, for example, legs growing out of their heads.
The hox genes have also been studied in frogs. This study showed that although frogs and fruit flies are located on two different branches of the evolutionary tree (these branches differ in the way the embryo forms a mouth), six of their hox genes are strikingly similar. For example, one of them in Drosophila differs from its counterpart in the frog only by its "sign": in Drosophila it regulates the appearance of the abdomen, and in the frog - the back. If you transplant it from Drosophila to a frog, then the course of development will not be disturbed at all, only the frog's back and abdomen will change places. Apparently, this difference arose as a result of a mutation. By calculating how many such mutational differences accumulated in similar hox genes during the separate existence of mice and frogs, and knowing the average number of mutations that occur for every hundred years, the researchers determined how long the common ancestor of frogs and fruit flies lived. This time turned out to be alarmingly close to the time of the Cambrian explosion - about 565 million years.
As we have already said, Drosophila has only eight hox genes, in mammals, for example, there are as many as 38. But all these 38 genes were found to be only slightly altered duplicates of the eight primary ones. As for these eight primary genes themselves, they turned out to be very similar in all modern types of organisms - from mammals to insects. As in the case of the frog and Drosophila, this similarity made it possible to calculate exactly when these eight original hox genes first appeared, which determined (and still determine) the most general principles of the body structure of all modern organisms (specific differences in this structure and the shape of their bodies - say, between Marilyn Monroe and the fruit fly - are generated by the difference in the regulatory genes of other groups that appeared later in the course of subsequent evolution).
These calculations led to the same results as the comparison of these genes in frogs and fruit flies. It turned out that the primary genes of the hox group, which are similar in all modern organisms, go back to the common ancestors of these organisms, which arose about 565 million years ago, that is, in the era immediately preceding the Cambrian evolutionary explosion. As we already know, those plans for the structure of the body, which have survived to this day in the form of the most general principles of the bodily architecture of modern organisms, arose in the Cambrian era. Now we see that the regulatory genes responsible for such general plans, appeared shortly before that. It is quite natural to assume that it was the appearance of the first complete group of hox genes (consisting of eight primary genes) that played the role of triggering that unique explosion of forms, which we call the Cambrian explosion.
At first, Valentin and his co-authors argued that history developed as follows: for the time being, only the simplest organisms existed, in which the entire hox group was exhausted by one single gene, in the Pre-Cambrian era the first multicellular organisms arose, in which the number of these genes gradually increased to five six (in flatworms), and in the Cambrian era this number jumped to eight, and this was enough to create an amazing variety of forms.
The later version of their theory looks much more complicated. Now they believe that the emergence of all the necessary set of regulatory genes occurred already in the Precambrian era, 565 million years ago. But for all the biological fundamentality of this event, it, nevertheless, was only a necessary, but insufficient condition for the Cambrian explosion. It is quite possible that even with one of those genes, its first owner, some kind of flatworm, had not an eye, but only an "eye potency" - something like a light-sensitive spot on the head.
Organisms are not mechanical toys that can be pushed enough to produce an automatic response, most likely it took a complex combination of different conditions for the possibility to become reality and an evolutionary leap like the Cambrian explosion occurred.
In other words, something additional had to happen in the Cambrian era, which played the role of a "trigger" for the launch of these genes into work, that is, for the creation of many different forms and types, so characteristic of that time. Valentin and his colleagues do not specify what could be such an "additional trigger". They only write that "the assumptions range from a sharp rise in atmospheric oxygen above some critical level to an ecological 'arms race' in which the evolutionary interaction of predators and prey could give rise to a whole range of different new species."
It is easy to recognize in these words allusions to the "oxygen hypothesis" of Berkner-Marshall and Stanley's "predator-reaper hypothesis". On the other hand, Kirschvink, the creator of the "earth roll hypothesis", believes that his explanation of the Cambrian explosion by the simultaneous sliding of all earthly continents can also be combined with the theory of "regulatory gene jump" proposed by Valentin, Yablonsky and Erwin. Therefore, summing up, we can say that latest theories Cambrian explosion tend to combine several different hypotheses and thus explain this unique and mysterious phenomenon not by any one reason, but by the interaction of several different factors, both physicochemical and biological.
On this we could draw a line under the story about the mysteries of the Cambrian explosion and attempts to explain them. But in our list of these mysteries, there is one more unsolved problem.
As we have already said, the Cambrian evolutionary leap is a fundamental difficulty for the "orthodox" Darwin's theory, in which evolution is considered necessarily "smooth" and "continuous". To get around this difficulty, some biologists generally deny the reality of the Cambrian explosion, while others propose to make rather radical changes in "orthodox Darwinism." In the most recent years, each side has put forward new arguments in their favor, and this has sharply exacerbated the controversy over the foundations of Darwinism. This dispute definitely deserves a separate story.
Raphael Nudelman
Researchers from the United States report that the Earth's magnetic north pole is shifting to Russia, or rather, to Taimyr. Its arrival on the peninsula is expected in 30-40 years. Siberians can be envied: the aurora will become a common sight for them.
But if the matter was limited to only a slight drift of the magnetic pole, then this news would have remained in the heading "and now about the weather." However, the forecasts of scientists are staggering: some of them speak not only of a shift of magnetic poles, but also of a change in geographic poles. That is, about the upcoming revolution of the Earth!
Summons Taimyr
There are reports of strange bird behavior from different regions of the planet. Observers have the feeling that, huddled in flocks, the birds do not know where to fly. As you know, birds are guided by power lines magnetic field of the Earth. The conclusion of scientists: the geomagnetic field is undergoing some changes.
In principle, the magnetic poles are never exactly fixed points. The Earth's liquid metal core is constantly moving. It is this that forms the planet's magnetic field, which, by the way, protects us from cosmic radiation. Throughout the 20th century, the north magnetic pole was located in the area of \u200b\u200bthe Canadian archipelago, shifting by about 10 km per year to the side geographic pole... Now the speed of its drift has increased to 50 km per year. Simple calculations show that if it goes on like this, by the middle of the century the magnetic pole will cross the Arctic Ocean and reach the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago. And there it is not far from Taimyr.
The South Pole does not stand still either. It turns out that he wants to switch places with the northern one. Over the 4.5 billion years of the planet's existence, this has happened more than once. In the language of geophysics, the process is called magnetic field inversion. This phenomenon is rare, humanity in its entire history has never caught it. It is assumed that the last time the inversion was 780 thousand years ago, and the species homo sapiens was formed about 200 thousand years ago.
Scientists learned about previous reversals of the magnetic field by examining frozen volcanic lava. As it turned out, at the moment of solidification, it retains its magnetization, that is, it allows you to establish the direction and magnitude of the magnetic field. Essentially, lava is made up of tiny magnets that indicate where north and south are. As it turned out, the lava layers, which have different magnetization, alternate, replacing each other.
Most researchers believe that the process of changing magnetic poles stretches over millennia. And the North Pole will reach Antarctica no earlier than in 2 thousand years. But when the planet's magnetic shield weakens (and at some point this will happen), humanity will face the threat of solar radiation. In addition to the obvious harm to health, electromagnetic radiation will lead to malfunctions of navigation equipment and communication systems.
Dzhanibekov effect
June 25, 1985 soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Dzhanibekov unpacked on orbital station "Salyut-7" cargo delivered from Earth. Sharply twisting the wing nut, he watched as it left the thread and, spinning, floated in weightlessness. After a dozen or two centimeters, the nut suddenly turned 180 degrees and began to rotate in the other direction.
Janibekov was impressed. He conducted his own experiment: he blinded a ball out of plasticine, shifting its center of gravity using a weight (the same nut). Moving in weightlessness, the ball turned over several times and changed the direction of rotation.
This unstable behavior of an asymmetrical body was later called the Dzhanibekov effect. In principle, it is described by the laws of classical mechanics and does not represent any secret for physicists. But let's imagine that the plasticine ball is a model of our planet, which rushes in outer space, rotating around its axis. Can she roll over?
Here the objection is pertinent: the Earth has an almost ideal spherical shape, perhaps slightly flattened at the poles. There is no question of any asymmetry of the celestial body. It's right. But it is only true as far as external appearance our planet. But what's inside her?
It's hard to believe, but modern science has a very vague idea of \u200b\u200bhow the bowels of the Earth look at a depth of over 3000 km. There are only theoretical models and hypotheses based on indirect data.
Somersault in space
Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences Igor Belozerov for many years he has been defending the theory that the Earth's core consists of "neutron matter". This is superdense matter, in which the very structure of the atom is violated.
Heart of the Earth. What do we know about the structure of the core of our planet?
“The core of the Earth is constantly emitting neutrons from itself, which turn into hydrogen. It actively interacts with the environment, launching a whole chain of substance transformations, says Igor Belozerov. - This phenomenon is called hydrogen degassing of the Earth. But with regard to the Dzhanibekov effect, something else is important. According to the theory, the core of our planet is much denser than its periphery. Denser by several orders of magnitude. And the Earth's gravity is created precisely by its core: the rest of the planet's mass can be neglected. And here the main question arises: what is the shape of the nucleus? If it's strictly spherical, that's one thing. And if it is wrong, asymmetrical? Then there is an imbalance in the core, which can lead to the Dzhanibekov effect: the overturn of the planet. "
If you believe the data from satellites measuring the Earth's gravitational field, it is really heterogeneous: somewhere the force of gravity is higher, somewhere - lower. This means that the planet's core is not a perfect ball. And it also means that the third celestial body from the Sun, our cradle of life, where the number of homo sapiens has reached 7.6 billion individuals, at any moment can simply turn over in space. Roll.
And this scenario will be scarier than a collision with some asteroid. Indeed, from such a somersault, the entire World Ocean will start moving.
You've heard of the Flood, haven't you?
