• Artyom@lemm.ee
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    16 days ago

    The moon doesn’t actually protect the Earth from asteroids. It’s a net-zero because the extra mass attracts more asteroids.

    • chillinit@lemmynsfw.com
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      16 days ago

      How do the exacerbaters and mitigators cancel each other out to yield exactly net zero?

      Hell, you can even have a 1% allowance. Just explain how it’s even close.

    • LostXOR@fedia.io
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      16 days ago

      It’s not really about “attracting” asteroids, it’s more about their orbital trajectory happening to intersect the Earth’s at the right time. I think the Moon’s gravity is about as likely to redirect an asteroid towards the Earth as it is away, but the Moon also physically intercepts some asteroids, so the net effect would be a slight decrease in Earthly asteroid impacts.