The Fermi Paradox: Solar Flares

Our Sun constantly froths with sunspots and solar flares, many larger than our planet, and yet these are dwarfed by Coronal Mass Ejections, such as the Carrington Event of 1859, which would have wiped out our communication and electric grid had it occurred today. For all of that, our Sun is far less volatile than most stars, and this may be a factor in why Earth has a technological civilization.

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Credits:
The Fermi Paradox: Solar Flares
Science & Futurism with Isaac Arthur
Episode 292, May 27, 2021

Produced, Written, and Narrated by Isaac Arthur

Editors:
Darius Said
Jason Burbank
Keith Blockus

Cover Art:

[francoislacombe]

I live in Québec, and I remember the 1989 blackout, well, the part of it that happened after I woke up that morning. It lasted only about 12 hours, starting at about 2 in the morning, so although it was an inconvenience, it was not a disaster. Our grid was vulnerable to solar storms because many of its high voltage lines run in a general north-south direction over long distances, an ideal configuration for geomagnetic storms to induce powerful spikes of current in the network. The grid has been improved in response to the event, so it would take something a lot more powerful than what happened in 1989 to cause trouble today.

[lewisnicolls]

There's a nice Star Trek Prime Directive episode. You find a planet trapped in the Victorian Era. Every time they get things going, they get flared.

[spectralvalkyrie]

Isaac I can't wait to talk to your soul one day and tell you about how you inspire my husband with your videos, you give him a zeal to make humanity and the world better. He's always talking about solar sails and shades and other tech that we could all be working on to ensure our existence here. The small amount of information I understand myself is very humbling. Everyone should watch your videos to realize how fragile this universe is. Scientific men like you are really the masters of the angles.
(Get it? Angles/angels? ✴️)

[NovaQueen]

Your cool descriptions of solar storms and previous knowledge of using magnetic fields for minor propulsion has given me the idea of a planet with low gravity but an extremely high magnetic field around a variable star, for some really extreme conditions and cool worldbuilding potential.

[Vorael]

0:08 "We view our sun as eternal and stable."

not on this channel we don't lol

[cxob]

I open youtube to be unproductive, but this will be some nice background entertainment and thoughts to get some work done

[flakeyjunk]

I'm going to use this to keep my mind off the fact that my city has just been locked down for a third time, and for the third time people are panic buying toilet paper. It makes all the grand futures on this channel seem so much farther away.

[moroteseoinage]

I'm a simple man. Isaac uploads, I watch.

[JanghanHong]

Our own sun is one of the most stable star, in almost every quality you can attach to a star. hope it stays like that for at least 1 billion years until we can find out how to massage (starlifting) it to eternity.

[ericrasnake]

Wondering how many intelligent civilization's at different stages have been destroyed by solar flares could be some really sad events that have ended civilization's at different stages of development

[albinocyclopse]

I'm a simple man. I see Star Doritos, I click.

[marlonlacert]

It is so nice when something good flares up: An Issac Arthur video, that is!

[zeekfromthecreek]

Okay, now I'm even more worried about space junk and the Kessler syndrome if a Carington-type event can knock out all our satellites at once. All these apocalypses are linked together if you look close enough.

[a-blivvy-yus]

Another factor with this solar storm world:

Soldiers wearing full body metal armour would routinely get fried alive in their armour because of the arcing bolts of lightning running through their metal suit. So they wouldn't do it because that's stupid. And occasionally swords would get lightning charged and set fire to their opponent or fire lightning at the enemy army.

[jgr]

"the great TP shortage of spring 2020" is a great way to sum up the madness that was the beginning of the pandemic.

[alejandrojuarez]

Does anyone know the song playing during Isaac's intro? It's so beautiful and peaceful.

[annoyed]

Fermi Paradox lesser filter: GoT season 8 and mass alien suicide.

[seabeepirate]

Hello wonderful person, Anton made a video that says we may have just lived through our own Carrington like event. Stay wonderful, see you tomorrow and as always bye bye. 👋

[agalah]

Is there a factor in Drake's equation that contemplates what a dip in the availability of toilet paper will do to the advancement of a civilization?

[davidbrennan]

I see several people didn’t wear sunscreen .
IA Algorithm has been served.