Originally published at: Turns out the Moon is older than we thought—40 million years older! | Boing Boing
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not the gif i was looking for, but the pun is worth it
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How the heck can they know that?
Oh.
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WTF is with the article’s author’s putting quotation marks around zircon? It’s not fake, like “cubic zirconia.”
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Damn. More candles for the birthday cake.
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Moving to Moontana…
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I kept telling people it looks too moldy for its purported age.
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Apollo Program: “You lied! If you had told the truth, we never would have ‘landed on’ you and ‘planted our flag!’”
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Well, this just shows that scientists don’t know anything, and we should ignore everything they say. /s
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Considering that last I checked, the age of the solar system was calculated to be 4.6 billion years, the 40 million still seems like a narrowing down of the margin of error and not some shocking revelation. Especially considering how hard it is to find actual evidence from that age, it’s amazing we can get so exact with our guesses.
This does not awake any shock or awe in me, just a sort of bemused satisfaction that our knowledge is still expanding.
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This is the second Phish-related comment in the same day. Must be some sort of record… 
The Moon? I thought that got blasted out of orbit in 1999.
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I want to know more about what’s inside the moon’s uneven core, as to why the moon rotates to keep only one side facing Earth. NASA also says that gravity is slightly different in different parts of the moon! I’ve read the same thing about parts of Earth, but it’s probably less noticeable here, because of all the cars and stuff.
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Most moons in the solar system keep the same face to their planet. That doesn’t have to do with their structure, but comes from tidal friction – the planets raise small tides on their surface, but friction means these are a bit behind where they should be, and the gravity pulling them to catch up eventually slows down the moon’s rotation.
That our Moon only has the dark maria on the close side is more mysterious. The general theory goes that the crust on this side is thinner, possibly because of heating from the Earth back when they were both first cooling, but I don’t know how well established that is.
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40 million years of extra aging you say? This will surely drive up the prices at the cheesemongers.
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It says here that Zircons and Cubic Zirconia are different molecules.
Sort of like confusing water with Orthosilicic acid
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I thought it was just one side being heavier, but I’m not a cheese expert or moonologist!
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Space:1999 still holds title as the jazziest theme song on TV. One of my faves as kid! Although the episode with rapid aging scared the hell out of me!
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Oh my God, no kidding. This theme song, juxtaposed with the frantic editing of scenes from “This Episode,” ROCKS. The only other one that comes close is the Jonny Quest opening credits.
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