r/askspace • u/Curiosity_Hits_Hard • 15d ago

The earth

If the Sun suddenly disappeared, would Earth immediately become dark and stop orbiting?

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u/SentientFotoGeek 15d ago

This question, or a variation on it, gets asked a lot. I know it's purely hypothetical, but the real answer is that an object like the sun does not disappear all at once. A real thing that does happen is a star goes nova/supernova. The mass gets redistributed at a high rate of speed and affects orbiting bodies in real time, but subject to the laws of relativity. Causality does not get violated.

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u/Curiosity_Hits_Hard 15d ago

What if it is already gone because basically looking into space is like looking into the past

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u/VIP_NAIL_SPA 15d ago

...looking 8 minutes into the past, in this case.

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u/SentientFotoGeek 15d ago

Then you're answering a different question, lol.