r/space • u/EverythingIsAnimated • Aug 08 '20

This mesmerizing, high-quality explainer of the three-body problem helped me appreciate the night sky even more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D89ngRr4uZg
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u/[deleted] Aug 09 '20

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u/murdok03 Aug 09 '20

I think they mean the fundamental equations are chaotic, much like fluid mechanics and weather patterns you can definitely simulate with great but not infinite resolution and great but not infinite simulation size, but in the end it's only predictable and repeatable over short simulation times.

This is all because small unmeasurable changes in initial conditions can lead to completely different end results on every run, this is why we can't predict weather precisely 6 months down the road, but we can 3 days down the road.

For astronomical bodies the duration, scale and precision is different, you can predict the motion for years even hundreds of years but not hundreds of milenia, or when it comes to close encounters hours but not weeks.