Contains spoilers for the first couple of chapters of Seveneves

Highly speculative on my part, I know very little about most of these topics

In Seveneves Neal Stephenson does the classic sci-fi trick of assuming that exactly one thing in the universe is different, and seeing where that takes us. In his case that one thing is the moon has somehow exploded.

And where that takes us is the complete destruction of the earth. As the initially huge chunks of moon rock hit into each other they break into smaller and smaller pieces, and take up more and more space. Eventually this process increases exponentially, the loosely held collection of rocks that was the moon disperses into a planetary ring, and earth is bombarded by lunar leavings for 5000 years:

There will be so many [meteors] that they will merge into a dome of fire that will set aflame [...]

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Outline:

(05:18) Heat

(08:28) Meteorites

(10:00) Energy And Food

(13:02) The Plan

(18:16) Conclusion

The original text contained 5 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:

Source:

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.