Imagine that there are a distant land cuffs for the global nuclear war. To what extent can we discover the explosions associated with this war outside the planet?
Our imagination is often associated with advanced experiences. To calibrate what we might expect from the war zone on Earth, let’s think about a reasonable scenario for our planet.
In her book entitled “Nuclear War: a scenarioThe wonderful journalist Annie Jacobsen describes a realistic scenario, as North Korea launches for the first time a nuclear ballistic missile towards Washington, DC, followed by a missile from a submarine towards a nuclear power plant in California. The United States sends nuclear ballistic missiles over the Arctic and its Russian surrounding.
Consequently, Russia misuses this step and decided to launch 900 nuclear warheads towards the United States, this escalation leads to the United States’ allies and NATO allies to target the full warheads in Russia. This Day of Resurrection scenario can lead to explosions of up to a few thousand megatone from TNT within two hours. Assuming a 50 % radioactive efficiency, a global nuclear war of this size will lead to a radiological spread with a full shine of about 10^{15} watts, which is about percentage of the total shine of sunlight reflected from the Earth.
Given that the glow of the nuclear war will have unique signatures in UV rays and infrared, and last for a few hours, a distinction can be made between the glow outside the planet resulting from an immediate scenario on the occurrence of tangled data from TWEX.
For the nearby Earth, a few dozen light years, space telescopes can separate the planetary glow from the star site. Hide bright stars light is a challenge, but it is likely to be possible for dull dwarves, which is the most common type of stars.
Was any candidate candidate from the vicinity of a dwarf star near? Unfortunately, no research has yet been dedicated to finding Annie torches. There was no report on an abnormal discovery discovery with the characteristics of nuclear war.
Based on our geopolitical experience, the global nuclear war is expected to be very rare. Even if the global wars of this size are repeated once in each century of any specific lands, the discovery of an immediate strait once a year will require the monitoring of a hundred earth twins continuously. Since the glow lasts only hours of a century, the possibility of monitoring this at any specific time is one of a million.
In other words, the polls will appear in one of the million people of land that show global nuclear wars once in the century. The Milky Way galaxy is unlikely to host more than a million people from the Earth’s persistence, as global nuclear wars are repeated once in the century. The possibility of this can be evaluated using a variable from Drake equation For nuclear war, technological signatures are signed.
However, even after anchored discovery of Annie, the discovered is likely to indicate that the glow may be the result of a magnetic reintegration event in the exit exit from the outer planets. Astronomers tend to adhere to the least exotic scenario, neglecting technological alternatives, and cleaning technological anomalies under the rug of conservative interpretations. For example, when a semi-land object was reported on January 2, 2025, it was first classified as a rocky asteroid and only after matching the orbit of the Tesla Roadster-it was identified instead as a technological object.
In addition to its devastating effects on Earth, the global nuclear war will also change the chemical composition of the planet’s atmosphere, which can be investigated after many years after the war ended. This signature can be discovered for transit exoplanet lines that are directed to the orbit that passes in front of the star’s face, so that the telescope can conclude the composition of the atmosphere.
In particular, the temperature issued by the nuclear fiery balls will perform Nitrid oxide particlesIn addition to the unique radioisotopes that were released in the explosion. Long -life molecules can indicate a war that occurred a while ago, which enhances the disclosure prospects a few hours after Annie glow.
One may argue that the disclosure of Annie glow will not hang intelligence outside the ground but stupidity outside the ground, because it indicates a geopolitical tendency to self -destruction. If astronomers choose to search for Annie torches, they must determine the search effort as groups instead of SETI, because it is manifested I am looking for stupidity between the stars.
In a recent year event, I was asked about the importance of money. She made it clear that the money is important to a certain amount, as long as it buys freedom for you. Freedom, I mean the ability to follow what you enjoy. Besides that threshold, preoccupation with getting more money or using it beyond your needs takes off your freedom.
The same lesson may also apply to the technological progress of a smart civilization. Until a certain level, new technological progress enhances the length of smart organisms. But behind that threshold, advanced technologies make civilization more vulnerable to self -destruction.
Have we really crossed this threshold? Do we approach the inevitable Day of the Resurrection of a global nuclear war, as envisaged by Annie or some other catastrophe caused by artificial intelligence or robots?
To gain a better perspective, we may make a census of civilizations outside the planet and draw their life as a function of their technological level. Once we get to know the threshold of self -destruction, we must stop our technological development at this level. Without knowing the threshold, our self -driving car will fall metaphorically from the shelf, like the car in The final scene From Thelma & Louise.
