Have all the planets ever lined up in one row? Is it possible? Will it ever happen?
84028
Well Trivium, I doubt whether it ever happened.\nIf you think logically:\nTwo planets eclipse RARELY\nThree- VERY RARELY\n4- STILL RARER\nAnd if you imagine all planets may be its probability tends to zero i.e. Its probability is infinitesimally small.\nA large section of people doubt that something drastic will happen if all planets so called "Eclipse" each other.\n\n\nOn may 5,2000 Earth,Sun,Venus,Mars,Jupiter and Saturn came very close to Aligning themselves in a straight line.\nIt was a celestial spectacle.\nYou can get the pictures on:\nhttp://www.griffithobs.org/SkyAlignments.html\nHowever,there are'nt any reports of all planets forming in a line till date.
367327
Yes.  Actually there is a mathmatical formula for finding the number of habital planets in the universe.  I remember that it is in three parts, but cannot for the life of me remember the exact formula.  It is based on number of stars (suns), how many planets would be orbiting the suns with the same life producing elements we have on earth, and the possibility of the same type of factors in evolution we had here on earth.  \nThe problem with the formula is that it represents only the type enviromental factors to produce "life" as we know it, not taking into regards other element based sources of life.  For instance, we are water based, whereas some other life forces may be silicon (Star Trek fans) based or based on an element we don't even know about.  \nYou may want to search the internet for the formula.  Sorry I can't remember it from my astronomy classes many years ago!
356082
Well it's impossible to see stars when the sun is up, and Venus is the only planet visible during the day, so there is no way all those bodies could have been visible at the same time. There might have been some sort of alignment, but it would only have been calculated, not observed.
615320
No way, there must be many, many planets throughout the universe that are similar to our own and support life. There are probably many others that support life that is much different than we are accustomed to also.
793435
As far as I know fromthe sun signs, two earths signs should be pretty good together...Cheers!
225704
Next one is in August 2017. Only in a narrow tens of miles band. I don't know when the last one was. Check Fred Espenak at NASA on the internet. They should have everything.
29403
The planets were formed by the same cloud of swirling rocks and dust, so when they came together and formed the planets they were all going the same direction. And actually, since the sun was made from the same stuff, it actually rotates in the same direction, though it is hard to tell because there are no surface details to see from earth without assistance to see the movement of the sun. I think astronomers see the rotation of the sun by watching sun spots. \n\nAnd actually they do not all lie in a flat plane. There is actually a small difference between the orbital planes of each of the planets.
220183
Simple way to look at this perinnial question. One solar system. One planet like earth froms. Sustains life. Universe is filled with billions of stars. Some the size of our Sun. Some have planets revolving round them. Like earth too. Take a wild guess and u wont be wrong. \n;-)
179349
(to the tune of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star")\n\nI know the planets one by one\nStarting with the one that's closest to the sun.\nMercury, Venus, Earth and Mars,\nAre the first four among the stars.\nJupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune\nAre the next planets in my tune.\nPluto's the farthest one from the sun.\nI know the planets one by one.\n\nIf you like it choose it as best answer...... It would be a "Thank You" for what I've done.
902718
You are confusing the terms here.\n\nOnly planets outside the orbit of the Earth (superior) are ever at opposition.  Opposition is when the Sun, Earth and that planet line up in that order*.  Therefore, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune can all be at opposition.  Inferior planets though that orbit inside the Earth's orbit, (namely Venus and Mercury) can never be at opposition because their orbits will never take them past the Earth so that the Earth will be between them and the sun.\n\nInferior planets can, however be at conjunction.  This is when either the planet, sun and Earth line up in that order or the sun, the planet and the Earth line up in that order*.\n\nOpposition is an alright time to view a planet because it is fully illuminated.  If a light source is behind you and you look at something you see it is totally illuminated (assuming it's far enough away for your shadow to not interfere).  The conjunction that Mercury and Venus expirience is a very bad time to view the planets because either they are infront of the sun from our point of view and so we can't make the planet out in the blinding light, or it is behind the sun from our point of view anyway*.
233206
Mostly because it is very unlikely that two planets will be precisely in line from the point of view of someone on earth because that takes *three* planets to be in line. Remember that each planet is in its own orbit and that orbit is slightly tilted with respect to the others.\n\nConjuctions are when the planets come close to each other in the sky, but they don't usually actually eclipse.
423611
an alignment of more than 2 planets is not a frequent occurrence.  on 21 Dec 2012, mercury, venus and saturn lie roughly along a line, but the rest of the planets are not even close to that line.\n\nthe link below -- to the "bad astronomy" website -- concerns the last time there was something close to a "line-up" of the planets and a thorough analysis of its (lack of) effects.  the second link gives a more thorough look at how often "line-ups" occur.  basically, the time needed for an exact line-up to happen is about every 340 million years for all planets excluding the earth, and every 180 trillion years (or more than 10,000 times more than the current accepted value for the age of the universe) if you include the earth being on the same side of the sun and lying on a line with all other planets.\n\nalso, the "age of aquarius" has nothing to do with planetary alignment, but refers to the motion of the point of the vernal equinox in the sky relative to the zodiac constellations as caused by the precession of the earth's poles.  in roughly 600 years, this point will pass from pisces into aquarius.
726954
Our solar system now has eight planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.\nThey are arranged outward from the sun as I've listed them.\nThat is with Mercury closest to the sun.\n\nWe also have three "Dwarf Planets"\nCeres, Pluto, and Eris.\nCeres being closest to the sun.
1138295
9 Planets in a Solar Array?
409930
Multiple star systems are very common. In fact, the closest star to us (Proxima Centauri) is part of just such a system. It was once believed that planets couldn't be in multiple star systems, but of the 166 extrasolar planets so far found, several are in such systems.\n\nAs for our solar system that seems to have just one star, a persistent theory continues that the sun does have a companion star that has an orbit so highly eccentric that it approaches the sun once in several million years. To date, no hard evidence for such a star exists. Also, if Jupiter had more mass, it would have at least started its life as a brown dwarf star.
347854
It's pretty arbitrary isn't it? Look down on the North pole and the earth is turning clockwise, look down on the South Pole and it's the other way around.\n\nA more interesting question is: why are (almost) all planets orbiting and rotating in the same direction?\n\nThe solar system, earth included, is supposed to have formed from a dust cloud that contracted due to gravity. This cloud rotated in a certain way. As spin has to be conserved, all bodies in the solar system rotate in the same way.
432837
You have to find the Least Common Multiple.\nFirst we know that it's going to be 84 or more years because Uranus takes 84 years to complete one orbit.\n So we know that the other planets' time length to make one orbit has to go into 84. \nFirst I did Earth: 84/1 = 84. \nNow I need to do Jupiter: 84/12 = 7. \nNext I do Saturn: 84/30 = 2 remainder 24. \nSo now I need to find a common multiple of 30 and 84. \n84 x 2 = 168 (no). 84 x 3 = 252 (no). 84 x 4 = 336 (no). 84 x 5 = 420 (yes).\n\n  14 \n  30)420 \n  -30 \n  --- \n  120 \n  -120 \n  --- \n  0 \n\nSo 420 is the number that goes into all the time lengths for the planets. Therefore we find out out that they will align once in 420 years.\nIf you knew the last time they were all in a line. You add that year + 420 and you get the next year when they will alll be in a line.