Saturn's Rings May Be Very Old

Kristina from Science News writes "Combining computer simulations with data about the way starlight shines through Saturn's rings suggests the individual grains are big and thus could have been around a good 4 billion years, not the mere 10 million to 100 million previously suspected. What may have thrown earlier observations off is the chance that the grains aren't evenly distributed, but clump here and spread out there."

I think it's cool...

[davidangel]

that Saturn's rings are governed by Shepherd Moons.

if there that old...

[Coraon]

then who knows whats floating around in those rings, there might be some good clues to the nature of this star systems construction in there...

Re:Evenly distributed?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know how to say this nicely, so I'll be blunt. You're a crackpot. Please don't take that bad, but you sound exactly like so many people who say, "I don't understand the math, but physics is wrong and I know better." Check out Act III [thislife.org]

You obviously don't understand the first thing about the physics you claim is false. Rubber sheets? That's just a way of explaining it to children. It's not the actual model. Discs form because angular momentum [wikipedia.org] is conserved and nothing sweeps thing into a larger body (moon, etc). There's no need for changing the rules of gravity, which have been verified to an insane degree within our own solar system. Sure there's potential problems with gravity on larger scales, maybe you're right for galaxies and bigger, but not for Saturn.