Moon May Not Be As Dead As We Thought 120
rivin2e writes "It would seem our neighbor, the moon, has something hidden below the surface. 'Images collected by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter hints the moon has probably seen tectonic activity within the last 50 million years.' It would appear from the article that the moon is changing a lot more than we think, even if it doesn't seem like it. I, for one, am still waiting for that big black obelisk to be dug up." From NASA's press release: "A team of researchers analyzing high-resolution images obtained by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) show small, narrow trenches typically much longer than they are wide. This indicates the lunar crust is being pulled apart at these locations. These linear valleys, known as graben, form when the moon's crust stretches, breaks and drops down along two bounding faults. A handful of these graben systems have been found across the lunar surface."
Re:So "Being Alive" is defined as what? (Score:4, Informative)
Geologically, "live" means active and "dead," or "extinct" means inactive (as in a dead or extinct volcano). This terminology has been used for a long time (decades, if not centuries) and is reasonably expressive.
By the way, electrical engineering has live wires, using the same analogy. Best not to touch them.
Re:No volcanos (Score:4, Informative)
...the moon has none, as long as we've been observing it.
Don't be so sure [columbia.edu].
The Moon has shallow (non-tidal) Moonquakes [nasa.gov]. No one knows much about their causes.
No other solar system body (except, of course, for the Earth) has had any seismological data at all. (One of the Viking landers had a working seismometer; it was totally swamped by wind vibrations; at most it may have detected the grand total of one Marsquake, but that's not clear.)
Re:No volcanos (Score:4, Informative)
Earth has 2-5 eruptions each year
That's off by a factor of ten.
From wikipedia [wikipedia.org]: "Presently there are about 500 active volcanoes in the world – the majority following along the Pacific 'Ring of Fire' – and around 50 of these erupt each year.[6] The United States is home to 50 active volcanoes.[7] There are more than 1,500 potentially active volcanoes.[8] An estimated 500 million people live near active volcanoes.[9]"