Why and How Did Krypton Explode?

[redsycorax]

The current answer is because its radioactive uranium core became increasingly unstable until it underwent a terminal chain reaction and took the planet with it in one almighty explosion. I wonder if there are other questions that need to be answered, though. Are radioactive uranium cores scientifically plausible? According to this astrophysicist, yes, although they may well be more common in gas giants like Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune in our own planetary system. Okay, so what about superearths, terrestroid planets larger than Earth but smaller than ice giants like Uranus and Neptune? The problem is, we don't have one in our own planetary system to check out (although some astronomers theorise that the thus far undiscovered Planet Nine may be either a superearth or another ice giant in an eccentric orbit). The other issue is that barring events that excite the uranium core, uranium at a planetary core will eventually cycle through its half-lives and become inert lead. If there's any near our own planetary core, this will finish happening in two billion years, although the Earth will only remain habitable for five hundred million years. 

And then I realised something, which is that Krypton is supposed to orbit a red dwarf M star, much smaller than our own sun, and with a far smaller and closer potential habitable zone than is the case within our own or comparable G class yellow sun habitable zones. Which raises the question- given the probable closer proximity of Rao (Krypton's sun) and its moons, Wegthor and Mithen, what tidal and geophysical/ exophysical stressors might result when it came to planetary formation and development? Unlike Earth's hypothetical uranium core, might it not therefore be the case that Krypton's radioactive core might be overstimulated and stressed by Rao's closer proximity? Added to which, red dwarf suns are usually variables.  So, to summarise, my hypothesis is this- proximity to Rao required to develop and maintain sapient life and civilisation on Krypton unfortunately coincided with Krypton's core overstimulation from its adjacent sun, leading to the tragedy that destroyed the planet as the core reached critical mass- which would also have been worsened by Jax-Ur's destruction of Wegthor, which might have further, if incrementally, destabilised the planetary core. Moreover, the proximity of Rao might also have adversely affected the development of Kryptonian spaceflight, although there was a colony on Wegthor at the time of its destruction. 

So, what do you think?:

Source: www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/nuclear-planet

Additional thoughts:
(i) If Jax-Ur's destruction of Wegthor did accelerate the instability and consequent chain reaction in Krypton's core, doesn't that mean that after its destruction, legal authorities and forensic scientists in either Kandor and/or Argo City realise his contributory negligence, and therefore, wouldn't the duration of his sentence within the Phantom Zone have been prolonged as a result? Moreover, if that happened. wouldn't Jax-Ur have witnessed this? Yet he has never demonstrated any remorse or guilt for his possible complicity in his planet's destruction. Could he therefore be a psychopath? And would that also not mean that Jax-Ur's Phantom Zone sentence would have been one of the longest possible?

(ii) So why hasn't this happened to Daxam, which is a close Krypton analogue, or were the circumstances of its planetary development different, resulting in it lacking a uranium core, or having a smaller one, or being at a safer distance from its primary?

[dans]

In some story somewhere I suggested that there was exotic matter involved - matter composed of exotic particles, and so it exhibits different physical properties than normal matter. In particular, perhaps kryptonite is entirely exotic matter?

[redsycorax]

Perhaps Krypton, Rao and its planetary system are close to a white hole, which might explain any exotic matter in planetary formation? And possibly, it might also have led to distortion of planetary development in the case of Krypton (but not Daxam). The thing is, in the Superman mythos, Krypton is the only red dwarf superearth world to have exploded.

[dans]

Or maybe there was another one, Zoron, home planet of Hyperman? In any case, there might be more super earths that exploded that we aren't aware of; maybe some of them were on the far side of their stars when they exploded so the light from the flash was occluded and any debris aimed our way fell into the stars, or the light from the explosion arrived before telescopes or hasn't reached us yet? And maybe there are some red stars surrounded by debris fields...

[redsycorax]

It would depend on the intensity of the explosion. If Krypton were as close to Rao as it would have to be to be within a red dwarf habitable zone, a significant proportion of Kryptonite might have simply fallen into Rao. Some of it would have been vaporised altogether, such as matter adjacent to its planetary core. Some would be volatilised into kryptonite dust or micrometeorites, while others would achieve Rao's stellar escape velocity and go flying off into the cosmos to bedevil future Kryptonian survivors. I'm not an astrophysicist, so the math required to work out the exact proportions will have to wait for someone more qualified in that respect.

As for exploding superearths, there may well be possibilities why they haven't been detected. One is that they simply weren't inhabited by any lifeforms, or intelligent life when they were destroyed. Or any dominant species might have destroyed themselves through pandemic disease or nuclear war or antimatter weapons, or major asteroid impacts beforehand. Or they might have had difficulties in achieving interplanetary travel if my primary proximity theory is accurate. Superman, Supergirl and any other Kryptonians would give red suns a wide berth, although one suspects they could observe any such events with telescopic or x-ray vision. One would guess that this isn't commonplace though, given the psychological costs of looking on, but being powerless to intervene to prevent a repetition of the tragedy that destroyed Krypton.

[johnreiter902]

There was a fanfiction I read once, involving Luthor being sent to another universe, where he visited the alternate version of Krypton and found it had no intelligent life. He commented that it is statistically improbably for a world with such high gravity and intense solar radiation to develop intelligent life at all, let alone space-capable life.

[redsycorax]

Sounds fascinating. One might argue though that perhaps Krypton's various incarnations exist in probability sequences where that particular  combination of formative  circumstances is feasible. Or perhaps Lex just  isn't as good an astrophysicist as he thinks he is. Or perhaps planetary development details are an evolving area of science and the intricacies are beyond the current status of astrophysics and planetary formation theories, which might even exceed a supergenius like Lex Luthor, who might be extrapolating from what is currently known, or tentatively theorised, about planetary development in such circumstances.  Or perhaps the seventies story in which Superman encounters the "Sun Thrivers",  energy beings at the core of Rao who engineered the development of Krypton were less competent than they thought they might be, given the uranium core, stellar proximity peturbation and eventual chain reaction that destroyed the planet.  One problem with that, however, is the existence of other planets in Krypton's solar system. When a dying Rao and its inhabitants visited Earth's solar system back in August 1972, it didn't have its remaining planetary retinue in train. So where did Boron, Phalon, Thalon and Haron go?:


Rao and its planetary system: superman.fandom.com/wiki/Rao_System

Source: "The Sun of Superman" Superman 255 (August 1972): dc.fandom.com/wiki/Superman_Vol_1_255

[dans]

Feb 22, 2021 0:28:51 GMT johnreiter902 said:

There was a fanfiction I read once, involving Luthor being sent to another universe, where he visited the alternate version of Krypton and found it had no intelligent life. He commented that it is statistically improbably for a world with such high gravity and intense solar radiation to develop intelligent life at all, let alone space-capable life.

I am pretty sure the theories about the evolution of life have changed since then, at least about high gravity. But Rao may have been a relatively cool, radiation-free star, too... And of course, there are almost always some low probability events in almost every story...

[redsycorax]

Which is also feasible, given the existence of Antarctic City, implying that Krypton is at enough of a distance from Rao to have polar icecaps- assuming, of course, that such glaciation is natural and not the product of Kryptonian technology to cool the planet otherwise.

[dans]

There are probably endless realities where Krypton didn't develop life, but they would be pretty uninteresting to Lex... he would just be a normal genius, possibly even well-adjusted and 'good' if his Krypton didn't have life!

Of course, it is also possible that in some realities, Jor-El was able to project Krypton into the Phantom Zone before it exploded.

I wonder what a civilization stuck in the Phantom Zone would look like? No hunger, no poverty, no way to physically harm another, no physical abuse, no money (and no need for money). I suppose war would still be possible; each side could combine their mental powers and mentally assault the other side, but to what end? What do <they> have that <we> need? It would be hard to do experiments without tools, but their possibilities for observation would be endless - and with all eternity to study in, maybe they would develop mental tools that would allow them to manipulate the outside universe. Maybe even develop the mental power needed to exit the Zone! I suspect tourism would become the eternal pastime of a large part of the population, and voyeurism, and then storytelling, two of the other most popular occupations.

I wonder how far away someone in the Zone can sense someone else? How fast can they travel? How does moving in the Zone correspond to movement in the real universe? Are Zone inhabitants limited to the same visual electromagnetic range as humans? How do they see anything at all, actually - in order to see, your eyes have to actually absorb photons; if your eyes are immaterial, how does that happen?

[johnreiter902]

In an Earth-S story, we learned that the Jor-El of Earth-S sent Krypton into the Phantom Zone. Your speculation helps picture what that Krypton might be like

The biggest issue is that people in the zone do not age. A 2 year old child when krypton exploded will still be 2 years old, even centuries later.

[johnreiter902]

Feb 22, 2021 2:09:03 GMT dans said:

How does moving in the Zone correspond to movement in the real universe?

Most of your questions I'm not certain of off the top of my head. However, it seems pretty clear that the Zone is "smaller" than our dimension, and you can travel vast distances in our dimension in little or not time in the Zone (similar to traveling through hyperspace)

It seems like, when Zoners are not specifically focusing on earth, they just see a misty void. When they focus their thoughts on Earth's dimension, the mist clears and they see the world around them as if they were an intangible ghost.

[redsycorax]

For that matter, there are probably also endless alternate Earths where life never developed, due to astrophysical or biochemical variables differing from those Earths where it did. Which does raise some interestng questions about colonisation of those vacant Earths from others in the DC multiverse.

[dans]

Feb 22, 2021 3:02:41 GMT redsycorax said:

For that matter, there are probably also endless alternate Earths where life never developed, due to astrophysical or biochemical variables differing from those Earths where it did. Which does raise some interesting questions about colonisation of those vacant Earths from others in the DC multiverse.

other than being the same size as an inhabited Earth, many of those alternate Earths would be more like Venus and not worth the effort.

[redsycorax]

Or a larger version of Mars, depending on the distance from the Sun. However, back to the Krypton explosion thread. Which does lead one to wonder what happened to Krypton-X, if Jor-El of Krypton-S sent the whole world into the Phantom Zone. Was it uninhabited, did it not exist, did all its inhabitants perish, did Jor-El and Lara send Kal elsewhere, or did it fail to explode at all?