For some reason, I seem to get along with much less sleep than the 8 hours my sainted mother recommended. I go to sleep at 10-11 PM, and typically wake at 2-3 AM, fully rested and ready to think about interesting things (but avoiding worrisome ones).
As a Physical Chemist I'm equipped to understand the macrocosmos and the microcosmos. I read a lot and ask myself questions never asked before. I then put things together that have never been joined before.
For instance, "Venus is Earth's sister planet, but she was born too close to the sun and lost her water - and life, while we retained our water and generated life. But we were both born from the same cloud of stardust/gasdust.
Our spacecraft have been to Venus and they find that the atmosphere is composed of 89 atmospheres of carbon dioxide, CO2, and 3 atm of nitrogen, N2. From this I infer that when Earth was formed 4.6 Billion years ago, we probably had a similar atmosphere, slightly denser because we are larger. Let's say Earth had 100 atm of CO2 and 3 of nitrogen. It is hard to concieve of an atmosphere 100 times as dense as we have today. A 1mph wind would blow you over!
If Earth started with such a large quantity of CO2, where did we put it?
This and other questions will be the subject of this blog.
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