What would happen if the moon got closer to the earth?
At one time it was theorized that the moon formed by being literally thrown off by the earth in the days when the earth was nothing but molten rock. Somehow, people thought, the surface bulged at one point and a clump of material broke free. One problem with this theory is that extrapolating backwards from the moon’s current distance and velocity, at the time of its break from earth it would have had to be moving in its orgit at a velocity that is impossibly fast. This can’t have been the moon’s origin.
