Our home planet may be the most treasured topographic point we know , but it is n’t priceless . land ’s resources and the value they put up to humans add together up to some prodigious , touchable cost . Our species may never have to worry about buying or sell the world , but thinking of it in terminal figure of concrete numbers can help us better empathize its note value . Now , asTreehuggerreports , one scientist has develop a special formula that allow us to do just that .
According to calculations made in 2020 byDr . Greg Laughlin , now a prof of uranology at Yale University , Earth is deserving roughly $ 5 quadrillion ( or $ 5,000,000,000,000,000 ) . He add up up with that cost after gauge the satellite ’s mass , temperature , long time , and other factors that now correlate to its ability to maintain aliveness .
To accent just how worthful Earth is , Laughlin also estimated the Charles Frederick Worth of other planet in oursolar systemaccording to their ability to bring home the bacon imagination for living thing . Our nearest neighbour , Mars , costs $ 16,000 , which is a lot less than the current fair price for aused elevator car . But that ’s a fortune compared toVenus , which he appraised at the meager value of one centime . Maybe Venus ’s atmosphere , which is 96 percent C dioxide , and its224 mph windshave something to do with it .
Laughlin does n’t expect these numbers to have applications in the real earth . Rather , he hop they will cheer people to better appreciate the only home they know . He ’s not the first person to put a massive , conjectural monetary value tag on something just for fun . The cost of the Death Star fromStar Warshas been calculated at $ 852 quadrillion — many time Laughlin ’s estimate for Earth .
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A reading of this story was published in 2020 ; it has been update for 2023 .
