The moon is solid, without any gooey core like the Earth has. The moon has no atmosphere. Therefore I imagine that the moon must ring like a giant space gong every time a meteor hits it, and go on ringing. Probably differential cooling and heating from the sun cause it to ring as well. Without core goo or atmosphere, there is nothing to quell the ring.

There needs to be some way to translate this ring (no doubt of very low frequency) into a higher frequency so all can enjoy. I wonder if there will be different frequencies or just different volumes at the same frequency?
-- bungston, Mar 28 2004

Asteroseismology http://www.ster.kul...seism/index_en.html
Star quality [suctionpad, Oct 05 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004]

Laser listener http://www.spy-equi...stening-device.html
With one of these, maybe we can listen from here. [NoOneYouKnow, Jun 17 2006]

The music of the spheres, I guess - I'll put it with the whale songs!
-- DrCurry, Mar 28 2004


I don't understand this. If it were ringing wouldn't the vibrations cause all of the loose dust of the crater walls to settle? I thought that the impacts could be dated by seeing which craters overlapped one another just because there have been no other changes to the Moons surface.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 29 2004


//Without core goo or atmosphere, there is nothing to quell the ring.//

The ring will die away eventually - even the ring of an idealised system will die away exponentially. The exponential factor is a property of the material. I have no idea what the moons Q-factor is.

A system of transducers over a large area should do the trick.
-- Detly, Mar 29 2004


"In space, noone can hear you ring."
-- Cedar Park, Mar 29 2004


Hang on!

//Sound waves exist as variations of pressure in a medium such as air. They are created by the vibration of an object, which causes the air surrounding it to vibrate. The vibrating air then causes the human eardrum to vibrate, which the brain interprets as sound.//not my words...from a scientificky site.

Without atmosphere there is nothing to make it ring at all.
-- squeak, Mar 29 2004


This is another good argument to hollow out the moon.
-- kropotkin, Mar 29 2004


Asteroseismologists use the oscillations of stars to study their internal structure [link]. Throw in the moon and a few planets (metaphorically) and you could have an orchestra.
-- suctionpad, Mar 29 2004


//wouldn't the vibrations cause all of the loose dust of the crater walls to settle?//

I think the moon probably has too low a frequency to shake the dust. Linked is an article on earth vibrations as well.
-- bungston, Mar 29 2004


//Without atmosphere there is nothing to make it ring at all.//

Not quite. When we hear sounds, we detect the vibration of the air - but really, any system of matter can vibrate. A bell in space will ring if struck, it just won't be heard by us. The idea is to make it heard by us.
-- Detly, Mar 29 2004


Yes – the vibrations would eventually just dissipate as heat.

Maybe a laser interferometry system would work for this...
-- Detly, Nov 12 2004


Would you get that? The moon is ringing.

But it would only ring in one key. Seems it would get monotonous after the first thousand or so years.
-- nihilo, Jun 13 2006


<conspiracy theory>Perhaps this is the cause of the Hum...</conspiracy theory>
-- dbmag9, Jun 14 2006


My associate here pointed out that from the vantagepoint of the Earth, the movement of the moon would cause a doppler effect as regards the pitch of the ring, rising as it approached the listeners vantagepoint and falling as it receded.
-- bungston, Jun 14 2006


Where do I cut a personal check for this? I'm not sure enough of our tax dollars will go toward installing audio transponders ON THE MOON.

Fish bones.
-- thekohser, Jun 15 2006


I suppose the moons of jupiter are out then too. I guess we can use that $94.5 billion to pay for something else.
-- bungston, Jun 15 2006


If you had one of those laser listening thingies (see link), maybe you wouldn't have to launch something to the moon to do this. You could just listen from here.
-- NoOneYouKnow, Jun 17 2006


Very nice. I had been pondering this as well. One would need to bounce the laser off a large and solid rock. I suspect dust and rubble might mute the lunar vibration.
-- bungston, Jun 17 2006



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