Moon rotation direction

It's actually quite the opposite. Of all large moons in the solar system, only one (Triton) has a retrograde orbit (opposite to its planet's rotation). All other large moons have prograde orbits (same direction as its planet's rotation).

There are a large number of moons with retorgrade orbits around Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus, but all of them are small captured asteroids and such, not genuine moons as we think of them.

It is theorized that Triton is a captured Kuiper Belt object (like Pluto and recently discovered planetlike objects further beyond), and will eventually collide with Neptune or be destroyed (becoming a ring) due to its slowly decaying retrograde orbit.

Actually, due to.. can't remember the name of the force, tidal something (tide locking?), moons orbit the same direction a planet turns, and eventually, the rotation of the planet will become the same as the orbit of the moon. The earth's day is very slowly (we're talking something on the level of a few seconds since man's existance, though I don't know the exact numbers) extending until it becomes tide locked with the moon, and the moon is already tide locked with the earth.

earth's day is very slowly (...) extending until it becomes tide locked with the moon, and the moon is already tide locked with the earth.

Huh? How can the moon be tide locked to the earth, but the earth NOT be tidelocked to the moon. PLz explain.

The Earth is bigger, has more rotational momentum, and thus takes longer to "tidelock".

Popup Target, actually the rotational and orbital direction is not generally due to tides for large moons (of gas planets) but rather due to the fact that they formed in the same accretion disk... or so it is said in the legends of my people. If small (captured) moons orbit in the same direction as the planet rotates, I guess that might be tidal.

That's what I thought, it looked weird to me anyway. Can we get that fixed to spin the other way?

Though a few going the other way would look cool, as well as rings & moons at odd angles every now & then.

Actually, that was floating around in the back of my mind as well, but I could remember tide-lock pre-caffine, but "accretion disk?" My mind doesn't want to get out of bed some mornings, and refuses to do so until long after the body in some cases

Wait, isn't the planet supposed to become tidelocked with the sun? Not the moon? (That way days will last indefinately. How would we evolve for that? When would we sleep?)

Wait, isn't the planet supposed to become tidelocked with the sun? Not the moon? (That way days will last indefinately. How would we evolve for that? When would we sleep?)

By the time that happens the sun is allready out of fuel, if it happens... And even if that's not so, when one side of the earth would face the sun for ever it would get pretty hot while the dark side would freeze...

The tidal influences of the Earth's moon is significantly greater than that of the Sun due to the proximity of the moon, so I don't think that's going to happen any time before the heat death of the universe.

Well, as the sun will die before the rest of the universe (assuming heat death), I don't think humans will really care if tidelock to the sun occurs in a few billion years.

Unless we collonize the rest of the galaxy. Then we would get to survive the death of the solar system!

Oh, and how would the ecosystem adapt to a really hot/cold planet? There are certainly life forms that would survive it.

Wait, isn't the planet supposed to become tidelocked with the sun?

Mercury is tidelocked with the sun.

Well, I read recently that scientists are reevaluating the possibilities of tidally locked planets orbiting red dwarves having life -- apparently it has something to do with weather systems regulating the temperature of the planet to a fair extent? Indeed, it'd be pretty hostile but not impossible for such a world to be inhabitable or even thriving with life.

Unless we collonize the rest of the galaxy. Then we would get to survive the death of the solar system

Yeah, but by that point, I don't think we would really care what happened to Earth. We might not even remember why Earth was special.