Held up by the big questions.
By Fleur
@Fleura (29120)
United Kingdom
April 30, 2021 5:22am CST
Every morning the girls come for a ‘morning cuddle’ before we all get up and start rushing around to get ready for school. Usually just a few minutes.
But this morning, just as we were getting up, Little One asked ‘Where did the water on Earth come from?’
Such a simple little question. But the answer, of course, is far from simple. It’s the sort of thing that continues to tax the minds of great physicists (and probably, theologians too) and whatever theories they come up with can never be proven one way or another.
So before even getting dressed we had discussed the Big Bang theory, the periodic table, nuclear fusion, atomic structure, and the cooling of the Earth’s crust, among other things.
Feeding the chickens did seem rather mundane after that.
All rights reserved. © Text and image copyright Fleur 2021.
12 people like this
12 responses
@xFiacre (12593)
• Ireland
30 Apr 21
@Fleura My job when I was a child in Africa was to feed the chickens and ducks. My pet hen, Audrey, used to lay an egg on top of my wardrobe every morning. My brother’s hen, Heather, laid hers in the living room fireplace. I’ll feed hens any day.
1 person likes this
@sharonelton (24949)
• Lichfield, England
30 Apr 21
Why don't you just tell them the truth? God created it!
3 people like this
@sharonelton (24949)
• Lichfield, England
30 Apr 21
@Fleura Well, it is the truth.
2 people like this
@DaddyEvil (137145)
• United States
30 Apr 21
*sigh* I miss the cuddling and the questions that made me think before I could answer.
Why do so many people, looking through the other responses, want to give a(n)... unscientific response? (I like the theory that water came from the comets bombarding the earth while it was still forming.)
2 people like this
@DaddyEvil (137145)
• United States
30 Apr 21
@Fleura I was just told, on another discussion, that the earth isn't millions of years old. I agreed and said it was 4.8 billion years old. Then the person informed me that couldn't be true...
I'm scared to ask how old the person believes the earth really is... 
2 people like this
@mildredtabitha (16051)
• Nairobi, Kenya
30 Apr 21
You should have discussed about Noah too, how it rained for 40 days and night and the land got separated and now we have continents.
2 people like this
@Fleura (29120)
• United Kingdom
30 Apr 21
@mildredtabitha Yes, it should be billion 
1 person likes this
@mildredtabitha (16051)
• Nairobi, Kenya
30 Apr 21
@Fleura mmmhh... Okay. But saying" million years" is a little exaggerated
1 person likes this
@msdivkar (23359)
• India
30 Apr 21
Simple answer could be two gases came together during cooling down process after the big bang and formed water but the question still remains why it only happened on this planet and why it did not happen on others formed at the same time. Simple answer could be mystery of creator of universe.
2 people like this
@Fleura (29120)
• United Kingdom
30 Apr 21
Exactly - what formed the gases in the first place, why did they come together, and why not everywhere? One theory just leads to more questions. It would certainly be easier just to say it was the work of the creator - but if I don't believe that myself, how can I tell her that?
1 person likes this
@Robinhuut (457)
• Bogor, Indonesia
30 Apr 21
If in scientific theory I have read in an article that the water on Earth is thought to have come from an asteroid that fell to the Earth's surface about 4 billion years ago. European researchers claim that the original suspicion that the water on earth came from comets has been proven wrong. The water from comets was much older and heavier than the water that exists today. Meanwhile, the hydrogen isotope content in water in asteroids is similar to the levels in Earth's water today.
2 people like this
@Fleura (29120)
• United Kingdom
30 Apr 21
That's interesting, I hadn't heard that. Of course that raises the question of where did the water on the asteroid come from? And do they think that an asteroid fell to Earth carrying all the water that now exists on Earth? For example as a giant iceberg?
@Robinhuut (457)
• Bogor, Indonesia
30 Apr 21
@Fleura Since August the Rosetta spacecraft has been orbiting comet 67P / Churyumow-Gerasimenko. Now the European Space Agency (ESA) researcher is publishing the first analysis of water trapped in the comet's body.
As a result, the frozen water on the Chury comet is different from the water on the Earth's surface, wrote a team of scientists led by Kathrin Altwegg of the University of Bern in the scientific journal, Science. These findings rule out comets as a source of water on Earth.
1 person likes this
