Since I started this project in 2021, hundreds of people from all over the world have had a go at answering the main question: “If 1st January is when the Earth formed and 31st December is when it will be consumed by the Sun, what would today’s date be on this imaginary calendar?“
Let’s remember that this timeline is just an illustration. It can’t be ‘correct’ because it assumes that the Earth will be absorbed by our dying Sun on a specific date – here one moment and gone the next. We can be pretty sure that won’t be the case: rather that its demise will be a gradual process lasting many millions of years. The same goes for the formation of Earth of course – we now know it didn’t happen on 22 October 4004 BCE, as the Ussher Chronology long held. On top of this, the current estimations of when the Earth will cease to be vary enormously.
However, now that all the small print is out of the way, here’s how close participants so far have got to “today’s date” of 17 May on this timeline:
There’s a fair spread across the whole year, but the majority get it ‘right’: somewhere in the middle. Earth has been around for a long time, but has still got a lot of future ahead of it. Bravo! And many thanks to everyone who has taken part.