See title. This is a shower thought that popped into me while slowly waking up. I’m thinking, what if due to e.g. gravitational shenanigans, the pull on a planet is such that a planet stands relatively motionless in a fixed position towards its star?
Is that possible or am I forgetting some astronomy basics?
I think the closest thing to what you’re talking about is a Lagrange Point
Yeah, this seems to be the closest. Or as another in the thread answered, inbetween two parent bodies. Would probably not be stable for that long, though…
Yeah, that doesn’t really work. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-body_problem
Ah yes, the hyperintelligent aliens send sentient subatomic particles to fuck everything up, don’t they…
That’s this link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three-Body_Problem_(novel)
Lagrange points L4 and L5 are stable (think trojan asteroids), L1, L2 and L3 are unstable and require some propellant for station keeping (think James Webb).