A cataclysm in the dyson sphere

I was wondering what would happen if a meteor hit a dyson sphere outside of it hard enough to create a "hole" in it. Would the inhabitants see stars through it? Would the centrifugal force suck the atmosphere outside? I know the sphere would probably have some form of protection against meteors, but let's say it failed or the civilizations inside the sphere regressed and forgot what their world actually is, so the mechanisms protecting the sphere shut of after some time.

Also another question concerning gravity. Let's say artificial gravity in the sphere would be caused by it spinning around the "equator", would that mean that the more you'd travel north or south from it, the smaller the gravity would be? And on the "Poles" the gravity would be created solely by the heaviness of the sphere layer underneath?

A Dyson shell as you are describing, with people walking all around the inner surface of the thing, will require artificial gravity (i.e. magic), so what would happen in this situation is governed by however you decide that kind of technology works.

EDIT: Durr, I didn't read your whole post :P

Well, if you are relying purely on spinning to provide gravity, then the further away you get from the equator, the less the gravity, yes. I suppose you could use the very-low-gravity poles as massive solar power farms, with the equators being the habitation sections.

In Ringworld, set on... well, a ringworld (imagine just the equator section of a Dyson shell, spinning around a star), there is a huge permanent storm caused by an impact - basically air being sucked out. It looks like a giant eye. Notably, the impact also created a huge mountain; if the asteroid had been moving faster when it crashed into the ringworld, the top of the 'mountain' would have been higher than the atmosphere, so no air would be lost.

A Dyson shell is a mind-bogglingly huge structure, so it would take a very long time to deplete the air from the shell. Of course, it would completely wreck the nearby area.

edited 21st May '13 3:24:56 AM by imadinosaur

For starters, a Dyson sphere is not actually a hollow sphere with people living inside. It is layers and layers of multiple installations around a star, designed to collect all of the star's energy output. So, a "hole" would just be the destruction of one of the installations, and would likely not affect the inhabitants of the other stations. What you are describing is closer to a Hollow World, where there is an entire concave world built around a central sun, and it has entirely different circumstances to consider.

As for the gravity, if a hollow world creates centrifugal force by rotating to simulate gravity, it is highly likely people would not actually leave the narrow bands where gravity is comfortable enough for living, except scientific or maintenance purposes, and the people responsible for such would have special training and equipment to handle the lower gravity near the poles.

Wouldn't it be possible it taken million years into the future, for some species to adapt to more low-gravity conditions? So animals and intelligent beings would be bigger and heavier the more north you went?

That, or genetic engineering. I imagine it would look something like a forest of very tall trees, with long lengths of seaweed trailing from the uppermost branches, and various animals would propel themselves by swinging from tree to tree. And flying, of course.

You might have more success with this thread if you asked a mod to move it to "world building".

Anyway, everything depends upon the relative sizes of the sphere and asteroid (not "meteor"). Anything could happen, from the asteroid rebounding off the outside of the shell to the complete collapse of the entire sphere, or anything in between. It seems rather unlikely to me that it would simply punch a neat hole in it, like a bullet. The end result would likely be much messier.

Artificial Gravity is actually a thing that exists right now and is a serious avenue of scientific research as part of long-term space exploration.

No magic about it.

First of all in order to answer your question you have to understand what Dyson sphere actually is and how it works. Dyson sphere as it is described in almost all works of science fiction (hollow solid shell) is impossible to build and maintain not to mention useless and ineffective. You see First of all there is question of size. In order to maintain temperatures similar to those found on earth you have to make Dyson sphere with diameter equal of the diameter of earths orbit (cca 300 million kilometers because Earths orbit is not a circle) to build the shell one meter thick you need 9.1 * 10^26 kg that is slightly less than mass of Jupiter the biggest planet in Sol. Then you have to deal with gravity, because of shell theorem the shell would provide no gravity by itself and you would have to give it a rotation so that stuff wouldn't drift of. This causes additional problem because said force would be higher around equator and everything would move towards it. If everything this is not enough you would have to constantly monitor shells position in relation to star itself again because of shell theorem.If you did not the star would hit it eventualy.

All things considered the Dyson sphere shell is impossible and any science fiction that contains it can not claim to be even slightly accurate.

Dyson swarm on the other hand or several banks orbitals are much more plausible and would be even much more interesting as a setting for your story. Because Dyson shell is impossible I wont discuss possible catastrophe but I will tell you what would happen if banks orbital was damaged.

First of all it would be destabilized, how much would depend on scale of said damage. Its orbit could deteriorate and massive earthquakes would wreck its surface, after that there would be atmospheric destabilization. First pressure wave like after big explosion then hurricanes and global storms of cataclysmic proportions as air would be sucked into free space due to centrifugal force. Air pressure would decrease and temperatures would get more extreme. Destabilization would get gradually worse if no one interfered causing widespread damage. The atmospheric effects would be worse near the epicenter and eventually unsurvivable for unprotected human. How much time would it take for said orbital to be unlivable. That depends on size and design but it could be anywhere from days to months.

I hope this helps. If you want to know more about orbital habitats go to Orions arm project website. They have more than enough resources there.