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Comment by lettergram | Hacker News Reader

Even stranger, our sun has collapsed and been rebuilt at least once (estimates are 3 times). Makes you wonder how many civilizations could have been built.

More specifically to your comment, even on our planet, the evidence of civilization would be hard to find if there was a civilization several million or even a few hundred thousand years ago.

"Dust to dust"

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Our sun has collapsed and been rebuilt at least once?

Google search for "sun collapsed rebuilt 3 times" lists Stonehenge, which seems to indicate Google can't find anything on the subject. I really don't understand what you're saying.

Can you please elaborate?

I think it's a reference to the supernova that occurred before our sun existed, which created the seed material for the sun to form from. It had to have happened because there are heavy elements on earth that only form in a supernova.

You can probably determinate the number of supernovas/hypernova/etc that happened before the sun by analyzing the proportions of different elements in the solar system and then use the various equations to compute how many explosions you would need to create the heavy elements (heavier than iron) that are observable since they are mostly created in these situations.

You probably can get these equations by analyzing nebula composition and the type of star which was there.

Also, the type of star gives an indication of it's history.

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