Simple Physics and Integrators Accurately Reproduce Mercury Instability Statistics

The long-term stability of the Solar System is an issue significant scientific and philosophical interest. mechanism leading to instability Mercury's eccentricity being pumped up so high that Mercury either collides with Venus or scattered into Sun. Previously, only three five-billion-year $N$-body ensembles thousands simulations have been run assess stability. We generate two additional ensembles, each 2750 members, make them publicly available at \texttt{https://archive.org/details/@dorianabbot}. find accurate statistics can be obtained by (1) including Sun 8 planets, (2) using a simple Wisdom-Holman scheme without correctors, (3) basic representation general relativity, (4) time step 3.16 days. By combining our previous we form 9,601-member ensemble ensembles. In this logarithm frequency event increases linearly between 1.3 5 Gyr, suggesting single responsible for instabilities in range becomes more active as progresses. Our work provides robust estimate over next five billion years, outlines methodologies may useful exoplanet system investigations, large integrations serve testbeds theoretical ideas well training sets artificial intelligence schemes.