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Humanity eventually colonizes the whole solar system and experiences a time of unprecedented prosperity. An alien robotic fleet begins destroying every colony, cleaning every trace of biological/organic compounds from every planet and moon (for as-yet unknown reasons). As humanity is on the brink of collapse and the resistance in the Jovian System begins to crumble, humanity dismantles the moon and Mercury (the Aliens don't possess any type of superluminal travel) to build a complex "bubble" around Earth and a massive warp drive (Alcubierre-like warp engine) to escape the solar system.

Since there is nothing left for humanity in the solar system, they decide to make the Sun explode to protect the galaxy from this fleet.

How can humanity make the Sun explode (destroying everything inside the heliosphere) ?

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    $\begingroup$ I've heard that Trilithium inhibits nuclear fusion... $\endgroup$
    – Qami
    Jul 17, 2022 at 0:27
  • $\begingroup$ you can't if you dropped all the other matter in the solar system on the sun it would barely notice. $\endgroup$
    – John
    Jul 17, 2022 at 1:49

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Frame Challenge: What's the point?

Why make the sun explode? If the robotic fleet is a threat to the galaxy, it's presumably a Von Neumann fleet and blowing up the sun will be a pointless effort that puts an insignificant dent in its overall numbers.

If it's not a massive, galaxy spanning fleet in thousands of solar systems, it presents no threat to the galaxy. They don't have FTL. Humanity, in its current state as of the crisis, was able to effectively resist. The average distance between stars in the Milky Way is five lightyears. There's a hundred billion stars in the Milky Way. Even assuming near-c travel, the alien fleet would take forty times the age of the universe to scour the galaxy. This is not a "threat".

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    $\begingroup$ That's a good point. I was indeed thinking of a Von Neumann Fleet. But humanity would never know if it's an isolated fleet or a part of a larger swarm, and a sense of revenge could fuel the need to obliterate the fleet. By the way, thank you for correcting the horrible misspellings in my post. $\endgroup$
    – Elyo
    Jul 16, 2022 at 20:44
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    $\begingroup$ I imagine if humanity has faster-than-light travel, they'd be well aware of whether it was an isolated fleet or not, and it's hard to imagine a sense of revenge justifying annihilating the cradle of humanity. It's rather like setting your house on fire to spite home invaders. $\endgroup$
    – jdunlop
    Jul 17, 2022 at 8:34
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According to Wolfram Alpha, the sun has a gravitational binding energy of over 10^41 joules. That is many times more powerful than every nuclear weapon ever created. Directly destroying the sun probably isn't possible with materials only found in the Solar System.

Other methods can be used to shorten the sun's lifespan by redirecting its energy back to it or increasing its luminosity so it burns out quicker. These methods would still take millions if not billions of years however to destroy the Sun which means it cannot be used to affect an alien fleet. One final method to destroy the sun is to send a larger star or black hole at it and have the collision result in the Sun being "eaten" and destroyed. Other stars and black holes are outside the Solar System however.

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Test your star drive on a white dwarf

Pick a nice heavy white dwarf, with the smallest radius. Make one of those planet-sized FTL drives around it, and start it up! When the white dwarf comes out of warp inside the Sun, you'll have a prize-winning type 1a supernova to brag about.

Notes:

  • Make sure the FTL drive you use to send word to Earth is faster.
  • You'll feel a little strange when you discover the white dwarf was inhabited before you sent von Neumann probes to their system to take everything apart and carry away their star.
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  • $\begingroup$ "you discover the white dwarf was inhabited" Do you mean that one of its planets was inhabited? Isn't a star itself way too hot to have any form of life? $\endgroup$
    – Joseph Sible-Reinstate Monica
    Jul 16, 2022 at 23:56
  • $\begingroup$ I don't want to test my planetsized warp drive on a white dwarf because I want to make the sun go boom after Earth left, and your solution would mean obliterating the solar system while we are still inside $\endgroup$
    – Elyo
    Jul 17, 2022 at 7:05
  • $\begingroup$ @Joseph Hal Clement wrote some great books with that premise, but honestly, I spoke imprecisely. $\endgroup$
    – Mike Serfas
    Jul 17, 2022 at 19:41
  • $\begingroup$ @Elyo Fine then - test the drive on Earth then send it back if it works. Bonus: you can resettle Earth (and its inhabitants) in a double star system that is generally considered uninhabitable ... due to the presence of a white dwarf. $\endgroup$
    – Mike Serfas
    Jul 17, 2022 at 19:42
  • $\begingroup$ @Elyo Send warp drive to white dwarf, put it around the white dwarf, then send the star back slightly slower than a messenger warp ship that leaves at the same time. When the messenger ship arrives confirming that the white dwarf is on the way, you get Earth outta dodge with time to spare. $\endgroup$
    – Ethan Maness
    Jul 18, 2022 at 13:51

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