Thunderbolts of the Gods

[Dancing David]

Thank you Dancing David.

May I ask the same question as I asked sol invictus?

For the purposes of our study, how do you decide what constitutes the Sun's 'behavior'?

For example, how pertinent are data from space probes such as Cluster (I can't put a link to the Cluster website yet, as I'm not up to 15 posts; Cluster takes direct measurements of various aspects of the plasma it is immersed in)? what about historical records on the numbers of visible sunspots? or what the researchers who write up their results call neutrinos, from various underground detectors? or the amount of helium-3 found in the lunar soil samples returned by various Apollo missions?

To what extent can - or should - 'observations' be distinguished from 'evidence'?

(to be continued)

The meaning of observation is part of the evidentiary process. the provenance and validity are sperate issues. Report of unicorn are somewhat related to a rhinocerous, so the there is a thread of truth but low validity.

Why do you ask, observations are observations and are part of evidence.

 

[The Man]

Of course I don't even understand how an Ion drive works, much less if that paper is correct.

Ion propulsion, is not that difficult to understand and is based on Newton’s third law “For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction” the same as with chemical propulsion. One of the primary differences between chemical and ion propulsion is that in chemical propulsion both the fuel and an oxidizer must be carried. In ion propulsion you carry only fuel reducing your total load and ion thrusters have a higher specific impulse (or increased thruster efficiently) making better use of the fuel carried. Ion drives also have fewer parts making them inherently more reliable, easier to repair or replace (in a manned mission), and generally smaller then chemical thrusters (again reducing overall load). One of the main drawbacks of ion thrusters is their low thrust or propulsive force. So it can take a long time to accelerate or decelerate using an ion drive. Gravity assist trajectories and aero-braking at the destination can help compensate for that drawback but also increase travel time and overall mission risk. The other main drawback of ion thrusters is the high power requirement to drive the thruster (compared to chemical thrusters). A nuclear fission power source is generally used to supply that power.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_engines

 

[DeiRenDopa]

Hi I am acquiring that list at home, but the argument goes like this and does not need articles to support it, bad ideas are still bad ideas.

If there is an alleged sample of QSOs that are within a certain arc radius of galactic cores that is cool, but because it is a statistical sort of beast that raises the following questions:

(rest of post omitted)

As I understand it, there are also knotty issues to do with "QSOs".

Back when they (or 'quasars') were discovered, they seemed very rare, only a few per tens of degrees of sky. It was about this time that Arp (and others) first wrote papers about quasar (or QSO) alignments across active or peculiar galaxies (if I remember correctly).

Then more were discovered, and more, and more, and more. Arp and fellow travellers (shall we say) changed their methodology, and their statistical calculations too, but (as far as I know) didn't revisit their first papers to see if the specific 'alignments' they first wrote about still made sense, in light of the (now) much larger numbers of quasars.

Then some x-ray sources were found to be quasars too.

Then some objects that weren't originally quasars (or QSOs) got roped into the bucket - BL Lac objects, blazars, type 2 quasars, Seyferts, ... and the unified AGN model was published.

I think, if you follow the history of Arp's (and others') work on this, you will find little revisiting of old work, in light of new data ... if only because a million quasars (or QSOs) across the whole sky tells a very different story about alignments (to take just one example) than if there are only a hundred or so.

'ULXs' (ultra-luminous x-ray sources) and their apparent high density near certain local spiral galaxies is a tiny snapshot: even with gravitational lensing, if it turned out that most of these were indeed quasars (or QSOs), then it would seem surprising ... so many more quasars near this large, local galaxy than in random patches of sky! So at least some quasars must be local, and ejected from this active spiral galaxy, right?

Of course that's the wrong lesson to learn ... it turns out most of the ULXs are, indeed, obscured AGNs ... and that they considerably outnumber the quasars (or QSOs) detectable with ordinary telescopes.

 

[DeiRenDopa]

The meaning of observation is part of the evidentiary process. the provenance and validity are sperate issues. Report of unicorn are somewhat related to a rhinocerous, so the there is a thread of truth but low validity.

Why do you ask, observations are observations and are part of evidence.

Thanks for this (an answer to the question about the relationship between 'observations' and 'evidence').

In the case of the question 'what powers the Sun?', is there legitimate evidence beyond observations of the Sun?

Specifically, how legitimate - as evidence with respect to the Sun's behaviour as it pertains to the question being discussed - is the data from the Cluster satellites? the reports from the teams who worked with underground neutrino detectors? the data from those who analysed returned lunar soil samples for helium-3?

 

[DeiRenDopa]

What do I do? Sometimes I start a topic about it, but usually I do some more research, or ask in a topic already going. Or just blank it out of my mind completely, because who needs any more stress.



That is an extremely good question. (Which is code for "I have no clue on how to answer it").

On matters that actually effect me, I tend to discuss it in real life, with others also effected by the matter. For those intellectual issues which really don't matter, well, that is what th Internet is for!

In regards to the sun being powered by electric currents, I just can't imagine how that can be. How it could work. But the unsolved issues around the sun do make it an area of interest, in the philosophical sense.

I feel the same way about giant magnetic fields, charged particles, ions, solar wind, solar flares, ejections, coronal heating and x-rays shooting out of the sun's poles. There are more questions than answers when it comes to the sun.

I tend to agree with those pointing out electrons can't be flowing in, when everything else is flowing out. But then we get a link to ions drives and see that such a thing can occur, and everything goes back into more questions.


















Of course I don't even understand how an Ion drive works, much less if that paper is correct.

Thanks for this, robinson.

It seems that you let your intuitive feel for the goodness, or rightness, or credibility of the answers, as written, be a guide, at least in respect of the Sun's behaviour and the question of what powers it ... if I may be so bold as to summarise in my own words.

If that is so, what are some effective ways that folk posting one 'side' or the other, on the question of what powers the Sun, could couch what they write to better appeal to your intuitive senses? Say, for example, how could BeAChooser make the case, for you, for the Sun being powered, at least in large part, by its connection to the electrical circuitry of the galaxy? Or how could Ziggurat make the case, for you, that it is powered by fusion in its core?

 

[Ziggurat]

Back when they (or 'quasars') were discovered, they seemed very rare, only a few per tens of degrees of sky. It was about this time that Arp (and others) first wrote papers about quasar (or QSO) alignments across active or peculiar galaxies (if I remember correctly).

Then more were discovered, and more, and more, and more. Arp and fellow travellers (shall we say) changed their methodology, and their statistical calculations too, but (as far as I know) didn't revisit their first papers to see if the specific 'alignments' they first wrote about still made sense, in light of the (now) much larger numbers of quasars.

This reminds me a little of something someone (might have been BAC) mentioned in one of these threads: that very heavy but close in planets seemed far too common among extrasolar planets than standard planetary evolution models would predict. The problem with that statement, of course, is that those are exactly the sort of planets which are easiest to detect, so their frequency among detected extrasolar planets doesn't tell us what their frequency among all extrasolar planets is.

And I can't help but wonder if similar things were happening with quasars. If people spent more time looking at nearby galaxies, wouldn't it be more likely to detect other objects like quasars where they're already looking than in areas that they don't spend as much time observing? I don't know how you correct for that sort of effect except to do a uniform survey of some patch of sky and ignore any and all quasars which were not detected by the survey even if you know they're there.

 

[The Man]

I stand by that statement, it is largely correct. Capacitance is a differential concept. The capacitance of the Earth with respect to what? The moon? Pluto? All of the planets? The sun? Each area you choose will give a different value. Maybe it is you that does not understand the concept of capacitance.

Yes, Capacitance is a charge differential concept, that part of your statement is correct as is your statement that other celestial bodies are likely have different capacitances, which would be measured in Farads ( Charge / Volt or Coulomb² / Newton Meter). However, in order to utilize a capacitor in an electrical circuit you need isolated conductive attachments to each of the charged plates. Where is the conductive attachment to the Earths surface from some other celestial body or bodies that passes through the charged atmosphere and is conductive only to the Earth’s surface? Even an energized capacitor, containing generally equal yet separated charges is still, as a whole, generally charge neutral as is the Earth. So, although your statements may be fundamentally correct it is your application that is profoundly incorrect.

 

[robinson]

If that is so, what are some effective ways that folk posting one 'side' or the other, on the question of what powers the Sun, could couch what they write to better appeal to your intuitive senses?

BeAChooser could, for a start, stop going on forever in the Dark Matter topic, and stay on the course here, which is true for everybody else of course. Right now it is like one conversation split between two topics.

I wouldn't use the word intuition, but it seems like it I know. It is more like we all have a view based on our experience, education, and in my case, experimentation and observations I have done myself. I'm sure I also suffer from mental blindspots, and an aversion to theories that sound crazy. But then, I also have a soft spot for mad scientist who go against the mainstream, because sometimes they end up being right.

As for how to present, I'm not sure. I tried to tell BeAChooser long ago to not throw so much into each post, because TEGO, and it is too much to wade through. The serious bone of contention seems to be that Galaxies and stars and everything is formed because of electricity, which is going to need some serious math and calculations and hard physics to explain.

But the side issues, comets and magnetic ropes and coronal heating and stars changing and all that is pretty interesting. It is enough to spend some time looking at what is being presented.

The serious sticking point is the source of the current. Or where is all the power coming from? How can that much current be flowing into the sun and we can't detect it? It goes against the grain. It really, as several have pointed out, it really is hard to calculate or explain, based on what we know of electricity.

I try to keep an open mind, just not so open my common sense falls out.

As for the classic physics side, let go of the snide insults and such. Educate, maybe have a little fun, explain why, try to remember most of us have no idea what you are talking about. An insulting post is no substitute for knowledge.

And provide some friggin links, don't just say it is so.

 

[Zeuzzz]

This thread has wandered far and wide in terms of its contents.

Very true. A lot of what has been posted here is mainly EU material, mixed with plasma cosmology and astrophysics. It is important to distinguish between the two.

This does a good job of pointing out some of the differences;

The Electric Universe is a variant of Plasma Cosmology, and it is necessary to differentiate between the two. While they share more similarities than differences, it should be noted that EU ideas tend to go a step further than the generally more conservative approach of Plasma Cosmology.

While both viewpoints permit many ideas previously excluded by Big Bang Cosmology, The Electric Universe looks at the bigger picture, and promotes more radical ideas about the role of electricity in the universe, from ancient mythology to the mind-body connection.

Both PC and EU proponents acknowledge the fact that space is NOT electrically neutral, a fact largely denied in conventional astronomy.

Plasma cosmology/astrophysics material has been published in many astronomical journals for over the past century, and most EU ideas can be traced back to work in plasma cosmology. EU just goes that step further, actually declaring that current science is wrong and they are right, whereas plasma cosmology is much more compatible with mainstream scientific views, that is why journals have published plenty plasma cosmology material but not so much EU. That and EU theory is a lot more recent a theory than Plasma cosmology.


For example the whole concept of Electric stars derives from the experimental work of Kristian Birkeland, and the work of Hannes Alfven who believed that there were certain electrical solar circuits, called a heliospheric current circuit. Although you will not see anything in the literature about stars being fuelled externally, you will see plenty of topics about heliospheric current circuits, electrical currents in flares and other aspects. Mainstream astronomers see these phenomenon as small inconsequential effects to their solar model and are unlikely to change any of their original assumptions due to them, Plasma cosmologists put a lot of attention into understanding these plasma/electrical effects, holding them in much higher regard than conventional opinion, but still listening to what they have to say, and EU proponents often are left to say what the plasma cosmology material is inferring.


Another example is this paper; Radiation Properties of Pulsar Magnetospheres: Observation, Theory, and Experiment published in the journal of Astrophysics and Space Science, 1995. It openly says in its conclusions about pulsars (a form of star)

The source of the radiation energy may not be contained within the pulsar, but may instead derive from either the pulsars interaction with its environment or by energy delivered by an external circuit (Hannes Alfvén 1981).[2] This hypothesis is consistent with both the long term memory effect of the time averaged pulse and the occurrence of nulling, when no sub-pulses are observed. As noted earlier, our results support the 'planetary magnetosphere' view (Michael 1982) where the extent of the magnetosphere, not emission points on a rotating surface [emphasis added], determines the pulsar emission."

So although they have not proposed an actual model for 'electric stars' as such, they have proposed the possibility that stars could receive energy from an external circuit, which was accepted in a mainstream astronomy journal. I have a feeling that if they had made this particular claim about the sun, that would not have been published by any journal, that’s why this area falls more under the scope of EU (at the moment).

 

[Zeuzzz]

Whilst talking about heliospheric current circuits, this recent paper from some astronomers seems to lend credence to the idea of Birkeland currents incident on the suns poles, which is exactly what EU proponents have seen saying. (field aligned currents is just different terminology for Birkeland currents)

http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGS02/00292/EGS02-A-00292.pdf

MAGNETIC FLUX TRANSFER BY THE SOLAR
WIND AND HELIOSPHERIC CURRENT SYSTEM
P. Israelevich (1), A. Ershkovich (1), and T. Gombosi (2)
(1) Tel Aviv University, Israel, (2) The University of Michigan, U.S.A. (peter@luna.tau.ac.il)
We calculated the change of the magnetic flux through the surface encircled by the Earth’s orbit. This change is associated with the magnetic flux transfer by the solar wind flow and exhibits clear 22-year periodicity. The magnetic flux transferred by the solar wind is of the same order of magnitude as the flux of the main solar magnetic field through the northern hemisphere of the Sun. There seems to be a feedback between the solar wind and the solar magnetism. Indeed, the radial current of total strength of 3×10⁹ A exists in the heliospheric current sheet. The only way to fulfil the electric current continuity is to close the radial electric current by means of fieldaligned currents at the polar region of the Sun. The surface density of the closure current flowing along the solar surface is 4 A/m, and the magnetic field produced by this current is B 5×10−6 T, i.e. several percent of the intrinsic magnetic field of the Sun. Thus a treatment of the solar magnetic field generation should take into account the heliospheric current circuit as well as the currents flowing inside the Sun.

This is a good indication of what i meant in my previous post. The astronomers who wrote this paper are happy saying that there are huge currents of flowing particles travelling into the sun, but wont consider this to change anything about their current models as they dont see anything wrong with them.

However, to EU proponents, talk of birkeland currents at the suns poles, billions of amps of electricty and stellar current circuits are not so new and mysterious, they have been predicting exactly this for years. The huge Birkeland currents that connect the Earth to the sun were discovered just six or so months ago, and they are right next to the earth where we should be able to see them much more clearly than we would far away on the sun. So if we have only just discovered currents able to transport 650,000 amps into the Earths poles due to inprovements in technology, the chances are that we should discover similar birkeland currents at the suns poles in the near future with the new generation of satelites.

 

[robinson]

This is a good indication of what i meant in my previous post. The astronomers who wrote this paper are happy saying that there are huge currents of flowing particles travelling[sic] into the sun, but wont consider this to change anything about their current models as they dont see anything wrong with them.

However, to EU proponents, talk of birkeland currents at the suns poles, billions of amps of electricty[sic] and stellar current circuits are not so new and mysterious, they have been predicting exactly this for years. The huge Birkeland currents that connect the Earth to the sun were discovered just six or so months ago, and they are right next to the earth where we should be able to see them much more clearly than we would far away on the sun. So if we have only just discovered currents able to transport 650,000 amps into the Earths poles due to inprovements[sic] in technology, the chances are that we should discover similar birkeland currents at the suns poles in the near future with the new generation of satelites[sic].

That is the sort of thing that is just so interesting. We have these huge, immense magnetic ropes connecting the Earth to the Sun, and we just couldn't see them. Much less study them, until now.

What else is going on right in front of us we don't know about?

I don't know if I posted these images in this topic before, but I find stuff like this to be mysterious. The great nebula in Orion

Look at this star (in the box), and what is happening there:

What is causing this? What is even happening there? I see a bow shock, and a jet of some sort, something. How is that star causing that huge amount of plasma to form that structure? The size of it must be immense. There are all kinds of things like that going on in the Nebula.

Gravity just doesn't explain it.

 

[robinson]

And yes, I did download a giant file from the Hubble site and zoom in on stuff and found that. I don't even know what the name of the star is.

 

[Ziggurat]

What is causing this? What is even happening there? I see a bow shock, and a jet of some sort, something. How is that star causing that huge amount of plasma to form that structure? The size of it must be immense. There are all kinds of things like that going on in the Nebula.

Gravity just doesn't explain it.

Ummm.... how do you know the star in question is even in the nebula, and not, say, well in front of it or even behind it? Without that kind of information, you could be chasing your tail for quite some time looking for an explanation for a correlation (the star and the form of the gas around it) which might not even exist.

 

[robinson]

You could say the same thing to any astronomer looking at stuff out there. In fact, that is one of the annoying things about stuff in outer space. Unless it is close enough to use parallax, how do you know how far away something is?

Or how big it is. Or what it is made of.

 

[Ziggurat]

You could say the same thing to any astronomer looking at stuff out there.

You could say that, but you'd be wrong. They have more information than is available in just those photos which allow them to determine things like whether or not that star is in front, behind, or inside that nebula.

In fact, that is one of the annoying things about stuff in outer space. Unless it is close enough to use parallax,

Which the Orion nebula is.

 

[Terry]

You could say the same thing to any astronomer looking at stuff out there. In fact, that is one of the annoying things about stuff in outer space. Unless it is close enough to use parallax, how do you know how far away something is?

Or how big it is. Or what it is made of.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_candle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrophotometry

 

[Dancing David]

Thanks for this (an answer to the question about the relationship between 'observations' and 'evidence').

In the case of the question 'what powers the Sun?', is there legitimate evidence beyond observations of the Sun?

Specifically, how legitimate - as evidence with respect to the Sun's behaviour as it pertains to the question being discussed - is the data from the Cluster satellites? the reports from the teams who worked with underground neutrino detectors? the data from those who analysed returned lunar soil samples for helium-3?

Data is data and therefore what I would term evidence.

Hypothesis, theory and synthesis should hopefully try to explain the data.

What is it that you think is important about the data you mention, what hypothsis and thesis?

 

[Wolverine]

Look at this star (in the box), and what is happening there:

[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/110534771bda0e3d40.jpg[/qimg]

What is causing this? What is even happening there?

The basic version (click on "Mapping Orion's Winds").

The technical version (section 3.2.3 addresses that region specifically).

Ziggurat's caveat is a good one. In this case the star in question (V* IX Ori) does reside within the nebula, but it's definitely prudent to obtain the details first in order to avoid reaching errant conclusions.

 

[The Man]

Whilst talking about heliospheric current circuits, this recent paper from some astronomers seems to lend credence to the idea of Birkeland currents incident on the suns poles, which is exactly what EU proponents have seen saying. (field aligned currents is just different terminology for Birkeland currents)

http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGS02/00292/EGS02-A-00292.pdf


This is a good indication of what i meant in my previous post. The astronomers who wrote this paper are happy saying that there are huge currents of flowing particles travelling into the sun, but wont consider this to change anything about their current models as they dont see anything wrong with them.

Why should they, since this represents a closed solar current circuit. Even if that were not the case, at 3 x 10 ⁹ Amps it would only represent 0.000008% of the 3.8 x 10¹⁶ Amps needed to electrically power the luminal output of the Sun. Since this is an interaction of the solar wind (representing more energy lost by the Sun) with the Sun’s rotating magnetic field or in other words it is the Sun itself driving this current, so it can only represent an energy loss not an energy gain. Additionally, since all the charges involved emanate from and return to the Sun it cannot represent a mechanism for charging or discharging the Sun as a whole.


http://cds.aanda.org/index.php?opti.../2001/34/aah2814/aah2814.html&access=standard

However, to EU proponents, talk of birkeland currents at the suns poles, billions of amps of electricty and stellar current circuits are not so new and mysterious, they have been predicting exactly this for years. The huge Birkeland currents that connect the Earth to the sun were discovered just six or so months ago, and they are right next to the earth where we should be able to see them much more clearly than we would far away on the sun. So if we have only just discovered currents able to transport 650,000 amps into the Earths poles due to inprovements in technology, the chances are that we should discover similar birkeland currents at the suns poles in the near future with the new generation of satelites.

“650,000 amps into the Earths poles”, what exactly do you mean by that? Is this what you are referring to?

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/11dec_themis.htm?list208336



For those unfamiliar with the interactions between the solar wind and the earths magnetosphere.


http://www.phy6.org/Educatcc/Sconct17.htm

 

[MattusMaximus]

Fyi folks, I have recently caught Zeuzzz misrepresenting the work of other scientists as a way of pushing his (her?) plasma cosmology & electric universe woo. Since Zeuzzz has been bouncing all over this particular thread, I wanted to let everyone know about this...

"Something new under the sun" thread

Personally, I think that Zeuzzz makes so many errors in the physics on that other thread, plus the fact that he (she?) misrepresents the work of other authors, that I find his (her?) claims to be highly dubious.

I'm certain that many on this thread have already figured out as much, but I just wanted to add my $0.02 worth for any lurkers who might care.