Merged Electric Sun Theory (Split from: CME's, active regions and high energy flares)

[Tubbythin]

You make a common mistake, people with only a cursory familiarity with the term "plasma" (and really no familiarity with the properties of plasmas) make this mistake frequently. Plasmas are any charged (ionized) matter. You can have a "solid" plasma. If you want another example, look at the Earth. The "ground" conducts electricity across vast distances with little resistance because it is plasma. We "ground" all our electric grids through it, in case you didn't realize.

The ground is a plasma! I'm calling Poe.

 

[dasmiller]

You make a common mistake, people with only a cursory familiarity with the term "plasma" (and really no familiarity with the properties of plasmas) make this mistake frequently. Plasmas are any charged (ionized) matter. You can have a "solid" plasma. If you want another example, look at the Earth. The "ground" conducts electricity across vast distances with little resistance because it is plasma.

So, are you defining a plasma as being "anything that conducts electricity?"

 

[cev08241971]

So, teacher, what's the voltage and current powering the sun?

The current would of course bear an equivalent relationship to the sun's output. As for "voltage", I can't say. Perhaps we'll measure it some day. Suffice it to say, though, that the entire "voltage potential" would be expressed across a plasma double layer. You can't just stick a volt meter next to the sun to read it. The difficulties of these kinds of measurements in plasma are known, but there are techniques to get around them. For example, probes inserted into plasma develop a "double layer" around them, which of course is going to interfere with measurements taken unless properly accounted for.

The properties and behaviours of plasmas are awkward and unexpected when compared to the "sensible" world of ostensibly "neutral" matter where we all live.

 

[cev08241971]

this is not magic

Is that like being a little bit pregnant?

If you don't understand how the surface of the sun can be seen through the photosphere, do a little research into x-ray technology. We can see through skin and muscle to look at bone inside human bodies. Skin and muscle are arguably "opaque", yet we can look through them with other spectra. We can look under "opaque" clothes that we find are actually transparent when it comes to x-rays. Go to your local airport if you want a demonstration.

 

[cev08241971]

no

So, are you defining a plasma as being "anything that conducts electricity?"

No.

 

[Tubbythin]

If you don't understand how the surface of the sun can be seen through the photosphere, do a little research into x-ray technology. We can see through skin and muscle to look at bone inside human bodies. Skin and muscle are arguably "opaque", yet we can look through them with other spectra. We can look under "opaque" clothes that we find are actually transparent when it comes to x-rays. Go to your local airport if you want a demonstration.

X-rays aren't infinitely penetrating though are they? Just more penetrating than visible.

 

[cev08241971]

X-rays aren't infinitely penetrating though are they? Just more penetrating than visible.

correct...sort of...x-rays can be stopped by certain glasses that are transparent to visible light...it isn't a case of x-rays seeing through everything or at infinite distance, some EM that passes easily through several meters of rock is stopped by encountering a thin layer of metal and so on

 

[Ziggurat]

The current would of course bear an equivalent relationship to the sun's output. As for "voltage", I can't say.

And that is rather my whole point. The MOST FUNDAMENTAL properties of the model, the parameters needed to calculate the total solar power output (which, let's face it, is the most important result for any solar model), you have no idea about. No way to even deduce them. What you have is not a model, it's a hunch.

Suffice it to say, though, that the entire "voltage potential" would be expressed across a plasma double layer.

That doesn't suffice. We need numbers to evaluate the theory.

You can't just stick a volt meter next to the sun to read it. The difficulties of these kinds of measurements in plasma are known, but there are techniques to get around them. For example, probes inserted into plasma develop a "double layer" around them, which of course is going to interfere with measurements taken unless properly accounted for.

For the standard model you demand lab measurements under conditions which are impossible to produce on earth, but for your model you explain away not only difficulties in performing measurements, but a failure to even estimate fundamental parameters. Quite the double standard you've got going here.

 

[Tubbythin]

Don't project your confusion onto me. Just because you don't know what I'm talking about doesn't mean that I also don't know. I do know.

I no exactly what you're talking about. You just happen to be completely wrong, that's all.

It isn't just the force between "electron" and "proton", it's the force between any two charged bodies able to interact electrically. Incidentally, this describes over 99% of the observable universe, including the sun and every other star. It also applies to any two birkeland currents (well known effect of electric discharge in plasma). Welcome to the twentieth century, now you're just a century behind science.

Nope. As is trivially easy to show.

F_G = GM1M2/r²F_E = kq1q2//r²
Take M1 = m_p = 1.67*10^-27, M2 = m_Sun = 2 * 10³⁰q1 = q2 = e = 1.6 * 10^-19G = 6.67 * 10^-11k = 8.99*10⁹
where we're using SI units...
Then:
F_G/F_E = GM1M2/Kq1q2
= 2.22*10^-7/2.30*10^-28 = 9.6*10²⁰

 

[Tubbythin]

correct...sort of...x-rays can be stopped by certain glasses that are transparent to visible light...it isn't a case of x-rays seeing through everything or at infinite distance, some EM that passes easily through several meters of rock is stopped by encountering a thin layer of metal and so on

So, in conclusion, the photosphere is opaque.

 

[cev08241971]

...in conclusion, the photosphere is opaque.

...at certain wavelengths. in others it is transparent.

 

[Reality Check]

If you don't understand how the surface of the sun can be seen through the photosphere, do a little research into x-ray technology.

Other than

• x-rays can be quite well absorbed by plasma and
• there is no "surface" that can be seen under the photosphere

you are right!

The opacity of any plasma depends on the wavelength being considered. Regions some hundreds of kilometers below the nominal surface seen in the visible spectrum, emit light this seen in certain wavelength (I think the far infrared). This allows astronomers to measure the temperature of the photosphere with depth. It turns out that the photosphere is ~5700K at the surface and gets hotter with depth to ~9400K at some hundreds of km.

Odd that - almost as if it is being heated from below !

 

[Tubbythin]

More non sequitur? What does any of this have to do with the price of teabagging in China.

Nothing, but it has everything to do with what we know about neutrinos. In otherw ords we know exactly when and how many are produced in a given process. That is unless you want to reject pretty much the whole of nuclear and particle physics. So your claim that we couldn't make predictions about how many neutrinos should be produced is of course completely erroneous (unless you want to reject nuclear and particle physics or energy and momentum conservation of course). Quite how showing one of your wild claims is completely wrong constitutes a non-sequitur I haven't the faintest idea.

 

[cev08241971]

He also can't recognize he's wrong.

As a scientist, I can't realize what isn't the case. In this case, I'm not wrong, so I have no factual basis for recognizing that I am. Until I become wrong, that won't change, and it will take more than your bald assurances to convince me I'm wrong.

 

[Tubbythin]

...at certain wavelengths. in others it is transparent.

No, since no photon has an infinite mean-free path.

 

[cev08241971]

self-compressing gas ball stellar fusion was always a non-starter

In otherw ords we know exactly when and how many are produced in a given process.

Feel free to cite any instances of which you're aware that demonstrates the process of sustained, gravity-driven, self-collapsing, gas ball fusion that's supposed to be taking place inside the sun. I'll wait.

 

[cev08241971]

TRACE, SOHO and other solar-observing satellites are not hallucinations

No, since no photon has an infinite mean-free path.

You can say what you like, none of what you say will change the fact that the TRACE, SOHO and other research teams operating solar-observing satellites have been directly imaging the surface of the sun beneath the photosphere for over a decade now.

 

[Tubbythin]

Then why are you acting so confused?

I'm not sure how you think I'm acting confused. You made some completely false statements about neutrinos, I explained to you why they were wrong (or what fundamental physics we had to change to make your false statements true). You made claims about plasma that I have shown, through subsequent use of Newtonian and Coulombs law to be completely wrong. You claimed that a model of the Sun had some relevance to cosmology to which I pointed out that that showed you had no understanding of the difference between astronomy and cosmology. You made some vague claims about x-rays and I (implicitly) pointed out that it was just a matter of depth. Now, what do you think I'm confused about?

 

[W.D.Clinger]

I asked our dear Mr. Spock (not you) to select a paper for our friend kmortis that describes an *EXPERIMENT* (preferably a lab experiment) where all the conditions Alfven puts forth are satisfied, and where Mr. Spock is satisfied as well.

Why should it matter who answers? You have gotten perfectly good answers from several scientists who know a lot more about this area of physics than I do.

Ok Mr. Spock, how about selecting a paper from Tim's list that doesn't end up driving a nail in the coffin of reconnection theory.

No paper ever written has driven a nail in the coffin of reconnection theory.

Magnetic reconnection obviously means different things to different people, and some of those notions may not make sense. My own understanding of magnetic reconnection is essentially mathematical, and is so straightforward that it is very nearly a triviality (in the mathematicians' sense of that word); I'll say more about that in response to cev08241971. The papers I have cited speak of magnetic reconnection in a sense that's closely related to the one I understand; that's part of why I picked them.

Actually I'm convinced from reading enough papers on this topic that the mathematics are correct, just as they were correct in Alfven's time.

Which means you are no longer in such dire need of my limited expertise, so I can turn my attention to cev08241971. For the experimental results, I defer to the physical scientists who have been responding to you.

 

[Ziggurat]

Your contention that knowing the precise "voltage" of the (variable) electric field powering the sun is the "MOST FUNDAMENTAL" property of the model is absurd, to say the least.

I don't need them to be precise. Ballpark will do. I'll even give you a full order of magnitude to play with. Really, are you telling me that you can't get an estimate within a factor of 10? That's a pretty lame "theory" you've got there.

By that approximation of "logic" that you offer, we can discount "gravity" and all of biology because physicists can't as yet, even with the help of biologists, predict when a leaf will fall from a tree or where it will land. It's idiotic, but not unexpected given your past performances.

If the theory of biology is that it's explained by gravity, you might have a point. But it isn't, and you don't.

Your claim here that calculating the "total solar output" is "the most important result for any solar model" is mind-boggling and profoundly stupid.

It's based on the fact that the total power output of the sun is rather obviously the most important result of whatever dynamics are going on inside the sun. Nothing stupid about it, but it is rather stupid to pretend otherwise. It's stupid to pretend that solar flares are more essential to a solar theory than total power output, when the former involve a miniscule fraction of both the mass and the power output of the sun. We live and die by the total power output of the sun, not by solar flares. A model which gets the right total output can always be tweaked to add dynamics with much less power, but a model which can't get the total power in even the right ballpark cannot be tweaked, it has to be discarded.

But now I'm curious what your next excuse will be for your total failure to provide the most basic parameters of your own model.

What numbers did you use to evaluate the theory of the easter bunny? What about the tooth fairy?

Wow. That came out of left field. Unless you think that the sun is somehow fictional, or that the power output doesn't exist, then this comparison is, well, crazy.

It isn't me that suggested these conditions that are "impossible to produce", in your words. They're impossible to produce because they're impossible conditions.

What's impossible about very large pressures? Seriously, is there some law of physics that you're familiar with that the rest of us remain ignorant of, proving that large pressures can't exist? Please, do tell, teacher.