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

[tusenfem]

So just out of curiosity, why do you embrace only half of it?

How can I only use half of it, when I work with double layers?
(i.e. I assume you mean that I would only use B fields and not E fields)
You just have NO idea about day to day plasma physics research.

Pick any experiment you want that begins with an E field and do it yourself. Just leave in the E's. Why do you expect me to be your math mommy anyway? Isn't this your personal field of mathematical expertize?

Ehhhh, why not do some work yourself for a change? Always other people wll have to do stuff for you, whereas you can sit back in your chair, answering phone calls.

I don't need you to be my math mommy, however, I do want you to start backing up your nonsense with actual science, but waiting for that is like waiting for Godot.

The only thing I actually care about is the fact you never set RC straight, and you never put "truth" before mob mentality. It says volumes about your motives.

YOU are the expert on Alfven and Birkeland and circuits and MDH, so why should I set RC straight?

However, as long as you keep on claiming that the solar wind is a current (which I think you mean an actual electrical current measured in Ampere) pointing out any minor mistakes that RC may or may not have written (and yes he sometimes is just off of target) is futile. However, I just leaved through Cosmic Plasma again, and now I know why you don't understand that the solar wind is not an electrical current, because Alfven never ever writes down the expression for current in that book, because he does everything in MDH and circuit theory. And thus you NEVER have read that the definition in electrodynamics or plasma physics of an electrical current is:

[latex]
{\bf J} = \Sigma_k n_k q_k {\bf v}
[/latex]

Here the Σ means summation over all species k, n is the density, q is the charge and v is the velocity of each species k.

Now, the solar wind is mainly protons and electrons with some alpha particles and is quasi-neutral, which means that in a volume that is larger than the Debye sphere the total charge, defined as:

[latex]
Q_{tot} = \Sigma_k n_k q_k
[/latex]

is zero, and the speed is the same for the particles. So this leads (for the radial motion of the solar wind) that both Q=0 and J=0.

Now, there is the Parker spiral. This is NOT caused by different directions of the negative and positive particles, as you claimed 2 pages ago. This is caused by the fact that the solar wind plasma moves radially outward, with the magnetic field frozen in (yes that holds most of the time in the solar wind) but the magnetic field is rooted in the Sun which rotates and thus the Parker spiral is created.

What should not be forgotten is that over large scales the magnetic field of the Sun is a dipole field, and thus there are opposite directions of the magnetic field in the different hemispheres. Therefore, there is the induced heliospheric current sheet, which is a current which is perpendicular to the heliosperic magnetic field (just like the current sheet in the Earth's magnetotail and a direct consequence of Maxwell's equations), this is embedded in the solar wind.

It is simple things like this that you don't know or don't understand, and if your lack of knowledge is so basic then there is no use in going any deeper into this whole topic.

 

[Michael Mozina]

How can I only use half of it, when I work with double layers?

And you've never seen one release stored EM energy?

Ehhhh, why not do some work yourself for a change? Always other people wll have to do stuff for you, whereas you can sit back in your chair, answering phone calls.

Well, for starters, you're the one's making the claim that "magnetic reconnection did it". We get to the lab experiments however, and you folks do a gigantic bait and switch routine and start with an E field. You then intentionally dumb down the math to ignore the presence of that E field and claim "magnetic reconnection did it". What horse pucky.

YOU are the expert on Alfven and Birkeland and circuits and MDH, so why should I set RC straight?

Um, perhaps because you're the one that is claiming to be an "professional" on MHD theory for starters?

If you really were such the expert on plasma physics, you would have explained to RC a long time ago that electrical discharges can and do occur in plasmas. Are you ever intending to do that, or did you just intend to pretend that my personal math skills are relevant? You spend more time gloating over your math skills than anyone I've ever met, and more time pretending that GR theory or EU theory rises and falls on my personal math skills than anyone I've met. If and when you find a problem in Alfven's double layer paper, you let me know. Until then I don't need your stupid theory in the first place, so what do I personally need to prove to you T? NOTHING!

A real "professional" would be a lot more interested in 'truth' and a lot less interested is pretending that one's personal maths are the be-all-end-all of physics.

 

[Michael Mozina]

And thus you NEVER have read that the definition in electrodynamics or plasma physics of an electrical current is:

[latex]
{\bf J} = \Sigma_k n_k q_k {\bf v}
[/latex]

Here the Σ means summation over all species k, n is the density, q is the charge and v is the velocity of each species k.

Now, the solar wind is mainly protons and electrons with some alpha particles and is quasi-neutral, which means that in a volume that is larger than the Debye sphere the total charge, defined as:

[latex]
Q_{tot} = \Sigma_k n_k q_k
[/latex]

is zero, and the speed is the same for the particles. So this leads (for the radial motion of the solar wind) that both Q=0 and J=0.

So what exactly happens to those high speed particles when they slam into a relatively stationary magnetic field? Still zero t?

 

[Reality Check]

The "data" in terms of the actual solar wind makes it very clear that the sun is in fact "disintegrating" just as Birkeland's cathode model predicts.

That is nonsense for the simple reason that Birkeland has no solar model. He is careful to state that what he has is analogies for solar activities, i.e. the images he generates look like images of solar activity (and galaxies and Saturn's rings!).

What he has is a mathematical model for his experiments on the electrical discharges from metallic balls that have magnets in them. This is a model of the Earth (terrella = "litle Earth").

FYI, Birkeland's theory also "predicts" a Parker spiral.

FYI, Birkeland's modelling of the Earth does not predict Parker spirals which originate on the Sun and extend through the solar system (also see tusenfem's post).

Also: FYI, Sputtering of metal (as in Birkeland's experiments) has nothing to do with the solar wind. The solar wind is mostly H and He, neither of which is a metal. The proper term for the existence of ions in the solar wind is ionization (plasmas tend to be ionized !).

ETA
What if we were deluded enough to think that Birkeland's solar analogy meant that the Sun was an actual metal ball?
Then the sputtering implies that the Sun does not exist !
He reports seeing pitting of the palladium ball in his experiments. So a small % of his ball was spluttered away in his experiments. The rate of loss was probably high enough so that extrapolated to billions of years, the Sun would vanish.

 

[iantresman]

I am interested in your (new?) assertion that "plasmas tend to have a dielectric constant that can change over time".

Looking at the plasma dielectric in general, it is fascinating.

"The dielectric constant of a plasma is always less than unity. The dielectric constant may even become negative. The medium then is very different than other dielectrics where the dielectric constant is always greater than unity. Since the refractive index of a medium is the square root of the dielectric constant, a plasma has a refractive index less than unity, or even imaginary" (R K Shevgaonkar, Electromagnetic Waves, 2005, page 502)

Just thought I'd share!

 

[Michael Mozina]

That is nonsense for the simple reason that Birkeland has no solar model.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50A11FB385F13738DDDAA0A94DA405B838DF1D3

Don't you get tired of living in pure denial after awhile?

 

[Reality Check]

If you really were such the expert on plasma physics, you would have explained to RC a long time ago that electrical discharges can and do occur in plasmas.

Hey tusenfem, do you want to take Michael Mozina up on his challenge ?

Of course if you state that electrical discharges cannot and never occur in plasmas, I suspect that MM will just say that you are not an expert on plasma physics. I hope not since that would make him extremely ignorant given your demonstrated expertise in plasma physics.

ETA

Now I had to look hard to get any "discharges" in my plasma physics books, but Peratt had it in the index, basically with the extra: "associated with lightning" and "in aurora" and "breakdown of atmpsohere" and "in dielectrics". Now Peratt re-defines the term discharge as it is usually used (on page 22):
...
So, he puts it in a broader sense, however there is still the "breakdown" of the medium that is needed. The last bit of the quote is just a description of e.g. lightning. But then he starts to go further, e.g. about the aurora, and calls them a "discharge":
...
To call the aurora a "discharge" makes no sense at all.

 

[iantresman]

I am interested in your (new?) assertion that "plasmas tend to have a dielectric constant that can change over time".

It seems that the dielectric constant of a plasma depend on the electromagnetic field:

"A plasma, by nature is hyperactive. More often than not, it responds violently to external stimuli in an attempt to attain equilibrium. When subjected to strong radiation fields, it exhibits a variety of nonlinear processes which modify its parameters as well as those of the radiation. [..]

.. Thus the electric field of the electromagnetic wave heats the electrons preferentially, as a result of which the dielectric constant, ϵ, and the conductivity, σ, of the plasma become functions of the electromagnetic field and a nonlinear relation between the electric field, E, and the current density, J [..]

.. the dielectric constant begins to depend on the electromagnetic field and the plasma again becomes a nonlinear medium." -- Vinod Krishan, "Role of plasma processes in astrophysics", 1994 Physica Scripta 1994 T52 118 (Abstract)

 

[Reality Check]

It seems that the dielectric constant of a plasma depend on the electromagnetic field:

Yes - I knew that.
The question is whether MM knows that it has nothing to do with the physical impossibility of electrical discharges in plasma.

 

[GeeMack]

That is nonsense for the simple reason that Birkeland has no solar model. He is careful to state that what he has is analogies for solar activities, i.e. the images he generates look like images of solar activity (and galaxies and Saturn's rings!).

What he has is a mathematical model for his experiments on the electrical discharges from metallic balls that have magnets in them. This is a model of the Earth (terrella = "litle Earth").

Indeed. On page 720, Volume 1 of Birkeland's "Norwegian Aurora Polaris Expedition", he very specifically writes that his experiments didn't bear out an electric Sun conjecture...

We have not yet succeeded, however, in spite of continual experiments, in producing a proof that by this extended radio-activity chemical elements might be transformed into one another, or that heat was developed by the disintegration of a cathode, in the same way as when radium is transformed. The last question would acquire a fundamental importance in the problem of the heat-store and longevity of the sun and stars.

Perhaps there are those who believe otherwise, but they obviously aren't familiar with Birkeland's work. Or possibly they have severely misunderstood it. But any way about it, even though he may have dabbled with some interesting conjectures about the Sun and planets, Kristian Birkeland, by his own admission, did not have a viable solar model.

 

[Reality Check]

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50A11FB385F13738DDDAA0A94DA405B838DF1D3

Don't you get tired of living in pure denial after awhile?

Don't you get tired of living in pure ignorance that this is a news article?
This news article has no solar model.

There was an idea about planetary formation from particles emitted from the Sun. This was wrong.

There was a suggestion that electrical discharges cause transmutation of elements ("His experiments, he said, showed that as a result of an electrical discharge in a vacuum tube platinum and uranium appeared"). This was wrong. Birkeland was clear that this was a suggestgion and not shown to b experimentally correct.

There was a suggestion that the rings of Saurn are "dustrings". This was wrong. They are actually ice rings.

There was the idea that space is filled with ions and electrons which make up the majority of the mass of the universe. This was right.

 

[Tubbythin]

There was the idea that space is filled with ions and electrons which make up the majority of the mass of the universe. This was right.

Err..?

 

[dasmiller]

There was the idea that space is filled with ions and electrons which make up the majority of the mass of the universe. This was right.

Err..?

To the extent that dark matter is really just ions and electrons . . .

 

[Reality Check]

Err..?

The intra-cluster medium (ions and electrons) makes up 80-95% of the baryonic matter in a galaxy cluster.
Of course dark matter is another matter !

 

[W.D.Clinger]

Pick any experiment you want that begins with an E field and do it yourself. Just leave in the E's. Why do you expect me to be your math mommy anyway? Isn't this your personal field of mathematical expertize?

No one expects you to demonstrate any mathematical expertise.

If you had the slightest competence in this subject, you'd have acknowledged the many explicit solutions of Maxwell's equations you've been given in which magnetic reconnection occurs with an E field of zero or close to zero.

Irony overload. That seems to be YOUR personal claim to fame. Whom shall I believe, a professional that is employed at Los Alamos and has written books on plasma physics and worked under Alfven, or a couple of RANK amateurs like myself that I met in cyberspace who never even bothered to read either Alfven's book or Peratt's book?

You think tusenfem is a rank amateur like yourself?

Knowing Alfvén's and Peratt's names (and skimming their books without understanding the math) does not place you in tusenfem's company.

...or did you just intend to pretend that my personal math skills are relevant? You spend more time gloating over your math skills than anyone I've ever met, and more time pretending that GR theory or EU theory rises and falls on my personal math skills than anyone I've met. If and when you find a problem in Alfven's double layer paper, you let me know. Until then I don't need your stupid theory in the first place, so what do I personally need to prove to you T? NOTHING!

A real "professional" would be a lot more interested in 'truth' and a lot less interested is pretending that one's personal maths are the be-all-end-all of physics.

If you weren't pretending to make a scientific argument, your personal math skills would be irrelevant.

As it is, however, your personal math skills are relevant because their absence has left you with no arguments beyond your own uninformed incredulity, religious pejoratives, and incessant incantations of personal heroes (Alfvén/Peratt/Birkeland etc) whose work you cannot evaluate critically and apparently cannot even present accurately.

 

[tusenfem]

So what exactly happens to those high speed particles when they slam into a relatively stationary magnetic field? Still zero t?

What the frak is "zero t" supposed to mean?
If you talk about the Earth's magnetosphere, then they are slowed down first by the bow shock and the flow behind the bow shock is mainly diverted along the magnetopause (see e.g. the paper with the longest title I ever wrote) and the main stuff is happening through the interaction of the magnetic fields of the solar wind and the Earth.

If a high speed particle enters a region of strong magnetic field, it will start to gyrate around the magnetic field.

Basically, again questions that have nothing to do with the fact that the solar wind is NOT a current.

 

[tusenfem]

Hey tusenfem, do you want to take Michael Mozina up on his challenge ?

Of course if you state that electrical discharges cannot and never occur in plasmas, I suspect that MM will just say that you are not an expert on plasma physics. I hope not since that would make him extremely ignorant given your demonstrated expertise in plasma physics.

ETA

I have already discussed discharges found in various books. The discussion is pointless, as the name is not important, it is the actual physics that is important. But MM wants to keep that discussion going on, because then he does not have to think about anything else.

I therefore stated that I accept any definition for the term discharge that MM wanted, and henceforth refrained from actually using the term discharge in any scientific way, unless the general term asks for the use of the word, like a "glow discharge" which I cannot be responsible for.

 

[tusenfem]

Ah just for fun, we will keep this simple, we will look at the dielectric tensor of a cold plasma. It can be generalized for a warm plasma, but that takes too much typing.

We all know that in general the following holds: J = σ·E, where J is the current, σ is the conductivity tensor and E is the electric field. Note that often the conductivity is a scalar, but when there is a magnetic field present that no longer holds and it becomes a tensor.

Now, one can combine the plasma current J and the discplacement current (which is often neglected, especially in MDH or circuit theory) and get the following:

J - i ω ε₀ E := - i ω ε₀ K·E

where := means "equivalent". And we can write down the components for the (equivalent) dielectric tensor K which has the form:

[latex]
{\bf K} = \left( \begin{array}{ccc} S & -iD & 0 \\ iD & S & 0 \\ 0 & 0 & P \end{array} \right) = \left( \begin{array}{ccc} K_1 & K_2 & 0 \\ -K_2 & K_1 & 0 \\ 0 & 0 & K_3 \end{array} \right)
[/latex]

Here S, D and P (and the upcoming R and L) are defined in the excellent book by Stix (Physics of fully ionized gasses, recently republished in a very nice paperback).

So, what are these K's?

[latex]
K_1 \equiv S \equiv \frac{1}{2}(R+L) = 1 - \sum_j \frac{\omega_{pj}^2}{\omega^2 - \omega_{cj}^2} \\
i K_2 \equiv D \equiv \frac{1}{2}(R-L) = 1 - \sum_j \frac{sign(j) \omega_{cj} \omega_{pj}^2}{\omega (\omega^2 - \omega_{cj}^2)} \\
K_3 \equiv P \equiv 1 - \sum_j \frac{\omega_{pj}^2}{\omega^2}
[/latex]

In these three equations ω_pj is the plasma frequency for species j, ω_cj is the cyclotron frequency for species j and ω is the frequency (as we are clearly working in a harmonic wave assumption: all quantities vary with e^{i(k.r - ωt)}) and sign(j) is the charge sign of species j (either + or -)

The wonderful thing about plasma physics is that this dielectric tensor K describes the whole of plasma dynamics. A bit more manipulation is necessary, but that goes too far here but can be read in the other excellent book by Swanson (Plasma Waves, still in press and a must have for plasma physicists), in order to e.g. examin the wave modes that are present in a plasma, which basically results in determining where the determinant of the adjustes dieletric tensor vanishes in the dispersion relation equation. And indeed every possible wave mode possible in a plasma rolls out, it is amazing how elegant plasma physics is.

 

[Michael Mozina]

Hey tusenfem, do you want to take Michael Mozina up on his challenge ?

Of course if you state that electrical discharges cannot and never occur in plasmas, I suspect that MM will just say that you are not an expert on plasma physics.

So what's it going to be t? Which is it?

 

[Michael Mozina]

Yes - I knew that.
The question is whether MM knows that it has nothing to do with the physical impossibility of electrical discharges in plasma.

That is an absolutely false statement. There is no REQUIREMENT of a dielectric breakdown for an ELECTRICAL DISCHARGE to occur in a plasma. Neither Dungey or Peratt make such a requirement. Peratt begins by defining an electrical discharge in a plasma as a sudden release of stored EM energy. It can be stored CIRCUIT energy. It can be "magnetic field energy" too. Whatever the form of the stored energy, it's RELEASE from the stored condition, is an "electrical discharge in a plasma". It's such a simple definition, it's impossible to believe ANYONE could do to it what you're trying to do to it. You're acting in a purely irrational manner. What you claim is "impossible" is by DEFINITION AND TITLE possible and common according to Peratt. Now whom shall I believe, you or Peratt and Dungey? You've never bothered to read Peratt's book like I have, so clearly you're utterly clueless as to it's contents.