But how much water? Any details?
Not yet. I don't think results have been published.
Because the only sources I can find seem to conclude that Holmes is "atypical".
Perhaps in terms of the outburst and its magnitude, or timing past perihelion. Not necessarily its composition.
And I'm not arguing that comet's are all dry. Just that they aren't all wet. And the mainstream model seems to need them to be all wet.
I don't recall see anything requiring all comets to be wet. You seem to be reading too much into encyclopedia-esque pages designed for laypeople.
You want to talk further about water? Sure. Let's examine the mainstream predictions and facts. Let's examine the details in your two sources (and some other mainstream articles). Let's see who is in fact misrepresenting the facts here, Wolverine.
As I previously noted (
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=17385 ), the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said that astronomers were "puzzled" by the "lack of increased water vapor from Temple 1". Why would they be puzzled, if they weren't in fact expecting far more water release than what occurred?
Considering the article's from four days after the impact, it's a bit premature to flaunt. Perhaps they expected more than they received initially. So? More to follow below when you re-cite the same release.
Isn't it a fact that the mainstream "consensus" (you folks are always big on consensus) is that comets are "mostly" water/ice? That's what I was told here on this forum. Someone even claimed the number was 80 percent ice/water. Here's a sampling of what one finds from mainstream sources on the internet:
http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/comet_worldbook.html "NASA ... snip ... Scientists learned much about comets by studying Halley's Comet as it passed near Earth in 1986. ... snip ... The nucleus contains equal amounts of ice and dust. About 80 percent of the ice is water ice, and frozen carbon monoxide makes up another 15 percent. ... snip ... Scientists believe that other comets are chemically similar to Halley's Comet."
http://www.noao.edu/education/igcomet/igcomet.html "National Optical Astronomy Observatories ... snip ... The following physical properties of comet nuclei are based mainly on observations of periodic comets ... snip ... Chemical composition of the nucleus by number, based on coma observations: H2O ice is the main component (80-90%)."
Here is NASA's pre-impact press kit for the Deep Impact mission:
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache...lnk&cd=3&gl=us . At one point it calls Tempel 1 a "frozen ice ball". Do you think that might be a tad misleading?
No, I don't think it's misleading. As stated, the percentage estimates provided are based upon prior observations, not reckless assumptions. With additional measurements those estimates may be refined. Bear in mind that all three of those pages were written before the science results from Deep Impact were delivered. Certainly if the ongoing study of short period comets yields more evidence for "icy dirtballs" rather than "dirty snowballs", these types of write-ups will be amended to reflect such. That's how science works.
Now, your first link
http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/...ArticleID=1213 doesn't actually quantify the amount of water released by Deep Impact. It states that that ice has been found on the surface of the comet and then admits it was "not very much and definitely not enough to account for the water we see in the out-gassed material that is in the coma."
Admits? That's a strange choice of verbiage.
Tempel 1 was known to contain water (again -- from observations). What they didn't know was its distribution through the nucleus. That only 5-6% of the surface consisted of water ice indicates that much more must be below its surface or in its core in order to account for that detected elsewhere.
It then states that because "not very much" ice was found on the surface, we can "firmly conclude that most of the water vapor that escapes from comets is contained in ice particles found below the surface".
They know the water is present and can estimate the quantity based on data from the spectrometer and other instruments. It's not loose conjecture.
How can one "firmly conclude" that is true for "comets" in general?
Because it's based upon direct observations?
It might be true for Tempel 1 but then how do you explain cases where comets have been observed to break up (e.g., Shoemaker-Levy-9 and 1999 S4 LINEAR) and little or no ice or water was detected? Your model of comets also has to fit those data.
Again, it's not
my model.
It's not a deal-breaker for short period comets to be lacking in water. They orbit closer to the Sun and have many more opportunities to part with their water content than their long period counterparts like Halley. Still, more often than not, they're found to contain water.
Why are you including 1999 S4 LINEAR in the water-deficient category? (I'm guessing it's
because of this, which is predictably and grossly inaccurate.) In 2000, the SWAN instrument on SOHO was used to observe the comet from 5/25 through 8/12 and it was determined
the comet shed 3.3 million tons of water during that period.
Now electric comet theorists have no problem with comets containing water ... even lots of water. They also have no problem with comets that have no water. They have an explanation why both types of comets form comas and tails. They also have an alternative "electrical" mechanism for the creation of the OH used to deduce the presence of water in many comets. Now maybe there is water below the surface in this particular comet. But it's bogus to claim this confirms there is lots of water in all comets. And if there isn't, then explaining the jets in those cases becomes problematic for the mainstream model. Wouldn't you agree?
Nope. Even if somehow our understanding of comets and the methods used to observe them were found to require dire improvement, that "electrical mechanism" defies established physics to the point of pain. It's safe to call it fantasy. New-age Velikovskyism with a shiny bow on it.
Furthermore, both your sources fail to explain how ice that is "deep" in a comet could vaporize due to heat from the sun to create the tails and jets that characterize comets.
They were neither provided nor written for that purpose, so that's a silly gripe to raise.
In regards to Temple 1, mainstream sources (such as
http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00000232/ ) admit that "evidence suggests that the thermal inertia of the comet is nearly zero, meaning that it heats and cools quickly in response to sunlight, but the heating and cooling doesn't propagate into the interior." So how does the heat get to the "deep" ice to vaporize it and create the jets and outbursts that were seen coming from the comet long before and long after the impact? Do you or NASA have any real explanation for this? Or are you just ignoring this?
The mechanism isn't known at present, but ongoing study continues.
Now your second source claims "Deep Impact saw the amount of water and carbon dioxide go up by a factor of 10." But that is only a comparison of spectra immediately above the impact site ... not a comparison of total comet emissions. A factor of 10 increase over what was essentially no outgassing in that location prior to impact may amount to very little water actually being released.
And that's consistent with what I linked earlier (and which is also found here
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/press/2005/pr200523.html ); namely, that astronomers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics using NASA's Submillimeter Wave Astronomy Satellite (SWAS) reported seeing only weak emission from water vapor during and after the impact. They said the post impact release was "an emission rate very similar to pre-impact values, and less than seen by SWAS during natural outbursts in the weeks before the impact." (See also
http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0509850 ). And astronomers using the ground-based Submillimeter Array (SMA) in Hawaii reported their findings "corroborate the SWAS findings" and that they "saw little increase in production of gases following the impact." They were talking about the entire comet.
Initially,
according to this, the impact released 4500 metric tons of water, and that more dust was present.
Further observations by SWIFT released the following year, however, revealed a noteworthy increase in output.
Tempel 1 is usually a rather dim, weak comet with a water production rate of 16,000 tonnes per day. However, after the Deep Impact probe hit the comet this rate increased to 40,000 tonnes per day over the period 5-10 days after impact. Over the duration of the outburst, the total mass of water released by the impact was 250,000 tonnes.
Perhaps it's not as "puzzling" as you'd hoped?
Now your second source has a spectra that you claim shows water in the plume. It does. But you state "note how the observations match the prediction where water abundance is concerned." Really? I question this because with regards to the spectra,
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...746/258?ck=nck states "emission features are optically thick in individual lines, so that absolute abundances cannot be obtained directly". So yes, there was water in the plume ... but how much?
Not surprising you'd call it into question since it's contrary to what you'd rather believe. Oh well.
According to NASA's A'Hearn (see
http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00000232/ ), "the total ejected mass" (that's dust, ice, vapor, etc) "was about 10 or 20 MILLION kilograms". Of this, the mass of vapor ... be it water or CO2 or something else ... has been calculated (see
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007Icar..191...84S ) to be about 5 projectile masses. That's less than 2000 kg. Not a whole lot. And they don't really know how much of that is due to water. If they did, they wouldn't be running parametric hydrocode calculations trying to back out the amount.
Rendered irrelevant by further study provided above.
And then there is this curious item, brought to our attention by McCanney. It illustrates the way mainstream astronomers think. In March 2006, they announced (see
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/X_...ep_Impact.html ) that "Over the duration of the outburst, the team calculated, the mass of water released by the impact totaled 250,000 tons." Now that's a lot of water. But it's important to note that they didn't directly measure that water. They detected x-rays ... x-rays that Electric Comet theorists say have an entirely different origin than the one that mainstream theorists think. And examine the mainstream train of thought. It is ASSUMED that a brightening of x-ray emissions 13 days after the impact means water is present in the tail. It is ASSUMED it must have come from the impact site. But did anyone bother to figure out how big 250,000 tons of water is? Well McCanney did. It's a cube over 200 feet on a side. About as big or even bigger than the crater the impact is believed to have carved out of the comet. Do you see the problem in that, Wolverine?
The problem I see is that you're relying on cranks as if they're reliable sources of information -- as I noted some time ago, you seem to have difficulty distinguishing between science and pseudoscience, and it unnecessarily burdens the discussion with all the misconceptions and tangental minutiae. As a result you've managed to reach an opposite conclusion from the very data which contradict your position.
On
McCanney's (abysmal) page on Tempel 1, he's claiming that it's a hot, dry rock that's not releasing any water. It's also not surprising that he didn't provide any calculations for how he arrived at his "200' cube" conclusion, but that hasn't stopped you from buying into it because it's what you'd like to hear.
And one last item to add further to the confusion being created by NASA and mainstream researchers. The Deep Impact
pre-impact press kit states that comets are 50 percent water by weight. Well not according to this from September 2005:
http://www.space.com/scienceastronom...l1_update.html . A'Hearn, one of the key Deep Impact researchers, reportedly said "In recent years, our impression of comets has shifted from dirty snowballs to snowy dirtballs. That latter description holds true with comet Tempel 1 ... snip ... There is more dust than ice ... snip ... but the ratio is less than 10-to-1." 10 to 1? That's not even close to 50 percent. More like 10 percent. Do you know the water content of ordinary asteroids? Apparently 10 to 20 percent. Hmmm, makes one think ....
It makes me think you expect them to be psychic. You're taking something written before the impactor met the surface and crying foul because the science results were different. What sense does that make? The reason we undertake missions like this is to learn more and improve our ideas. That's precisely what we've done, again, and the pertinent data will prompt refinements where necessary.
I think McCanney, for all his idiosyncracies, actually summarized the situation quite well in this (
http://www.jmccanneyscience.com/Deep...ordSubPage.HTM ) "the percentage of ice required by 'theorists' on a comet nucleus has steadily been diminished ... snip ... 1985 (pre comet fly by theory) expected 100% surface contribution of ice and snow sublimating from the comet nucleus to create the observed comet tail, 1986-7 scientists reduce the estimate to 60% surface contribution and add the possibility of cracks and fissures ejecting jets of water ... but now these "jets" must be seriously active to make up for the lesser surface area contribution, in the early 2000's 3 comet close up encounters show no ice or snow on the nucleus ... so theorists now reduce expectations from 40% surface contribution to hopefully 4% ... snip ... the nucleus is now seen to be a hot dry rock with no snow or ice at all ... and no gushing fissures to make up for the original dirty snow ball surface contribution calculations". How times change.
McCanney also points out that "another little problem arises in that now there is insufficient solar energy to probe the cracks and fissures to produce the amount of water needed to fill the tail area on a continual basis ... snip ... as the comet tail develops it blocks the solar radiation that allegedly is affecting the nucleus to create the tail". Furthermore, he notes that "of the approximately 12 billion square feet of surface area of this comet nucleus ... only 300,000 square feet indicated any presence of water" and "these areas were not emitting any water 'to form the tail'".
Despite claiming not to be defending McCanney's model, you're defending McCanney's model. Why is that?
So you don't think in science there's no difference between saying "generally away" and "always points directly away"? I see.
Your focus is upon a subtle difference in language, not science. What you attempted to exploit is a non-issue.
Is this your theory or something from the mainstream? Source?
That's my observation from the imagery I provided, based on the "fanned" ion tail tracing the large halo of outgassed material rather than the comparatively dinky nucleus.
Are you saying Holmes has no or little dust tail? Apparently so.
No, I'm saying it's not shedding a
prominent dust tail
compared to the great comets whose imagery I included in the previous post.
You asked me different questions about this in your last post but condensed my replies into the same line while misconstruing my answers.
Primarily, you asked if what we see as the halo (what you called "diffuse symmetric cloud") is the dust tail. No, it's not. That's a mix of outgassed stuff.
Because in comparison, the nucleus is significantly smaller and has far less mass than the likes of Halley, Hale-Bopp, or the others I mentioned.
Don't comets usually have dust tails and sometimes have ion tails?
Yes, depending on their mass and proximity to the Sun.
What is that huge coma made of then?
Cyanogen and diatomic carbon, for starters (that's what provides the green cast). We'll know more about its composition when results are published.
Why would it grow to larger than the size of the sun from such a small object?
That's a bit misleading. The outburst material it puffed out grew larger than the size of the Sun. The nucleus remains a comparatively dinky 2-3km object. As you so fondly pointed out repeatedly, the cause is unknown at present.
If it's dust, why wouldn't solar radiation blow it "generally" away from the sun and form a tail?
I'm not sure why the halo seemed so cohesive (perhaps its relatively low velocity has something to do with it?). Regardless, Holmes is surely leaving behind a dust tail, it's probably just difficult to spot given our viewing angle and its size.
But again, I'm not defending his model. I'm defending the Thunderbolt group's model. And proving that NASA's model is inconsistent and does not adequately explain many of the observations. While the Thunderbolts model would seem to explain those observations.
Oh but you are defending McCanney's model, because you've invoked it once again, even in this very post. Let's recap.
1) First you promoted it saying
"Maybe here's the real answer".
2) I asked you why you gave it any credence.
3) Your first reply didn't explain why you place any stock in it, but instead that you reject the mainstream model. (Which is a non-answer.)
4) I reiterated by asking: what is it specifically about McCanney's cometary claims you think have merit, and why?
5) Your second reply:
"LOL! I'm not defending McCanney's theory. Much of what he says may indeed be nonsense...", and you go on again only to state you reject the mainstream.
6) I again remind you that's still a non-answer. (Side note: If much of what he says is nonsense, why are you citing him, anyway?)
7) Then you have the audacity to claim, again, that you're not defending his model when you're quoting it. In this very post.
The wheels on the bus go round and round. It reminds me of your attempt to deny claiming that comets cause CMEs, until you were obviously cornered and begrudgingly admitted that was the case.
I can only conclude you have no defense for invoking McCanney, other than it's something you think might be a neat idea since it bashes the mainstream.
MAINSTREAM BAD! is not an argument enumerating why you think someone else's model has merit.
Sure thing. But if he doesn't, will you address my criticisms in his place?
He already replied to you.
See #168.
Most of what you posted trying to argue against Phil was just diversionary fluff anyway, rehashing the
electric sun claims again, and using them as a means to reject The BA's refutations of McCanney.
