Perpetual motion accepted in astronomy - why ?

[Dove]

Hello guys,

seriously, why is it accepted that the Earth's obliquity is unchanging apart from a wobble caused by the perturbations of our sister planets?

It is clearly asserted that our axis movement, a decrease of 47" of obliquity per century, will remain wobbling 2-3 about our present obliquity. That is a notion of perpetual motion of Earth's axis if there ever was.

Any one like to check it out ? There is ample evidence for the assertion available on record.

Cheers, Alan.

Omission to last post.

read. 2-3 degrees

Alan.

[Ukastronomer]

I can never understand why perpetual motion is said not to exist

Surely as stated an object in motion will continue unless acted upon by an external force . etc

Then anything travelling in space no matter what speed will be in perpetual motion ???

[Sunfish]

Er. Entropy.
The Universe is winding down. Entropy increases.
Second law of thermodynamics I think can not be avoided.

So no perpetual motion.

A little more complicated than that if you read Carlo Rovelli.
But that is speculative I think.

I can’t see why the earth tilt has anything to do with perpetual motion. I will happily leave that to physicists.

[Atmos]

Where you may be getting confused is the difference between "perpetual motion" in the sense of the Earth rotating, whether it be around its own axis, around the sun or whatever.
This concept and the "perpetual motion machine" which is a very different concept where the power generation of a system is greater than the energy required to keep it running. It is this second concept that breaks the second law of thermodynamics.

Everything in the universe has a certain amount of motion promotional to the kinetic energy is has. This holds true for anything from atoms to galaxies. The energy pool of one body can affect another body. The moon is moving away from the Earth at some 2-3cm per year, as the moon recedes the Earth spins more slowly. This is known as the conservation of angular momentum, it's the same concept as a dancer having their arms out or in while spinning.

Theoretically you can have perpetual (forever) motion if you have something moving through space and it isn't interacting with anything else. It's energy pool remains constant and isn't changing so it'll continue doing what it's doing.

[Ukastronomer]

In which case perpetual motion can theoretically never be achieved

[Sunfish]

There is nothing in our universe which does not react with something else as far as one can demonstrate now. Radiation,light, gravity, magnetic and electric fields and so on , even when imperceptible has an effect. Moving things , warm things, loose energy. Eventually the universe will be cold and dark and big or squashed up in a tiny non space.

[JA]

Motion that continues for aeons: 1000's, tens of thousands, millions, hundreds of millions of years, etc... is perpetual enough :D

Best
JA

[Ukastronomer]

Then there will never BE perpetual motion............... ever

[astroron]

Tell me what is your definition of Perpetual Motion:question:
Cheers:thumbsup:

[pfitzgerald]

FWIW - I would suggest that you may be confusing perpetual motion with simple harmonic motion.

[Ukastronomer]

it isn't m"MY" definition..............

[astroron]

Now I remember why I stopped contributing to this forum:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

[Sunfish]

In which case the universe itself has “perpetual enough” motion fuelled by its initial supercharged state although it could be all that mysterious dark energy doing some pushing.

There were some calculations I read by a physicist that a ship pushed by an exploding star and whipped around a black hole or two to accelerate at some part of the speed of light could zip far into our future. Easy to speculate I suppose.

Perhaps that it perpetual enough and thankfully no one is junking up the future yet.

[JohnF]

To throw a cat in among pigeons. As far as the angle of the earth on the orbit, etc. Ancient Races all had a year of 360 Days -- it appears in ancient times the year was 360 Days. But the earth has apparently slowed down to 365 !/4 days [and a bit more that we do not need to discuss for this discussion.]. I am basing this on Archaeology, not Astronomy.

That is practically every ancient race did record the year as 360 days. Then the earth slowed. races from Central America, as well as the middle east described the 5 1/4 extra days that were added as BAD day, demon days, etc.

So perhaps this will throw a spanner into perpetual motion.

And sorry guys, I may not get back to this until Friday.

[Dove]

Hello to all.

I address my argument to those who agree with the scientific premise that there is no such thing as perpetual motion, in order that we can proceed to look at some facts concerning the motion of our planet. Namely the misconception in astronomy that earth's angle of obliquity is unchanging and earth will forever remain wobbling around 23.5 degrees due to the perturbations of our sister planets.

Those friends who believe that there is such a thing as perpetual motion, can rest content in the notion that earth will exist forever wobbling around 23.5 degrees obliquity. Cheers Alan.

[Dove]

Hello Sunfish,

The angle of obliquity is mainly a question for astronomy.

It is also a question of planetary motion, a subject that is not fully understood due to neglect.

I put my argument in more detail in my next post.

Cheers, Alan D.




Reply to sunfish (Ray}

Allow me to explain:

1.
You will be aware that the precession ‘circle’ traced on the celestial sphere is centred on the pole of the ecliptic. And is truly described as a circle not a spiral, and when the north pole completes a full circuit it will not return to the same spot to complete a circle, this indicates that it is actually performing a spiral.

This became evident from Isaac Newton’s description of Precession of the Equinoxes, showing that the equatorial plane shifts annually, along the plane of the ecliptic completing a spiral orbit and in accord with it, the north pole of earth’s axis shifts spirally about the pole of the ecliptic. Yet Newton gave no indication or recognition of the spiral nature of Earth’s orbit.

The Precession of the Equinoxes operates in accord with the law of Spiral planetary motion the spiral nature of which, has ever since been ignored by astronomy.

From the foregoing it follows, that the North pole annually moves along on a spiral precession cycle in accord with Earth’s spiral orbit about the equatorial plane.

2.
It will be understood that spiral planetary motion has two inherent functions that are best described as follows:
a.
The first inherent function of the spiral orbit induced by the Sun is as follows.
Each orbit progressively advances the plane of the orbit and of course with it the angle of its axis to the Sun. See Newtons ‘bending moment’ the torque that the Sun ‘tends’ to draw the Earth’s equatorial plane to equate with the plane of the ecliptic, (And of course, eventually to the plane of the Sun, due to the protuberance of Earth’s equator).
b.
The second and basic inherent function of natures spiral orbit is its continuous gravitational movement toward the centre, to the Sun. (see the Newton Hooke correspondence 1679 concerning the movement of matter toward centre, introduced by Dr.Hooke with his elliptispiral form of motion.

Natures spiral is the essence of all planetary motion, as such, it is the dynamism of gravity, of change and life itself.

Due to the impetus of spiral motion throughout the solar system and beyond, no forms of matter can be held in perpetual suspension without change, the spiral motion of matter ensures change absolutely. Everything has a beginning and an end.

So you see Ray, planet Earth cannot be left in suspension wobbling about 23.5 degrees going round and around the Sun perpetually at that fixed angle, because that would be a perpetual motion and consequently science generally does not support the notion of perpetual motion.
.
Cheers Alan

[bojan]

Yep...

Can I offer some badly needed education on precession, see here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precession


And orbital motion of planets, here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbit

[morls]

Just out of interest, has anyone or any theory described or modelled the motion of the earth around the sun in such a way that includes the sun's movement as part of the milky way and the milky way's movement as part of the local group?

[gary]

Hi Stephen,

What is referred to as the secular aberration drift (SAD) is fancy wording that
describes the solar system barycentre's rotational acceleration around the
centre of the galaxy, a point heavily weighted by the supermassive black
hole designated Sagittarius A.

In the year 2000, we went from using the positions of approximately 1500
stars to using the positions of distant quasars for defining RA and dec.
This system we now use is referred to as the International
Celestial Reference Frame (ICRF).

This capability came about through the now routine use of Very
Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) where a global network of
radiotelescopes uses the distant quasars as references.

In recent years, they are measuring angles down at the phenomenally
small microarcsecond (μas) level.

So the SAD (our rotation around the centre of the Milky Way) has
been measured at around 5 to 6 μas per year.

The theories of precession and nutation are now refined to mindboggling
levels of precision, as they need to be for everything else to be
measured so accurately, so there is not much that is not accounted for with
respect the Earth's own motion.

They even use VLBI to measure plate tectonic motions down to
one millimetre per year!

In turn the proper motions with respect the Local Group are being
measured and refined as well.

Years ago I had a customer buy from us and I recognised his name
as one of the leading authorities in planetary position theory.

He worked at JPL and I had a brief email exchange with him.
Turned out he was an amateur observer too in his spare time.

He was one of the people responsible for refining the ephemeris for
the Earth, Moon and planets so that, for example, the JPL landers
could more accurately hit their reentry corridors through the
Martian atmosphere.

I told him I had read several of his papers and that we used a subset
of that very emphemeris to compute the positions of the planets.

In turn he was happy to use our device in his spare time to look at the
planets. :) So I was chuffed by the thought his work had gone through
a full circle.

These ephemeris in their full form will compute the position of any of
the planets to no less 25 metres accuracy and to the Moon within a metre!

[morls]

Wow, thanks Gary.

It's amazing that we are be able to measure our movement around Sagittarius A.

[Dove]

[QUOTE=bojan;1450561]Yep...

Can I offer some badly needed education on precession, see here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precession

Yes Bojan I agree, on the presumption that some contributors may not be familiar with all details of the precession of the equinoxes, a fundamental factor of planetary motion.

For example, precession of the equinoxes is a demonstration that Earth's orbit is a spiral motion that progresses the orbit about the plane of the ecliptic and the North pole cycling about the pole of the ecliptic. This spiral orbital motion of our. planet seems not to be fully recognised.
Alan D.

[bojan]

Alan,

It is essential to understand the mathematical and physical basics before going any further with this discussion.
Gary's reply is a good start...
Precession of equinoxes is well undersood phenomenon...

Spiral orbits are one of the effects of GR, see here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tests_of_general_relativity
In practice, those effects could be disregarded as insignificant when Earth orbit around our star is concerned.

[Sunfish]

+1 for Gary and Bojan
Thanks for that.

Like Charlie Browns football , what appears to be a question aimed at science discussion winds up being not there at all.

[JohnF]

It is probable that once the earth was not wobbling at 23.5 degrees. Fossils of tropical animals are found at both poles, that is what is now our Polar regions were once warm. and the poles have change their position many times in the past according to the fossil record.

So that is one thing that possibly proves that we were not always at 23.5 degrees.

[bojan]

It only proves the places where today's rotational poles are were not always at the rotational poles...
Also, continents are migrating independetly of Earth rotation and/or precession.

[JA]

It's more than probable: It's certain - (Pr=1) (as much as science can ever be).

The evidence in the scientific literature is clear on the fact that the Earth's current 23.5 degree angle of tilt (obliquity) varies over something like a 40,000 year cycle by a few degrees (±1 or so degrees). There are also other orbital changes (on much longer time scales): changes in the eccentricity of the Earth's orbit around the Sun and precession of its rotational axis.

These are all well documented variations in the earth's orbital parameters and were brilliantly pulled together by Mulitin Milakovitch, a Serbian mathematician to help explain climate change and the coming and goings of the ice ages (and as a reasonable logical extension many of the changes in between).

Best
JA

[andyc]

Fossils from polar regions demonstrate plate tectonics and continental drift (with a bit of geological scale climate & greenhouse gas change thrown in), *not* that Earth tilted wildly on its axis any more than we very well understand from orbital mechanics (e.g. Milankovitch cycles). The astronomical year has not in human times been 360 days either (hard to believe this came up at a reasonably scientific site) - those who think so need to learn about intercalation and intercalary months (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intercalary_month_(Egypt)) that were present in ancient calendars to allow a 360-day calendar (an extremely pretty round number with opportunity for subdivision) to be repeatedly recalibrated to the ~365.25 day astronomical year.

None of the Solar System's orbital mechanics has anything to do with the laughable pseudoscience notion of 'perpetual motion', which generally involves magicking up some free energy to maintain an otherwise decaying system. XKCD visited this (https://xkcd.com/2217/) just the other day. Physics is mean...

[gary]

Hi Andy,

And one of course doesn't have to go far here in Sydney to see wonderful examples of continental drift. :)

Large swaths of Sydney are built upon Haweksbury River sandstone.

Some of it is most dramatically seen through the cuttings of the M1
(previously F3) Freeway between Sydney and the Central Coast.

Very close to where I am right now.

Douglas Mawson I recollect was one of the first to recognize the
sandstones he saw in Antarctica were "Hawkesbury River" sandstone.

All when Australia and Antarctica were all part of Gondwanaland and
"Sydney" was much closer to the south pole. :)



http://www.adderley.net.au/geology/exhibition/04/04_02_12.html

[Dove]

Hello John F,

Yes, that is right. the obliquity has been known to be reducing regularly for the last 2000 years and we know how important this angle is to our climate. The current theory is as we know Milankovitch’s but it only offers an explanation of some 2.3 degrees wobble and some varying eccentricity changing the obliquity.

This theory puts a restriction on all astronomers and geologists to within a very narrow range to explain the mysteries of great changes of climate in the past. These past changes in climate call for an explanation covering a greater range of obliquity.

As Bojan rightly suggests, we need to look deeper into the subject. For example I suggest we start by looking at the motion of our planet. The earth is travelling about the Sun. So I ask all contributors, is it travelling in a circle or a spiral? We can all answer this definitively I am sure. It is an important point to commence the argument.

Alan D.

[JohnF]

Well I had read many years ago that the earth travels in an Elipse shape. Not sure how a spiral fits, but will follow this interesting thread.

Fossil Evidence seems to indicate that this world once had a daily universally warm climate.

Certainly there is Progression of the poles. For example Polaris is now the North Pole Star. But around 4000 years ago the North Pole Star was the star "Alpha Drakonos," the Eye of the Dragon -- Hence Santa, anagram of Satan, keeps his eye on people from the North Pole.

Anciently Drakonos was beloved to watch and keep his eye on people.

The Pyramid of Cheops in Egypt was aligned with Alpha Drakonos.

So their is a definite progression.

Another post claimed research on Quasars show they are speeding up in going away from us. So how does this first with perpetual motion.

Oh, and I have one copy of Nw Scientist that mentions a cluster of Galaxies that all show different rd shifts, though this cluster is thought to be all at the same distance from us. So that there are a quite a number of problems.

I am not an Astrophysicist, so do not claim to have the answers. But do find such problems intresting.

[andyc]

No they don't, unless you have some remarkable new evidence you'd like to share that's in contradiction to the body of scientific understanding of geology and Earth's palaeoclimate. Merely saying "it was once warm at the Poles" is neither news, nor paradigm-shifting. Plate tectonics, stellar physics and (crucially) greenhouse gas changes cover the key observed variations very well.

[morls]

Alan,
I get the impression you don't believe the science behind theories of anthropogenic climate change? Sounds like you are claiming the accepted science is flawed or somehow incomplete? (Well, all science is incomplete to an extent I suppose as theories are tested and new knowledge emerges...)

[Multiverse]

'New Scientist' mags! They need to be thrown in the bin.

[Dove]

Thankyou Moris

You are quite right, a serious flaw, stay tuned.

Cheers Alan D

[morls]

Oh dear...:(

You talk of changes to the obliquity over the last 2000 years, well, I'll attach a figure charting temperature trends for the past 65 million years (Ma).

This figure is from a paper published on the "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America" website

It's probably not going to change your mind, but here is a link to the document:
https://www.pnas.org/content/115/52/13288


Here's an excerpt from the abstract to the article:

Here, we quantitatively assess the similarity of future projected climate states to these six geohistorical benchmarks using simulations from the Hadley Centre Coupled Model Version 3 (HadCM3), the Goddard Institute for Space Studies Model E2-R (GISS), and the Community Climate System Model, Versions 3 and 4 (CCSM) Earth system models. Under the Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5) emission scenario, by 2030 CE, future climates most closely resemble Mid-Pliocene climates, and by 2150 CE, they most closely resemble Eocene climates. Under RCP4.5, climate stabilizes at Pliocene-like conditions by 2040 CE. Pliocene-like and Eocene-like climates emerge first in continental interiors and then expand outward. Geologically novel climates are uncommon in RCP4.5 (<1%) but reach 8.7% of the globe under RCP8.5, characterized by high temperatures and precipitation. Hence, RCP4.5 is roughly equivalent to stabilizing at Pliocene-like climates, while unmitigated emission trajectories, such as RCP8.5, are similar to reversing millions of years of long-term cooling on the scale of a few human generations. Both the emergence of geologically novel climates and the rapid reversion to Eocene-like climates may be outside the range of evolutionary adaptive capacity.

[andyc]

:lol::lol::lol:
This climate scientist is not going to hold his breath that Alan Dove, random commenter on the Internet, has succeeded where actual generations of climate deniers (sometimes funded by some of the world's biggest companies who knew the reality (https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/oct/23/exxon-climate-crisis-house-democrats-hearing)) have failed... to overturn 150 years of extremely well-established physics (https://history.aip.org/climate/co2.htm)!! I've lost track of the number of 'eccentrics' who've come up with a novel unsupported weird theory (like 'spiral planetary motion', or 'iron Sun', various flavours of planetary gravitational influences, cosmic rays, multidimensional curve-fitting and the like). All consistently "ABC" (Anything But CO2). Not expecting the latest one will get even remotely close to explaining the full body of scientific understanding of planetary physics, geology, climate, oceanographic, atmosphere, biosphere, atmospheric chemistry, energy balance and all the rest...

Oh, and by the sounds of it, wants to toss out orbital mechanics too!

[Multiverse]

Not everyone understands 'The Scientific Method', one of the greatest ideas humans have developed (upon which all our modern civilization rests on). This despite being afforded every opportunity of a school 'first world education' and the continuing internet resources available for evidence-based findings.
I too despair at the sometimes wasted effort of the real school teachers and am irritated at the faith-based nonsense schools (which enable young minds to lose focus on reality).
Trying to argue with and becoming frustrated with the deluded is akin to wrestling with a pig in mud - there comes a point when you finally realise that the pig is enjoying it!

[morls]

I agree that not everyone understands the intricacies of the scientific method, but why don't people trust scientists? When the United Nations backs the science, when the vast bulk of peer reviewed, rigorous research papers build the case that this is indeed happening, why do people instead say "no, they are wrong"? It's like me telling a brain specialist that his diagnosis of a neurological condition is wrong, because phrenology hasn't been taken into account.

[JA]

As a general comment on such discussions, I feel in any scientific argument it's important to argue the facts based on the evidence rather than any of the qualifications or lack of qualification of either proponent. Anything else tends towards activism however well intentioned it may or may not be.

If one is interested in hearing all views, contrary or otherwise, then people need to feel comfortable in expressing their views without ridicule or personal judgements. Otherwise all we have is open house for political correctness and non-contrarian views. We make the society we deserve.

Best
JA

[morls]

I was commenting on the fact that on occasion people ignore or reject evidence-based arguments on the basis of ideological difference, even when they don't fully understand the field of endeavour with which they are engaging (or not engaging).
I don't think political correctness comes into it.

[andyc]

People feeling comfortable, expressing their views without ridicule (or without extremely blunt push-back) is a noble aim. And may work where consequences are minor, such as for branches of philosophy, metaphysics or religion. But in real-world high-consequence situations, such as destabilising the only climate we know of able to sustain life and produce our food, it is extremely problematic. Would you be happy with homeopaths having more control over your cancer treatment than your oncologist? Would you be happy if what passes for physics of flat-Earthers was used to design the next space probe? How about the perpetual motion believers designing the engines for the next aircraft you fly in? We're in the 21st Century precisely because we've built on knowledge, rather than keeping all the crazy unphysical hypotheses in the mix. Vale, phlogiston!

"We make the society we deserve" Is a very interesting comment in the context of us having voted a bunch of full-on science deniers into government at the last three elections. (and it's not as if they just dispute the hard, actually-worth-debating stuff, they dispute the century-old easy, utterly-verified-many-times-before-computers, obvious stuff too). It's what happens when the cranks are given a greater voice (and legitimacy) than our esteemed national and international scientific institutions.

[Multiverse]

True.
You can have your own opinion, but you can't have your own facts!

[Dove]

[QUOTE=morls;1451268]Oh dear...:(

You talk of changes to the obliquity over the last 2000 years, well, I'll attach a figure charting temperature trends for the past 65 million years (Ma).

Hi Moris,

I refer to the last 2000 years of the obliquity by reason that we have a clear rate of the the constant decrease of the obliquity over this period and that the rate of decrease is known to be increasing. My objective is to demonstrate the existence of spiral planetary motion and how it has always controlled the continuous change in our planets climate.

To move on from the point where we could clearly identify that Earth's Orbit is a spiral that is responsible for the precession of the equinoxes. So we understand that in the first place the Spiral mode of of Earth's orbit is a very important important factor in the motion of our planet. Without the spiral factor what would we have Circular orbits? I think not - perpetual motion.
So the Spiral nature of our orbit takes on a very important place in Astronomy
and planetary motion. Then why we ask did Newton ignore it in the first place?

There is a very good reason for his decision, because it was being brought to his notice By Dr. Hooke in their correspondence in 1689. But Newton dared not recognise what Dr Hooke had hinted at in his own work that he had asked Newton to review, Where they discussed Hooke's contention of all matter 'moving to a centre' Hook sketched for him the elliptic spiral as the form of motion.
This was in fact the biggest step forward for astronomy since Kepler described the elliptical form of orbital motion. But the Hooke was disappointed and returned to other many scientific studies and activities. So the advance stagnated.

Hooke and Newton fell out over this but Newton In his Principia 1786 (after Hookes death he gave mention of the spiral but reduced the study of planetary motion to the study of curvature which continues to this day.

The reason why not only Newton but all of the revered principle characters in astronomy, ever since, all continue to ignore the natural spiral motion of our planets. To follow the spiral is a great adventure into the history of our planet to see where it leads.

Kepler gave us the elliptical form of orbital motion. If it is wished, We can discuss the foregoing before we pass on to the spiral effect of Earth's second form of motion it's rotation. There are some questions perhaps, this is a very simplified explanation but it is all based on historical fact and the constants of precession published in the astronomical almanacs.
Cheers, Alan D.

[bojan]

There is NO natural or un-natural spiral motion of our planets...

Motions of planets are totally described with General Relativistic equations..

If you substitute c (speed of ligh) with infinite value in those equations, you will get Newton's Mechanic.

[JohnF]

Problem is many who do claim to be Scientists do deliberately avoid all evidence that does not fit there theory.

As an example of this from Geology, most deliberately ignore the Carbon 14 dates of Coal Seams, as if that information was known their whole Theory of Evolution falls flat on its face.

Many other Examples of so called Science ignoring the evidence, in order to prop up their Theory can be given.

[bojan]

John,
This is a very bold and wide statement...
Please provide references and supprot those claims with relevant evidence, befor ewe go any further.

BTW, peer review is one of the tools scientist use to ensure the quality and accuracy of their work.
If idea does not fit the available data, it is rejected.. or put on the back burner for more data to be collected.
Those who ignore the above methodology can't be considered as scientists.

[morls]

Yes, I agree. John, please provide references to support these claims.

[morls]

Hi John,
I've done a bit of digging (:D) into your assertion, and have found some interesting articles.

It seems that one of the arguments creationists use to support their ideology surrounds the half-life of carbon-14. The hypothesis seems to be that the presence of c14 in fossil fuels, rock samples and fossils proves that current scientific methods for dating such materials is flawed, because this c14 could not be present in samples older than, say, 100,000 years. The half-life of c14 is around 5,730.
This is the view of Curt Sewell (2004) http://ldolphin.org/sewell/c14dating.html
One of his more creative conclusions is:...the finding that measurable and reproducible amounts of 14C in fossil material such as coal and other materials previously thought to be very ancient is a powerful refutation of the geological timescale of millions of years. This should force a complete re-examination of the entire scientific system of dating...
The same hypothesis may be found in a wealth of other articles, including:
https://answersingenesis.org/geology/carbon-14/doesnt-carbon-14-dating-disprove-the-bible/
http://www.creationstudies.org/operationsalt/carbon14.html
I suspect there are many more websites such as these. The ideas seem very close to your own John, so I'm assuming you are familiar with these?
I'd like to suggest you also look into the use of isotopes other than carbon-14 for radiometric dating. There are many many more methods than the above pieces would suggest. Try this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiometric_dating

[morls]

I've been thinking more about these articles refuting the accepted methods for radiometric dating, and it seems that such literature is damaging, not only to the credibility of those who write them, but also potentially to those readers who may be swayed by the perceived or self-assumed status of the authors. If arguments for a different interpretation of theories are to be taken seriously, and be of service to their intended audience, they at least have to engage at something approaching an informed level.

In another thread Paul Davies was mentioned, and although some may question the direction his more philosophical musings take, there is no doubting the depth of his knowledge regarding current scientific practice and theory. On this basis alone his writing merits serious consideration.

Articles such as the ones I've seen this morning are, in my opinion, nothing but selective fluff, carrying no weight of rigour and showing no willingness to enter into informed debate on the issue. In fact fluff is the wrong word. These articles represent an approach to knowledge that is blinkered, biased and selective, masquerading as an approach informed by an exclusive connection to divine knowledge. This is dangerous and damaging to impressionable minds.

If an argument can be formed through an unbiased review of all the literature dealing with a particular topic, which might require taking the time to learn more about a topic in order to understand it more completely, then this is a good point to proceed from. I consider essential as well to hold an attitude of openness, to be prepared to be wrong. This is difficult, but knowing you have approached an issue as objectively as possible is itself a very satisfying outcome.

Anything less is a waste of time, and renders any argument formulated without a willingness to fully engage with the whole body of literature irrelevant at best, manipulative and exploitative in more extreme cases.


Sorry for the rant.

[Dove]

[QUOTE=bojan;1451487]There is NO natural or un-natural spiral motion of our planets...


Bojan

Sorry for delay in getting back on line.

That is a bold statement you made. How do you describe earth’s orbit if it not a spiral motion, you are virtually saying that it is performing a circle, a perpetual motion?

Only a spiral motion can produce the precession of the equinoxes not a circle. As you suggested, we started with the precession the equinoxes, rightly so.

Cheers Alan D.

[bojan]

OK...

Could you then explain to me (and others) exactly why and how spiral motion causes precession (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precession), maybe I am misunderstanding something.
I included link from wikipedia above to help you point out for us what you think is my problem.

[morls]

Without reading up on this, I imagine the earth's orbit would trace a more or less level path around the sun. If I was to imagine this as a spiral I would have to first assume the solar system as a whole is moving through space in a direction perpendicular to the earth's orbit. This would then I suppose trace out a spiral.

If the movement of the solar system as a whole was not perpendicular to the orbit of the earth then the spiral would not be as I imagine a spiral to be - which is like a slinky.

I strongly suspect my conception of this is waaaay off. The answer might lie in topology, but it's hard for me to know because I'm not on top of (:D) all the dimensions in the universe which would need to be taken into account for such a model to be formulated.

[Multiverse]

Post

[morls]

I was hypothesising. How else is one to form a hypothesis if not through imagination?

The whole idea of a spiral orbit seems pretty imaginary...

[morls]

In any case, I realise now I was hypothesising about how one may describe the earth's motion through an imaginary space ("the universe"), limited in the context of this hypothesis to 3 dimensions.

Alan D., could you please explain your theory of a "spiral orbital path of the earth around the sun", and some background as to how you arrived at this theory?


Do you agree with this definition from NASA Knows? https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/5-8/features/nasa-knows/what-is-orbit-58.html
An orbit is a regular, repeating path that one object in space takes around another one.

[Dove]

Hello Moris

No, it is inadequate. 'a repeating path' does not define the nature of it the orbital path. 'a continuous path' would be less ambiguous, a repeating path could be interpreted as an orbital circle.

We find the science is, as always, reluctant to call the orbit a circle, for good reason. but at the same time same time they cannot, dare not say what it really is, a spiral. And they have good reason for this reluctance. The history of the farce goes bach 360 years. The only people who wouid dare to recognise Spiral planetary motion are those who have nothing to lose recognising the truth of it.

The repercussions following recognition of this truth are enormous, affecting far more than astronomy alone. Enough said. The question has to be asked to every astronomer is, do they think the earth's orbit is continuous spiral, if not what do they think it is? A simple question but a leads an amazing story.

Cheers Alan D.

[morls]

So what is this amazing story?

[Dove]

Sorry bojan .

for the delay I’ve been a little busy of late.

I did try to visit your wiki reference by copying and pasting the address but was unsuccessful

Yes of course, my explanation.
The precession of the equinoxes is the key to understanding the spiral mode of Earth’s orbit about the Sun. the Sun’s gravitation effect on the Earth is paramount as it is with whole solar system I think you will agree. It has a strong influence on both of Earth’s forms of motion. It’s rotation on its axis and it’s revolution about the Sun.

As a preliminary it will be useful to quote Isaac Newton on his observations and study of planetary motion; from the ‘Principia’ (1687) aided with the impressions that he received from Dr, Robert Hooke during their earlier correspondence during 1679 where Hooke asked him to review his work – ‘The Attempt to Prove the Motion of the Earth from Observations’.

Hooke’s observations which obviously influenced Newton was the movement of the spheres to the centre etc. I quote a short extract:
“First, That all Coelestial Bodies whatsoever, have an attraction or gravitating power towards their own Centers, whereby they attract not only their own parts, and keep them from flying from them, as we may observe the Earth to do, but that they do also attract all the other Coelestial Bodies that are within the sphere of their activity; and consequently that not only the Sun and Moon have an influence upon the body and motion of the Earth, and the Earth upon them, but that also , , , and by their attractive powers, have a considerable influence upon its motion as in the same manner the corresponding attractive power of the Earth hath a considerable influence upon every one of their motions also.
The second supposition is this, That all bodies whatsoever that are put into a direct and simple motion, will so continue to move forward in a streight line, till they are by some other effectual powers deflected and bent into a Motion, describing a Circle, Ellipsis, or some other more compounded Curve Line.” End of quote
In the Principia it is evident that Newton had absorbed much from their discussions , where Hooke had clearly advanced the new notion that planetary motion was an ellipsis or a curved line. Towards the end of their correspondence, as they were considering the movement of the spheres to the centre, Hooke produced a sketch. A beautiful elliptical spiral.

There is much more to be told that followed but Its getting late for me, so tomorrow we will look at what Newton said in his ‘Principia’ about the movement to a centre , 7 years after Hooke’s death; plenty of time to contemplate on the risk of declaring an orbit as a spiral motion.

Have nice day , Alan D.

[morls]

I've dug up the following from The Cambridge Companion to Newton: The spiral orbit with a center of force at its pole is a particularly simple direct problem whose solution is an inverse-cube force [see attachment 1, the first paragraph of which is from an earlier footnote, but still interesting]. In this way Newton could have discovered in a straightforward manner that for the inverse-cube force the orbit reaches the origin “by an infinite number of spiral revolutions,” as he described it in his 13 December 1679 letter to Hooke. It is noteworthy that in “De motu” Newton quoted this result in a scholium without giving a geometrical demonstration as he did with his other propositions, and later on in the Principia, he applied the 1/r3 force law rather than the physically more interesting 1/r2 case, to solve explicitly the inverse problem (see Theorem 41, Corollary 3, Book 1) [see attachment 2]. Although Newton could also have applied his curvature method to solve the case of an elliptic orbit, there is no direct evidence that he actually carried out such a calculation.

The missing ingredient for a complete solution of the orbital problem, which must include the temporal as well as the spatial dependence of the motion, was provided by the fundamental idea of Hooke to view orbital motion as compounded by a tangential inertial velocity and a change of velocity impressed by the central force. This idea can be expressed in simple mathematical form for forces that act
as periodic impulses for which the curvature method is not applicable, and it leads directly to the area law (see Principia, Proposition 1, Book 1). After the correspondence with Hooke, Newton evidently understood the equivalence of these two distinct physical approaches to orbital motion, but he never credited Hooke for his seminal contribution.
Brackenridge, J., & Nauenberg, M. (2002). Curvature in Newton's dynamics. In I. Cohen & G. Smith (Eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Newton(Cambridge Companions to Philosophy, pp. 85-137). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CCOL0521651778.004

[spaceout]

Perpetual motion could be philosophically accepted in space, simply because you cannot find a single item at rest.


Find something in the universe that doesn't move, then you can prove that perpetual motion is impossible.



Perpetual motion is a misnomer that shouldn't be given much thought.



The term is usually used and convoluted with free-energy machines, but the term is not exclusive to gypsy science.



To deny perpetual motion is to infer the age of the universe and how long it will last. How can something perpetual exist in a finite theater?

[bojan]

Alan,
From "The Cambridge Companion to Newton" provided here by Stephen, it is visible Newton "experimented" (mathematically) with movement of bodies influenced by central force between them that has various dependency on distance r between them. We would say today he played with different math models of orbital motion, by varying the value of exponent to "r" (distance between bodies) in his equations.

Basically, he concluded then that gravitational force obeying only inverse square law (1/r^2) results in stable elliptical orbit (circular is a special case of ellipse where eccentricity is zero), which corresponded with observations.

If gravitational force obeyed for example 1/r^3 law, the orbit would have been inward spiral (I don't remember which type of spiral exactly, it could be Archimedes' ?)... resulting in collision of two bodies. BTW, spiral (and unstable) orbit results from any value of exponent >2.
If exponent applied to r is less than 2, then spiral would have been "open", resulting in increasing separation of bodies (and escape).
Remember, this was happening in times physicists did know how gravity force behaves with distance... hence the discussion.. involving mathematical details... So, apart from historical insight, it is irrelevant to our discussion here.

However, my question to you was:
"why and how spiral motion causes precession (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precession)".

[spaceout]

Allow me to throw a wrench into this discussion.


Rather then discussing solid bodies, or jelly filled bodies might I remind you of the electrical/magnetic interaction that probably has a lot to do with the alignment of planetary orbits.



Do we think it's a coincidence that the top and bottom of the earth are also it's north and south magnetic poles?
How do you think this aligns with the suns magnetic poles?


Seems like a planet has no choice but to fall in line, or be obliterated or expelled. The orbital disc is determined primarily by magnetic equilibrium for lack of a better term.



As a footnote I might remind you that Archimedes math for infinity is still obscured in a Palimpsest. Everything cited since then, including Newton may be dealing with incomplete information. For better or worse.

[bojan]

I have to inform you that, contrary to all EU believers, electromagnetic interaction has nothing to with "alignment" of celestial bodies.


In our discussions on this forum, we are trying to be scientific.

That means, every claim or statement anyone writes here has to be backed with evidence.

[Dove]

Space out

Hello
You should find the topic of great interest it is surprising how many people unwittingly accept the medieval notion of perpetual motion within the solar system.

Alan D

[Dove]

Hello bojan,
Bojan,

Yes we can see that the protection of the medieval perpetual solar system notion has got deeper and deeper and more complex since the 17th century . I take it this is your reply to my question, that “if you consider there is no such thing as spiral planetary motion, what do you think the motion is? Then your response now is that, there is such a thing as spiral planetary motion, “open and closed” spirals but that spiral motion, is a highly complex motion. Well at least you have answered the question, you believe there is such a thing as spiral planetary motion.

Your question to me was for an explanation.

I have posted the first part of my explanation to you and will continue probably today.

As I see it, the situation at the moment has advanced, most agree that there is such a thing as spiral planetary motion. The difference of opinion now lies in whether it is a relatively simple movement of our spheres or; is a highly complex movement, a movement that prevents science discerning whether our planet is moving progressively and continuously, albeit slowly changing our angle of obliquity.
That then is your task, to maintain this situation of no advance beyond the medieval notion of an ‘invariable’ solar system; that our axis is merely wobbling back and forth over a 2.4 degrees cycle over 14 thousand years. Over the past 360 years there has built up a vast array of ‘proof’ to defend this. You have plenty of ammunition, we know.

I do wonder how any modern astronomer can be happy with the accepted theory of the ‘invariable’ solar system without question

Can you explain what a ‘closed spiral’ looks like please. A simple sketch would be better.

Alan D.

[morls]

Alan,

You say "most agree that there is such a thing as spiral planetary motion".

You are not being specific, you are not providing evidence, and you are not backing up these blanket assertions with any published literature. The challenge for you is to do so.

I suspect you aren't because you cannot. I suspect there is no published literature from the last 100 years supporting a theory of spiral planetary motion.

Please prove me wrong.

[spaceout]

Science is not a democracy, I do not acknowledge your insulting demands rather ask that you first practice what you preach.

[spaceout]

Alas the topics of such interest are the source of the great frustration.



I long for the days to be able to have these conversations with "peers", however I always regret it. It's akin to talking politics or religion, the worst is when they think they know something.



History repeats itself in ironic ways with the antagonists cheering on protagonists of the past.

[morls]

Spaceout, Bojan's is not an insulting demand, but a call for intellectual rigour. Without rigour there is the risk of prejudice, bias and emotion to cloud discussion.

We are all human and subject to human frailty. I believe that by acknowledging that every idea has a history, and referring to this history openly and diligently when involved in debate, we can avoid many pitfalls.

[bojan]

Heh, this is getting interesting :-)

First, reply to Alan:
What I wrote was, if gravitational force were not obeying the inverse squared law (1/r^2), the motion would have been spiral.. which is contrary to observation. Observational results (measurements) suggest orbital motion of planets are along ellipses. Which means the gravity obeys 1/r^2 (inverse square) law.
Using that law, today we can calculate the positions of planets with sufficient accuracy, which is the proof the concept is valid.
To achieve better accuracy (and to explain fully the precession of Mercury orbit) we have to use General Relativity.

Interesting fact is, GR does predict the spiral motion of two bodies in extremely strong gravitational field (for example two neutron stars or two black holes in close orbit), and that motion results in crash or fusion. This kind of motion I called (possibly clumsy) "closed spiral" because orbital distance becomes smaller with time... my term "open spiral" suggests orbital distance increasing with time).
Please note, systems like the one described above were observed, and the measurement results of decreasing orbital distance exactly follows the GR.
However, for some reason I feel this is not the proof for whatever you are trying to suggest.
BTW, have a look at this link, discussion of Arcimedean spiral:
https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/16745/moving-a-particle-around-an-archimedean-spiral-at-a-constant-speed





To Spaceout:
?
Well, of course I agree, the science is not democracy.

It is not democracy precisely because the outcome is not based on opinions, wishes/feelings and power games between individual scientists (of course there are always elements of those factors because science is human activity, but we have peer review process in place to eliminate those un-scientific factors).
Science is based on facts, than can be confirmed, measured and obtained (at lest in theory) repeatably by anyone whenever needed/wanted.

What was my "insulting" demand?

And I do not understand your suggestion ("practice what you preach"), could you please be more specific and let me know exactly where I do not practice what I preach? I do not preach.. I am just trying to guide this discussion so we could come to result we can all agree on.

[spaceout]

Bojan rather then dwell on the past lets have a look at the link you have with the Archimedian spiral.



Where is the Z axis?


What is the reason for omitting the third axis in a 3-dimensional equation?



I could tell you that the planets are not orbiting, so much as they are chasing the sun through space. That is why I am not offended by those that suggest the earth is spiraling toward the sun. They aren't really wrong, if the sun is moving away.



I could also suggest the direction the sun is traveling based upon the right hand thumb rule, (Perpendicular to earths orbit) but alas I would have to try prove it.


I suppose if I was to believe in the big bang, I could use that to back up my claim that the sun is moving in a linear direction, however opportunistic uncorrelated correlations are a pet peeve of mine. Until then I will have to wait with baited breath for confirmation that the Earth's orbit is slightly "below" the center of the sun.

[bojan]

Well, don't you think labels/names for magnetic "North" and "South" poles are just conventions? Same as "up" or "down".. where is 'up'?


Magnetic field of the planets are thought to be caused by movement in the liquid iron core (dynamo effect). Earth's magnetic poles are moving but did not flip for quite some time, see here:
https://www.space.com/43173-earth-magnetic-field-flips-when.html



As for Sun, have a look here:
https://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/the-suns-magnetic-field-is-about-to-flip/ It flips every 11 year cycle.

[mynameiscd]

Doesn't Mars have a small core so the corolus effect is so small it doesn't have a magnetic field but is still in alignment with the other planets?
I think magnetic fields have little to do with planar alignment but that's my opinion.
Cheers
Andy

[bojan]

Hmm... this link I provided to Alan only to help defining what we mean by term "spiral", because I think he needed that definition.



As to clarification you gave to motion of planetary system, we can call orbits "coils", right? Well, yes of course that is right, if we assume Milky Way is "fixed" (which it is not of course) and Sun (with planets) moves relative to Galactic coordinate system.



Actually so far I do not see we have any disagreement of the issue...

However, this is OT.. the thread is about Alan's "spiral motion" and precession of nodes..

Let's stick to that until the issue it resolved.

The orientation of rotational axes of Sun and Planets are caused by total angular momentum of the primordial cloud of gas and dust from which the Solar system formed.. not much to do with its original magnetic field (however there may be some remnants of it still present on planets and Sun magnetic fields).

[Dove]

I am putting my explanation posts to bojan to save repeating for simplicity I hope you don't mind.

Alan D.

[morls]

So you don't have any evidence to support your assertion? The challenge I put to you was to provide evidence, which it seems you cannot do.

Do all planets rotate in the same direction?
Is it always (WRT the line of travel) right side (outside of orbital path) moving in same direction as orbital path?

edit: for some reason I assume both planetary rotation and orbit are clockwise. Interesting...

[Dove]

Bojan, thank you for your patience.

Hello bojan,

Here is part two of my explanation of the spiral orbit of Earth about the Sun, producing the precession of the equinoxes, as requested by you. But first, a little of how Newton had to deal with the facts of planetary motion, he had to exercise great care not to openly give recognition to the spiral nature of planetary motion, his whole future could be in jeopardy.


Produced 7 years after Hooke’s death we have Newton’s definition in:
The ‘Principia’. Book 1. The Motion of Bodies, Basic Concepts: Definitions and Axioms.

Definition V
‘Centripetal force is that by which bodies are drawn or impelled, or anyway tend, towards a point as to a centre.
Of this sort is gravity, by which bodies tend to the centre of the Earth; magnetism, by which iron tends to the lodestone; and that force, Whatever it is, by which the planets are continually drawn aside from the rectilinear motions, which otherwise they would pursue, and made to revolve in curvilinear orbits.
………... And the same thing to be understood of all bodies, revolved in any orbits. They all endeavour to recede from the centres of their orbits; and were it not for the opposition of a contrary force which restrains them to, and detains them in their orbit, which I therefore call centripetal, would fly off in right lines, with a uniform motion.
And after the same manner that a projectile, by the force of gravity, may be made to revolve in an orbit, and go round the whole Earth, the Moon also, either by the force of gravity, if it is endued with gravity, or by any other force, that impels it towards the Earth, may be continually drawn aside towards the Earth, out of the rectilinear way which by its innate force it would pursue; and would be made to revolve in the orbit which it now describes; nor could the Moon with out some such force be retained in its orbit. If this force was too small, it would not sufficiently turn the Moon out of a rectilinear course; if it was too great, it would turn it too much, and draw down the Moon from its orbit towards the Earth. It is necessary that the force be of a just quantity, and it belongs to the Mathematicians to find the force that may serve exactly to retain a body in a given orbit with a given velocity; and vica versa to determine the curvilinear way into which a body projected from a given place, with a given velocity, may be made to deviate from its natural rectilinear way, by means of a given force.'

End quote.

Terms from the above we have:

Centripetal force - tending to a centre, = spiral motion.

Of this sort is Gravity, Bodies tending to the centre of the Earth = spiral motion.

Planets continually drawn aside from rectilinear motion = spiral motion

The same of all bodies revolved in any orbits = spiral motion

They all endeavour to recede from the centre = restrained linear motion.

Centripetal = a restraining force, gravity’.
Also,
Moon - retained in its orbit - restrained by some such force not too great and not too small, = a circular orbit.
The latter is an assurance to the governing religious authorities, Moon is not getting closer to Earth.

Newton’s lifesaving statement ; ‘ it belongs to mathematicians to find the force to retain a orbiting body in a given orbit. Very clever, he knew there was no such force, he just passed the buck on.

Newton had side - stepped the issue of perpetual motion implied in retaining an orbiting body in a given orbit.

And who could blame him, or Hooke who had walked away from recognition of spiral motion? They both knew that Gallileo had recanted his works when he was threatened with torture, only 40 years earlier. That is how things were in the 17th century.

Of course, there is more to tell, that was 350 years ago but still today, astronomy kow - tows to the church.

Even so, my faith is in the masters of astronomy right up to Newton and Hooke., who acted within the limits imposed on them during their time. I respect their judgement, they had their necks to lose.
The next step forward for the science of astronomy, in recognising the spiral mode pf planetary motion, will keep for a bit longer it seems.

With this historical background presented, I will explain my view of the cause of the precession of the cause of the equinoxes as requested. It is based on Newton’s explanation and is to my mind, a perfect one, consistent with the law of spiral planetary motion.

His definition is subject to the necessary constraints on him, not to openly recognise the spiral nature of planetary motion, which he dared not venture into. His explanation we recall was delivered in the ‘Principia’. Which we can examine in next post. I will post again soon.

Alan D. 2/11/19

PS I will try to send a graphic that will greatly in my explanation

[bojan]

Alan,

I think your detailed explanation will not be necessary, now I know exactly what you have in mind, and I am sure other do as well. Please leave it for some other times.

[morls]

Thanks for the detailed post Alan.

[JohnF]

Who says it is due to "the perturbations of our sister planets?" There is Archaeology Evidence that tells us that the wobble is not constant over the Centuries, but has been decreasing, however slowly.

[Dove]

The best is to come Moris',

It was necessary to post the somewhat tedious, but essential background in order to understand the motive for the neglected feature concerning the distorted interpretation of the annual decrease in the obliquity of the ecliptic, namely the spiral mode of planetary motion.

This has stifled the advance of astronomy to a better understanding of the motion of our planet. One serious consequence of this is the inability to understand the cause of the Ice - ages.

I will be Back posting shortly with the not so tedious, conclusion.

Alan D.

[JA]

Hi Alan,

Are you referring to the motion described as Apsidal Precession as depicted in the animated graphic linked below? ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apsidal_precession#/media/File:Precessing_Kepler_orbit_280fra mes_e0.6_smaller.gif

Best
JA

[morls]

I've just found this great quote in Stephen Hawkings' "Brief answers to the Big Questions", in a passage dealing with, amongst other things, ten-dimensional M-theory space:

In three dimensions, planets can have stable orbits around stars. This is a consequence of gravitation obeying the inverse square law, as discovered by Robert Hooke in 1665 and elaborated on by Isaac Newton (p.59)

[JohnF]

our earth's axis tilt does change, that I it is not constant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_tilt

[Dove]

I agree John F

but It has long been listed as one of the 'constants' like planetary precession Luni - solar precession and general precession in the Astronomical almanacs'

Alan D



Hi JA,

No, but yes, apsidal precession too is a spiral, like al planetary motions, the rotation of the ecliptic', displacement is the similar to precession of the equinoxes. though it is progressing prograde.

Aln D.



Interesting, If Hooke said something it would be worth listening to.

I am sorry I am a bit slow with my reply but as usual I am pretty busy but here goes:

This simple geometrical fact reveals that any movement of the equatorial plane of a rotating body carries with it the corresponding movement of its axis, since the axis will always be perpendicular, 90 degrees, to its equatorial plane. This principle applies in spherical as well as plane geometry. So, as the Earth’s equatorial plane is being moved toward the plane of the ecliptic so the North pole of Earth’s axis will correspondingly move toward the pole of the ecliptic by each spiral orbit, producing a continuous decrease in the obliquity. This annual decrease caused by Luni – Solar action, has never been recognised, Instead, the decrease in obliquity it has been attributed to Planetary perturbations for reasons already explained.

There are only two options open, if you declare for a circular orbit that is a notion of perpetual motion. If you declare for a spiral orbit then the orbit is recognised as being a continuous movement toward the centre.
Nature accomplishes this planetary movement with a spiral path of the plane and axis of the sphere. There is no other way the axis or plane can be moved, though perturbations can disturb it. Newton’s fine explanation of the ‘bending moment’ has long been accepted as the primary cause of the precession of the equinoxes, rightly so. This shows that he had, due in no short measure to his short association with Dr Hooke, come to fully understood the Spiral motion of the spheres of the Solar system. Though perhaps not commendable, He did not openly recognise it. We should accept what he needed to do, it was in order to survive.

The consequences of spiral planetary motion during the history of Earth are, dramatic climatic changes, bringing into play a long, cycling interaction between water and ice for many millions of years, we know as the Ice Ages. The annual decrease in the obliquity of the ecliptic is the clue to really understand spiral Planetary motion revealing the consequence of this conflict between Earth’s Spiral Spin and spiral Orbital motion, both driven by the Sun’s gravitational power.

Note,
It is said that the Sun’s gravitational influence on Earth is 500 times greater than that of planetary perturbation.

Cheers Alan

[Dove]

Hello Stephen,

Pardon me if I comment on your question concerning the direction of the rotation of the planets.

That is an interesting topic we might engage in later. if we accept and follow the spiral law of planetary motion, so much is revealed that otherwise lies as a mystery or remains unresolved. For example the essence of natures spiral is change and all things or processes have a beginning and an end. Change is continuous in the solar system and is not chaotic it is a very orderly process' the main rule to follow in our planetary research is the spiral.

I will put it to you, the Sun is continuously changing our planet angle of obliquity as was being disscussed. If we rolled the orbits back by less than 90 degrees obliquity our planet would be orbiting the Sun in a clockwise direction the opposite to our present anticlockwise (prograde) direction. So you can understand that a planet's direction of orbit is not a fixed thing everything is subject to change. Planets have grown through the accretion process. All basic knowledge of our solar system.

There are some good sites to visit that have the records of the rotations and orbits all our main planets and their satellites. prograde and retrograde but there is order in this. But of course they are viewed as fixed entities. When you have done this and get the general picture we can have a chat on the subject on the planets of the Solar system from the spiral point of view.

I will take the liberty of making an assumptiion, that you entered into the league of astronomers and was told that if you want to learn about astronomy 'then we will assist you and teach you how use a telescope and study the cosmos.

I make this assumption on the basis of the format of introductions to astronomy are all based on that formula. Space is the place.

Now that is great, nothing wrong with that apart from the fact that the basics of the poor old Solar system are tending to get left behind, that there is not much more to learn down here.

There is a tendency for astronomical societies to induce newcomers to leap off into the deep end first I think.

Cheers. Alan D.

[morls]

This isn't the case, I just love looking through a telescope, and have an interest in the universe we are part of.
"Space is the Place" is the name of an album by the wonderful musician Sun Ra.

[andyc]

Except we do understand the cause of ice ages. We've known about it for a long time - quite subtle changes in peak insolation at higher northern latitudes (driven by physically understood periidic eccentricity, precession and tilt variations), magnified by attendant changes in CO2 that provides sufficient alteration in Earth's energy balance to make these oscillations global, visible in the glacier and ice sheet palaeoclimate, and ocean sediments around the world. Or perhaps you think the oxygen atoms in the ice cores conspired to produce that same pattern, that glaciers conspired to advance and retreat at these times? Good grief, crack open some basic textbooks Alan! This thread has managed denial of: orbital mechanics, climate physics, evolution and relativity, an impressive list. It's implying grand conspiracies of scientists around thrthe world. So I'm definitely out of here now. We need to build our understanding on reason, logic and reality. Not seeing that in this thread!

[AussieTrooper]

Perpetual motion is not possible. Due to (albeit incredibly tiny amounts of) matter spontaneously appearing then disappearing in the vacuum, there can never, ever be perpetual motion. The effects of this would take billions upon billions of years to be measurable though.
What is measureable though on far shorter time scales is the yarkovsky effect, which literally tears asteroids apart.

[Swagman105]

I'm not really sure about that. Spontaneous particle appearance in the path of motion should seem to provide a pressure against that motion through a vacuum. But there should also be particle appearance behind the direction of motion (and above and below for that matter) so shouldn't this result in zero overall pressure in any direction so that motion is not affected.
I wonder about light travelling from distant galaxies and whether the diminution of the light received is purely the result of the inverse square law which seems to be the effect of dispersion over a widening sphere or whether there are any measurable effects that could possibly be explained by spontaneous particle interactions that block out some of the photons.

[bojan]

There was some work done on this, see here:
https://physics.aps.org/synopsis-for/10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.204801