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Article: <[email protected]>
From: [email protected](Nancy )
Subject: Re: Hale-Bopp THEN and NOW
Date: 22 Feb 1997 21:25:35 GMT
This debate has been cross-posted to sci.astro.amateur, sci.astro.planetarium, sci.space.news, and alt.paranormal as CNN did not choose to list sci.astro among the Usenet sites where information on Hale-Bopp could be located. Check
for the sci.astro debate thread history.
In article <[email protected]> Jim
Scotti writes:
> Just because a comet leaves the vicinity of the sun doesn't
> mean that gravity stops working on it - in fact, it behaves
in
> an even MORE predictable way since it does not have planets
> like Jupiter to encounter ... I am waiting to hear your
> explanation for how the objects that have been discovered
> just beyond the orbit of Neptune manage to behave in
> predictable enough ways that their orbits can be calculated
> and their future positions predicted well enough that we can
> go observe them.
> [email protected] (Jim Scotti)
(Begin ZetaTalk[TM])
And we are waiting to hear YOUR explaination of how a comet can
decide to move a vast amount of distance SIDEWAYS when far out in
space and away from your Sun, as outlined in our companion
posting to your response - ZetaTalk: Contradictions. And please
don't say they are following the form of an ellipse. Comets are
not constructed by CAD programs nor do they have a track in the
sky that they are following.
The objects you are describing are those you are able to
observe, are discernable by astronomers on a continuing basis,
unlike the tiny comets that you LOSE after they stop outgassing.
Likewise these objects are continuously in a position where the
gravitational pull of the Sun is to their SIDE, not their BACK.
We will ask our emissary, Nancy, to post our previous ZetaTalk on
this subject, regarding your smug sense that you can PREDICT
bodies when in fact you have only learned to DESCRIBE what you
are observing.
(End ZetaTalk[TM])
As requested, excerpts from the exististing ZetaTalk topic.
(Begin ZetaTalk[TM] excerpts)
ZetaTalk: Dark Ages of Astronomy
Elaborate mathematical descriptions of trajectories and orbits were drawn up in an age when man had not peeked beyond the Solar System with high powered telescopes floating above the atmosphere, and when slow motion video was unheard of. The only complete orbits known were those of the planets which hugged the Sun, and as the math was drawn up to fit these orbits, the orbits fit the math. The explanation for comets either fit the model or they didn't. When they fit the model they were assumed to have the orbit, when out of view, that the model dictated. If they didn't fit the model then they were dressed up in mathematical curves, parabolas or hyperbolas, which came close enough to let everyone go home at the end of the day feeling smug. As concepts tend to solidify as time passes, the young taking as absolutes what their elders preach, the Earth was now no longer flat, and the heavens no long revolved around the Earth, but most certainly all orbits were elliptical. ...
Where orbits are snug about their center of gravity, there is little contradiction between these and what mankind calls their laws of gravity and motion. These are not laws, of course, but elaborate descriptions of what they observe. The flaws in the laws, however, were always present. If gravity diminishes with distance, but distance is attained with speed, then an object in a snug elliptical orbit seems to logically be adhering to the laws of gravity and motion. Speed up during the approach, sling past, and the speed carries the body outward where the diminishing gravity pull slows the body down so that its curve sidewards takes predominance. The theory fit what man observed, and thus was not questioned until his powers of observation increased. Tiny comets, seen by man in the past only when they gave their brilliant displays while going around the Sun, have only recently been observed in great detail during this passage.
Repeating comets are not slinging past, as in a passing body. They are in orbit, doing the better part of a circle about the Sun. Unlike the planets, whose center of gravity is just that, at the center, the comet does not behave as though the Sun is its center of gravity. The elliptical orbit of planets is such that if one were to examine the distance from the Sun, the difference at any given point would be slight. It is more circular than not. Comets, however, are at the other extreme. They appear to be a fan, rather than an eye. For the laws of gravity and motion to fit, the comet must be increasing its speed as it leaves the Sun, thus explaining its increasing distance. However, careful studies have shown this not to be the case. The comet is going its fastest when closest to the Sun, and has slowed down when it begins to leave what is assumed to be its gravitational master. The slowing precedes the exit, thus throwing the smug assumptions of man into consternation.
In addition, the distance comets travel outward, and the
curvature of their exit are now able to be examined where in the
past they were an unknown. They go essentially straight away, not
the curve anticipated. Thus the distance from the Sun wherein
they would have to complete an elliptical curve is extreme,
challenging the laws of gravity and motion. The distance where
the elliptical curve would reinstate is too far, and the curve
during the straight away too slight. Rather than deal with this
new information, the majority of scientists prefer their comfort
factor over new knowledge. Change is resisted, and for many the
Earth is still flat.
(End ZetaTalk[TM] excerpt on Dark Ages of Astronomy)
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