The Secret Astronomer’s Other Ball
Tim Cullen April 2012
There are a series of celebrations and jamborees scheduled for the 5th and 6 June 2012 to commemorate a last in your lifetime event, lasting 6 hours and 40 minutes[1], called the Transit of Venus 2012[2].
For the children born after 8th June 2004[3] this is a once in a lifetime event because the next cyclical pair[4] of transits are scheduled for the 2117 and 2125, while the previous pair occurred during the Victorian age in 1874 and 1882.
Image Credit: NASA[5]
For astronomy the Transit of Venus 2012 is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate some magnificent scientists and their science.[6]
Johannes Kepler 1751-1630 [7]
Determined the relative distances of the planets from the Sun in astronomical units (AU).
Johan Philip Lansberge 1561–1632 [8]
Published astronomical tables that predicted planetary positions.
Jeremiah Horrocks 1618 – 1641 [9]
Achieved a triple first by predicting, observing and recording the Transit of Venus in 1639.
William Crabtree 1610–1644 [10]
William Crabtree worked with Jeremiah Horrocks to estimate the size of Venus and the distance from the Earth to the Sun.
James Gregory 1638-1675 [11]
James Gregory published an improved technique for observing the transits of Venus.
Edmond Halley 1656–1742 [12]
Edmond Halley advocated[13] that the techniques of James Gregory used to observe the next transits of Venus in 1761 and 1769.
Guillaume Le Gentil 1725–1792 [14]
Le Gentil was unable to make astronomical observations of the transit of 1761 while his vessel was rolling about in the Indian Ocean. However, he decided to build a small observatory in Pondicherry and waited patiently for the 1769 transit. Unfortunately, on the day of the transit an overcast sky day prevented him from making any observations.
Charles Green 1735–1771 [15]
On June 3, 1769 Charles Green observed and recorded the transit of Venus, on behalf of the Royal Society, from Venus Beach in Tahiti during Captain James Cook’s[16] first voyage around the world in the ship Endeavour.
Thomas Hornsby 1733–1810 [17]
Thomas Hornsby calculated in 1771 (based upon the solar parallax values obtained from the 1769 transit) the mean distance from the Earth to the Sun to be 93,726,900 miles[18]. This is remarkably close to the radar based value used today of 92,955,807.3 miles[19].
Whilst the modern generation of astronomers bask in this reflected historical glory they promote the forthcoming transit of Venus as a rare opportunity to develop techniques for detecting extrasolar planets in the future[20].
However, whilst settled science focuses upon this historic legacy and dreams of future discoveries, this paper focuses upon some of the outstanding issues they are avoiding.
Welcome to The Secret Astronomer’s Other Ball.
Magnetic Mysteries
In 1997 the planet Venus was described as having practically no intrinsic magnetic field[21]and is now generally described as lacking an intrinsic magnetic field[22].
However, Venus does manage to support a magnetosphere and this is generally classified as an induced magnetosphere because the solar wind appears to directly interact with the ionosphere. The magnetotail is permeated with structured magnetic fields and exhibits a ‘double-lobed’ structure like an intrinsic planetary magnetotail[23].
Illustration Credit: Wikipedia
Another surprise is that the magnetosphere of Venus sports a giant, ion-packed tail[24].
Europe’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) Satellite showed that the tail stretched some 45,000,000 kilometres into space, more than 600 times as far as anyone had realised and almost far enough to “tickle” the earth when the two planets are in line with the sun.[25]
Marcia Neugebauer of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California suspects the tail is “a lot of little stringy things” like those of some comets, which can have several ion tails. If so, says Neugebauer, “the theorists are going to have fun trying to explain why they’re as narrow as we saw them”[26].
The ion tail of Venus. Credit: Jeff Hecht, New Scientist Magazine May 31, 1997.
Holoscience.com further comments that “Standard physics says that narrow plasma streams are unstable and should dissipate fast. No one can yet explain how they hold together over tens of millions of kilometres. This surprise has since been repeated for comet Hyakutake with its tail stretching half a billion kilometres across the solar system!”[27]
Miles Mathis also highlights some interesting questions and contradictions regarding the settled science of induced and intrinsic magnetospheres and leaves you to decide whether magnetospheres are fundamentally electrical or magnetic phenomenon[28].
Solar System: Wed 6 June 2012 01:29 UTC
Image Credit: Fourmilab’s Solar System Live
Fourmilab’s Solar System Live system[29] indicates that Venus will only be 0.289 AU (43,233,785 kilometres) from Earth during the Transit in June. Therefore, the transit appears to be once in a lifetime opportunity for the blogsphere to observe the magnetotail of Venus tickling planet Earth.
Plasma density, velocity and magnetic field – north-south cut (SWMF, T. Gombosi et al.)
Image Credit: NASA[30]
Perhaps, with an apparent 2,000,000 kilometre overlap, there is a possibility that Venus may give planet Earth a slap during the transit. Albeit a light slap because there are other times when Venus is only 41,840,000 kilometres away from Earth[31].
In the above diagram it is assumed that the magnetospheres of Earth and Venus tend to retain their structural integrity in a manner similar to magnetic repulsion.
However, observations may confound this assumption and the magnetospheres could have a tendency to merge in a manner similar to magnetic attraction. This would undoubtedly change the nature of the planetary interactions and would probably delay the Post Transit “Snap” until the planets were more spatially separated in their orbits.
Lunar Unknowns
Our frequently overlooked twin planet, the Moon, is said to have no dipole field, no magnetosphere and a superficial magnetic field a hundred times smaller than Earth’s[32]. Therefore, the Moon’s slight magnetic field is roughly equivalent to that of Mercury which is said to be about 1.1% as strong as the Earth’s[33].
Mercury’s Magnetosphere. Image credit: Wikipedia
Mercury’s extended, tear-dropped shaped tenuous exospheres is, unsurprisingly, referred to as a magnetosphere.
The Moon’s extended, tear-dropped shaped tenuous exospheres[34] is, surprisingly, referred to as a tenuous sodium tail[35]. Unsurprisingly this tenuous sodium tail looks exactly like a magnetosphere.
Moon’s tenuous sodium tail Image Credit: NASA
The Moon (plus tenuous sodium tail) takes six days to traverse Earth’s magnetotail and during those six days strange thing can happen[36]:
“Earth’s magnetotail extends well beyond the orbit of the Moon and, once a month, the Moon orbits through it,” says Tim Stubbs, a University of Maryland scientist working at the Goddard Space Flight Center. “This can have consequences ranging from lunar ‘dust storms’ to electrostatic discharges.”
Anyone can tell when the Moon is inside the magnetotail. Just look: “If the Moon is full, it is inside the magnetotail,” says Stubbs. “The Moon enters the magnetotail three days before it is full and takes about six days to cross and exit on the other side.”
It is during those six days that strange things can happen.
During the crossing, the Moon comes in contact with a gigantic “plasma sheet” of hot charged particles trapped in the tail. The lightest and most mobile of these particles, electrons, pepper the Moon’s surface and give the Moon a negative charge.
On the Moon’s dayside this effect is counteracted to a degree by sunlight: UV photons knock electrons back off the surface, keeping the build-up of charge at relatively low levels. But on the nightside, in the cold lunar dark, electrons accumulate and voltages can climb to hundreds or thousands of volts.
Walking across the dusty charged-up lunar terrain, astronauts may find themselves crackling with electricity like a sock pulled out of a hot dryer. Touching another astronaut, a doorknob, a piece of sensitive electronics—any of these simple actions could produce an unwelcome zap. “Proper grounding is strongly recommended,” advises Stubbs.
……
The best direct evidence comes from NASA’s Lunar Prospector spacecraft, which orbited the Moon in 1998-99 and monitored many magnetotail crossings. During some crossings, the spacecraft sensed big changes in the lunar nightside voltage, jumping “typically from -200 V to -1000 V,” says Jasper Halekas of UC Berkeley who has been studying the decade-old data.
Unfortunately, I have been unable to discover what happens to the Moon’s tenuous sodium tail during this six day crossing.
There are suggestions that earthquakes are more prevalent around Full Moon and New Moon[37].
Given that there is a full Moon on March Nineteenth which coincides with the closest Lunar perigee in 18 years (closest approach to Earth) to within the hour, and Jupiter is also at Perigee at the same time, I would not dismiss Ken’s warning out of hand.
Perhaps these peaks of disturbance are associated with the Moon entering and leaving the Earth’s magnetosphere.
Transit Forecast
The Moon has a busy schedule for early June so there is a potential for the Earth to experience more disruptions compared to the 2004 Transit of Venus:
3rd June 2012 – Lunar Perigee at 358,482 kilometres[38]
4th June 2012 – Partial lunar eclipse[39]
4th June 2012 – Full Moon[40]
Lunar eclipse chart Credit: Wikipedia
Having checked a couple of Tide Tables it appears that regular Perigee High Tides are forecast for during early June. Inspecting your local Tide Tables may provide different results and there is a possibility that reality may exceed these predictions.
Therefore, any disturbances experienced during Transit of Venus in 2012 are more likely to be geomagnetic / geo-electric, and are unpredictable based upon our current level of knowledge unless you use Solar-Lunar techniques to forecast the weather.
The Transit of Venus organisation advises us to be more concerned about climate change because there is a preponderance of scientific evidence.[41]
I think it is safer to be concerned about modern science and their scientific evidence.
______________________________________________________________
References
[1] Earthsky.org – Last transit of Venus in 21st century will happen in June 2012
[2] Wikipedia: Transit of Venus, 5th – 6th June 2012
[3] Wikipedia: Transit of Venus: 8th June 2004
[4] Nick Anthony Fiorenza: The Pentagonal Cycle of Venus
[5] NASA: The 2012 Transit of Venus
[6] Dr. Sten Odenwald (NASA / ADNET): The Mathematics of the Transit of Venus
[7] Wikipedia: Johannes Kepler 1751-1630: German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer.
[8] Wikipedia: Johan Philip Lansberge 1561–1632 Dutch astronomer.
[9] Wikipedia: Jeremiah Horrocks 1618 – 1641 English astronomer.
[10] Wikipedia: William Crabtree 1610–1644 English astronomer and mathematician.
[11] Wikipedia: James Gregory 1638-1675 Scottish mathematician and astronomer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Gregory_%28astronomer_and_mathematician%29
[12] Wikipedia: Edmond Halley 1656–1742 English astronomer, geophysicist, mathematician and meteorologist.
[13] Wikipedia: Astronomical unit
[14] Wikipedia: Guillaume Le Gentil 1725–1792 French astronomer
[15] Wikipedia: Charles Green 1735–1771 British astronomer.
[16] Wikipedia: James Cook, 1728-1779 British explorer, navigator and cartographer
[17] Wikipedia: Thomas Hornsby 1733–1810 British astronomer and mathematician.
[18] Wikipedia: 1769 Transit of Venus observed from Tahiti
[19] Wikipedia: An astronomical unit (AU) is equal to 149,597,870.7 kilometres – 92,955,807.3 miles
[20] TransitOfVenus.org: Hubble Space Telescope to Target 2012 Transit of Venus
[21] J. G. Luhman and C. T. Russell – VENUS: Magnetic Field and Magnetosphere
http://www-ssc.igpp.ucla.edu/personnel/russell/papers/venus_mag/
[22] Wikipedia: Venus
[23] J. G. Luhman and C. T. Russell – VENUS: Magnetic Field and Magnetosphere
http://www-ssc.igpp.ucla.edu/personnel/russell/papers/venus_mag/
[24] New Scientist magazine: Science : Planet’s tail of the unexpected
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg15420842.900-science–planets-tail-of-the-unexpected.html
[25] Thunderbolts.info: Venus’ Tail of the Unexpected
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2008/arch08/080220venustail.htm
[26] Holoscience.com: Do we have any proof of interplanetary electric currents?
[27] Holoscience.com: Do we have any proof of interplanetary electric currents?
[28] Miles Mathis: The E/M Fields of Solar System Bodies
[29] Fourmilab’s Solar System Live system
[30] NASA: Magnetosphere
[31] .thesolarsystemplanets.com: Interesting Facts About Venus
http://www.thesolarsystemplanets.com/interesting-facts-about-venus/
[32] J.B. Zirker: The Magnetic Universe 2009 – page 142
[33] Wikipedia: Mercury (planet)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_%28planet%29#Magnetic_field_and_magnetosphere
[34] Wikipedia: Moon
[35] NASA: The Moon is heading for a close encounter with a Leonid debris stream on Nov. 17, 2000.
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast26oct_1/
[36] NASA: Earth’s Magnetic Field Does Strange Things to the Moon
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2008/17apr_magnetotail/
[37] Tallblokes’s Talkshop: Ken Ring: Earthquake predictions in Christchurch NZ
https://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/ken-ring-earthquake-predictions-in-christchurch-nz/
[38] moonphasecalendars.com: The Lunar Perigee and Apogee Table for 2012
http://moonphasecalendars.com/Lunar_Perigee_and_Apogee_Tables.php?MoonPhaseYear=2012
[39] Wikipedia: June 2012 lunar eclipse
[40] moonphasecalendars.com: New and Full Moon Data for 2012
http://moonphasecalendars.com/Yearly_Lunar_Moon_Events_Tables.php?MoonPhaseYear=2012
[41] TransitOf enus.org : 2012 Doomsday and Solar System Alignment
http://www.transitofvenus.org/component/content/article/170-2012-doomsday-and-solar-system-alignment
The Post is available as a pdf document.
Tallbloke's Talkshop 
Perhaps ‘tickle’, isn’t the right word. The following shows a large effect on Earth’s electrical circuit during June 2004 transit…
The Effect of Recent Venus Transit on Earth’s Atmosphere
“Some experiments on June 8, 2004, the day of transit of Venus across the Sun, were undertaken at Kolkata (latitude: 23034 N) to observe effect, if any, of transit of Venus on FWF, ELF and VLF amplitudes. The result shows good correlation between their temporal variations during the transit.
The observation was unbelievable as the Venus subtends only 1/32th of the cone subtended by Sun on Earth. This anomaly may be explained on the assumption that the height of Venusian atmosphere with high content of CO2, and nitrogen which absorbs electromagnetic and corpuscular radiations from Sun, depleting the solar radiation reaching the Earth to a considerable extent. As a result, relevant parameters of Earth’s atmosphere are modulated and here we show how these changes are reflected in identical behaviour of fair weather field and ELF and VLF spectra.”
Full paper here…
http://www.earth-prints.org/bitstream/2122/1942/1/manuscript1.doc
Perhaps Venus has a bigger sting in it’s magnetotail than we think?
This is a really enlightening post . Venus, Aphrodite, Isis, Ishtar, Sekhmet, Esther, Kupris, Kukulkan, Quetzal-Cohuatl, The feathered Serpent.
By causing the heavens to tremble and the earth to quake,
By the gleam which lightens the sky,
By the blazing fire which rains upon the hostile land,
I am Ishtar,
Ishtar am I by the light that arises in heaven,
Ishtar the queen of heaven am I by the light that arises in heaven.
I am Ishtar; on high I journey….
The heavens I cause to quake, the earth I cause to shake,
That is my fame…
She that lightens in the horizon of heaven,
Whose name is honored in the habitations of men,
That is my fame.
“Queen of Heaven above and beneath” let be spoken,
That is my fame.
The mountains I overwhelm altogether,
That is my far.
(Immanuel Velikovsky, “Worlds in Collision” pp.177)
Tenuc says: April 20, 2012 at 4:49 pm
Perhaps ‘tickle’, isn’t the right word.
My preferred word is “slap”.
Perhaps Venus has a bigger sting in it’s magnetotail than we think?
I view the planets as electrical accumulators.
Therefore, there is the potential for a far bigger “sting” from Venus
and a “blowback” from Earth to Venus.
Thank you for the linked document!
And it will happen on California:
And watch it in three dimensions: (see also the Moon at opposition)
OT
Hi Tb
You might recall SC24.com lively discussions, time and censorship has finally taken its toll http://solarcycle24com.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=general&thread=855&page=44#81063
N° Alig.Earth-Venus Earthquake Magnitude State Diff.Date
1 08/07/1900
2 14/02/1902 13/02/1902 6.9 AZERBAIJAN -1
3 18/09/1903 13/09/1903 6.3 ROMANIA -5
4 27/04/1905 04/04/1905 7.5 INDIA -23
5 30/11/1906
6 06/07/1908
7 11/02/1910
8 16/09/1911 17/09/1911 7.1 ANSS 1
9 25/04/1913 31/03/1913 7.3 ANSS 25
10 28/11/1914
11 03/07/1916
12 09/02/1918 13/02/1918 7.3 CHINA 4
13 13/09/1919
14 22/04/1921
15 25/11/1922 11/11/1922 8.5 PERU’ -14
16 01/07/1924
17 06/02/1926
18 11/09/1927 24/10/1927 7.1 ANSS 18
19 20/04/1929 01/05/1929 7.2 IRAN 11
20 23/11/1930 21/11/1930 6.1 ALBANIA -2
21 29/06/1932 06/06/1932 8.5 USA -23
22 04/02/1934 12/03/1934 6.6 USA 38
23 08/09/1935 28/09/1935 7.0 FRANCE 20
24 18/04/1937
25 20/11/1938 10/11/1938 8.7 ANSS -10
26 26/06/1940 14/07/1940 7.7 ANSS 19
27 01/02/1942
28 06/09/1943 10/09/1943 7.4 JAPAN 4
29 15/04/1945
30 18/11/1946 20/12/1946 8.1 JAPAN 32
31 24/06/1948 28/06/1948 8.6 JAPAN 4
32 30/01/1950
33 04/09/1951 21/08/1951 6.9 USA 14
34 13/04/1953 18/03/1953 7.3 TURKEY 26
35 15/11/1954 16/12/1954 7.1 USA -32
36 22/06/1956
37 27/01/1958 15/01/1958 7.3 PERU’ -12
38 01/09/1959 18/08/1959 7.3 USA -14
39 10/04/1961
40 13/11/1962
41 19/06/1964 16/06/1964 7.5 JAPAN -3
42 25/01/1966 15/02/1966 7.1 ANSS 21
43 30/08/1967
44 08/04/1969 28/03/1969 6.4 TURKEY 20
45 11/11/1970 31/10/1970 7.0 ANSS -11
46 17/06/1972 30/07/1972 7.6 ANSS 43
47 23/01/1974 31/01/1974 7.0 ANSS 8
48 27/08/1975 06/09/1975 6.7 TURKEY 10
49 06/04/1977 02/04/1977 7.6 ANSS -4
50 08/11/1978 05/11/1978 7.1 ANSS -3
51 15/06/1980 27/05/1980 6.0 USA -17
52 20/01/1982
53 25/08/1983 17/08/1983 7.0 ANSS -8
54 03/04/1985 09/04/1985 7.2 ANSS 6
55 06/11/1986 14/11/1986 7.8 ANSS 8
56 12/06/1988
57 18/01/1990
58 23/08/1991 17/08/1991 7.0 USA -6
59 01/04/1993 16/04/1993 6.9 FIJI 15
60 03/11/1994 14/11/1994 7.1 ANSS 11
61 10/06/1996 10/06/1996 7.9 ALASKA 0
62 15/01/1998 04/01/1998 7.5 LOYALTY IS. -11
63 20/08/1999 17/08/1999 7.4 TURKEY -3
64 29/03/2001 24/03/2011 6.8 JAPAN -5
65 01/11/2002 03/11/2002 7.9 ALASKA 2
66 08/06/2004 10/06/2004 6.9 KAMCHATKA 2
67 13/01/2006 27/01/2006 7.6 BANDA SEA 14
68 18/08/2007 15/08/2007 8.0 PERU’ -3
69 27/03/2009 19/03/2009 7.6 TONGA -8
70 29/10/2010 25/10/2010 7.8 INDONESIA -4
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/world/historical.php
http://storing.ingv.it/es_web/Data/Es_map.html
http://www.ncedc.org/anss/catalog-search.html
femme fatal…
@ Adolfo
We don’t know the date and time.
I think the statement about tail length not being known before NASA “discovered” is wrong. I seem to recall this from the past.
[edit as mod: that might come across as critical of the post, isn’t]
Format test:
Table created by using <pre> tag (‘preformatted’)
Worked! Recognizes and preserves spacebar spacing, etc. Much easier to read.
“Worked! Recognizes and preserves spacebar spacing, etc. Much easier to read.”
You right, easier to read, much easier! Leaving some tabs in is the misalignment on the right Brian… when using the ‘pre’ tag… use only spaces, no tabs, they’ll mess up your columns every time.
And for others possibly reading this for future reference, also be sure to use a mono-spaced typeface when preparing the table, as Courier, or LucidaConsole.
Correct link for the above comment:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FA0812FB3C59117B93C2AB1789D95F408784F9
EARTHQUAKES.; A RECORD OF THE SHOCKS IN 1874. THE THIRTY DAYS OF TERROR IN GUATEMALA “UPHEAVALS” OF BALD MOUNTAIN, NORTH CAROLINA THE CHINESE”TEA-LONG” A SINGULAR COINCIDENCEIN CONNECTION WITH THE RUMBLINGSIN THE BUTLER AND PHELPS CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS.
.
Great post, Tim
Upon reading it, however, I had the embarrassing realization that my memory had failed me in a comment I had made to Tallbloke’s Jan 17, 2011 post, “Observation time: Fun with a 10″ Dobsonian Stargazer.”
I had recounted an observation that I had mistakenly remembered as having been made by me of a transit of Venus in the twentieth century. When I read your excellent post I realized, to my great embarrassment, that there were no transits of Venus in the 20th Century! What I had observed, and remembered incorrectly, was a part of the transit of Mercury on November 7, 1960.
It was a somewhat unusual observation nonetheless, because I had made the observation with the U.S. Naval Observatory’s six inch transit circle as Mercury crossed the Washington, D.C. meridion shortly before the meridian crossing of the trailing limb of the Sun, which I was also able to observe. I had earlier recorded the transit time of the leading limb of the Sun, so my meridian transit observations on that day comprised the two solar limb observations and the meridian transit of Mercury.
My correct memory of what had happened over 51 years ago was the memory of a rare and unique observation that I had made back then. The rarity and uniqueness caused a false association with the highly publicized extreme rarity of transits of Venus. Embarrassing as this is to me, I needed to set the record straight.
Wayne;
There is no misalignment on the right; it came out exactly as I typed/spaced it. I used no tabs.
TB,
Excellent presentation!
Two things I currently study which is not included is planetary rotation and velocity.
The other is pressure. We currently measure pressure by how much it effects the density on water to move the density. This takes a great deal of pressure that is not measured with any accuracy or looked at that would effect our biospheres weather systems.
The forward momentum accounts for the trails and flats in front of planets as they travel in space.
Ok, Brian. Just thought in that ‘Diff.Date’ column at the far right, that might have been the case. Not picking. I’m just glad others are learning how to use the ‘pre’ tag. Easy to read and hugely easier to copy and import!
This is why it really pays to visit the Talkshop, so you don’t miss important events in the solar system like the Venus Transit. (:
I will be very disappointed if many instruments and spacecraft readings just happen to “go down” at that time. NASA should know that many are watching. A comprehensive list of all pertinent remote sensing projects should be compiled by interested bloggers, in order to track this event from as many simultaneous views as possible.
It would be really spectacular if there was a CME at that time, earthward!
@ Zeke: It would be really spectacular if there was a CME at that time, earthward!
That´s for sure, and the current increases activity is because of such a loving encounter: As you know, love presides over the universe 🙂
Trouble is, that such CME is not composed of “little pebbles” but charge, the you have a big charge at one side while a ground line at the other side (the moon, having a big eccentricity acts like the ultimate cathode). The same happened (and, without Venus) at the big chilean earthquake, but with in the inverse order: High in the zenit was the shining full moon and at the other side of the earth the Sun, and a 500 mms. long fault needing just a bit of a helping hand to move on.
Now, we have Venus and the Sun right on a beautiful property of a well known preacher of “global warming” in a California beach, while at almost 180º will be a hungry for energy Moon….. If the known preacher is lucky…it will happen on Sumatra,. :-), or perhaps in both places, taking into account the female quality of Ishtar, that fierce queen of the heavens…..
“Trouble is, that such CME is not composed of “little pebbles” but charge, the you have a big charge at one side while a ground line at the other side.” ~AG
Yes, this event is very significant because the “stringy things” observed in Venus’ tail are in fact streams of charged particles in the form of Birkeland currents. That is why they maintain their form as pointed out in this excellent post. When Venus’ plasmasphere “tail” brushes that of earth’s magnetosphere, there will be a transfer of charged particles between the two bodies. Since there will be an electrical connection between the planets, one effect to look for are x-rays and gamma rays during the transit.
Also, not off topic since the author has referenced holoscience and thunderbolts.info in discussing the Venus Transit, the spacing of the planets so that their tails brush one another is no coincidence, according to Wal Thornhill. The problem with the present understanding of celestial mechanics is
“…orbital dynamicists have long known that Newton’s law of gravity applied to the solar system displays chaos in the short-term—perhaps a few tens of millions of years—not aeons-long clockwork stability. So the first question that must be asked is why does the solar system appear to run like clockwork? This is not done in the usual history of the solar system. A strict application of Newtonian dynamics would render retro-calculation of planetary histories impossible.”
So, “To provide clockwork stability there must be a feedback mechanism to control orbital spacing.”
This electrical exchange between planets as charged bodies is part of the mechanism which can explain orbital spacing and stability.
“Each planet acts as a small secondary cathode…and develops an invisible cometary plasma sheath, the tail of which stretches away from the Sun in the plane of the ecliptic. The cometary plasma sheath of Venus was found to stretch as far as the Earth during inferior conjunction. Researchers were puzzled by the coherent “stringy” nature of the Venusian plasma tail. [6] The stringiness is confirmation of Birkeland currents stretching between Venus and the Earth, which transfer charge between the planets. The same kind of electrical exchange takes place between Earth and Mars during opposition, giving rise to the ‘blue clearing’ of the Martian atmosphere and the electrically driven global dust storms on that planet. Many planetary plasma tails have been found to brush across the plasma sheath of the planet in the next outer orbit. This brushing constitutes an intermittent circuit for transferring charge between adjacent planets when they are aligned with the Sun.”
The maths are then treated in Electrically Modified Newtonian Dynamics (EMOND) here:
http://www.holoscience.com/news.php?article=q1q6sz2s
@Zeke: What has cleared up the things about the solar system is the idea, expressed in another post here at TB, by TB himself, is that the Sun and its solar system work as an induction electrical motor, where instead of three or four stator coils around there would be twelve (OMG, astrology again!), making its movement smoother though always existing a small chaos when changing from from stator to the next (Pisces-Aquarius), presumably causing first the 20th.century last years temperatures increase and now the minimum, until we hook upon the next field.
[Reply] Heh. 🙂 As I remember, you said that. Anyway, to push the analogy a bit further, we should say the stator coils are all of different sizes, keep changing positions, and the field flux oscillates as the whole ensemble spirals forwards through another varying field. Simple it aint.
In the near future we will know how the current goes through the solar system, the most probable route is the spiral, as also TB said in a former post. Then it would not necessarily follow the same order we observe in this system, that would explain the discrepancies in Bode´s Law.
Zeke: I think your points underline that there is so much more to observe and understand.
The mainstream is deliberately looking the other way:
Luckily the blogsphere is more focussed!
Regardless of our personal preferences I hope that most of Tallbloke’s Talkshop regulars will agree with the following statements from your linked article:
From Tim Cullen’s link:
Hubble Space Telescope to Target 2012 Transit of Venus: Micetype: Only, they are not going to look at the juncture of the two planets’ plasmaspheres.
They are going to look away entirely and look at the moon! “To mimic looking at a small exoplanet, the Hubble Space Telescope will measure small changes in light reflected off the moon as Venus diminishes the sunlight slightly when the inner planet passes between the sun and earth on June 5-6, 2012.”
Well maybe it will be better to protect old Hubble’s eyes from this because it could be quite energetic and Hubble has already nearly been knocked out of service by solar wind (over SA) before.
There must be a reason why astrophysicists and NASA have chosen to avert their eyes from this event. What about Mars and Venus Express, what about THEMIS, what other instruments are there? Is this magnificent opportunity going to ‘go begging’?
@TB: to push the analogy a bit further, we should say the stator coils are all of different sizes, keep changing positions…
Not at all. There are twelve of them. Each one is 30º long along the ecliptic, 360º around:
It seems to be true 🙂
That people are thinking outside the square and with the internet a place to stand and talk it gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling. The last twenty years were not good for science, it was once said that for the paradigm to shift in science the old scientists have to die.
The written word on the internet is a shift more powerful than the invention of the printing press, as it encompasses the collected minds of interested people over the entire world in real time. Peer review almost instantly, this changes the concept of all scientific thought, for being pilloried by those of a consensus science becomes irrelevant.
The time for all those with original thought to challenge the orthodoxy is now I commend all those with the intelligence to do so.
I do also have a question for those with the knowledge on this site and maybe a speculation.
The magnificent tail from Venus is shown as ions of Hydrogen Helium and oxygen. The planets atmosphere is supposed to be hugely CO2 where is the carbon?
Speculation are all these tails filling the void, the Aether with the elements to build more stars?
Thanks Tallbloke, those that can see further do not necessarily have better eye sight.
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