Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 14:02:27 -0800 (PST)
From: Jerry Friedman 
Subject: RE: (urth) Green's diameter, angular and otherwise


--- Dan'l Danehy-Oakes  wrote:
> Mantis wrote:
> 
> > > Using the Moon as a model.
> > >         ORBIT      ANGULAR DIAMETER
> > > MOON    240,000    0.52 degrees
> > > LUNE    150,000    0.83 degrees
> > > GREEN   105,000    1.18 degrees
> > > So even a puny world like the Moon (diameter 2160 miles) would be
> more
> > > than twice the size of the Moon in our sky when located at a
> distance
> > > attributed to Green.
> > > 
> > > A twin planet would naturally be much bigger.
> > > 
> > > Based upon this, the Bluvian astronomer is quite likely to be waaaay
> off
> > > in his estimate of the "closest approach" distance as being 35,000
> leagues.
> 
> ... for which I am frankly grateful, because it seems to me to drive the
> final nail into the "Blue = Urth" theory's coffin, based on past
> discussions
> herein.

Okay, how?  I too would be relieved, but I don't see the connection.

> Then Jerry F. asks:
> 
> > How are you thinking the Bluvian astronomer would make his estimate?
> > I can't think of a method that would be thrown off by Green's large
> > size.  
> 
> I don't believe Mantis is referring to the Bluvian astronomer's "method"
> but simply to his result. 

Ah, got it.

> At one level, Mantis refers to the description of Green, seen from Blue,
> 
> as a "baleful eye." A twin planet, or even the moon, seen at the
> distance 
> of 105K miles, would be rather too large for an "eye" to be, at any
> rate, 
> the most obvious metaphor. 

Au contraire, mon frere.  Sundogs (mock suns, parhelia) have a good
deal more than twice the angular diameter of the moon, and one person
who talked to me about seeing one compared it repeatedly to God's eye
looking at her, perhaps accusingly.  Anyway, the 105K miles is the
closest approach; most of the time Green looks much smaller.  (Or was
that "baleful" eye right at conjunction?)
 
> More important: from present evidence, it appears that Green, Blue, and 
> Urth have fairly similar surface gravity (the evidence is, admittedly, 
> negative: there is no mention of a sensation of weighing more or less, 
> no sense that thrown or swung objects behave differently, etc., and it
> is reasonable to suspect that _something_ of the sort would be
> mentioned) 
> -- indeed, all these seem to be fairly close to the accelerational 
> "gravity" of the Whorl at "ground" level. 

I think Marc just presented, not for the first time, cogent reasons
to think that Green's gravity is less than the Earth's.  I argued
a couple of days ago that nonetheless Green's gravity should be much
greater than the moon's, more or less for the reason you mention.  I
agree with you and him that there's no trace of any difference between
Earth's gravity, Urth's, Blue's, and the _Whorl's_ "gravity".

> (BTW, the whole issue of the Fliers in a separate thread seems to miss 
> the point that they rarely - never voluntarily? - come near "ground" 
> level.) 

But they're capable of flying near ground level, at least for a little
while.  See Sciathan's discussion of his capture, if I remember it
correctly.

> This being the case, Green needs to be at least somewhat similar in 
> mass to Urth. Such a mass passing within 105K miles of Blue would have 
> effects not terribly dissimilar to the effect of the passing of the 
> White Fountain on Urth. (And, of course, vice versa for Green.) The 
> effects described for the conjunction do not come close: for example, 
> the Narrator mentions extreme tides, but apparently they are not so 
> extreme as to swamp a seaside town (New Viron) or to make a home near 
> the shore of an oceanic island (Horn's hut) infeasible over a period
> of decades.
> 
> > Anyway, the higher the true distance, the harder the problem of how
> > the inhumi cross.
> 
> True, but in any event the problem of how the inhumi cross between
> Bleen and Grue

(or Blee and Groon, for King Crimson fans)

> is trivial next to the problem of how Remora (and,
> apparently, other inhumi) achieved the crossing to the Whorl. If I
> recall correctly, a Neighbor mentions to Horn that they (the Neighbors)
> sent them (the inhumi) - but does not describe how this was done. 

I don't see that.  It's one of the problems the Blue=Ushas theory is
supposed to solve, and for those of us who don't believe that, there
was plenty of space travel before Typhon.  The problem of how inhumi
got onto the _Whorl_ is no harder than the problem of how the averns'
and the alzabo's ancestors got to Urth.

On the other hand, I think you could make a good case that it's not
much easier for the inhumi to cross 35,000 leagues of space than ten
times that distance.

Jerry Friedman

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