From: "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" 
Subject: RE: (urth) distance
Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2002 11:26:09 -0700

> Well, Blattid, since you put it so succinctly, the choice is easy.  Of
> course the 30,000 league figure is incorrect!  Which means that Green
> might only fluctuate a tiny amount from its 80,000 league distance, 

I'm no orbit mechanic, but that seems unlikely with a six-year period,
and _very_ unlikely to cause the inhumi to be able to cross only for a 
short period.

> Thanks!  You made everything so much easier!  

Oh. Good.

> So we know that the moon was moved from about 80 to 50 thousand
> leagues in Severians day 

Ahem. We do not know that it "was moved." I believe that most models
suggest that the Moon _will_ in fact move closer over (geological) 
time.

> ... the moon is proportionally very large for a satellite when compared
> with the earth's mass.  It is huge compared to the satellites of most
> of the gas giants.

Correct; we are actually best regarded as a double-planet system. (The
center about which the Earth-Moon system mutually orbits is, if I am not 
mistaken, not actually inside the Earth.) 

--Blattid


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