Electric universe theories here.

Reality Check said:

Do you think that the TRACE detector using a 171A pass band filter can detect any radiation from the photosphere or below?

Click to expand...

I'm sure that the the TRACE detector using a 171A pass band filter is collecting valid data; the real question is are they collecting it from the place on the sun they think they are?

In no expert in these exact areas. But remain as dubious as mapping what really is going on under the photosphere via the 171A pass band filter than I do about the proclamations that helioseismologists have proven everything about the internal consituents of the sun (though some helioseismology is fine, but I find their certainly they have it all proven beyond repute disturbing). Till better methods are deveoped to map definitively the internal makeup of the sun (cant see how thats gonna happen for a looooong while) the more room has to be given to alternative explanations.

Zeuzzz said:

Got any rough future predictions mike for your iron sun theory? Would be interested.

Click to expand...

I think I'll spend more time over the next few weeks over at Space.com making some actual predictions and less time here beating my head against a wall.

I would say that I can begin to "predict' that CME events will tend to congregate near the hot zones seen in 195A images and now that the new solar cycle is starting to heat up it will be possible to predict a few CME events based on what's going on in the 195A images. The one thing that is predictable in Birkeland's model is that major surface volcanic eruptions are probably going to result in high amounts of electrical activity, sunspots if it get's hot enough, and probably CME events, particularly when it "blows" for the first time in a while.

brantc said:

Here is the TRACE website. This is what TRACE can see @ 17.1nm.
http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/TRACEpodoverview.html

As you can see it can also see coronal loops. They must be hot enough. It can also see the foot prints of the loop. The loops BEGIN under the photosphere.

Click to expand...

There are many images on that page taken in all of the pass bands of the TRACE detector. You need to read the description in the linked pages to find out what pass band is being used and whether they are composite images.
For example

A combination of two images taken by TRACE on 7 March 2000, around 00:25UT. The yellow image shows the 195Å passband, or plasma at approximately 1.5 million degrees. The purplish image shows the brightest structures in the 1600Å passband, which shows the location of magnetic field, with the exception of the spots and small pores, which are dark at that wavelength. What makes this image peculiar is the loop configuration in the red circle in the full-sized image: coronal loops have their footpoints on a ridge running right through the middle of a supergranular convection cell where there is hardly any strong field either in bright faculae or in dark pores.

Click to expand...

(emphasis added)
The 1600Å passband covers 4000 to 1000 K, i.e. includes the photosphere. So here the composite image includes the footprint in the photosphere.

The TRACE detector using the 171A passband sees the bases of coronal loops as the lowest portion of the loops that it can detect, not the actual footprints on the photosphere.

brantc said:

The reason for the loops shape is the right hand rule.

Click to expand...

That sounds right.

brantc said:

There is no other reason for their existence other than to equalize charge between 2 points on a surface.

Click to expand...

That is wrong. Firstly you need to separate charge before the discharge but in solar plasmas the charge separation is ~metres not 1000's of kilometers. Thus you need a separate unknown mechanism to somehow separate the charges. Even so IMHO the discharge would be along the surface.

brantc said:

If you are seeing the loop footprint you are see under the photosphere.

Click to expand...

If you are seeing the footprint in visible light then you are seeing the photosphere.

brantc said:

If you use the TOPS data base you will that find in a plasma the density of the photosphere there is a non extinction point at about UV.
That means UV passes through.

Click to expand...

I assume that yoiu mean the TOPS Opacities (the same one that a poster called upriver at BAUT was going to look at in yet another old surface of the sun thread).
What parameters did you enter?

brantc said:

If you use a model that incorporates thermionic emission then that solves 99% of all the problems with the solar wind, heavy ion acceleration etc.

Click to expand...

Citation please?

Zeuzzz said:

I'm sure that the the TRACE detector using a 171A pass band filter is collecting valid data; the real question is are they collecting it from the place on the sun they think they are?

Click to expand...

That is the real question alright. Keep in mind that they named TRACE before launch. They *ASSUMED* they would find a "layer" and they assumed it would be located between the chromosphere and corona. All of this was "assumed" before the craft was even put into space. All of it's equipment is physically capable of seeing loops starting at any depth above the photosphere even based on their own theories, and unless you honestly believe that light plasma is going to block all wavelengths of light at a shallow depth, it's very possible that these wavelengths could be seen to a great distance under the photosphere.

In no expert in these exact areas. But remain as dubious as mapping what really is going on under the photosphere via the 171A pass band filter than I do about the proclamations that helioseismologists have proven everything about the internal consituents of the sun (though some helioseismology is fine, but I find their certainly they have it all proven beyond repute disturbing). Till better methods are deveoped to map definitively the internal makeup of the sun (cant see how thats gonna happen for a looooong while) the more room has to be given to alternative explanations.

Click to expand...

Kosovichev's heliosiesmology paper makes it clear that there is a "stratification subsurface" sitting smack dab in what is supposed to be an open convection zone according to standard theory. That convection process is highly important to their whole theory because supposedly it keeps hydrogen mixed with iron and nickel. Since that layer block the flow of plasma from above and also from below, it blows their whole theory out of the water. Helioseismology data does not support the standard solar model from the photosphere to a depth of .90R in any way. They'd love you to believe that is the case mind you, but the evidence is quite the opposite. That stratification subsurface is a major problem for their theory.

http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0510111

Kosovichev is perhaps the only person on the planet who actually might be able to "predict" an eruptive event before it occurred at the surface because his method correctly measures the movement of plasma and the lack of movement of plasma in specific areas as well. Heliosiesmology data does no support the gas model theory, particularly at .995R where all sorts of unexpected events occur in sound waves.

Zeuzzz said:

I'm sure that the the TRACE detector using a 171A pass band filter is collecting valid data; the real question is are they collecting it from the place on the sun they think they are?

In no expert in these exact areas. But remain as dubious as mapping what really is going on under the photosphere via the 171A pass band filter than I do about the proclamations that helioseismologists have proven everything about the internal consituents of the sun (though some helioseismology is fine, but I find their certainly they have it all proven beyond repute disturbing). Till better methods are deveoped to map definitively the internal makeup of the sun (cant see how thats gonna happen for a looooong while) the more room has to be given to alternative explanations.

Click to expand...

I am not what you mean by "place on the sun". Do you think that they do not know where they are pointing the detector?

MM was the one claiming that the 171A pass band can see below the photosphere (he has retracted this in his last few posts but his web site still claims this).

Scientists designed the TRACE detector to include a 171A pass band filter so that they could look at activity in the transition zone and corona. They thus minimized the effect of UV light from the photosphere (IMHO to zero but I am prepared to be corrected - MM this is a hint).

I agree with helioseismologists having not "proven everything about the internal consituents of the sun". But then I suspect that helioseismologists would say the same.

MM doe have an alternative "explanation". He does not have an alternative hypothesis. His current (and future) predictions are the usual handwaving thing we usually see from crackpots. Before he even has a hypothesis he has to be able to match actual data from his model - the testable, flasifiable predictions part of the scientific process. This means mathematics (do not hold your breath !).

He cannot even calculate the temperature of his thermodynamically impossible solid iron surface. All he says is that he

• Assumes that it exists (without any evidence).
• Assumes that it is solid (not plasma as in O. Manuel's Iron Sun model).
• Assumes that it is made mostly of iron.
• Thus (since iron has a melting point of ~2000 K) its temperature must be < 2000.

He ignores that a photosphere temperature of ~6000 K means that the interior of the Sun must be hotter than this. Note that the photosphere is where visible light (and its energy) can escape the sun.
He ignores that an internal power source for the Sun (the standard fusion model or his seemingly preferred fission model) creates the same amount of energy, the same temperature profile and thus the same 1000's of K up to the photosphere.

Started Electric comet thread.

Michael Mozina said:

That is the real question alright. Keep in mind that they named TRACE before launch. They *ASSUMED* they would find a "layer" and they assumed it would be located between the chromosphere and corona. All of this was "assumed" before the craft was even put into space. All of it's equipment is physically capable of seeing loops starting at any depth above the photosphere even based on their own theories, and unless you honestly believe that light plasma is going to block all wavelengths of light at a shallow depth, it's very possible that these wavelengths could be seen to a great distance under the photosphere.

Click to expand...

They did not assume that they would not be able to detect the photosphere in the 171A pass band. They selected that pass band to exclude the interference of UV radiation when they wanted to just look at activity in the transition zone and corona. The other pass bands allow looking at the photosphere, etc.

Michael Mozina said:

Kosovichev's heliosiesmology paper makes it clear that there is a "stratification subsurface" sitting smack dab in what is supposed to be an open convection zone according to standard theory. That convection process is highly important to their whole theory because supposedly it keeps hydrogen mixed with iron and nickel. Since that layer block the flow of plasma from above and also from below, it blows their whole theory out of the water. Helioseismology data does not support the standard solar model from the photosphere to a depth of .90R in any way. They'd love you to believe that is the case mind you, but the evidence is quite the opposite. That stratification subsurface is a major problem for their theory.

http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0510111

Kosovichev is perhaps the only person on the planet who actually might be able to "predict" an eruptive event before it occurred at the surface because his method correctly measures the movement of plasma and the lack of movement of plasma in specific areas as well. Heliosiesmology data does no support the gas model theory, particularly at .995R where all sorts of unexpected events occur in sound waves.

Click to expand...

Zeuzzz - I hope that when you read the paper that you can see the misinterpretation that MM has placed on it. Basically all the paper says is that the stratification detected in the Sun's plasma moves during the sunspot cycle. There is one stratification layer that varies the least at 0.99 R_o (changes about 10km).

This is all fairly standard solar physics.

MM needs to show that this known stratification is due to his thermodynamically impossible solid iron surface of unknown depth. This should be really easy. Plasma and sold iron are very different in density and their speed of sound. He should be able to find published papers showing the abrupt change in the speed of sound in his iron layer (densities are less accurate). We are still waiting.

You have to also ask why astronomers could predict the formation of sunspots on the back of the Sun (and verify the the prediction when they rotated into view) using helioseismology models that did not include MM's magic iron layer.

Michael Mozina said:

Baloney. Birkeland built a working solar system in a lab.

Click to expand...

Birkeland build an analogue as he claims himself somewhere after page 664

Michael Mozina said:

Are you telling me that the flow of cathode electrons will have no influence on the movement of positively charged ions in a lab?

Click to expand...

Birkeland does not seem to discuss this in the whole bunch of pages that I went through and commented on (and you nicely ignored). And apparently you are unable to provide the evidence yourself, with your standard reply "read it in Birkelands book." It is not in the book!

Michael Mozina said:

Why are you dragging me personally into the comet theory side of this issue? That's really not my gig. I would assume that the oxygen atoms come from the comet's surface and electrically interact with the protons in the solar wind.

Click to expand...

Okay, then don't reply to this point, I will leave it to Sol88 who apparently thinks it important enough to open a thread on it. Join in if you like.

Michael Mozina said:

It's where a charged proton meets a charged electron and they "reconnect' at the level of actual physics. I've yet to hear your side of the aisle explain what is physically unique about 'magnetic reconnection" that can be physically demonstrated to be unique and different from ordinary electrical interactions in plasma. How did you determine for instance that "magnetic reconnection" is different from ordinary current sheet acceleration, and/or standard induction processes?

Click to expand...

Oh, you mean recombination!
That has been explained by me and by Tim Thompson and we have given papers about the specific signatures that are supposed to be there at the reconnection point (e.g. the quadrupolar Hall signature) which do not happen in any other process and again the change of topology of the magnetic field cannot be obtained by induction.

The plasma, after reconnection, is accelerated perpendicular to the magnetic field, i.e. it is magnetized and is pulled along by the magnetic field lines that reduce their magnetic tension (i.e. they want to straighten out instead of being bent so much as in the X-configuration). This is impossible to obtain through induction or "curent sheet acceleration" (whatever the latter may be, but I guess things like double layers, and they will not accelerate plasma in perpendicular directions to the magnetic field).

Michael Mozina said:

That X point you're talking about is simply a "short circuit" point, and the *TOTAL CIRCUIT ENERGY* will have a direct influence on the outcome of what occurs there. Furthermore, it is not the "magnetic lines' that are actually changing, it is the "current flow" that is "inside" that "magnetic line" that changes direction and therefore the topology of the "lines" follow suit. The "magnetic lines" are there *ONLY BECAUSE* the current flow is there sustaining the field. If there was no current flow, you'd have not "magnetic line" or any energy to release at the intersection point. A NULL point in a pure "magnetic line" has no energy at all at the NULL point that it could possibly pass on to a charged particle. There's no energy at a null point of magnetic lines, but lots of energy at a point of "short circuit".

Click to expand...

Then draw us a complete picture, Michael Mozina, show us how your circuit reconnection works, and the short circuit and and and. All we get is descriptive words, but a picture is much clearer, show us MM.
Naturally, a null point would not have magnetic energy, but that is only a very small region, for the rest the field lines are bent strongly and thus there is lots of tension. However, to get the field lines to bend in the X-configuration as shown in the figure that I linked, the currents need to flow in and out of the paper. But still, there is no short circuit.

Michael Mozina said:

You downplay their importance to the point of absurdity. Everything in the media an in the published papers talks about "magnetic" this, "magnetic" that, never "electromagnetic" this, or "current flow". They talk about charge particle flow as through they are neutral atoms, much as you treat solar wind. It's CURRENT FLOW that occurs between the surface and the heliosphere just as Birkeland *DEMONSTRATED IN A LAB* over 100 years ago! Gah. You're industry is so screwed up, it's almost hopeless.

Click to expand...

Yadayadayada, downplay my ass! For press releases the description with magnetic field lines is usually the easiest, because there are just lines to talk about. To turn it around and give the current description would mean a large complication of the whole picture, that for the general audience is no longer understandable, because currents tend to be perpendicular to the magnetic fields that they generate etc.

The fact that you have not made the step that you understand that both descriptions are usually (in 95%) equivalent, that's your problem.

Just to end, my last magnetotail paper was called:
Magnetotail dipolarization and associated current systems observed by Cluster and Double Star (JGR 2008)
with the following abstract:

Volwerk et al. said:

A dipolarization and its associated current systems are studied using Cluster, Double Star TC1, and ground-based observations. The Cluster spacecraft are located approximately 16 RE downtail near 0030 LT. The Double Star TC1 spacecraft is located more earthward at approximately 7 RE just before local midnight. Auroral observations by the Wideband Imaging Camera on the Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration spacecraft are used to determine the onset times of substorms. It is shown that the magnetic phenomena at the earthward site of a magnetic reconfiguration region are governed by field-aligned currents, which in their turn generate auroral brightenings near the foot points of the spacecraft. It is also shown that the inward and outward motion of the dipolarization front near Cluster has a direct influence on the parallel plasma flow at TC1, indicating a piston mechanism. Just like a piston, the inward moving dipolarization at Cluster pushes in plasma along with the flux transport, which turns to parallel plasma flow at TC1. When the flow reverses at Cluster, i.e., outgoing flux transport, the plasma gets ‘‘sucked out’’ again, which is directly reflected in the plasma data from TC1.

Click to expand...

Zeuzzz said:

I agree MM, the fallacies employed by some of those arguing against you are quite a spectacle. I just ignore posts like that one with emotive overtones, and reply to the posts that raise genuine scientific queries.

Click to expand...

Wow, I guess you then ignore basically all of MM's posts.

Sol88 said:

Point 2

Click to expand...

HUH?

Michael Mozina said:

If you got the point, you would realize it's a valid complaint. Since you don't see it as a valid complaint, I don't think you really do get the point. Empirical physics is the best thing since sliced bread. It allows us to determine actual cause/effect relationships in real world circumstances. It also allows us to "test" ideas in real life with real control mechanisms.

Click to expand...

I really don't think you've done much work in chemistry or physics labs, because it doesn't always work like that. Even the lab profs and TAs don't have this obsession with "empirical" physics.

Michael Mozina said:

Ya, it's nearly a full moon tonight.

Click to expand...

That's about the only thing I agree with you on.

Michael Mozina said:

From a skeptics point of view, it sure looks that way. There seems to be a rush to come up with new and improved versions of "dark" stuff, and inflation variations galore. None of you seem to be the least be concerned that none of these things show up in a lab.

Click to expand...

It's a popular concept, and so a lot of researchers are exploring different versions and different hypotheses. It's healthy science. I honestly don't care if these things don't show up in a lab. Ask any credible astronomer or physicist and they will laugh at you if you demand to have them reproduce something in a lab. We can't create a star in a lab, does that mean stars don't exist? What about the Moon? Or a comet? We've even landed probes on comets, but they don't show up in a lab. I guess that means they don't exist. This is why no one takes you seriously.

Michael Mozina said:

Well, when I see you folks look down at Birkeland's work, or Alfven's cosmology theories or Bruce's solar discharge theories I start to wonder if you've spent too much time away from the lab. You seem to have very little appreciation for the amount of skepticism there is for the things that hold your beliefs together, and you seem to show little interest in demonstrating any part of your theories in real life experiments. It's all paper and math and computer modeling with no regard for how nature actually functions. We point Rhessi at the Earth and we observe gamma rays from discharges in the Earth's atmosphere. We point the same exact piece of gear at the sun, observe gamma rays in it's atmosphere and you guys exclaim "magnetic reconnection did it". Come on. Your whole industry suffers from an acute case of "OMG we forget to test our theories in a lab".

Click to expand...

Birkeland's work is over 100 years old. Some of it stood the test of time, some of it was shelved. Theories change or die, and often will change and die. You seem to suffer from "OMG it wasn't tested in a lab it's false!" Go tell that to an evolutionary biologist, it's the same arguement that the Creationists and Intelligent Designers use to try and prove their pet theory is right. The exact same arguement.

Michael Mozina said:

Birkeland had no trouble creating high energy discharges in the atmosphere of his terella. He "predicted" their existence based on what he learned in the lab in fact in the "tried and true", "better than sliced bread" approach to "empirical physics". That's what real science is all about.

Click to expand...

So? He used a bronze (or was it brass?) globe. You claim the sun is iron. He made a prediction based on what information and knowledge he had at the time. As it turns out when we sent probes out there to investigate...he was wrong. Nuclear physics hadn't even been touched on during his lifetime, electricity was "the big thing". Even looking at the two pictures you spam on here, they don't even look the same. You can't even get the scale right. You can't even accept that an iron surface is impossible because of the observed temperatures, let alone what gravity would likely do to a hollow sphere of that radius.

Michael Mozina said:

Now you're welcome to believe in any number of dark and evil entities and any number of dead inflation deities, but they have never and will never have any effect on any experiment on Earth. In all the time LIGO has been in operation, not one bit of "dark matter" has shown up, not once. Dark energy seems to be physically shy around objects with mass, and inflation is dead and can never be physically "tested" in any empirical sense. Your beliefs are more akin to a religious belief system than real "science". Nothing like "dark energy" shows up in the particle physics, but lots of "electrons" show up in the lab.

Click to expand...

Blah, blah. Deities, inflation fairies. It's boring. Any physics professor would probably have ejected you from the classroom, but that's just me. Inflation is dead, we all hail a dead god. All hail Mozina, for he is righteous in his damnation of the false prophets.

Michael Mozina said:

I really wish you did "get it", but since you think it's "ok" to believe in dark energy, dark matter and inflation theories of all kinds *WITHOUT* even the hope of ever creating experiments to verify your claims make me seriously doubt that you actually do get it. I wouldn't mind so much that you believed in these things if you weren't attempting to exclude other theories from the classroom and from publication in mainstream publications. I see lots of material from Scott, Peratt and others published in EEIE publications, but never in the astrophysical journal or anything "mainstream". Why is that?

Click to expand...

I don't believe in anything. I'm skeptical optimist at best. You know, we'll probably never prove half of what we want in a lab. So? Does that violate years of actual, credible research to fit your inane requirements? I'm glad you don't teach, I'd feel sorry for your students. You don't see material from those authors in actual astrophysical journals because they're barking up the wrong tree, for one, and that they can't provide arguements and evidence to back up their claims. Credible, legitimate journals require things like mathematical derivations and proofs, something we'll never see from the EE'ers. If you can't even be willing to try and do the math behind it, then you really have no place in trying to prove something. As my professors have said, "math is the language of physics". This is true.

Michael Mozina said:

What exactly did you expect me to say about it? Birkeland identified the original current source (fission). He identified a discharge process between the surface and the heliosphere and even simulated coronal loops, jets, solar wind, etc. What did you guys do to demonstrate any of your claims in a physical way in controlled experimentation?

Click to expand...

Missed a couple of the usual MM assertions in this post:

• Please cite where in his book Birkeland identified fission as the "original current source".
• Please cite where in his book Birkeland identified a discharge process between the Sun's surface and the heliosphere (about 10 billion kilometers from the Sun).

We already know that he experimented with electrical discharges on metallic globes that looked like coronal loops and jets. He was even the first person to identify the solar wind as electrons and later electrons with ions.
We also know that his analogies were only valid for his knowledge of 100 years ago. The only lasting result from his work was his spot on theory of origin of the aurora.

Michael Mozina said:

You really are the single strangest character I've met in cyberspace. It doesn't matter how many times you're shown to be wrong, you just keep bouncing back for more.

[... snipped a bunch of crybaby whining...]

What other kind of "test" did you have in mind?

Click to expand...

Why, a controlled experiment, one we can replicate, that lets us see thousands of kilometers below the photosphere using difference graphs made from images of 171Å wavelength emissions obtained from the coronal region thousands of kilometers above the photosphere, of course. Ideally it would be an experiment we can do in a lab right here on Earth, in order to accommodate your standards of evidence, Michael. And to be scientifically useful, it must be objective, meaning other people must be able to reach the same conclusion as you.

Michael Mozina said:

You didn't hear me or understand me or you would realize it's not a "lie". The contours we observe are a direct result of the surface contours and we do in fact see the outlines of mountains in these images.

Click to expand...

They are not actual mountain ranges. They are records of changes in activity in the corona (temperature and position changes).

Your web site lies when it states:
"The flare activity is caused by increased electrical activity as fast moving plasma sweeps over surface ridges, resulting in increased electrical activity on the windward side of the mountain ranges."
There is no surface in the corona.
There are no "ridges" in the corona.
There are no "mountain ranges" in the corona.

Michael Mozina said:

How is Birkeland''s terella "thermodynamically impossible"? You keep stating the most irrational things. His "discharge loops" and cathode rays didn't instantly melt his sphere did they?

Click to expand...

Are you serious or just playing dumb?
Birkeland's terella is definitely thermodynamically possible - here on Earth.

Have you actualy read his book?
You do know that he did not have a fusion source in the middle of his metallic globes?
You do know that he did not have a layer of plasma on the outside of his metallic globes?

The fact is that your crackpot idea of a solid iron surface is thermodynamically impossible because it is sandwiched between

• The 6000 K temperature of the photosphere and
• The 13,600,000 K temperature of the solar core (whatever the power source).

The second law of thermodynamics means that a cold body (< 2000 K) in contact with 2 hot bodies will heat up unless there is someway to cool it.
Where is your refrigerator on the Sun?

Michael Mozina said:

You didn't hear me or understand me or you would realize it's not a "lie". The contours we observe are a direct result of the surface contours and we do in fact see the outlines of mountains in these images.

Click to expand...

How could we be seeing outlines of mountains in these images unless the mountains themselves were changing in between shots? Doesn't the process of generating RD images eliminate static features? What's the "running difference" between a mountain and itself that would cause it to show up?

Michael Mozina said:

That is the real question alright. Keep in mind that they named TRACE before launch. They *ASSUMED* they would find a "layer" and they assumed it would be located between the chromosphere and corona. All of this was "assumed" before the craft was even put into space. All of it's equipment is physically capable of seeing loops starting at any depth above the photosphere even based on their own theories, and unless you honestly believe that light plasma is going to block all wavelengths of light at a shallow depth, it's very possible that these wavelengths could be seen to a great distance under the photosphere.

Click to expand...

All valid points. This is where the ambiguity between distant astrophysics/cosmology and normal in situ laboratory physics comes in, all we have to go on in distant space is the EM radiation and (limited) other data we can collect; its the fact that there are numerous equally valid interpretations of the data that people cant get their heads around.

Kosovichev's heliosiesmology paper makes it clear that there is a "stratification subsurface" sitting smack dab in what is supposed to be an open convection zone according to standard theory. That convection process is highly important to their whole theory because supposedly it keeps hydrogen mixed with iron and nickel. Since that layer block the flow of plasma from above and also from below, it blows their whole theory out of the water. Helioseismology data does not support the standard solar model from the photosphere to a depth of .90R in any way. They'd love you to believe that is the case mind you, but the evidence is quite the opposite. That stratification subsurface is a major problem for their theory.

http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0510111

Kosovichev is perhaps the only person on the planet who actually might be able to "predict" an eruptive event before it occurred at the surface because his method correctly measures the movement of plasma and the lack of movement of plasma in specific areas as well. Heliosiesmology data does no support the gas model theory, particularly at .995R where all sorts of unexpected events occur in sound waves.

Click to expand...

Nice Hadn't seen this before. I think that anyone with any common sense can see that the *standard* (gas/fluid) model of the sun is patently obserd, and has long been falsified. Only when you reconsider the full properties of the sun as a ball of plasma will you get to the bottom of the matter. This post I wrote elsewhere may be relevent, and I think that Juergens may still be correct even to this day.

Zeuzzz said:

If you ignore the silly convective models and pay attention to how quick solar prominences move about and how readily sunspot penumbra repudiate standard convective conventions, you soon realise that the sun is more dynamic than most current models and simple gas laws appreciate. The sun is a dynamic ionized plasma, dominated by EM forces and complex plasma physics. Not dominated by the slow convective gas models first proposed decades ago by Eddington, years before plasma behaviour and EM influences were even being considered.

In eddintons standard nucler fusion core model the energy produced supposedly rises slowly away from the centre first by radiation (no movement of material) and then by convection (a flow of matter upwards). The granulation we see on the surface are supposedly the tops of 150,000 mile long convection columns where the heat has risen, then cools, then falls back down.

But if this complete process really takes 150,000 years, then why do the granules change shape and even disappear in a matter of hours?

As Juergens pointed out many years ago:

"If one calculates the Rayleigh number [the likelihood of smooth laminar flow] appropriate to the bottom of the solar photosphere, one finds that it exceeds the critical value by five powers of ten and therefore the solar granulation should on this basis be an entirely random phenomenon. The fact that the observed granules have a pronounced cellular structure and a bright-dark asymmetry has not yet been explained by theory.''(18)

Many facile assertions to the contrary, it becomes increasingly obvious that photospheric granulation is explainable in terms of convection only if we disregard what we know about convection. Surely the cellular structure is not to be expected."

Donald Scott also re-iterates the same problem in a breif article here

In the hypothesized 'convection zone‘ the question is not whether convection or conduction occurs. The question is: Since the Reynolds number is so large (remember that how it is numerically evaluated is based on many assumptions about a region we cannot observe), any convection must be turbulent, not laminar, flow. But the photospheric tufts‘ that we do observe are claimed to be the tops of laminar columns that reach from the Sun‘s radiative zone all the way up to the photosphere. How these stable columns can exist in the highly turbulent convection zone is what is being questioned. Dr. Eugene N. Parker, perhaps the most eminent solar astronomer, worried in print [1] that, "the Reynolds number [in the convection zone] is on the order of 10¹² and, perhaps worse, the convective zone is vertically stratified.”

[1] The physics of the Sun and the gateway to the stars
Parker, Eugene N.
Physics Today, Volume 53, Issue 6, June 2000, pp.26-31

Click to expand...

"Sunspot Penumbra Shock Astrophysicists

Textbook theory of sunspot activity faces new difficulties posed by the magnetically confined structures of the penumbra. The old idea that the penumbra filaments are “convection currents” must now give way to new evidence that electric currents dominate these solar structures."

http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2006/arch06/060418penumbra.htm

For decades, the standard model of the Sun treated the penumbra filaments as “convection cells”, columns of hot gases transporting heat from the interior to the surface. Astrophysicists formulated such concepts while under the spell of gravity and familiar gas laws. Seeing the Sun as an isolated island in space, they had no other tools to work with.

But proponents of the Electric Universe assert that there are no isolated islands in the universe. They contend that concepts of simple heat transport are alien to the plasma discharge behavior evident in sunspot activity. As Wallace Thornhill observed, the penumbra filaments “bear no resemblance to any known form of convection in a hot gas, magnetic fields or no”.

So we pose the question: what is controlling the behavior of the penumbra in these pictures—magnetic fields or gas laws? The new profile of the solar atmosphere has left the astrophysicists in a state of ambivalence. The APOD folks do not describe the network of interacting filaments as “convection cells”. They say simply, “Here magnetic field lines can be clearly followed outward from the sunspot to distant regions”. That is not the behavior of convection cells!

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Reality Check said:

The fact is that your crackpot idea of a solid iron surface is thermodynamically impossible because it is sandwiched between

• The 6000 K temperature of the photosphere and
• The 13,600,000 K temperature of the solar core (whatever the power source).

The second law of thermodynamics means that a cold body (< 2000 K) in contact with 2 hot bodies will heat up unless there is someway to cool it.
Where is your refrigerator on the Sun?

Click to expand...

Enough of the crackpot accusations RealityCheck, one day we might make such accusations back against you to see how you like it. As in my opinion many of the scientific ideas your adhere to are complete crackpottendom. But emotive words like this do nothing other than provoke unecissary emotions.

I would think (based on what EU material I have read) that they doubt that the core of the sun is at 13,600,000 K. But rather the hottest area of the sun is outside of itself in the corona where the glow discharge is taking place (~2⁶ Kelvin compared to vastly lesser ~6³ of the photosphere) and the inner sun is much cooler than most people realize. The corona is millions of degrees hotter than the surface of the sun, and no-one really knows why (in standard models anyway). So if mainstream physics has no definitive models about this, I dont see any reason why not giving an exact answer to this question falsifies anything much. Anymore than the inexplicability of the temparature of the corona falsifies the standard model. But michael may very well have an answer I dont want to tread on his toes here, we'll soon see

D'rok said:

How could we be seeing outlines of mountains in these images unless the mountains themselves were changing in between shots?

Click to expand...

They are experiencing subtle lighting shifts between shots the individual shots, and they are moving left to right in the image between shots.

Doesn't the process of generating RD images eliminate static features?

Click to expand...

No, not necessarily. If the features themselves are relatively static, they will show up in a running difference image. If you look at a RD LASCO-C3 RD image for example you'll notice a background pattern of stars in the image. They move slightly of course during the image so you'll always see the shadow of bright stars to the left of such images. The fact they are physically there, and that they collectively form a relatively stable pattern is easily visible in the RD images too. As long as the features themselves are static or persistent, they will show up in a RD image.

What's the "running difference" between a mountain and itself that would cause it to show up?

Click to expand...

First of all, the surface moves between the two original images, as do all the various light sources. The windward side of every mountain range is typically "lit up" due to the plasma flow past the surface structures whereas the leeward side of these structures is typically less electrically active. That makes these structures particularly visible.

Birkeland noted that the arcs of his discharges tended to congregate at the "bumps" of the surface of his terella That's true with the sun too since volcanic activity typically generates most of the activity in an active region like the one in the southern hemisphere that is facing us right now in SOHO images. All sunspot activity is located in and around these volcanic active regions just as they have formed over that active region in recent days. Not every active regions forms a sunspot, but sunspots only form above/around active regions.

Zeuzzz said:

I'm sure that the the TRACE detector using a 171A pass band filter is collecting valid data; the real question is are they collecting it from the place on the sun they think they are?

Click to expand...

Yes.

In no expert in these exact areas.

Click to expand...

Obviously.

But remain as dubious as mapping what really is going on under the photosphere via the 171A pass band filter than I do about the proclamations that helioseismologists have proven everything about the internal consituents of the sun (though some helioseismology is fine, but I find their certainly they have it all proven beyond repute disturbing).

Click to expand...

Images gathered from the corona showing 171Å emissions have nothing to do with the photosphere, or anything below it. Michael's mythical solid surface is 3500 to 4000 kilometers below the photosphere. Those images from the TRACE program are taken from the transition region, ~2000 kilometers above the photosphere and outward.

There are several thousand kilometers difference between the location of the 171Å images and that wacky solid iron surface. A few thousand of those kilometers are opaque to light at any wavelength. Michael's claim of seeing a solid surface in the running difference images, even if we ignore his ridiculous misunderstanding about them showing any actual real stuff, would be like claiming some imaging technique could see the French Alps from Chicago, in a straight line through the Earth.

Helioseismology data shows mass moving at thousands of kilometers per hour directly up, down, and laterally through Michael's solid surface. His "solid" surface, being totally fluid in its composition throughout, and having none of the properties generally attributed to a normally defined solid, is obviously unlike any solid anyone has ever described before. So unlike it that it would require a complete redefinition of the word "solid".

Also, nobody is claiming the level of certainty about the internal makeup of the Sun that you seem to think they are. That's not how science works, contrary to the misperceptions of crackpots like Michael.

Till better methods are deveoped to map definitively the internal makeup of the sun (cant see how thats gonna happen for a looooong while) the more room has to be given to alternative explanations.

Click to expand...

Any alternative explanation that matches all the observations, is consistent with the principles of physics, provides predictions that are validated by new data, and holds up to objective scrutiny are given all the room in the world. No such alternative explanations are offered by the PC/EU nutters, and have absolutely no relationship to Michael's insane solid surface Sun fantasy.

Reality Check said:

They are not actual mountain ranges. They are records of changes in activity in the corona (temperature and position changes).

Click to expand...

False. That would not explain the stable features in the image or the behaviors we observe in the images.

Your web site lies when it states:
"The flare activity is caused by increased electrical activity as fast moving plasma sweeps over surface ridges, resulting in increased electrical activity on the windward side of the mountain ranges."

Click to expand...

Yes, and I mentioned that to you here too. You're ignoring that little visual tidbid, but it's quite visible in the image.

There is no surface in the corona.

Click to expand...

The bases of the loops are not located in the corona, and they are not located in the corona even in standard theory.

There are no "ridges" in the corona.

Click to expand...

There are however persistent angular features in these images that you never addressed, not even once.

There are no "mountain ranges" in the corona.

Click to expand...

I agree, but these images do not originate in the corona.

Are you serious or just playing dumb?
Birkeland's terella is definitely thermodynamically possible - here on Earth.

Click to expand...

It's thermodynamically possible EVERYWHERE, not just on Earth. You can't ignore empirical experiments.

Have you actualy read his book?

Click to expand...

Yes, and two of Alfven's books too. I doubt any of you have read "Cosmic Plasma" where he specifically applies MHD theory to objects in space. He wasn't a big fan of "magnetic reconnection", in fact he called it "pseudoscience".

You do know that he did not have a fusion source in the middle of his metallic globes?

Click to expand...

You do know he mentioned uranium by name as a probable power source don't you?

You do know that he did not have a layer of plasma on the outside of his metallic globes?

Click to expand...

You evidently did not read the book. Several of his images show the plasma on the outside of the globe.

The fact is that your crackpot idea of a solid iron surface is

Click to expand...

Your crackpot statements are both rude, and irrational. You've certainly heard the term "Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones"? You folks believe in at least 3 different things that do not exist in nature, never show up in a lab experiment and are figments of your collective imagination. Please refrain from lecturing me about ideas. All of my ideas are:

A) lab tested
B) work in a lab here on Earth
C) involve only known and demonstrated forces of nature
D) rely on no metaphysical fudge factors of any sort.

Inflation is one of those things you folks simply "dreamed up" in human imagination. I can even tell you which specific human imagination invented the idea, namely Guth. Not one of you can show inflation does anything to anything else in a lab. Not one of you even bats an eye at the fact you will *NEVER* be able to demonstrate inflation in a lab in controlled experimentation. "Dark" stuff is just more gap filler to prop up your otherwise dead theory. In fact the whole Lambda-Gumby theory is 96% metaphysical gap filler, and only 4% actual "physics".

There is absolutely nothing about my beliefs that are even in the same "crackpot league" as inflation faeries, dark energy gnomes and dark matter beans. At worst my ideas are all based on demonstrated laws of physics and just happen to be incorrect. Your beliefs on the other hand are an act of pure faith in metaphysics and you can't distinguish inflation, or dark things from magic if we use the same math and apply it to magic elves.

I've already done your list several times and yet you still repeat the same nonsense. That just tells me you aren't even listening or responding to my points.

GeeMack said:

Obviously.

Click to expand...

Coming from you, that statement is utterly absurd. "Flying stuff? What flying stuff?"

You are hands down the *LEAST* qualified individual to discuss these specific images of anyone I've ever met in cyberspace. You've made at least 3 false statements about this technique including claiming there are no light sources, there is no flying stuff in the image, and the RD technique itself generates persistent features. You of all people have no right to criticize anyone.

Images gathered from the corona showing 171Å emissions have nothing to do with the photosphere, or anything below it. Michael's mythical solid surface is 3500 to 4000 kilometers below the photosphere. Those images from the TRACE program are taken from the transition region, ~2000 kilometers above the photosphere and outward.

Click to expand...

That is a belief of yours that you cannot physically demonstrate and you ignored several key images that demonstrate your claim is false.

The really outrageous part of all this is that you personally think you explained every pixel of every frame of this image. You did not mention a single detail observed in these images by location, by frame, or by event. You never mentioned one single cause/effect relationship observed in the image. You never mentioned anything specific at all in fact.

You have absolutely zero credibility as it relates to these images, in fact you have negative credibility because you have made at least three false statements related to this technique and you refuse to address anything specific about the image.

Michael Mozina said:

They are experiencing subtle lighting shifts between shots the individual shots, and they are moving left to right in the image between shots.


First of all, the surface moves between the two original images, as do all the various light sources. The windward side of every mountain range is typically "lit up" due to the plasma flow past the surface structures whereas the leeward side of these structures is typically less electrically active. That makes these structures particularly visible.

Click to expand...

If "the surface moves between the two original images", then doesn't that mean that the entire RD image is an error? How can any meaningful graphical representation of change be generated between two images of different geographical origin? If the telescope didn't account for surface movement (the Sun's rotation, I assume?), then there was a screw-up and your image is worthless. If the telescope did account for the Sun's rotation, then the image shows phenomena that exhibit change in a single geographic location thus eliminating persistent features like mountains. Correct?

If an Earth satellite took a series of pictures of Mt Everest (correctly taking into account the rotation of the Earth) and then an RD image was generated from those images, would Mt Everest be visible in the RD image? (Others, please jump in and answer this if you like).

Birkeland noted that the arcs of his discharges tended to congregate at the "bumps" of the surface of his terella That's true with the sun too since volcanic activity typically generates most of the activity in an active region like the one in the southern hemisphere that is facing us right now in SOHO images. All sunspot activity is located in and around these volcanic active regions just as they have formed over that active region in recent days. Not every active regions forms a sunspot, but sunspots only form above/around active regions.

Click to expand...

So they're not just mountains, but volcanoes? Or am I misunderstanding your use of the term "volcanic."

D'rok said:

How could we be seeing outlines of mountains in these images unless the mountains themselves were changing in between shots? Doesn't the process of generating RD images eliminate static features? What's the "running difference" between a mountain and itself that would cause it to show up?

Click to expand...

You are correct about running difference images eliminating any static features. Neal Hurlburt of LMSAL, where they designed, implemented, and analyze the data acquired from the TRACE program was asked...

GeeMack's email said:

In this video (T171_000828.avi), and other "running difference" images and videos, where there seems to be areas of light and shadow and often the appearance of some sort of surface, is it true that this effect is actually an optical illusion resulting from the process of creating a "running difference" image?

Click to expand...

To which he replied...

Dr. Neal Hurlburt's email said:

The answer is yes. A dark "shadow" in the difference movie is a region that became darker while a bright region is one that became brighter. Places where nothing changes are grey.

Click to expand...

So Michael's tantrums insisting that the differing opinions are incorrect and his is correct are wrong, as stated simply and clearly by a person who is obviously a knowledgeable authority on the matter. There you have it, D'rok. You can weigh your own opinion between one guy's wildass unsubstantiated guess and the statement of another person with doctorate degree credentials who works hands-on with the actual equipment and images being discussed. Any questions?

ETA:

D'rok said:

If an Earth satellite took a series of pictures of Mt Everest and then an RD image was generated from those images, would Mt Everest be visible in the RD image? (Others, please jump in and answer this if you like).

Click to expand...

No.

GeeMack said:

*Michael's mythical solid surface
*that wacky solid iron surface.
*crackpots like Michael.
*PC/EU nutters
*Michael's insane solid surface Sun fantasy

Click to expand...

Way to go! theres some more derogartory terms here if you want to add to your (seemingly) already extensive list of ad hominems: http://home.online.no/~rkaste/jokes/insults.htm

There really is no need for these words, that paragraph would be so much better without them.

Zeuzzz said:

There really is no need for these words, that paragraph would be so much better without them.

Click to expand...

But no less truthful or accurate.

GeeMack said:

You are correct about running difference images eliminating any static features. Neal Hurlburt of LMSAL, where they designed, implemented, and analyze the data acquired from the TRACE program was asked...




To which he replied...




So Michael's tantrums insisting that the differing opinions are incorrect and his is correct are wrong, as stated simply and clearly by a person who is obviously a knowledgeable authority on the matter. There you have it, D'rok. You can weigh your own opinion between one guy's wildass unsubstantiated guess and the statement of another person with doctorate degree credentials who works hands-on with the actual equipment and images being discussed. Any questions?

ETA:



No.

Click to expand...

Thanks. I'm happy to have learned some basic concepts from this thread.

Michael Mozina said:

Coming from you, [... more crying ...]

Click to expand...

Oh whine, whine, whine. Interesting that you should take every opportunity you have to actually demonstrate your fruitcake fantasy and waste it crying.

We're still waiting for you to explain the running difference image, in detail, with specifics, objectively, in a way that allows other people to reach the same conclusion you've reached. You can start with the pixel at Row 1, Column 1. How about that first pixel, Michael? Why is it the shade that it is? And after you explain that one, you can move on to Row 1, Column 2, then onward. Jesus, over three years and you have yet to explain one single pixel.

GeeMack said:

Yes.

Click to expand...

Very elaborative

And you know this.... how?

Zeuzzz said:

Very elaborative

And you know this.... how?

Click to expand...

It's been explained, right here in this thread, back up several pages. You must have missed it. Maybe start over. You'll find it.

D'rok said:

If "the surface moves between the two original images", then doesn't that mean that the entire RD image is an error?

Click to expand...

No. Let me try to explain it this way, starting with a LASCO RD image. If you go to the SOHO archives and watch some LASCO-C3 RD images for awhile, you will find that the background stars show up in these images and they create "persistent patterns" in the background of the image. They are not moving very fast relative to the plasma so they are visible throughout the movie with the bright side to the right, and the shadow of where it came from to the left. If there are "persistent features" in the image (like the stars and their relationship to each other), that pattern will show up in the RD images, just as it shows up in the original images. If we looked at just a set of background stars in an RD image, they would all appear to be fixed and not moving in relationship to each other. They are of course moving, but relative to each other based on our vantage point here in this solar system, they appear to be fixed and a definite pattern will be seen in such images.

The easy way to look at this (and the correct way too) is that any lighting that is "persistent", and any shading that is "persistent" will show up in the image, just as moving items (like the flying plasma) also show up in the image. The persistence of the background lighting determines the persistence of the various features. If the light sources are not moving much in relationship to one another, that lack of movement (relative to each other) is also visible in the RD image set. There's nothing magical about it, nor can it be caused by the RD imaging technique. The only thing that can create persistence in an RD image is persistence in the light source(s).

GeeMack said:

It's been explained, right here in this thread, back up several pages. You must have missed it. Maybe start over. You'll find it.

Click to expand...

No you won't. You'll find a brief overview of what a RD process is (subtracting one image from another) and at least three of GM's technical errors about the process in his explanation. You'll also find not a single specific observation, frame or quadrant of any frame has been "explained' and no "cause/effect"" relationships were ever offered. GM has said several things about the technique that are simply untrue like his claim that there is no flying plasma in the image, and that persistence is a function of the RD technique rather than the lighting from the sun. He's also said there are NO lighting sources when in fact the sun is the light source of all the images, the original images as well as the RD images. In short, he's blown everything he tried to "explain", and the only thing he even attempted to explain was the RD technique itself, not anything specific in the images.

D'rok said:

Thanks. I'm happy to have learned some basic concepts from this thread.

Click to expand...

GM stated three things here about RD images that are scientifically false. He said:

A) There are no light sources in the RD image.

That is categorically untrue as anyone can see. The sun has emitted every single photon striking every last pixel of every single image, all the original images, and all the RD images as well. The sun is the light source of these images.

B) There is no flying stuff.

That is also categorically absurd. There are all sorts of "flying plasma" blobs visible in the RD images and in the original 171A images as well. There is nothing about the technique that would hide any sort of movement of plasma, and that movement of plasma is very visible as it moves from the lower right, toward the upper left side of the image.

C) The patterns are a result of the RD technique.

That is also categorically false. The patterns are a direct result of the patterns in the original images and the patterns in the light sources. Their persistence or lack thereof are also directly related to solar processes and have nothing whatsoever to do with the technique. The technique cannot and does not create "persistence' in any way.

How can you verify this? Start with a LASCO-C3 RD image from the SOHO archive library.

http://lasco-www.nrl.navy.mil/daily_mpg/
(you may need to copy and paste this link to your browser)

You'll find them organized in the various folders by year and month marked with _d3 designation (like 010102_d3.mpg). If you choose a month in 2000 or 2001, you'll see more action than if you choose one from a recent date. I'll have you start with a LASCO-C3 image so that you can look at the background stars and see how their patterns of light play out in the RD images. The persistence of the patterns in the RD images are directly related to the persistence of the light sources in the original images. In no way are they related to the RD technique itself.

The "flying stuff" from the sun can also be observed in LASCO-C3 images, particularly during the 2000-2001 season where CME's were occurring on a regular basis.

You'll also notice that the "light sources" are in fact the material in the original images. The only thing that is really all that visually different in the RD images are the shadows you find in the wake of the plasma movement and the wake of the relative movement of the background stars. A single LASCO-C3 image can debunk all three of GM's false statements. How much time could he really have put into understanding a RD image, and how much does he actually understand correctly about an RD image if he missed all three of these points?

GeeMack said:

You are correct about running difference images eliminating any static features.

Click to expand...

That is absolutely and positively a false statement as the background stars in the LASCO-C3 RD images will demonstrate. The "static features" are also moving, albeit slowly perhaps, but they are moving. There is nothing in the image that is actually 100% "static" in the final analysis. GM's hero at LMSAL would never have said something so foolish.

Michael Mozina said:

That is absolutely and positively a false statement as the background stars in the LASCO-C3 RD images will demonstrate. The "static features" are also moving, albeit slowly perhaps, but they are moving. There is nothing in the image that is actually 100% "static" in the final analysis. GM's hero at LMSAL would never have said something so foolish.

Click to expand...

And what did they tell you about it, Michael?

Oh, by the way...

Michael Mozina said:

All of my ideas are:

A) lab tested
B) work in a lab here on Earth
C) involve only known and demonstrated forces of nature
D) rely on no metaphysical fudge factors of any sort.

Click to expand...

If you can take a moment out from your whining and bitching, where's that lab tested experiment that shows you can see a solid surface thousands of kilometers below the opaque photosphere by making difference graphs from images that were acquired from thousands of kilometers above the photosphere? Nothing metaphysical, Michael. No guesses. No fudge factors. You show us the experiment, repeatable, mathematically sound, physically consistent, and objective, so that other people can reach the same conclusion you've reached.

After all, you said it yourself. All of your ideas are, well...

GM: A few thousand of those kilometers are opaque to light at any wavelength.

Baloney. Prove it. Lets see you demonstrate in a lab that a super thin, composed of mostly hydrogen and helium plasma is going to block these specific wavelengths of light by a specific (and shallow) depth. You'll never provide such a physical experiment because no such experiment exists or could exist to demonstrate your claim. Atoms are not "black bodies". They absorb and emit light at very specific wavelengths that are directly related to their valence shell configurations. Not every atom can even absorb or emit every wavelength of light. You simply *ASSUME* that the photosphere is "opaque" to *ALL* (not even some) wavelengths. That's absolutely unsupported by observation and in fact it is refuted by the observations. I posted two images earlier that demonstrate that this specific claim is false which you completely ignored.

Michael Mozina said:

That is absolutely and positively a false statement as the background stars in the LASCO-C3 RD images will demonstrate. The "static features" are also moving, albeit slowly perhaps, but they are moving.

Click to expand...

If the "static features" are moving, then they aren't static and their movement will be captured by the RD process.

There is nothing in the image that is actually 100% "static" in the final analysis.

Click to expand...

Isn't that what everyone has been saying?

Let's see if I'm understanding you correctly. I looked at some of those LASCO-C3 animations, and I saw what looked like a background of stars that was moving. Some patterns were consistent and moved as a pattern. Other movements were random and intermittent and consisted of single events.

It seems perfectly reasonable to me that if an imaging device is focused on something relatively close in the foreground (the Sun) for an extended period, the immensely far-off background (the stars) would appear to move in relation to the foreground object. I can see the background stars "move" with my own eyes by watching the sky at night due to the rotation of the Earth. The SOHO satellite is in orbit around the Earth, yes? When the LASCO thingy is focused on the Sun, the stars in the background will "move" as the satellite revolves, yes? So then, this movement relative to where the LASCO instrument is focused will show up as graphically represented change when RD images are generated, yes?

What you seem to want to suggest is that your "mountains" on the sun are analogous to stars in the background of these animations - i.e. the mountains are persistent, solid features that "move" in the same way as stars in the background and are therefore captured by RD imaging in the same way.

Have I got this correct?

Michael Mozina said:

GM: A few thousand of those kilometers are opaque to light at any wavelength.

Baloney. Prove it. Lets see you demonstrate in a lab that a super thin, composed of mostly hydrogen and helium plasma is going to block these specific wavelengths of light by a specific (and shallow) depth. You'll never provide such a physical experiment because no such experiment exists or could exist to demonstrate your claim. Atoms are not "black bodies". They absorb and emit light at very specific wavelengths that are directly related to their valence shell configurations. Not every atom can even absorb or emit every wavelength of light. You simply *ASSUME* that the photosphere is "opaque" to *ALL* (not even some) wavelengths. That's absolutely unsupported by observation and in fact it is refuted by the observations. I posted two images earlier that demonstrate that this specific claim is false which you completely ignored.

[qimg]http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/images/T171_1600_WL_000606_1500.gif[/qimg]

Click to expand...

So you're saying that the Sun is not absorbing and emitting light largely like that of a black body? And that it's emission spectrum is dominated by very specific wavelengths?

And if not, can you clarify further your position?

D'rok said:

If the "static features" are moving, then they aren't static and their movement will be captured by the RD process.

Click to expand...

Yes. The time between images ensures that everything "moves" at least slightly.

Isn't that what everyone has been saying?

Click to expand...

No, not really.

Let's see if I'm understanding you correctly. I looked at some of those LASCO-C3 animations, and I saw what looked like a background of stars that was moving. Some patterns were consistent and moved as a pattern. Other movements were random and intermittent and consisted of single events.

Click to expand...

The stars all retained a similar pattern throughout the event just as they form a pattern in the night sky and in the original images. Transient particles fly through various images of course, and the plasma flying off the sun is also moving away from the sun in waves in these images, particularly the ones from 2000-2001. Note you can observe all the stars in the same patterns in the background because the stars move from from to frame. Nothing is 'static' in space.

It seems perfectly reasonable to me that if an imaging device is focused on something relatively close in the foreground (the Sun) for an extended period, the immensely far-off background (the stars) would appear to move in relation to the foreground object. I can see the background stars "move" with my own eyes by watching the sky at night due to the rotation of the Earth.

Click to expand...

Likewise you'll see them move in RD images. Some basic concepts still apply.

The SOHO satellite is in orbit around the Earth, yes?

Click to expand...

It's located pretty much directly in front of the Earth balanced between the gravity of the Earth and the sun.

When the LASCO thingy is focused on the Sun, the stars in the background will "move" as the satellite revolves, yes?

Click to expand...

The sun is obviously the thing that is moving, as is the SOHO satellite, Earth and everything else in space. The stars "appear" to move because of the movement of the sun and the Earth between the various images. Relative to SOHO, the stars moved from one frame to the next. The RD image will therefore show a bright spot where it moved to, and a dark spot where it moved from.

So then, this movement relative to where the LASCO instrument is focused will show up as graphically represented change when RD images are generated, yes?

Click to expand...

Yes. You've got it.

What you seem to want to suggest is that your "mountains" on the sun are analogous to stars in the background of these animations - i.e. the mountains are persistent, solid features that "move" in the same way as stars in the background and are therefore captured by RD imaging in the same way.

Have I got this correct?

Click to expand...

Yes, you have it correct in every respect. In this image, the tops of the mountains are highly electrically active because plasma is blowing by stationary magnetic fields on the surface that have been aligned by the currents that flow from the surface. The movement of plasma past the surface features creates an induction process on the windward side of these mountains that show up as bright points in the image. Their relatively "stable" shape over time is what shows up as rigid outlines in the image.

As you can already tell now, there is no possibility that the RD technique *causes* the "persistence" of the various features in the RD image. Only a persistence in the original light source could create persistent patterns in the RD image. You can also see that "subtracting" images from one other that are separated by a period of time will naturally show some amount of movement from one frame to the next, thereby ensuring that nothing is actually completely "subtracted out" from one images to the next. The only way that you'd get a full subtracted image or blank image would be to subtract the same image from itself. Since the two images are separated by time, nothing will be perfectly stationary and all things will move from left to right in that image, meaning shadows should generally be on the left side of most active (bright) regions.

Optical Depth

Michael Mozina said:

Lets see you demonstrate in a lab that a super thin, composed of mostly hydrogen and helium plasma is going to block these specific wavelengths of light by a specific (and shallow) depth.

Click to expand...

Where do you propose that one might build a 1000 km long plasma tube to contain the experiment? How do you propose to conduct the experiment, if and when it is built?

You constantly revert to an insistence on controlled laboratory experiments. But you yourself will reject even the most controlled of laboratory experiments, when they contradict your pre-conceptions, as you do with magnetic reconnection. So why should anyone be impressed by your insistence that other people adhere to criteria that you will not adhere to yourself?

And you fail to notice that some things cannot be demonstrated to your satisfaction in any conceivable controlled laboratory experiment. This is one example. Even a "thick" plasma, let alone a "thin" plasma, can be transparent or translucent under laboratory conditions, while being opaque in nature because nature exists on spatial scales that cannot be duplicated in any laboratory. The photosphere of the sun is on the order of 1000 km deep. So the concept at work here is what astronomers call column density. Even where the photosphere is "thin", with a hydrogen atom number density about 9x10¹² atoms/cm³, a column of that plasma 1000 km long will hold 9x10²⁰ atoms. A real photospheric column will hold rather more than that, since that is based on a minimum density, probably closer to 10²⁴ or 10²⁵ neutral hydrogen atoms. Is that "thin"?

I told you once before that "thin" is irrelevant. You don't believe me of course, but that's no surprise. But I'll say it again anyway. "Thin" is irrelevant, whether you like it or not. We call it "physics", and the key concept here is optical depth. The optical depth of anything depends not only on "thin" or "thick" (both of which you have yet to quantitatively define), but on the absorption coefficient of the material at the wavelength(s) of interest. A strong absorption coefficient means strong absorption, even in a "thin" material, while a weak absorption coefficient can mean weak absorption, even for a "thick" material. After all, ordinary glass has about 1,000,000 times the mass density of the solar photosphere, and is "thick" by colloquial standards, but totally transparent to eyeball wavelengths of light, while totally opaque at other wavelengths.

You must pay attention to the relevant physics, just as you demand of others to do the same, or you just wind up in a thread dominated by a sea of insults and minor conversations on unimportant points, as you are now.

Michael Mozina said:

Yes. The time between images ensures that everything "moves" at least slightly.



No, not really.



The stars all retained a similar pattern throughout the event just as they form a pattern in the night sky and in the original images. Transient particles fly through various images of course, and the plasma flying off the sun is also moving away from the sun in waves in these images, particularly the ones from 2000-2001. Note you can observe all the stars in the same patterns in the background because the stars move from from to frame. Nothing is 'static' in space.



Likewise you'll see them move in RD images. Some basic concepts still apply.



It's located pretty much directly in front of the Earth balanced between the gravity of the Earth and the sun.



The sun is obviously the thing that is moving, as is the SOHO satellite, Earth and everything else in space. The stars "appear" to move because of the movement of the sun and the Earth between the various images. Relative to SOHO, the stars moved from one frame to the next. The RD image will therefore show a bright spot where it moved to, and a dark spot where it moved from.



Yes. You've got it.



Yes, you have it correct in every respect. In this image, the tops of the mountains are highly electrically active because plasma is blowing by stationary magnetic fields on the surface that have been aligned by the currents that flow from the surface. The movement of plasma past the surface features creates an induction process on the windward side of these mountains that show up as bright points in the image. Their relatively "stable" shape over time is what shows up as rigid outlines in the image.

As you can already tell now, there is no possibility that the RD technique *causes* the "persistence" of the various features in the RD image. Only a persistence in the original light source could create persistent patterns in the RD image. You can also see that "subtracting" images from one other that are separated by a period of time will naturally show some amount of movement from one frame to the next, thereby ensuring that nothing is actually completely "subtracted out" from one images to the next. The only way that you'd get a full subtracted image or blank image would be to subtract the same image from itself. Since the two images are separated by time, nothing will be perfectly stationary and all things will move from left to right in that image, meaning shadows should generally be on the left side of most active (bright) regions.

Click to expand...

I think there is a glaring flaw in the analogy. In order for the movement of the stars in the background of the LASCO animations to be analogous to movement of features on a hypothetical surface of the sun in your image, the scale would have to be comparable.

The distance between the foreground (sun) and background (stars) is measured in light years; the distance between the foreground (corona) and background (iron "surface") is measured in kms. Isn't it precisely this massive scale (starfield background light years away from foreground) that gives the appearance of movement that is captured by the RD process? Aren't the features in your image part of the foreground, not the background? Doesn't this mean that they can't be "static" in the way that background stars are static?