I’ve seen this rarely: a more accurate depiction of the solar system. Usually, it is shown as a compact array of the relative sizes of planets with a huge sun in the center. How many have seen a realistic scale? If one inch=one million miles, the sun would be .865 inches diameter, Earth would be 7.8 ft. away and .008 inches diameter. Jupiter, .087" dia. and 40.3 ft. distance. Neptune, 232.7 ft from Sun and .031" diameter. Get real, graphic artists and science program directors… We’re really very tiny and alone…
There are plenty of outdoor scale models.
When pictured in a book, magazine, etc. there will be inaccuracies in scale. No deception is being attempted.
Yeah, these are pretty common. I saw this one in Anchorage a few months back.
There’s a good Apple app called Solar Walk that allows you to zoom around an accurate depiction of the solar system. What I like is that it shows you how the solar system looks in real time and you can move the date around (plus it includes satellites and stuff). What’s even better is that it’s the first time I’ve managed to get my 6-year-old half-brother fascinated by anything science related. I think he likes pretending to fly around in space.
Whoever decided to call it “space” had it right, because there’s not much else.
I’ve heard that the distances between atoms in molecules are at the same scale, mostly empty space.
It’s impossible to accurately show anything to do with the solar system with an ordinary picture. The short film Powers of Ten gives you a better idea:
Physical models of the solar system can either be visually interesting, or accurate, but not both. If you keepthe scale accurate, you either have to render the planets as grains of sand, or male the: planets bigger and have to drive or fly to get from one to the next.
There’s one in DC:
The diameter of Mercury is about 5000 kilometers. The radius of Neptune’s orbit is about 4.5 billion kilometers. That’s a ratio of roughly one million. There’s simply no accurate way to represent both of those figures accurately on the same linear scale.
ETA: For example, if you make Mercury 1 mm in diameter, Neptune is 1 kilometer from the Sun on that scale.
This picture of Neptune is part of a 1:38,000,000 scale model of the Solar System – I saw it about 2 years ago, but I haven’t yet seen the other parts of the model, since they are hundreds of kilometers away from where this is.
I saw a perfect scale model of the Solar System once. It was at 1:1 scale.
The world’s largest (apart from the one **Chronos **has seen) is in Sweden.
Best straight line I’ve read all week:
We are sorry, Europa is closed for renovation. Attempt no landings there.
That was going to be my suggestion. What’s funny is that I’ve seen three of those models, but have been in the buildings of several more without realizing it. I was mere steps away from Pluto just about a year ago.
You’ve only seen it once? You need to get out more.
Unexpected benefit of Pluto’s demotion from planethood: Accurate, smaller scale models are easier to create.