# Deceptive display of solar system. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 22, 2012, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321 "2012-01-22T18:50:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/21 "2012-01-23T19:35:46Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > Unexpected benefit of Pluto’s demotion from planethood: Accurate, smaller scale models are easier to create. 😃 I wonder if they’ve removed the display. And I wonder if protestors tied themselves to it when the men from the museum went to take it away. ---
**Author:** ![tanstaafl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ba8739/32.png) [@tanstaafl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tanstaafl)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/22 "2012-01-23T19:58:30Z")
> [@Jamicat](#): > > [Solar System Scale Model](http://www.phrenopolis.com/perspective/solarsystem/) 😉 > > [Build a Solar System | Exploratorium](http://www.exploratorium.edu/ronh/solar_system/) Another one [http://www.troybrophy.com/projects/solarsystem/](http://www.troybrophy.com/projects/solarsystem/) ---
**Author:** ![Arrendajo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arrendajo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrendajo)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/23 "2012-01-23T20:22:27Z")
We’ve got one right here in Eugene. The sun and inner planets are in Alton Baker Park, but I’ve never seen the outer planets because they are a long ways away. [http://members.efn.org/~jack\_v/](http://members.efn.org/~jack_v/) ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/24 "2012-01-23T20:40:49Z")
I live in the middle of nowhere, Vermont, and even our local science museum has one. ---
**Author:** ![Rhythmdvl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85f322/32.png) [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/25 "2012-01-23T20:53:55Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > We are sorry, Europa is closed for renovation. Attempt no landings there. As improbable as it sounds, that actually happened to me. I was visiting Magrathea at the time. ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/26 "2012-01-23T21:37:33Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > Unexpected benefit of Pluto’s demotion from planethood: Accurate, smaller scale models are easier to create. 😃 One does not simply walk to Pluto… ---
**Author:** ![standingwave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@standingwave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/standingwave)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/27 "2012-01-23T22:26:58Z")
My favorite [logarithmic map](http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/height.png) of the universe. (There’s nothing inherently deceptive about a log scale.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2012, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/28 "2012-01-23T22:35:00Z")
> [@](#): > > You’ve only seen it once? You need to get out more. Well, only once, but for a very long time. ---
**Author:** ![tanstaafl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ba8739/32.png) [@tanstaafl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tanstaafl)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2012, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/29 "2012-01-24T21:01:16Z")
[Just saw this and thought of this thread](http://mishka.lockandhenner.com/blog/?cat=45) ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2012, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/30 "2012-01-24T21:33:54Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I saw a perfect scale model of the Solar System once. It was at 1:1 scale. Yeah, I saw that one, too. I got so stuck on the Earth, I couldn’t pry myelf away to see the other planets. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2012, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/31 "2012-01-25T16:22:55Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > 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. One of these years I’m gonna do a bike ride to visit them all in one day. Stickler that I am, I’d have to do them in order, which makes it a bit more challenging. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2012, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321/32 "2012-01-25T17:41:44Z")
Here’s one way to try to get a handle on just how immense our little corner of the cosmos really is, as described by Prof. Jay M. Pasachoff of Williams College-Hopkins Observatory in Williamstown, Mass. in his book _Astronomy: From the Earth to the Universe_ (Saunders College Publishing 1983). I’ve paraphrased a bit: Imagine the Solar System is scaled down and placed on a map of the United States. The Sun is a hot ball of gas taking up all of Rockefeller Center, a kilometer wide, in the heart of Manhattan in New York City. Mercury, then, is a sphere four meters wide in mid-Long Island. Venus is a ball ten meters around, about one and a half times farther away. The Earth is only slightly bigger, located near Trenton, N.J., while Mars is half that size, five meters wide, located past Philadelphia, Pa. Jupiter, the next planet out from the Sun, is a hundred meters across (about the size of a baseball stadium), past Pittsburgh on the Ohio border. Saturn, with its rings, is a little larger than Jupiter, and is beyond Cincinnati, toward the Indiana state line. Uranus and Neptune are each about thirty meters across, about the size of a baseball infield, and are near Topeka, Kans. and Santa Fe, N.M., respectively. Pluto, about the size of Mercury, is near Los Angeles, forty times the distance of the Earth from the Sun. And occasionally, a comet sweeps in from Alaska… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/deceptive-display-of-solar-system/610321.md?page=1)