# Electric Sun **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 8, 2006, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586 "2006-07-08T02:15:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/201 "2006-07-16T06:41:03Z")
> [@"\[Phil](#): > > ([http://www.badastronomy.com](http://www.badastronomy.com))"]I am an astronomer, writer, and skeptic. I like reality the way it is, and I aims to keep it that way. My real name is Phil Plait, and I run the Bad Astronomy website. Here’s your typical astronomer. “I like the way things are and I’m going to fight tooth and nail to keep it that way! Nevermind all the evidence for the electric nature of the Universe, I like things the way they are!” Dude’s like this really try to keep the Electric Universe down, you should read some of his stuff. If you think what I say is a bunch of crackpottery, you should read what he has to say. You’ll REALLY think what I’m saying is crackpot after that. It boils my blood reading what he says because it’s filled with crap and isn’t even thought halfway through. He dismisses **everything** , much like you guys. So I thought you all would get along just fine. ---
**Author:** ![Monstre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@Monstre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monstre)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/202 "2006-07-16T06:52:29Z")
> [@](#): > > If they’re anything like their cousins, elves, then they are most definitely electric in nature. [QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] We had a universal language and nothing we could imagine was restrained from us, and God fucked that up? What a prick. [/QUOTE] No, no, it wasn’t God. It was the Dark Elves. The electric drow who run the universe… ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/203 "2006-07-16T07:03:26Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] It boils my blood reading what he says because it’s filled with crap and isn’t even thought halfway through. He dismisses **everything** , much like you guys. So I thought you all would get along just fine. [/QUOTE] Now you know how we all feel. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/204 "2006-07-16T07:09:34Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] If you think what I say is a bunch of crackpottery, you should read what he has to say. You’ll REALLY think what I’m saying is crackpot after that. [/quote] Actually, we did not need the testimony of **The Bad Astronomer** to think you are a crackpot, but it is good to know that he supports our positions. > [@TheFonz](#): > > It boils my blood reading what he says because it’s filled with crap and isn’t even thought halfway through. He dismisses **everything** , much like you guys. So I thought you all would get along just fine. Why yes, we do get along. Until other commitments reduced his posting availability, he was a member in good standing of this message board. ---
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/205 "2006-07-16T07:18:07Z")
> [@](#): > > Why yes, we do get along. Until other commitments reduced his posting availability, he was a member in good standing of this message board. I’m not surprised by any of that. I’m sure he’s also one of those types that tries to ask you for calculations and asks what you think about ridiculous crap, trying to hang you up on the finer points instead of he himself trying to understand the beauty of the entire idea as a whole. Then I bet he feels smart after doing that. I’m just trying to get people over that first hump, so they can start seeing it for themselves. If they try and weigh their mind down with too much crap then they’ll lose sight and forget about the whole thing. That’s what people like Phil Plait do. ---
**Author:** ![nameless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/779978/32.png) [@nameless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nameless)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/206 "2006-07-16T13:23:48Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] So either the energy in a nuclear bomb is stored inside the atom, or it pulls it from its surroundings. If there were no energy in there to be released then splitting an atom would be something we’d observe under a microscope. [/QUOTE] The energy is stored inside the atom. I’ve used a transmitting electron microscope, one of the more powerful microscopes available (it uses a stream of electrons to visualize things, **DUN DUN DUNNNNN** ) and even it cannot resolve individual atoms. I don’t know why you think you’d be able to observe the splitting of the atom under a microscope whether or not the resulting energy was intrinsic or somehow channeled from the surroundings. [QUOTE=TheFonz] Nope, remember I said that the nucleus of an atom is like the vacuum, and the electrons like the tube? That splitting an atom is like the explosion of a submarine collapsing, or a thick-walled lightbulb breaking. What do you think about the electromagnetic pulse that causes all electrical equipment in the area to fail? What do you even think about the electromagnetic pulse? [http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/Test20Nuclear.jpg](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/Test20Nuclear.jpg) [/QUOTE] Somebody else also already explained to you the electromagnetic pulse arising from the detonation of fission weapons and why it occurs, and you already blithely dismissed them, so I’m not sure what I could say to you for you to even consider the idea. How can a nucleus, which Rutherford showed (by bombarding gold foil with alpha particles and making the observation that some of the alpha particles reflect back) is the densest part of the atom, be anything like a vacuum? Is there any evidence that that is the case? ---
**Author:** ![Duke\_of\_Rat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Duke\_of\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke_of_Rat)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/207 "2006-07-16T14:43:27Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] some galaxies are double-helix. DNA and these galaxies are shaped by twisting electric currents. [/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Miller] Why only “some” galaxies? [/QUOTE] Because the same currents that turn them into double helixes also cause them to flatten out? [QUOTE=TheFonz] These currents are the axes that the galaxies spin around, and hold them together so that they flatten out into disks. [/QUOTE] Can’t wait to hear what he thinks about elliptical galaxies. And **Fonz** , do you actually have any pictures of a double helix galaxy? Even one? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/208 "2006-07-16T16:46:31Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] I’m not surprised by any of that. I’m sure he’s also one of those types that tries to ask you for calculations and asks what you think about ridiculous crap, trying to hang you up on the finer points instead of he himself trying to understand the beauty of the entire idea as a whole. Then I bet he feels smart after doing that. I’m just trying to get people over that first hump, so they can start seeing it for themselves. If they try and weigh their mind down with too much crap then they’ll lose sight and forget about the whole thing. That’s what people like Phil Plait do. [/QUOTE] A.A. Milne wrote a humorous story intended for adults rather than kids, Once On A Time. In the course of a war, two kings go to spy on each others’ camps, bump into each other in the dark, and dissemble by each claiming to be a swineherd, (an occupation of which each knows nothing), and exchanging meaningless pleasantries on the topic of their “labor,” afterwards returning to their tents impressed by the way that each had been able to pass himself off as a swinehered when confronted by a “real” swineherd. After the war, (decided without bloodshed), the defeated king shows up in the victor’s land looking for work as a swineherd. The victor asks why he did not simply take work in his own country, to which the defeated king replies that he set out, > [@](#): > > eager to carve out himself a new life as a swineherd. > ‘I had a natural gift,’ he said plaintively, ‘an instinctive feeling for it. I know I had. Whatever they said about it afterwards–and they said many hard things–I was certain that I had that feeling. I had proved it, you know; there couldn’t be any mistake.’ > ‘Well?’ [_asked the still reigning king_] > ‘Ah, but they laughed at me. They asked confusing questions; niggling little questions about the things swine ate and–and things like that. The great principles of swineherding, the–what I may call the art of herding swine, the whole theory of shepherding pigs in a broad-minded way, all this they ignored. They laughed at me and turned me out with jeers and blows–to starve’" “Too much crap” sounds a lot like “niggling little questions about the things swine ate.” ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/209 "2006-07-16T19:05:35Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] Here’s your typical astronomer. “I like the way things are and I’m going to fight tooth and nail to keep it that way! Nevermind all the evidence for the electric nature of the Universe, I like things the way they are!” Dude’s like this really try to keep the Electric Universe down, you should read some of his stuff. If you think what I say is a bunch of crackpottery, you should read what he has to say. You’ll REALLY think what I’m saying is crackpot after that. It boils my blood reading what he says because it’s filled with crap and isn’t even thought halfway through. He dismisses **everything** , much like you guys. So I thought you all would get along just fine. [/QUOTE] Phil Plait is just too awesome for words. You can blather on all you want about electric suns and dinosaurs and whatever other crap floats through your mind, and not a word of it is ever going to make a real difference in the world. Meanwhile, folks like the Bad Astronomer are out there showing us what real science is all about: [a monkey playing Ms. Pac-Man.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqvRjHaDX6M) Can your electric sun theory give us that? Yeah, I didn’t think so. Game, Set, [del]Monkey[/del] Match. ---
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/210 "2006-07-16T21:00:45Z")
> [@](#): > > And Fonz, do you actually have any pictures of a double helix galaxy? Even one? [http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060315175226.jpg](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060315175226.jpg) I’m sure that has NOTHING to do with the shape of our DNA or Birkeland currents. Everything on the Straight Dope is just one big coincidence. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/211 "2006-07-16T21:35:00Z")
> [@](#): > > “Too much crap” sounds a lot like “niggling little questions about the things swine ate.” It’s more like “Hey, that’s a pig!” to which people ask “Well do you know the exact gene sequence of that animal? How can you say it is a pig without knowing this?” There’s evidence for the electrical nature of the Sun everywhere: Accelerating solar “wind”? Check Sunspots reveal cooler interior? Check Tornadoes, hurricanes, dust devils are all related, and there are tornadoes running parallel to the surface of the Sun dumping themselves into sunspots which appear to be giant hurricanes themselves? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/hurrspot.gif) [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/040927earth-capacitor.jpg) [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/041015solar-tornado.jpg) [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/050617penumbra.jpg) and [CHECK](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/041015solar-tornado.jpg) Big glowing rings on our MAGNETIC poles when the solar wind blows? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/040927earth-capacitor.jpg) and [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/main_aurora-6nov-border-ams.jpg) The rings of Saturn tough to explain by gravity alone? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/i2-22.jpg) Elves, sprites, and “bolts from the blue” show us the energy from lightning is actually coming from space? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/sprites__elves.jpg) The features of Venus show electrical scarring which would otherwise be unexplainable by any mainstream crap? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060309venus.jpg) and [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060309venus-2.jpg) Features on the Moon show likeness to Earthly [Lichtenberg](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060309lightning.jpg) figures and [lightning rilles](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/Earth_rille.jpg)? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060309hubble.jpg) and [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060310crater.jpg) and [CHECK](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/Schroters_Valley.jpg) [Experiments in a lab](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/051108radial.jpg) with electric wind that appears to resemble [features on Mars](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/051108tyrrhena.jpg)? [Check](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/040705olympus-mons.jpg) Also: Uranus’ rotation and how its moons still orbit its equator. Venus nearly perfectly circular orbit and slow rotation in the opposite direction. All sorts of crap going on with Saturn’s lightning and radiation belts and damn I can’t go on… I’m tired of repeating myself. I keep hoping if I throw enough of it into one post that maybe you guys with your short attention spans will see… ---
**Author:** ![jshore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5e925/32.png) [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/212 "2006-07-16T21:51:23Z")
Yes, **TheFonz** , it is indeed sad how we and the world scientific community don’t recognize and bow before the great genius of you and your compatriates proposing the electric universe theory. Oh well…I guess you will just have to continue on your higher plane with a greater understanding of the universe than the rest of us satisfied with the piddling theories that conventional science has given us. Such is the life of those whose true brilliance surpasses the rest of us. ---
**Author:** ![nameless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/779978/32.png) [@nameless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nameless)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/213 "2006-07-16T21:55:53Z")
Context or experimental support for any of these images or assertions? None received. [Quote=TheFonz] I’m sure that has NOTHING to do with the shape of our DNA or Birkeland currents. [/QUOTE] How about this one [here](http://heritage.stsci.edu/2000/06/big.html)? What does this nebula have to do with? Is this God flipping us off? What, **TheFonz**? What is it? You keep saying we have short attention spans, or that we’re closed minded, but you won’t read technical literature, you won’t respond to calls for experimental data, and you’ve brought nothing but [confirmation bias](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias) into this thread. Your eyes are sutured shut. I leave you with a quote from the movie _Pi_– [Quote=Sol Robeson] Hold on. You have to slow down. You’re losing it. You have to take a breath. Listen to yourself. You’re connecting a computer bug I had with a computer bug you might have had and some religious hogwash. You want to find the number 216 in the world, you will be able to find it everywhere. 216 steps from a mere street corner to your front door. 216 seconds you spend riding on the elevator. When your mind becomes obsessed with anything, you will filter everything else out and find that thing everywhere. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![DiggitCamara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@DiggitCamara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiggitCamara)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/214 "2006-07-16T21:59:10Z")
As far as I can tell, TheFonz is someone who clings to the belief “I’ll believe anything I can see”… By the way: fission? Well, it’s pretty much explained by an equation: e=mc(squared) THAT’s how that mainstream physicist (aka Einstein, aka “resident insurance expert” and bureaucrat) explained it. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/215 "2006-07-16T22:01:34Z")
Right. Sunspots are caused by magnetic fields, which I’m sure have nothing to do with electric currents: [![](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/050617penumbra.jpg) ](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/050617penumbra.jpg) even though we have tornadoes running parallel to the surface, which then dump themselves into the sunspot: [![](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/sun.jpg) ](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/sun.jpg) [![](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/sun2.jpg) ](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/sun2.jpg) sometimes even bridging the sunspot: [![](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/041015solar-tornado.jpg) ](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/041015solar-tornado.jpg) But no, it’s just plain magnetic fields I’m sure. Nothing to do with electrons flying around or the solar wind accelerating off the surface of the Sun. Nothing to do with why we get auroras at our MAGNETIC poles when it comes flowing in. Nothing at all… 😛 ---
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/216 "2006-07-16T22:05:46Z")
Oh, and sunspots themselves appear to be hurricanes which are of course running perpendicular to the surface: [![](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/hurrspot.gif) ](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/hurrspot.gif) If we learned anything in school, it’s that electricity always takes the path of least resistance. Like these glass dunes on Mars did when it got zapped: [![](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/slide25.jpg) ](https://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/slide25.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![DiggitCamara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@DiggitCamara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiggitCamara)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/217 "2006-07-16T22:41:10Z")
By the way, TheFonz, why don’t you simply point us to your [photobucket](http://s61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/) instead of feeding us the images one by one? And, since we are on the topic of “images that prove anything and everything I say”: 1.- I must have missed your “UFO’s are all over history” thread. Could you point me to it? 2.- Why haven’t you downloaded the famous “Mars Face” (and/or the not-so-famous “Mars Smiley Face”? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/218 "2006-07-16T22:44:20Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] [http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060315175226.jpg](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/060315175226.jpg) I’m sure that has NOTHING to do with the shape of our DNA or Birkeland currents. Everything on the Straight Dope is just one big coincidence. 😃 [/QUOTE] Leaving aside the lack of evidence that that’s actual a galaxy, and not some other astronomical object, and wether or not it really is in the shape of a double helix, or only looks like it from the one side, so what? I took a dump this morning that looked eerily like Abraham Lincoln. That doesn’t mean the Great Emancipator has been re-incarnated in my colon. Sometimes, stuff looks like other stuff. Occasionally, this is because there’s a genuine connection between the two things being observed. More often, it’s because humans evolved complex pattern recognition behavior as a survival trait, and are genetically wired to look for similarities like that. Doesn’t mean there’s any real connection between the two. ---
**Author:** ![TheFonz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac8455/32.png) [@TheFonz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheFonz)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/219 "2006-07-16T22:51:04Z")
[QUOTE=DiggitCamara] By the way, TheFonz, why don’t you simply point us to your [photobucket](http://s61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/) instead of feeding us the images one by one? And, since we are on the topic of “images that prove anything and everything I say”: 1.- I must have missed your “UFO’s are all over history” thread. Could you point me to it? 2.- Why haven’t you downloaded the famous “Mars Face” (and/or the not-so-famous “Mars Smiley Face”? [/QUOTE] HaHa, already have! [http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/cydonia.jpg](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h56/unaguave/cydonia.jpg) There’s the face in the upper-right, next to all the pyramids. And the “UFO’s all over history” thread is actually a post on the first page of this thread. > [@](#): > > More often, it’s because humans evolved complex pattern recognition behavior as a survival trait, and are genetically wired to look for similarities like that. Doesn’t mean there’s any real connection between the two. Maybe so, but a search for “double helix galaxy” shows you how many people believe it is an actualy double helix. Plasma phenomena are scalable. That is to say, their electrical and physical properties remain the same, independent of the size of the plasma. Of course dynamic phenomena take much less time to occur in a small laboratory plasma than they do in a plasma the size, say, of a galaxy. But the phenomena are identical in that they obey the same laws of physics. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586/220 "2006-07-16T22:54:50Z")
[QUOTE=TheFonz] Maybe so, but a search for “double helix galaxy” shows you how many people believe it is an actualy double helix. Plasma phenomena are scalable. That is to say, their electrical and physical properties remain the same, independent of the size of the plasma. Of course dynamic phenomena take much less time to occur in a small laboratory plasma than they do in a plasma the size, say, of a galaxy. But the phenomena are identical in that they obey the same laws of physics. [/QUOTE] What’s sad is that you think this rebuts any part of my post. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electric-sun/363586.md?page=12)