Hobbies that are slowly dying due to apathetic millenials

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 3:54:52 PM UTC+1, Mike Collins wrote:
Gerald Kelleher wrote:
On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 1:22:56 PM UTC+1, wrote:
On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 7:39:04 AM UTC-4, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

'astronomy' is a hobby as it is for many others here

What exactly is it for you, birdman?


As a Christian, the worse condition of humanity was not disbelief but mediocrity -

“I know your works; I know that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you
were either cold or hot.So, because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor
cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. For you say, ‘I am rich and
affluent and have no need of anything,’ and yet do not realize that you
are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked" Christian truth

For Christ the rich were to be pitied more than the poor for the same
reason you think astronomy is an expensive hobby -

Most people are other people. Their thoughts are some one else's
opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation. Christ was
not merely the supreme individualist, but he was the first individualist
in history. People have tried to make him out an ordinary philanthropist,
or ranked him as an altruist with the scientific and sentimental. But he
was really neither one nor the other. Pity he has, of course, for the
poor, for those who are shut up in prisons, for the lowly, for the
wretched; but he has far more pity for the rich, for the hard hedonists,
for those who waste their freedom in becoming slaves to things, for those
who wear soft raiment and live in kings' houses. Riches and pleasure
seemed to him to be really greater tragedies than poverty or sorrow. And
as for altruism, who knew better than he that it is vocation not volition
that determines us, and that one cannot gather grapes of thorns or figs
from thistles? " Oscar Wilde, De Profundis

You can get nothing from your posts unless goading others into uttering
inanities passes off as a discussion. Hopefully things work out for you
in your new expensive hobby.






You've got a long way to ride before you can aspire to mediocrity.

Well,well, well ,if it isn't another one of my slaves.

Have you figured out Newton was trying to express the Equation of Time which uses two sticks, a shadow case as a location turns to noon and a watch -

"Draw a Meridian line upon a floor and then hang two plummets, each
by a small thred or wire, directly over the said Meridian, at the
distance of some 2. feet or more one from the other, as the smalness
of the thred will admit. When the middle of the Sun (the Eye being
placed so, as to bring both the threds into one line) appears to be in
the same line exactly you are then immediately to set the Watch, not
precisely to the hour of 12. but by so much less, as is the Aequation
of the day by the Table." Huygens

Tell me all about relativity and I will show you a hapless bunch who couldn't and still can't manage to deal with Newton however I can . It is junk but at least understandable junk -

"Absolute time, in astronomy, is distinguished from relative, by the equation of time. For the natural days are truly unequal, though they are commonly considered as equal and used for a measure of time; astronomers correct this inequality for their more accurate deducing of the celestial motions...The necessity of which equation, for determining the times of a phænomenon, is evinced as well from the experiments of the pendulum clock, as by eclipses of the satellites of Jupiter." Principia

It must be something else to witness the whole thing come apart at the seams regardless of who looks on .

The last time you pair got into correspondence with me you believed the Irish were British and that is not insulting as I greatly admire many facets of British heritage but it is intentionally funny. Of course the British like their eccentrics as Brexit has shown and Sir Isaac was one of them, pity the whole world followed him into catastrophe.

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 9:07:32 AM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

Have you figured out Newton was trying to express the Equation of Time which
uses two sticks, a shadow case as a location turns to noon and a watch -

"Draw a Meridian line upon a floor and then hang two plummets, each
by a small thred or wire, directly over the said Meridian, at the
distance of some 2. feet or more one from the other, as the smalness
of the thred will admit. When the middle of the Sun (the Eye being
placed so, as to bring both the threds into one line) appears to be in
the same line exactly you are then immediately to set the Watch, not
precisely to the hour of 12. but by so much less, as is the Aequation
of the day by the Table." Huygens

Well, here I explain why, due to the combination of the Earth's orbital and rotational motions, there is an Equation of Time:

http://www.quadibloc.com/science/eot.htm

as I have noted before.

If that's a quote from Huygens, though, shouldn't that be what Huygens was
trying to express?

John Savard

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 9:07:32 AM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

The last time you pair got into correspondence with me you believed the Irish
were British and that is not insulting as I greatly admire many facets of
British heritage but it is intentionally funny.

Ah, yes. They wouldn't call it the "United Kingdom of Great Britain _and_
Northern Ireland" if Ireland were part of Britain or even Great Britain.

Britain is a name originating from Welsh, referring to the land of the Welsh
people - both Wales, and England which is on land stolen from them by the
invading Angles and Saxons. Then, when England annexed Scotland, the island as
a whole was known as Great Britain.

So you are quite right.

John Savard

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 2:16:17 PM UTC-4, Quadibloc wrote:
On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 9:07:32 AM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

The last time you pair got into correspondence with me you believed the Irish
were British and that is not insulting as I greatly admire many facets of
British heritage but it is intentionally funny.

Ah, yes. They wouldn't call it the "United Kingdom of Great Britain _and_
Northern Ireland" if Ireland were part of Britain or even Great Britain.

Ireland is a British Isle.

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 7:09:58 PM UTC+1, Quadibloc wrote:
On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 9:07:32 AM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

Have you figured out Newton was trying to express the Equation of Time which
uses two sticks, a shadow case as a location turns to noon and a watch -

"Draw a Meridian line upon a floor and then hang two plummets, each
by a small thred or wire, directly over the said Meridian, at the
distance of some 2. feet or more one from the other, as the smalness
of the thred will admit. When the middle of the Sun (the Eye being
placed so, as to bring both the threds into one line) appears to be in
the same line exactly you are then immediately to set the Watch, not
precisely to the hour of 12. but by so much less, as is the Aequation
of the day by the Table." Huygens

Well, here I explain why, due to the combination of the Earth's orbital and rotational motions, there is an Equation of Time:

http://www.quadibloc.com/science/eot.htm

as I have noted before.

If that's a quote from Huygens, though, shouldn't that be what Huygens was
trying to express?

John Savard

Tell me all about how a weekday is not a complete rotation of the Earth with all its effects such as the Sun coming into view,temperatures responding the the Sun and the stars as each comes into view in turn.

None of you have any self-respect which spares me having to judge you in what is the darkest era in astronomy the world had ever known.

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 12:59:56 PM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

Tell me all about how a weekday is not a complete rotation of the Earth with all its effects such as the Sun coming into view,temperatures responding the the Sun and the stars as each comes into view in turn.

A weekday _is_ a solar day, with all the effects of a solar day such as "the
Sun coming into view, temperatures responding to the Sun" and so on.

The Earth orbits the Sun. So even in the course of a day, the Earth has moved around the Sun.

If we use the *same reference* for the Earth's rotation as we do for its orbit
around the Sun, the background of stars in the sky instead of the Sun, then the
Earth makes slightly more than one rotation in 24 hours - it moves a little
extra angle to correspond to its motion in its orbit, so that the same places
on it face the Sun again.

Why would we want to use that reference, though, when the 24 hour day is so
much more important in our daily lives than the 23 hour, 56 minute "sidereal
day" that is just good for pointing telescopes at stars?

A fair question. I admit that.

But the question does have an answer. And it is one I have given you more than
once.

The Earth turns, with respect to the reference of the stars, at a very nearly
constant speed. A particular star crosses the meridian at a constant interval,
not an average interval, of 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds.

So stellar circumpolar motion is uniform - it works like our wris****ches, our
mechanical clocks. Newton's "absolute time".

The Earth's orbit around the Sun is elliptical, not circular. And the plane of
the Ecliptic, the Earth's orbit, doesn't match the Earth's rotational Equator.

So the little bit of the 24 hour day due to orbital motion changes during a
year - we get the Equation of Time, we need to make a correction between a
sundial and a wris****ch.

So if we want to think of the Earth as a physical body in space, following
physical laws - rotating at a constant speed unless something pushes on it to
speed it up or slow it down - its motion relative to the stars allows us to do
this.

Its motion with respect to the Sun is a compound effect of its own rotation and
its own orbit - just as the apparent motion of Mars in the sky is a compound
effect of its orbit and the Earth's orbit, leading to retrogrades.

John Savard

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 9:17:38 PM UTC+1, Quadibloc wrote:
On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 12:59:56 PM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

Tell me all about how a weekday is not a complete rotation of the Earth with all its effects such as the Sun coming into view,temperatures responding the the Sun and the stars as each comes into view in turn.

A weekday _is_ a solar day, with all the effects of a solar day such as "the
Sun coming into view, temperatures responding to the Sun" and so on.


A weekday reflects one complete rotation of the Earth, no more or no less, however you unfortunates believe more rotations than weekdays thereby displacing flat Earthers in the scheme of things. It is not a criticism nor a judgment but simply an error created a few centuries ago by careless people.

To think all the iconic heroes adored by empiricists and all there is is left is a sci-fi addict living in his homocentric head.

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 2:37:16 PM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

To think all the iconic heroes adored by empiricists and all there is is left
is a sci-fi addict living in his homocentric head.

Well, I should not have expected that repeating myself for the umpteenth time
would finally convince you that a "rotation" and a "day" can be two different
things.

The facts are clear to me, why do they not persuade you?

Well, from others of your posts, I know why. Talking about the Equation of
Time, while important in its place, misses the real issue.

When you talk about cannonballs and empiricists, you reveal what it is.

Kepler knew _that_ the orbits of the planets were ellipses, _that_ they swept
out equal areas in equal times, and _that_ the square of the orbital period of
a planet was proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis of its orbit, but
he didn't know why. And historians of astronomy say that he did want to know
why.

Newton, by having the planets in the heavens follow the same physical laws as
cannonballs on Earth and other mundane objects, was able to say why.

And that is what you reject - stripping the heavens of their exalted status as
something closer to God than the mundane world around us that scientists and
engineers can take apart and tinker with.

That is a fundamental emotional reaction that I can't argue you out of, I can
only make it visible for you to see it.

John Savard

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 7:45:12 PM UTC+1, wrote:

Ireland is a British Isle.

Just as America is a British colony.

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 10:00:59 PM UTC+1, Quadibloc wrote:
On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 2:37:16 PM UTC-6, Gerald Kelleher wrote:

To think all the iconic heroes adored by empiricists and all there is is left
is a sci-fi addict living in his homocentric head.

Well, I should not have expected that repeating myself for the umpteenth time
would finally convince you that a "rotation" and a "day" can be two different
things.


Finish this out once and for all - you believe the Earth doesn't rotate once each weekday and there are more rotations than days across a year through a fiction inherited from an older generation.

Pity none of you can feel ashamed as that is better than feeling nothing for the great cycles that make life possible.

Now stay away.