h a l f b a k e r yFewer ducks than estimates indicate.
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The moon needs to be speeded up. We can send a few robot craft out to that Oort cloud, find some fellers with the necessary mass and nudge them towards the Sun.
More craft are sent out with the mission of altering the trajectory to be a moon grazer, using the moon's gravity as a slingshot enroute
to the sun. We do not want them lingering around any more than absolutely necessary. The moon fly-by is arranged such that the moon gets speeded up.
This process is repeated a sufficiently large number of times until the orbital period of the moon becomes 365.2422/12 days or just a bit under thirty and a half days.
When you're at it you might as well align the plane of its orbit to the ecliptic to make eclipses more frequent. Making the orbit a bit more elliptic will ensure a variety of total, annular and just-so eclipses. (PeterSilly, krelnik)
As a side effect, we would get to see the "other side" of the moon as well. (8th of 7)
Complete lunation
http://antwrp.gsfc..../apod/ap991108.html
[waugsqueke, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 21 2004]
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If we speed the moon up, but keep the rotational period the same, we'll get to see all the Alien bases on the dark side ....... (+) |
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How would werewolves feel about this? |
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Does a full moon consist of two half-baked buns? |
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That's a good question, [Shz] - would we get more eclipses ? Any astrophysicists out there ? The eclipse pattern would change, certianly, but whether we would get more or less is debatable. Intuitively, we ought to get more. |
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If we can eliminate night by launching jillions of geostationary convex nano-mirrors (or however we pulled that one off, I forget) then this shouldn't be too big a deal. |
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I think the frequency or lack of eclipses are more to do with the fact that the moon's rotational path around the earth is slightly wobbly, both in and out as well as up and down. It shouldn't really have anything to do with how quickly the moon goes round the earth because the moon will still have to come between the earth and the sun periodically. If the moon is sped up then we statistically get more in proportion to the amount it is sped up by, but the duration of the eclipse would be correspondingly shorter. |
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With this longer rotational period, the moon would also be further away. This would change the tides here on Earth, and would decrease their amplitude to some degree. I imagine that would have some effect on Earth's weather patterns. |
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It would also appear incrementally smaller than it does now, which might make it more likely to have an annullar eclipse instead of a total eclipse. |
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// ... like the rest of us // |
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Several cultures and religions use lunar and luni-solar calendars, so this 'rest of us' bit is somewhat inaccurate. You have not presented a compelling reason to do this, and I can't think of one. |
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Not that it would be possible if there was one. In any case, you don't want to speed the Moon up. You actually are talking about slowing it down, so it takes that little bit longer to do its thing. It's orbital period is just shy of 28 days now. If you want to add 2.5 days to the period, you need to slow the moon so it takes longer to make the trip. |
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The number of eclipses should not change. The change is so slight overall. If there was a change, it would be a decrease in the number of eclipses, perhaps only by one a year, or every other year. The decrease would be due to the moon's path crossing the plane of the ecliptic (and thus putting it potentially in front of the sun, or behind the earth) that much less frequently per year. |
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seeing as pretty much every religion has its own calendar based on one form of counting or another, i believe picking on the muslims is a little out of line here. a quick list of calendars that the "rest of us" follow: |
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christian (western)
christian (gregorian)
christian (julian)
jewish
hindu
buddhist
sikh
baha'i
wiccan
and probably i few others that i can't think of right now. |
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so i suggest a name change to "calendar reform - a calendar for everyone" which is pretty much baked and half-baked and therefore this idea should be [marked-for-deletion]. |
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don't forget the chinese, mihali! They are 1/6 of the people on earth. They should just gang up and get everybody to switch to their calendar! (although i'm more in favour of everybody using the mayan calendar, myself) |
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If you speed the moon up, I'm assuming it would also be moved a bit closer to the earth. But this would mess up the whole spectacle of a total eclipse. The reason that a total eclipse is as special as it is, is because when the moon passes in front of the sun, it covers it almost exactly, allowing the whole diamond ring/ Baileys Beads phenomenon to occur. So if it was closer to us, then tho' the sun would dissapear behind the moon, I don't think it would be quite as spectacular as it is at the moment.
So, wether it happened more often or not wouldn't matter. |
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Idea title and description changed in the light of [mihali]'s comments. |
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[waugsqueke] make a valid point in that the moon has to be slowed down; paradoxially, in order to do that you will have to provide a force in the direction it is already moving. |
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While we're at it, can we slow the earth's rotation, so it only rotates 365 times a year, not 365 1/4-ish? |
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pottedstu - wouldn't you rather speed up the orbit of the earth so that a year was 365 days? So what if it gets a little warmer - the politicians and lobbiests assure me that we'll never wind up like Venus! |
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At present, the earth is slowing down - and the moon moving further away, by about 3cm per year. |
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// the moon moving further away, by about 3cm per year // |
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Is it something we said, or just embarrasment ? |
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All calendars start off based on the phases of the moon. However, the times of the Earth's orbit around the Sun and the Moon's around the Earth do not have any simple relationship. |
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An agricultural people depending on a lunar calendar will have to keep on adding months at irregular intervals in order to keep their calendar in tune with the weather: the calendar is needed primarily to know when to sow seeds so as to take the most advantage of the growing season. |
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Surely changing the number of days it takes the earth to go around the sun to 360 would be much more mathematically satisfying than just rounding off the fraction. |
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By the way, when are we getting one of those eclipses where the sun comes between the earth and the moon? I hear those are quite spectacular! |
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So you don't care for Muslims, then, neelandan? And that's why you posted this idea? Maybe you could take your theories about primitiveness somewhere else? The 19th century might suit. |
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