*findthumb

Invocations (findthumb) cannot be called by ElessarJD because ElessarJD is not privileged - sorry.

"The universe is bigger than we can draw it to scale." - You Think?

Yeah I found the later part of the video a bit extraneous/obvious too, but the Moon distance info was interesting.>> ^Sagemind:

"The universe is bigger than we can draw it to scale." - You Think?

Maybe they're thrown off because the guy's hand-held microphone is so tiny.

Your penis truly is smaller than anyone can imagine

This video makes me hate people in general just a little bit more.

wow people, really? Think about what the moon would look like from Earth if it were that close...

it would look like this: <holds a racquet ball several inches from a volleyball>

>> ^residue:

wow people, really? Think about what the moon would look like from Earth if it were that close...

I'm sure we COULD draw it to scale, I just doubt we would be see anything meaningful relating to our tiny microscopic section

People know better though, don't they? They just haven't thought about it.

The way I see it, even if they don't know the distance to the moon, they probably know the rough diameter of Earth and are aware that visiting the moon is not a one-hour trip. At least, they will have watched Apollo 13, so they know a trip on a really, really, really fast rocket still takes days. Ask them to think it through once again and make them give another estimate. It will still be off by a large margin, but it'll be more realistic.

I remember when i was a kid, we watched a film in school from the 60's that demonstrated the solar system to scale. There was the sun, which was represented by a big circle about 20 feet across or more, and to place the earth (represented by a baseball), they had to get in a car and drive for a while to place it properly.... as best as I can recall, it was probably something like a mile or two away.

I thought that was pretty cool. That video has to be around somewhere...

As a related note, someone told me that a hydrogen atom is similar in relative scale to the solar system, with the sun being the nucleus and the earth being the electron. I dunno if that's right or not, but it's pretty cool anyways. Maybe Pluto was the electron. Back when it was still a planet.

*spacy

Adding video to channels (Spacy) - requested by brycewi19.

>> ^AeroMechanical:

As a related note, someone told me that a hydrogen atom is similar in relative scale to the solar system, with the sun being the nucleus and the earth being the electron. I dunno if that's right or not, but it's pretty cool anyways. Maybe Pluto was the electron. Back when it was still a planet.


That interested me.. if you're interested;
Accepted radius of a proton (nucleus of hydrogen) is 0.88*10^-15 m
Radius of sun = 6.96*10^8 m
Divide radius of sun by radius of proton to give how many times bigger the sun is than the proton = 7.91*10^23

Radius of an orbiting electron = 0.0529*10^-9 m
Multiply orbital radius of electron by our scale factor = 4.2*10^13 m.

We're 1.4*10^11 m away from the sun (that's the value of an astronomical unit, it's as good as you can ask for when talking about orbital radius, cos it's not a circle). So it's out by a factor of 300ish. (cos i rounded here and there)

Pluto's orbit is very eccentric (more elliptical than circular), but at its closest, it's about 4.4*10^12 m away from the sun. Out by a factor of 10 there. Or getting close to a factor of 5 at its furthest. Getting close, but still a pretty big difference.

^ all subject to change when (not if) i notice i've dropped a clanger

Hmmm, interesting...

No, actually I don't give a shit.

I probably would have erred too far the other way. From where he stopped I probably would have kept going back to where the other people were, or nearly two times too far...if his scale is accurate.

Our nearest star is the sun! Talk about giving ppl the wrong ideas.

moon is about 30 basketball diameters away

In melbourne australia (st kilda specifically) there is a 1 to 1 billion scale model of the solar system. It's pretty awesome. It goes along the beach.

huh?


>> ^solecist:

it would look like this: <holds a racquet ball several inches from a volleyball>
>> ^residue:
wow people, really? Think about what the moon would look like from Earth if it were that close...

This is actually saying quite a bit.

For anything to be visible in our scaled model, there simply isn't enough room for a visible drawing to include the nearby galaxies, let alone the entire universe.

>> ^Sagemind:

"The universe is bigger than we can draw it to scale." - You Think?

I would have gotten it wrong.

>> ^djsunkid:

In melbourne australia (st kilda specifically) there is a 1 to 1 billion scale model of the solar system. It's pretty awesome. It goes along the beach.


There is? Cool, I'll have to check it out next time I'm over there... which actually isn't that much really, but should be more seeing as I work in the city

>> ^Sagemind:

"The universe is bigger than we can draw it to scale." - You Think?


But, dude, what if some one DID draw the universe to scale? Like, what if that is where we're living RIGHT NOW?

>> ^residue:

huh?

>> ^solecist:
it would look like this: <holds a racquet ball several inches from a volleyball>
>> ^residue:
wow people, really? Think about what the moon would look like from Earth if it were that close...




what about a cue ball and a medicine ball?

I would've taken the tennis ball and thrown it as far as I could...then I would've taken the basketball and kicked it as far as I could. Then I would've asked the guy "Hey buddy! Will you help me stop womens suffrage?!"

>> ^Yogi:

I would've taken the tennis ball and thrown it as far as I could...then I would've taken the basketball and kicked it as far as I could. Then I would've asked the guy "Hey buddy! Will you help me stop womens suffrage?!"


Then you would've been invited on Sean Hannity to be hailed as a Great American.

http://bit.ly/usOKE
>> ^entr0py:

>> ^Sagemind:
"The universe is bigger than we can draw it to scale." - You Think?

But, dude, what if some one DID draw the universe to scale? Like, what if that is where we're living RIGHT NOW?

>> ^westy:

Your penis truly is smaller than anyone can imagine


And certainly smaller than we can draw it to scale...

Sorry, I still don't get it all I can figure is maybe you interpreted the original comment as "Think about what the distance between 2 scaled down versions of the moon and Earth would look like" (what the video is about) which isn't even close to "what the moon would look like when viewed from Earth"... I'm missing something though since the comment is getting appreciation...

>> ^solecist:

>> ^residue:
huh?

>> ^solecist:
it would look like this: <holds a racquet ball several inches from a volleyball>
>> ^residue:
wow people, really? Think about what the moon would look like from Earth if it were that close...



what about a cue ball and a medicine ball?

Most of those diagrams were to scale!, just from a convenient perspective.

I submit for your approval The Universe Drawn to Scale

>> ^dgandhi:

I submit for your approval The Universe Drawn to Scale


This is one of my favorite websites ever!

Thanks dgandhi,
I recommend using this link: http://htwins.net/scale/scale.swf
and bypassing the secondary Facebook link.
>> ^dgandhi:

I submit for your approval The Universe Drawn to Scale

>> ^dannym3141:

>> ^AeroMechanical:
As a related note, someone told me that a hydrogen atom is similar in relative scale to the solar system, with the sun being the nucleus and the earth being the electron. I dunno if that's right or not, but it's pretty cool anyways. Maybe Pluto was the electron. Back when it was still a planet.

That interested me.. if you're interested;
Accepted radius of a proton (nucleus of hydrogen) is 0.88 10^-15 m
Radius of sun = 6.96 10^8 m
Divide radius of sun by radius of proton to give how many times bigger the sun is than the proton = 7.91 10^23
Radius of an orbiting electron = 0.0529 10^-9 m
Multiply orbital radius of electron by our scale factor = 4.2 10^13 m.
We're 1.4 10^11 m away from the sun (that's the value of an astronomical unit, it's as good as you can ask for when talking about orbital radius, cos it's not a circle). So it's out by a factor of 300ish. (cos i rounded here and there)
Pluto's orbit is very eccentric (more elliptical than circular), but at its closest, it's about 4.4 10^12 m away from the sun. Out by a factor of 10 there. Or getting close to a factor of 5 at its furthest. Getting close, but still a pretty big difference.
^ all subject to change when (not if) i notice i've dropped a clanger

A factor of 300 is actually not that bad when you're talking about such big numbers.

Wow, I never realized that the Basket ball/Tennis ball diameter ratio was so close to the Earth/Moon diameter ratio. The Tennis ball diameter is too big by just 2.3mm. That's an error of 3%. Pretty dang accurate for common items. Of course, you should probably slightly deflate the Basketball which would better represent the non-spherical tidal bulge of the Earth - and by doing so make the Tennis ball even more accurate of a model.

so how far away was the guy standing? My guess was 100 feet, but just a complete guess.

Wow, an actual use for wolfram alpha!
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=distance+from+the+earth+to+the+moon+%2F+diameter+of+earth

As Deathcow points out (humorously) the moon is approximately 30 basketball diameters away. A regulation basketball has a diameter of 9.5" so for purposes of this analogy the guy should be standing about 24' away which is where he appears to be.>> ^daxgaz:

so how far away was the guy standing? My guess was 100 feet, but just a complete guess.

>> ^krydd:

Our nearest star is the sun! Talk about giving ppl the wrong ideas.


He already mentioned the Sun, so you can easily interpret it as meaning "nearest star besides the Sun".

There's never any miscommunication.

The moon is about 30 miles away. But they're really long miles.

What blows my mind is pictures of Mercury transitting the sun. You see this huge sphere of the sun compared to the tiny spec of mercury, yet, due to paralax (I think) the apparent size of the sun from Mercury is only about 6 times the apparent size from Earth.

The distance from the earth to the moon is 60.268 times the radius of the earth.

1 second? So the Moon is only 300,000 km away! Dolt.

>> ^Gallowflak:

1 second? So the Moon is only 300,000 km away! Dolt.


1.26 technically, but the rounding shaves off 77,000 kilometers, either way it's hard to really imagine 300,000km or 377,700km. Your brain just interprets it all as "a shitload".