Motions of Comets Made Simple

The Motions of Comets Made Simple

A dictionary defines "orbit" as "The path described by one body in its revolution about another, as by the earth about the sun or by an electron about a nucleus." The concept of "orbit" which we envision from this definition, not to mention that which we already have in mind, is that an orbit is a near-circular motion of one body as it moves about another. Such a concept is that of a classic orbit.

We will not argue with this definition. Our distrust of the term begins, however, when it is used to justify and sanctify the bizarre motions of some comets with no account being made for the incredible circumstances which must coincidentally happen time after time to allow such motions to exist as a classical orbit. Nevertheless, trusting astronomers label motions of all comets as "orbits" because they must do so to explain the simple fact of how comets continue to exist. Second, they have no other explanation. They must assume that comets are merely natural bodies acting under the whim of nature. Comets are considered as left-over from the creation of the solar system and for them to remain to this day, and they must have a mechanism to sustain that existence. Orbits, even if grotesque to the extreme, must be the only explanation. And since planets obviously survive via such a manner, why not comets? Thus, a simple solution to a dogging problem.

Astronomers talk about four different shapes of cometary orbits. They equate these motions with the shapes of curved lines found in conic-section geometry. Practitioners of geometry looks at a cone-shaped three-dimensional area (think of a pointed, upside-down ice cream cone) and imagine that if the cone was cut through at various angles to its sides it could result in four different types of curved lines from a perfect circle to extremely drawn-out ellipses.

These “curved lines” are a circle, an ellipse, a parabola, and a hyperbola. Astronomers use these various divisions of a cone because they allow easy computation of all comet motions, generally. The problem is that astronomers take these convenient terms and their inherent formulas too literally in trying to apply them to comets and in explaining those motions to us.

Some members of the astronomical community have voiced displeasure at the continued use of this geometric theory approach by their colleagues to describe the actual motions of comets. But their valid arguments are futile. They don't get much recognition of their point because the geometric model does work fairly well to produce the desired orbital results for some roundish orbits.

Only about two or three short-period comets are known to move in orbits that are as nearly as circular as are the planets. This type of orbit would show on a geometric cone as a cross-section almost directly horizontally across the cone. These are very unusual short short-period comets.

On the other hand, the ellipse orbit is the standard of the four types. But even here the term is broadly used and is not true except for the shortest short-period orbits which are moderately oval in shape. However, it is a safe, umbrella term and even applied when extreme elliptical motions carry the comet far out into space. In truth, the term merely serves as the idealized and general picture of the motion a comet follows when in the vicinity of the sun, never the actual path.

Conic geometry is a very clever concept. From it, you can develop formula and almost plot in numbers the entire unbroken curved lines of a comet’s orbit given no outside influences to that body. Conic geometry also provides a fair visual representation of that orbit.

A parabolic orbit on the cone and in reality resembles a toothpick in its extreme shape. On the cone it can be traced down along the entire length of the cone. It is very narrow with virtually straight, parallel lines, not resembling a classic orbit at all. One turn around point at the very top of the cone (represents the sun), and the other end point is exactly at the very bottom edge of the cone. That bottom position represents the turn around point where the comet pivots for the return side of the long ellipse. Having covered the entire length of the cone from top to bottom gives it an eccentricity of 1.0, the maximum to which an ellipse can be extended. But that bottom edge merely represents a transition into infinity not a boundary. When that eccentricity of 1.0 is applied to a comet’s actual motions, it says nothing about the maximum length of that motion, only that it is infinite.

A hyperbolic motion is similar to a parabolic motion except it is a few fractions of a thousandth over the unity mark of 1.0. That means that it doesn’t meet itself at the bottom of the cone to be a closed ellipse of indefinite length as with the parabolic. Rather, it continues on into infinity with a slight eccentricity over 1.0+.

In actuality, little difference separates long elliptical, parabolic, and hyperbolic motions. For all practical purposes, their motions are straight-ling routes to and away from the sun in parallel lines of extremely long and infinite lengths. This is nothing less than what we would expect for the to-and-fro motions of interstellar spaceships dropping in to visit our sun and then returning home along the same pathways.

Eccentricity explanation: Eccentricityis the term for the out-of-roundness of an orbit. A perfect circular orbit—which doesn’t exist in nature--has an eccentricity of zero. Any point along its curved line is always the same distance from the center, the focus, as any other. The Earth moves in a slight ellipse. Its degree of eccentricity is very low, .0168. Comets moving within the orbit of Jupiter generally have egg-shaped, oval-shaped orbits with eccentricities less than 0.7. When an eccentricity reaches above 0.8, the orbit begins to lose its oval appearance and gains that of a slightly stretched rubber band. The general rule is that far-ranging comets have eccentricities over 0.930. At that point, it is useless to apply orbital periods to these comets. But it happens because they sometimes show up way too soon. The nightmare example for astronomers is Comet Halley. It has an eccentricity of .967 which should place it as having such a long motion that it probably would never return within several hundred if not thousands of years. Yet it has repeatedly returned in the extremely short time and embarrassing time of 76 years. Eccentricities of near 1.0 are parabolas, and those higher than 1.0 are hyperbolas. All of these are near or at escape velocities with no determinable orbital times being possible.

reply to [url=http:/The English astronomical writer Peter Lancaster Brown wrote in Comets, Meteorites and Men, "One of the difficulties peculiar to comets--which has always beset the orbit computers--is an account of the actual shape of the apparent path taken by an elliptical comet whose eccentricity is so great that it is very difficult to differentiate it from the shape of a parabola. …The problem still taxes the geniuses of today armed with powerful electronic computers which are able to solve complicated problems in celestial mechanics with millisecs."

Brown's book is a bit dated now, but yet an excellent, data-packed volume of conventional viewpoint. His discussion of various types of orbits is informative and meaningful for the cometship theorist. Despite, as has been demonstrated here, the standard preoccupation with defining the shape of the motion according to geometry.

Professor J. M. Witkowski formerly of the University Observatory, Paznan, Poland, read a paper before the assembled members of the International Astronomical Union's Symposium No. 45 held in 1970. Professor Witkowski was speaking before astronomy people from all over the world as they were assembled to take part in and take heed to the symposium's topic, "The Motion, Evolution of Orbits, and Origins of Comets."

Witkowski was presenting his own different but somewhat conventional ideas about the origins of comets, he first shot a caustic arrow toward some members of his profession.

He said, "Not all others have stated the problem of the character of the orbits in a sufficiently lucid way. The only possible orbits are ellipses and hyperbolas, since the statistical probability of circles and parabolas (as well as straight lines) is geometrically and dynamically infinitesimally small and need not be taken into consideration."

Brown, in his book also wrote in that vein. "Within a body in orbit, the curved path induced by the two forces ) centripetal--influencing a body inwards, i.e., gravity, and centrifugal--influencing the body outwards) will produce a circle if the two forces are exactly equal. However, in practice, when the probabilities of the kind of curve described by a body in space are calculated, the chances of either a circle or parabola occurring is extremely small. In both these kinds of orbits the balance of the two opposing forces is exactly equal, or stated another way, it implies that a particular velocity is absolutely necessary."

Astronomers must admit to Witkowski being right about the low statistical probability of such orbits being in actual existence. And they also must admit to Brown's description of how natural parabolic orbits must have a precise balance of forces. Yet they still must offer an explanation of why comets universally defy statistical probabilities and continually dwell in the theoretical extremes of orbital theory.

Each scientist must have sat there agreeing in principle with Witkowski, but yet knowing that the hard data did not lie. As of 1975, of 625 different comets listed, 282 (45%) had parabolic (unity) orbits. And even this figure fails to tell the full truth. Of the total number of long-period comets listed, 85 are listed as hyperbolic. These can be added to the list of parabolic comets because they are just barely hyperbolic. On the other side of the unity mark are a large number of near-parabolic elliptical comets. Overall, virtually all long-range comets reside at the unity mark or slightly on either side. And the most damning element, why they never fall into the sun but safely round it and return whence they came , is never mentioned.

By and large, the balance of astronomers continually discuss parabolas and near-parabolas and duly note them without seriously considering how that condition consistently happens. The reason for such unquestioned belief is obvious: Comets have always behaved that way. Just look at any number of them! Astronomers cannot argue with what they see. While observations may be a little disturbing at times, and statistical information as equally troublesome, they unerringly find ways to bend all of the information around to create some manner of comfortable explanation with which to satisfy themselves that all is well and in order in their world.

The first step in straightening out this mess about the movements of comets is to not become overly preoccupied with the various names and classifications which come from outside the real events displayed.

The saga of Comet Kohoutek (1973VII) is an excellent case in point. Kohoutek was originally thought to move in an "elongated ellipse" that carried it out 3,600AU (astronomical units) from the sun. This is not a long orbit as long-period comets go. In fact, it is quite unusually short and virtually non-existent among the balance of its members.

The orbit's width was about 44AU. Working that figure with the supposed length yields an 81-to-1 ratio of length to width. If drawn out, the orbit's shape would resemble a toothpick's profile, and thus it illustrates the absurdity to which a conic ellipse can theoretically be drawn and still be applied to the real world as a real motion entirely allowed by natural physics.

However, after hundreds of plots of Kohoutek's orbit had been collected and studied, it was announced that the comet did not have an elongated ellipse as was originally believed. Instead, the comet was said to display a slightly hyperbolic orbit with an eccentricity of 1.0000078. (It is amusing to be asked to accept that the movements of the comet finally have been so thoroughly wrung out that it now has revealed an orbit known down to seven decimal points!)

If you find the astronomers' idea of a natural comet having an 81-to-1-ratio orbit hard to accept and suspect it of not being viable in natural physics, you would be correct. Yet, the dictates of the new information about the comet being hyperbolic demands that the far end of the toothpick orbit be extended out indefinitely. It gives cause to wonder—if we didn’t know better—how something so elementary as simply plotting a comet’s course by hundreds of observers across the heavens could go so wrong.

If nothing else, remember from this section that the term "orbit" is useful for describing the movements of most other heavenly bodies and is applicable to a few comets that stay near the sun, honestly orbiting in roundish motions as they maintain their presence in this system. But that term cannot apply to the vast majority of their number. Long-period comets do not belong to the sun’s family of bodies. Instead, they come from afar, gigantic, controlled bodies engaged in star-to-star travels. They swing around their sun on one end and swing around the visited star on the other end. They are too huge to ever land on any surface. They can exist only in the free-fall of space. They obviously are totally self-sufficient habitats, worlds within themselves. There is nothing "natural" about their long-distance motions anymore than a nuclear bomb is a natural weapon. Both cases are not nature at work, both are extreme manipulations of nature by intelligent control. (However, maybe not so intelligent with the bombs).

One basic rule of Science is that observation trumps theory. However, writings in the field of cometary astronomy frequently refer to how direct observations of inappropriate motions with a comet coming near to and departing from the sun are consciously discarded, over-looked and explained away to maintain adherence to conventional theory. The term "corrections to the orbit" is the proper astronomical band-aid to cover comet misadventures outside the norm. In most cases the corrections were necessary not because the early observations were wrong and replaced with more precise data, but because the comet changed its pathway and prior observations became “incorrect.” If you were to notice or check the current literature on the in-coming Comet Ison, you will find recent evidence for that old tactic.

There was a day when astronomers were unaware of intelligent actions being possible out there in the dark of space. Those days are long gone. While they still deny UFOs and claim to be looking for positive signs, they already have put enough equipment and probes out from our safe harbor that they know these days that we are not alone and are, in fact, a Third World world amongst a vast crowd of superiors. And that scares them. How about you?



For more about the cometship theory see threads Rethinking Comets and Trouble with Comet Halley found below on ATS .
www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread970554/pg1
www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread972761/pglastpost
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