Ophiolite

IF you wish this dialogue to continue I suggest you start participating in it. For the last time, where did you derive your figure of 2/3 from? You continue to refuse to answer this question and instead you ask new questions each time. I have patiently answered each of these and instead of acknowledging these answers you respond with a disconnected observation. Your behaviour has been discourteous throughtout. I trust that will change now.

Apparently you didn't understand my post. I said they were alien. 1. What makes you think they will have technology? 2. What makes you think they will be intelligent? 3. What makes you think they will be able to perceive us as intelligent? 4. What makes you think they will visit the Earth rather than Mercury (lots of solar energy), or Jupiter (great magentic fields), or Venus (nice and hot and sulphurous) or Titan (loads of lovely methane)? 5. What makes you think they will have spaceships? 6. What makes you think they are capable of confusion? They are alien. Speculation is futile.

This is where they currently reside, but it is not where current theory envisages they were formed, as I noted in my preceding post. Your statement remains incorrect and potentially confusing for Maximus.

As has been pointed out, I think, by an earlier poster, Jupiter does not have a true surface in the sense that the Earth has a surface. You say we have never been to Jupiter: are you then dismissing two Pioneer probes, two Voyager probes, Galileo, Ulysses and Cassini-Huygens? Moreover we do not need to visit Jupiter to determine its size, nor many details about its composition. Now will you please have the courtesy to state where your figure of 2/3 came from?

The key to your answer is in the word alien. The aliens would be alien. You need to abandon thoughts of all SF movies. These aliens are different in ways we cannot imagine and in ways we might never understand. (Some men never understand their wives and allegedly they are members of the same species.) Trying to extrapolate what might happen when we meet may be an amusing thought experiment, but I seriously doubt it is capable of generating a realistic appraisal of the probable options.

A surface cannot have mass, so I do not quite understand what you are trying to say. I am saying that the core of Jupiter is generally thought to have a mass somewhere between five and ten times that of the Earth. This core is thought to be rocky and surrounded by a very deep zone of metallic hydrogen. As I have noted earlier some models for Jupiter's interior do not require the presence of any core. Since the current explanation for the formation of Jupiter requires gas accretion around a massive core this would require some mechanism by which the core material became disseminated in the metallic hydrogen after Jupiter formed, or we would need to rewrite the book on how it formed. The simplest conclusion, until and unless conflciting evidence emerges, is to accept a 5-10 x Earth mass core. On that basis I do not understand how you claim a core 2/3 the diameter of the Earth. I am asking you to justify that claim, which I believe to be erroneous for the reasons noted.

The supernova creates, or contributes to a GMC, a giant molecular cloud. At some point gravitational instability causes a portion of this cloud to collapse. The central portion becomes the proto-sun, while the remainder of the collapsing part forms a disc around the star. Particles begin to condense out of the cloud and over time these particles coalesce through collisions and gravitational attraction into sizeable bodies called planetesimals. Some of these planetesimals are rocky, some are icy. Some become large enough that they partially melt and differentiate. Many collide to form large bodies that go on to become planets and the major moons. Other are ejected from the system entirely by the gravitational influence of the giant planets, which form rapidly and early in the system. In the region of the giant planets, where temperatures are lower, many of the bodies are icy. These are the proto-comets. Under the influence of the giant planets these are ejected to form the Oort cloud and the Kuiper belt. The above is greatly simplified, but captures the main features of the process.

In what way is a restatement of the challenged statement an explantion?1. Current thinking is that the core has a mass of from 5 to then Earth masses. I ask again, how do you fit 5 to 10 Earth masses into a sphere 2/3 the size of the Earth. Despite the high pressures and the consequent high density mineralogy this just isn't possible. If you maintain it is, please provide references that support this claim. 2. Your definitive statement of 2/3 diameter is questionable purely on the basis that you make it so definitive. Original thoughts on core size postulated thirty Earth masses or more. Improved understanding of the equations of state for the principal components in Jupiter have steadily decreased this number. Some extant models require no core at all, so your claim that it is 2/3 the diameter of the Earth seems frivolous.

Really!!! Care to provide some citations to support that erroneous statement. Comets, traditionally have been seen, like the asteroids, as the rubble left over from the formation of the solar system. The majority were formed within the solar system, beyond the ice line,in the realm of the giant planets. They were ejected from there, into their present orbits by gravitational interaction with the giant planets. There is some recent research suggesting that comets may not be as promordial as previously believed, but they are very much a part of, and formed in, the solar system. This is comet astronomy 101, but if you require references I shall be happy to provide them.

Since Jupiter is thought to have a rocky core of approximately five to ten Earth masses, how do you account for this being only 2/3 of the terrestrial diameter?

You would win the bet. I did much the same thing before I posted in this thread, just to make sure I wasn't missing something.

Get a new text book. If it says the natural gas comes out first then it is badly written. The well is drilled into the reservoir and (unless it is a horizontal well) a short distance beyond the reservoir. It is then cased off i.e. pipe is run into the well bore and cemented in place. Logging information has identified the water, oil and gas zones within the reservoir. Holes are perforated in the casing opposite the oil zone. Tubing is run within the casing to conduct the oil to surface. In some cases, rather than perforating the casing, a slotted liner will be run, through which the oil will flow. In other instances, where the reservoir rock is robust, an open hole completion will be carried out. All oil produced will contain some amount of gas in solution and some water. At surface there is equipment to separate these components from the oil. Often the gas is flared (burned) off at the location. As to new textbooks, get yourself a copy of A Primer of Oil Well Drilling. (If that's the book you do have I'll go out and hang myself.)

Good luck with that. However he seems quite blind to the fact that many data will plot as a straight line on a log-linear plot ranked by magnitude. (I was unaware this was called or related t Benford's Law, so thank you for that info.) I keep being reminded of a friend who, when playing darts, would occassionaly look at the board in simulated shock and awe and declare, "My God! Look! They form a triangle."

What latitude are the equator, the tropic of Cancer and the tropic of Capricorn? Why have I asked you these three questions? That should give you enough hints?

That is either a neat coincidence or elegantly clever.

He has absolutely no idea that is what he has done. Further discussion with him will be fruitless. He is too embedded in his hypothesis to listen to advice or commentary, however it is phrased. (Although look up the works of Duncan Lunan to see how such warped thinking can get you a series of book deals.)

Thank you. Of course you may post what you wish within the rules of the forum. I have no objection whatsoever to you explaining one of your answers. I was objecting to the fact that you didn't give one. You seemd to be saying yes, but that was a deduction on my part. If you had answered directly in the first place we could have avoided this sidebar. It does not illustrate a bias, it demonstrates a plausible interpretation of your response. It carried several of the hallmarks of the professional woo-woo: the world is against you; your views are being suppressed; etc. That may not qualify as paranoia in a medical sense, but it's close enough for me. I repeat, I have no interest in the history of your attempts to develop and promote your theory. I have no interest in you. I am interested in your theory and its evidential base. Therefore, when you interject irrelevant personal information I shall reserve the right to comment on how I perceive that personal and historical information. If you felt that to properly appreciate the nature of the x-axis I needed more information and that information, for whatever reason, could not be divulged on the forum all you had to do was send me a pm. It's not rocket science. I freely confess that I don't give an aardvark's arse what Smolin finds unacceptable. Nor do you have any grounds on which to declare I have restricted the debate to certain parameters. I am bemused that you even think that is the case. I asked you two things in order to clarify my understanding of your position. If you choose to read something into those questions beyond their open intent that is your problem, not mine.

elas, thank you for your reply, now would you care to answer the questions? Implicitly you seem to have answered it, but I wish to be asboslutely clear. (1) Is the x-axis of your chart simply the sequential position in your data set, ordered by the largest value of semi-major axis? Yes, or no? (2) Do you feel the straight line character of a logarithmic plot in these circumstances is significant? Yes or no? I was not asking you to go further. I was not asking for a review of forum history that does not interest me. I was not asking for a display of paranoia. I was asking you two straightforward questions. I hope this time you will answer them so that we can move forwards.

Have I understood you correctly? You are saying that the x-axis is simply the sequential position in your data set, ordered by the largest value of semi-major axis? And you feel the straight line character of a logarithmic plot in these circumstances is significant?

You are correct. I view geology as an experimental science in which the experiments have been conducted by nature. The tasks of geologists is then twofold: to discern the nature of the experiment - science as stamp collecting, then to determine the meaning of the results - science as theory creation. This has worked admirably in plate tectonics.

Which is precisely why have I have recommended initiating the colonisation of Mars. It hits the right buttons in four key areas. 1. It addresses the inherent exploratory and inqusitive nature of mankind. 2. It provides a challenging, but achievable goal. 3. It provides a long term escape route for humanity. 4. It has the potential to deliver substantial technological fall-out. 1. In the context of this thread this is my frigging mission so I can define the desired results. 2. In the broader context these results would be unavoidable. Succesful research in the areas I have indicated would be essential if the colonisation program were to succeed. Those technologies would then be available for terrestrial applications. The colonisation and partial terraforming of Mars are considerably more practical than attempting interstellar colonisation. The latter is at least an order of magnitude more difficult.

We have to dream. We have to strive to realise our dreams. Mankind's success is an outgrowth of exploration. If we wish to redirect expenditure towards eliminating poverty and starvation lets do it by addressing things such as cosmetics or entertainers salaries, not by abandoning our higher aspirations. Moreover a program of Martian colonisation would require the development of more effective recycling systems, the creation of more productive food crops and the establishment of more ethically responsive societies. All of these elements would be transferable to Earthbound solutions of poverty and malnutrition. So, I would ask you how can you ignore the starving people alive today and all of humanity alive tomorrow, by rejecting the opportunity do somthing lasting and meaningful for all of them?

Initiate the colonisation of Mars.

Fine. I'm just trying to get you to say yes or no to some very simple questions. You say you are not a scientist, which is fine, but you felt you had enough knowledge to express an opinion on certain matters. Your statements were ambiguous. Your refusal or inability to remove that ambiguity by answering yes or no leaves me as much in the dark as to your views as ever. I cannot inform you, or direct you to sources of information if I do not know the location and extent of your ignorance. You don't seem interested in addressing that. Consequently I can be of no service to you and I'm out of here.

someone who is relatively uneducated in science, but could benefit from such an education. They will not benefit from a hard core, 'get a riiging education' response, whther this explicit or implicit. they might benefit from a careful, diplomatic, respectful explanation. Those who do come with an agenda will not be influenced by anything that is said.