The
Electric Sun/Earth Connection Confirmed
12/17/2007
By Michael Goodsped
The day of this writing,
December 13, 2007, is the 140th anniversary of the birth
of the Norwegian-born physicist Kristian Birkeland. It
was Birkeland who correctly hypothesized in the early
20th century that electric currents from the Sun power
the earth's auroras. For many decades, the scientific
mainstream largely rejected Birkelands thesis,
favoring instead the idea that Earth's magnetosphere is
an impenetrable envelope, "squeezed" by the
solar wind to induce auroral activity. Only when
satellites detected the magnetic signatures of electric
currents in the aurora in 1973 was Birkeland's hypothesis
irrefutably validated -- though for another two decades
many astronomers resisted the implications of this
discovery.
In testing his ideas about the Earth/Sun connection,
Birkeland built a vacuum chamber and placed a magnetized
metal ball called a terrella inside it, representing the
Earth. He observed how the terrella behaved in its
artificial, electrically charged atmosphere. In addition
to solving the riddle of Earth's auroras, Birkeland's
electrical experiments also uncannily simulated planetary
rings and the energetic displays of cometary jets. Yet a
full century later, astronomers continue to be mystified
by these phenomena in space. (To see Birkeland's
observations on the electrical properties of comets,
published in 1913, read "Comets:
Kristian Birkeland's theory").
More than a century after Birkeland's polar expedition to
investigate the Northern Lights, mainstream scientists
still express surprise or even astonishment when they
observe the telltale signs of electrical circuitry
connecting the earth and the Sun. That is because they
still cling to theoretical models that conceptually
exclude the possibility of electrical circuits in space
-- even when their models are refuted by new observations
that they characterize (and sometimes discard) as
"impossible."
The disconnect between astronomical theory and discovery
is in full display in the recent NASA press release,
"NASA Spacecraft Make New
Discoveries about Northern Lights".
The report discusses the THEMIS spacecraft's recent
observations of "giant magnetic ropes that connect
Earth's upper atmosphere to the Sun and explosions in the
outskirts of Earth's magnetic field." Describing the
THEMIS encounter with a "magnetic rope" NASA
investigator Dave Sibeck states: "It was very large,
about as wide as Earth, and located approximately 40,000
miles above Earth's surface in a region called the
magnetosphere." Investigators observed that the
so-called rope "formed and unraveled in just a few
minutes, providing a brief but significant conduit for
solar wind energy. Other ropes quickly followed: 'They
seem to occur all the time,' says Sibeck."
Magnetic "ropes"? This expression begs the
question of how the fluid dynamics envisioned by NASA can
explain a "rope-like" structure that twists and
changes dynamically, and extends all the way from Earth
back to the Sun. NASA scientists often use the phrase
"flux ropes" to describe these twisted
filamentary pathways traversed by charged particles. But
to electrical engineers, such terminology reveals a deep
confusion among astronomers struggling to comprehend
unexpected electrical activity. Professor Donald E Scott,
author of The Electric Sky, says, "Ropes, of course,
have beginnings and ends. Magnetic fields do not. So this
use of language from NASA fails to explain anything, and
is conceptually wrong as well as misleading." (For a
synopsis of Prof. Scott's highly acclaimed book, see here).
The "ropes" to
which the investigators refer are commonly described in
plasma science as electrical "Birkeland
currents," named after the aforementioned Kristian
Birkeland. The rope-like structure is not just a
curiosity; it is the structure taken by current flow due
to the long-range attraction and short-range repulsion
between current filaments. The "twisted magnetic
fields" are simply the signature of the electric
current flow. In plasma cosmology, these entwined plasma
filaments act as transmission lines carrying
"field-aligned" currents across interplanetary
and interstellar space.
A layperson reading the NASA report might believe that
the observation of these "ropes" is news -- as
if they had never been seen before. But Birkeland
currents have been the object of plasma research for more
than a century. The term describes an electric current in
a space plasma. It is this function of plasma filaments
that inspires Electric Universe proponents to assert,
"There are no isolated islands in space!"
However, the term "Birkeland current" has never
been included in the mainstream astronomical lexicon.
Only in recent years have astronomers begrudgingly
entertained the concept when evidence has allowed for no
alternative.
The NASA report continues, "The mission is only
beginning but THEMIS is already surprising us," says
Vassilis Angelopoulos the mission's principal
investigator at the University of California, Los
Angeles.
The surprises for investigators began in March, when
"a substorm erupted over Alaska and Canada,
producing vivid auroras for more than two hours."
The report reads: "Right away the substorm surprised
investigators: The auroras surged westward twice as
fast as anyone thought possible, crossing 15 degrees of
longitude in less than one minute,' says Angelopoulos.
The storm had traversed an entire polar time zone in 60
seconds flat!
"Also, 'the display was surprisingly bursty.'
Photographs taken by ground cameras and NASA's Polar
satellite (also supporting the THEMIS mission) revealed a
series of staccato outbursts each lasting 10 minutes or
so. 'Some of the bursts died out while others reinforced
each other and went on to become major events.'"
The energy of this two-hour outburst -- five hundred
thousand billion Joules -- is roughly the energetic
equivalent of a 5.5 magnitude earthquake. In trying to
discern "where does all that energy come from?"
NASA is left groping for explanations.
The language used by the investigators reveals their
determination to avoid describing obviously electrical
displays in terms of electrical circuitry. Rather, they
cling to ideas of mechanical "collisions"
between magnetic structures -- without explaining how
these structures can be magnetic in the absence of
electricity -- somehow generating the observed energies.
The NASA report describes the "magnetic ropes"
(electrical Birkeland currents) observed by THEMIS as
"twisted bundle(s) of magnetic fields organized much
like the twisted hemp of a mariner's rope." This
description is colorful and poetic, but does it amount to
a scientific explanation? Left unanswered is, how are the
ropes created, and why do they twist?
The report continues, "Spacecraft have detected
hints of these ropes before, but a single spacecraft is
insufficient to map their 3D structure. THEMIS's five
satellites were able to perform the feat.
"THEMIS has also observed a number of relatively
small explosions in Earth's magnetic bow shock. 'The bow
shock is like the bow wave in front of a boat,' explains
Sibeck. 'It is where the solar wind first feels the
effects of Earth's magnetic field.' When a knot of
magnetism within the solar wind hits the bow
shock--'Bang!' he says. 'We get an explosion.'"
Using such language to describe the electrical currents
and powerful discharges from solar energy replaces the
language of advanced plasma science with the mechanical
language of wind and water. Nowhere does the report
mention the explosive potentials of the
"double-layer," a structure common to all
plasma sheaths -- the cellular strictures, such as
Earths magnetosphere, around charged objects in a
plasma.
A double-layer consists of two parallel layers of
opposite electrical charge. A catastrophic rise in
voltage across the structure may result when flow is cut
off. This causes the double-layer to "explode"
-- as observed when a circuit breaker is opened
incorrectly. The explosions THEMIS has observed are the
predictable effects of instabilities in the interface of
Earths plasma sheath, and the out-flowing charged
particles of the solar wind.
Clarity can be gained on many space phenomena, including
unpredictable outbursts of comets, supernovae, and
coronal mass ejections, if astronomers will consider the
well-documented dynamics of electrical double-layer
explosions. The irony here is that by clinging to
gravity-only dogma ("no electricity in space"!)
-- a dogma codified before we had the tools of modern
plasma science -- mainstream astronomy has obstructed the
path of scientific progress pioneered by Kristian
Birkeland a century ago.
"It seems to be a natural consequence of our
points of view to assume that the whole of space is
filled with electrons and flying electric ions of all
kinds." -- Kristian Birkeland
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