The Solar System is a Helical Vortex

by keltex • 14 years ago

1 1 14 years ago

burke• 14 years ago

It's a cool animation, but it overstates the incorrectness of the heliocentric model.

There is no absolute reference frame, so the heliocentric model is perfectly valid if we take the Sun as the reference. This model is (closer to) correct if we take the galactic core as the reference.

There are two remaining issues:

1) The planets do not rotate exactly in the plane normal to the sun's movement through the galaxy (I think it's closer to a plane bisected by the sun's path but I can't remember).

2) What makes the galactic core an appropriate reference? We could also take the movement of our local galactic cluster, which, by the same bigger-is-better logic, is more correct. As far as this animation is concerned though, it would be roughly the same result, just different speeds, I guess.

Neat animation though.

The Solar System is a Helical Vortex

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