Scientists Find Hot Spot on Saturn's Chilly Pole

Originally posted by weedwhacker
Even our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is a double (in fact, I think I have read that there is a smaller 'companion' as well, in a very eccentric orbit around Centauri 'A' and 'B').

Proxima Centauri?

To understand this finding properly, see my journal entr(ies) on Slashdot:

(Latest journal entry on the topic; preferred for its more neutral tone and additional details / "how / why it matters")
slashdot.org...

(Older version; more controversial, prefer the newer version as it sticks to the prediction / issue and doesn't go into detail on the "controversy" so much.)
slashdot.org...

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(Keck observatory article from 2005.)
www2.keck.hawaii.edu...

(Article with predictions of the dual hotspots by [Aussie physicist] Wal Thornhill who published his predictions the day after the Keck announcement).
www.holoscience.com...

(Recent confirmation of the dual hotspots confirming Wal Thornhill's prediction and refuting the original Keck speculation of one hot and one cold pole)
www.reuters.com...

Anywho, if you find the above to be at minimum "interesting," you might vote for the first journal entry above on Slashdot. See if it makes it to the front page.

Goos times. Lots of awesome data coming back from space! First the lightning at Venus, then the "flux ropes from the sun" powering the arctic Auroras, now the dual hotspots of Saturn. Things are just coming up roses!

Cheers,
~Michael Gmirkin

[edit on 9-1-2008 by mgmirkin]

Originally posted by squiz
This was actually predicted by electric theorist Wall Thornhill, mgmirkin posted some info on this in my thread on the electric sun.

Here's the link to Wall Thornhills article written in 2005.

Saturns Strange Hot Spot Explained.

This guy has made several startlingly accurate predictions in the last several years, quite extraordinary in a field where constant surprise is normal.

Another confirmation for EU/plasma Theory.

[edit on 7-1-2008 by squiz]

Well, I guess I've quoted myself. Heh. C'est la vie. Anyway, the above post I made links to a Slashdot blog/journal article I wrote for Slashdot, which I summarized on the other thread, since it was a rather interesting related thread I was already participating in. Apologies for cross-posting. Thought the folks here might find it of interest. I guess Squiz did. Didn't realize someone was already using me as a reference. w00t! (As it were.)

I've got my head slightly wrapped around SOME of the stuff. Others of the stuff I'm still mentally digesting, as it were. But I do think that it's interesting that Keck and Thornhill both made polar opposite predictions, and this Cassini data thus acts as an experimentum crucis between the opposing models. Keck's predictions appear to have NOT panned out. Thornhill's appears to have gotten the double hot spot correct. I sppose it simply remains to be seen what other data comes out in favor of one or the other model. If nothing else, Thornhill's assertions and correct prediction merit further investigation / testing.

If I recall the NASA report correctly (Or was it the Reuters report? Well, one of the two.), it said something to the effect that the poles were basically mirror images of each other with a warm spot directly at the pole and a ring of warm material about 20-30 degrees of lattitude up (not a gentle gradation as one might expect from seasonal effects and polar tilt). And I think they said the south pole's spot and ring were slightly warmer than the north pole's spot and ring. However that seems to indicate only a minimal input from seasonal effects. IE, since both poles have the same basic feature, then if one assume the same features are caused by the same process, might one also conclude that the "minor temperature difference" between the ring and spot at each pole is the effect of "seasonal" input (rather than the ring and spot themselves)? That's purely speculative on my part. But doesn't seem entirely unreasonable? I could be wrong tho'.

Good times!
~Michael Gmirkin

[edit on 9-1-2008 by mgmirkin]

Now those are two great back-to-back posts! Alot of good and useful information. I agree that there is alot of great information coming back from space now. It will only get better.
The seasonal effects on the sun side pole is so negligible compared to the other pole. Just seeing the Hexagonal rotation on both poles and on 2 planets is giving credence to the EU. Have they gotten some good info from Neptune yet? Or is New Horizon's going to do a quick swing by?

reply to post by harddrive21


Doesn't look like it will make a flyby directly...

New Horizons itself will be traversing through one of the Trojan regions of Neptune in 2014. For a long time, astronomers wondered if there were asteroids trapped in Neptune's Trojan regions, but in recent years a few have been discovered. These fascinating bodies probably represent a sample of the most primitive bodies in the solar system, like comets and Kuiper Belt objects.

www.spaceref.com........




I'm interested to see what these trojans are made of. I wonder if they display characteristics of comets or asteroids?

-Dev


[edit on 11-1-2008 by DevolutionEvolvd]

[edit on 11-1-2008 by DevolutionEvolvd]

reply to post by DevolutionEvolvd

Thanks for the map DE. And the trojan area is interesting all in its own. Getting the composition of these space rocks can only help our defense from rocks landing on our heads.
Great photo and link!