This is too funny - why the sun is hot.

This isnt strictly fiction, well it is but it wasnt meant to be when it was written. I was looking through some old newspapers online and came across this article. I find the way the paper talks about this is modest at least, with an obvious bias for a certain theory. I wonder what our current scientific theories will sound like to scicentists in 300 years?

The date of the paper is 1868, only 144 years ago.

This article has been digitaly scanned and translated to text, so there are many mistakes, if you want to see the original scan click below and enlarge it.

TROVE

THE SUN AND THE STARS. The recent discovery by Schiaparelli, of Milan, that the orbits of many of the comets are filled with a circulating band of meteoric stones, explains why the ehrth experiences a star shower nearly every time it rolls through the orbit of a comet. These stones, or such as reach'the earth, are mostly composed of iron, nickel, cobalt, and phosphorus. Some of them area kind of sandstone. When the meteorities strike our atmosphere with a velo ' city infinitely greater than the rush of mis siles ejected by human artillery, the friction of the air sets fire to them, and ere they have penetrated in a vertical direction as much as twenty or thirty miles, the intense heat burns them into powder. If they contain any com bistible substance, it ignites, so that few ever fid their way unbroken to the earth. Those that -do reach the earth fall in an intensely heated state. Pieces of ragged meteoric sandstone have been picked up with the jagged edges rounded off in consequence of the partial melting of the stone by the heat.

'One very remarkable fact connected with the circulation of these small cosmical bodies in space, is that they have given philosophers a clue to the real cause of the light and heat of the sun. The amount of heat received by the earth from the sun every year is known by experiment and calculation, and from this the total amount of heat radiated by the sun in all directions has been nearly ascertained. The yearly expenditure of heat by the sun being known, the question arises, "What keeps up the heat of the sun to compensate for . the annual waste T' Well-established philosophical laws can be brought to throw light upon the subject. If it were a block of burning coal supplied with sufficient oxy gen to enable it to throw out its observed amount of heat, the entire mass of the sun would be burnt up in 5,000 years: hence it is concluded that the light and heat of the sun cannot be caused by common combustion. If it were a hot globe now cooling its heat would cease in less time stilL How, then, is the heat of the sun kept up ?

Whenever motion is suddenly arrested, heat is generated, as in the instance of a cannon bll sriking a target and falling to the ground in a heated state. This raises the question whether in the sun we have an example of the transformation of mechanical power into heat. Mayer, Sir William Thomson, and others have largely investigated this subject. The laws of the heat generated by the con cussion of solid bodies being accurately known Professor Sir William Thomson set himself to work to calculate the amount f heat which would be generated by each of the planets, did it strike the sun. He found that each'of the planets falling into the sun would, by the simple act of the concussion, generate enough heat to cover total solar emission for the following number of years: Mercury, 6 years; -Venus,.83 years; Earth 94 years; SMab , 12 years; Jupiter, 32,240 years ; Sa turn, 9,650 years;. Uranus, 1,910 years; and Neptune, 1,890 years. If, then, solid Lodies are constantly falling into the sun, here is a possible source of generation of heat far ex ceeding that which could be caused by com moin combustion

. Since the first publication of these ideas by Dr. Mayer, in 1843, addi tional interest was necessarily thrown upon the facts of the circulation of large numbers of meteorites in space, and their occasional colli -p?on?fwith the planets. " The sun, being the centre of gravity of the system, would naturally draw all these bodies towards his own surface. It is of no use to pott-~i telescope to the sun to see these cos mical bodies if they are these, because neither the moon nor the planets can be seen through a telescope when they are near the sun, such is the brilliancy of the light. But the zodiacal light, which surrounds the sun obeys the laws of planetary motion; it also appears brighter to ius when in one position than when in another. The planet Venus, when at a certain angle between the earth and-the sun, reflects more light than at other times, and it is at the same angle that the zodiacal light is brightest. These facts, al though the proof is not absolute, tend to show that the zodiacal light is reflected from a great mass of solid bodies circulating round the sun. Once, as two astronomers were ob serving a large sun spot, they saw a brilliant incandescent body shoot across it, and - at the same moment the magnetograps at Kew and at Lisbon, which are always in some myste rious manner affected by sun spots, were vio leiitly agitated. These are a portion of the facts tending to show that the light and heat of the sun are kept up by the constant showering down of red-hot rocks upon his surface, and, in the present state of philoso phail knowledge, no better cause can be assigned for the production of the observed effects.

Mr. Mungo Ponton, F.B S.E, in a recently published and interesting philoso phical book, entitled "The Great Architect," promulgates some very curious ideas, to the effect that there are living organisms in the sun, and that the viewsn- we have indicated are all wrong, But Dr. Balfour Stewart, superintendent of the British Association Ob servartory at Kew, who has himself made niany new discoveries about the sun, inclines strongly to these views; so also do Professor Tyndall and the more clear headed of modern philosophers. It is very possible thait some of the meteors whose course through the heavens is likely to be cut short early to-morrow morniuf are a portion of the fuel which feeds the sun. It is not at all necessary that the said fuel should be combustible, like coal, for the heat of combustion at the surface of the sun would he as nothing in comparison with the heat of concussion. If these little meteors are drawn rapidly ito the sun, the ugly question arises whether the earth is going there also, This, as ) et, jt is impossible to tell. The distance of the earth from the sun cannot be told within several thousand miles. Hence, if we are drawing a quarter of a mile nearer to it every vyear, astronomers are not able to measure the jmovement. Euck's comet, which is a very iight body, drawing nearer to the sun at .r eery revolution, is expected eventually to till into it, although some of the heavenly '.,dies have exhibited contractions of thor drbits for a time and subsequent lengthening ,,,t their original dimensions At all events,Fix this text millionsupons millions of years must elapse Ibefore the earth can fall into the sun at its present rate of motion, and long before that i?nournrsupplies of coal will be burnt out sl that we may then be glad of a hotter temperature. - English Papers

Just found another theory in a paper of 1872

TROVE

Maxwell Hall's hypothesis respeefcuig the source of solar hoatand light is now attracting the atten tion of philosophers, although tho cardinal ideas of tho hypothesis have been before tho world for many years. He supposes that the sun is slowly but continually contracting, by which means the heat which he radiates into space is evolved. The rate of contraction relative to tho enormous mass of the sun is so small, that thousands of ages must elapse before any diminution of the sun's light and heat become visible to us. if the
hypothesis be regarded as true, it follows from it that there will be a time, no matter how distant, when the contraction of the solar orb will have reached its furthermost limit, and when his heat aud light will begin to decline. Tho ultimate result will bo thai the solar system will become completely dark, and all life, at least as we know it, will be extinguished on our earth, and in all tho other worlds included iu the system. It may be that before sufficient time elapses to allow of such a catastrophe happening, the orbs of the solar system may be carried into the vicinity of some other sun and become satellites or planets to it. Both events aro possible. The true destiny of the universe is shrouded in mystery. The dreariness of the prospect which science spreads before tho eye of the mind is not much relieved by tho selfish consideration that such wondrous changes will certainly not occur during our own lifetime or that of our children's children.

the part of above text that is underlined is intresting.
according to their data, magnetism is 'instantaneous', much faster tham the 'speed of light.

i've tried to argue that on ATS before ...

Reading old papers are hilarious sometimes.

Look up some articles from conspiracy theorists in the 1800's and they would fit in exactly perfectly with what we write today. Especially the theories about the governments and banks taking over the world.

I love history

I've heard that the sun is actually plasma, considering space is a vacuum this might help explain why it keeps burning. My personal favorite is that the sun is alive and conscious, it's spirit so strong it burns eternally with fire.