About the distance to the stars

Dear Scsa, you wrote:

“We know how big Uranus is and how far away. We can see that Sirius looks smaller than Uranus (if using a proper optical instrument and not relying on limited naked eye estimations). So Sirius must either be further away than Uranus or smaller than Uranus.”

Surely, you must be joking…: SIrius is the very brightest and largest star in our skies (that EVERYONE will have seen it in their lifetimes). Uranus, on the other hand, is an extremely faint light only barely visible with our naked eyes (that most people will NEVER see during their lifetimes). These are undeniable, HARD FACTS. If Sirius appears smaller in a telescope than Uranus, it does not logically follow that Sirius must either be further away than Uranus or smaller than Uranus.

Dear all,

It is my pleasure to announce today February 5 (the day of my birthday, serendipitously enough!) that the TYCHOS has been cited in an article posted at the Vatican Observatory website. To be sure, this is the very first article mentioning my TYCHOS research to be published on an ‘official’ (for lack of a better term) astronomy website! :slight_smile:

“You Can’t See Atoms, so Why Can You See Stars?” - by Christopher Graney: https://www.vaticanobservatory.org/sacred-space-astronomy/you-cant-see-atoms-so-why-can-you-see-stars/

The author of the article is none other than Christopher M. Graney, the public relations officer (and astronomy historian / adjunct scholar) of the Vatican Observatory Foundation - based in Arizona, USA - yet linked to the original Vatican Observatory headquartered at the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo (which just happens to be located less than 6 miles from my own house, in the hills overlooking Rome).

“The Vatican Observatory is one of the oldest active astronomical observatories in the world, with its roots going back to 1582 and the Gregorian reform of the calendar.”
https://www.vaticanobservatory.org/

As it is, over the years I have read (and thoroughly enjoyed) a great many papers by the prolific astronomy writer / historian Dr. Graney, especially those concerned with Tycho Brahe’s work and achievements - which he has always treated objectively (i.e. with due insight and open-mindedness). You may thus imagine my delight to see my TYCHOS research being cited on the VO website - even though it isn’t exactly supportive of the same. In any event, I remain confident that the TYCHOS model is here to stay - and that it is only a matter of time before it gets seriously assessed, discussed and debated by this world’s scientific community.

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Here is what you can read on the main page of the site that has just published an article quoting my TYCHOS research:

“The Vatican Observatory is one of the oldest active astronomical observatories in the world, with its roots going back to 1582 and the Gregorian reform of the calendar. Headquartered at the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, outside Rome, this official work of the Vatican City State supports a dozen priests and brothers (Jesuits and diocesan) from four continents who study the universe utilizing modern scientific methods.” https://www.vaticanobservatory.org/

I have to wonder if my fate will be that of Galileo (who was supposedly confined in house arrest for the rest of his life) or that of Giordano Bruno (who was burned at the stake)! :smiley: Only joking, folks…

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Yes, this is an interesting and most welcome development Simon. Kudos to Mr. Christopher Graney for posting this. But I don’t find his argument very reasonable however. I’m amazed how scholars dismiss valid arguments with others that clearly aren’t. Of course we can see the light from a lamp in the dark from a further distance than we can see the lamp itself in daylight. But I fail to see how this is a relevant argument here or that the light from an atom supposedly is visible with the naked eye.

But unfortunately this is what we see time and time again. The planets move in elliptical orbits at varying speeds and stars have enormous mass because otherwise Newtonian mathematics don’t work. Never mind the postulates of Euclid, sigh.

But I think we are steadily approaching that moment in human history when the Emperor and his court will have to admit that even they are not above grammar, or in this case geometry and reason.

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I just read his article and his reasoning isn’t logical. The jist of his response is that its the light from the object that we see not the actual object, ok… What else could we be discussing? The visible “light” is the entire crux of the discussion. Simon has only ever referred to what can be visibly seen. Do we have to now start splitting hairs and say that the object itself is what astronomy has been referring to in the past not the observed light it emits?

No, this is not the argument at all and never was. Astronomy, as Simon noted, attributes the diffraction of light through the atmosphere which affects starlight but apparantly not planetary light or the sun, as being the reason we aren’t supposed to trust our eyes. And was also the same argument, mostly, given by Scsa, that devolved into blatant contradictions of his own argument. I wonder if Scsa is also Graney?

All that being said, I must still wonder why there would not be a reduction factor for our own solar and planetary distances/sizes? How can we be assured of the validity of the 299 200 000 km distance?

Dear Schoeppfer,

That’s an interesting question: you see, I have chosen to ‘go with’ the official estimates of the distances between the bodies of our own solar system because they’ve been calculated (trigonometrically) using the diameter of Earth of 12756 km - which I believe is pretty much correct. Having said that, I do not completely dismiss the idea that those distances may be shorter. Note that if we should find out one day that this is the case, the RELATIVE distances between our solar system’s “family members” will always remain the same, so it wouldn’t change a iota of the TYCHOS paradigm - as implemented in the Tychosium simulator.

Interestingly perhaps, if we apply my “42633 reduction factor” to our own Solar System’s bodies, the Sun would be just about 3509km away (149 600 000km / 42633 = 3509km). Well, 3509km just happens to be exactly 1/4th of 14036km (which is the annual distance covered by the Earth in the TYCHOS model). As it is, the rotational speed of Earth around its axis (≈1600km/h) is just about 1/4th of that of the Sun (≈6400 km/h). Food for thought I guess - but perhaps nothing more than food for thought! :slight_smile:

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Dear Schoepffer, I just noticed this error of mine (out of distraction).

In your first post in this thread you asked:

"So the distance would be 2,219,166.4 km? (of 1.4834 AU) "

I then (mistakenly) replied :

“Yes, precisely: what is currently called “one light year” would - under the TYCHOS paradigm - correspond to a distance of about 2,219,166.4 km.”

Wrong! - my bad. The correct distance of “1 light year” in the TYCHOS would be 221 916 640 km !
(i.e. 149 600 000 X 1.4834)

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Simon,

I happened to be watching a video on Sacred Geometry and he mentioned a number that immediately piqued my interest. The number 43,200, which is the scaling factor of the Pyramid at Giza. A scale of 1:43,200 which gives the diameter of the earth near exact. Now this number is so close to your ‘reduction’ factor that I thought it might interest you.

Dear schoepffer,

Hmmm - I can’t see how my reduction factor of 42633 (for the distance to the stars) would have any connection to the 1:43200 scaling factor of the Pyramid at Giza.

However, I am rather fascinated with the 432000 years said to be the duration of the Kali Yuga (as mentioned at 32:00 in the above video) - and with the 25920-year period often stated to be the duration of one Great Year (as mentioned at 28:00 in the above video).

See, in the TYCHOS the duration of a Great Year is estimated to be 25344 years. This is 576 years less than 25920 years. The reason for this shortened Tychos estimate is expounded in Chapter 12 of my book. Now, we see that:

25344 / 576 = 44
whereas
25920 / 576 = 45

Hence, exactly one “unit” (of 576 years) separates the ‘historical Great Year estimate’ of 25920 years from the TYCHOS estimate of the same.

We then see that 432000 is an exact, round multiple of 576:

432000 / 576 = 750

Pretty interesting, isn’t it?

Yes, very much so.

And 576 / 72 = 8 exactly

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I understand this might be off topic because the title implies something broader than the specifics discussed here, upon a cursory scan. However, I hope I am enough on-topic. When I search the forum for “Barnard” this is the topic that came up, and that’s what I want to talk about.

I have been listening to an interview with Walter Cruttenden and he still seems to discuss Kepler’s elliptical orbits, and it made me wonder if he would benefit from the TYCHOS — and if he did, just what he might have gained if he’d been available when we tried to visit the Binary Research Institute.

It seems that if we take the 5.96 light-years and the reduction factor into account we end up with 0.0001397978 which translates to 821.8 million miles. This would place it just inside the orbital distance of Saturn (886 million miles).

Also, if we want to apply this to the assumed diameter, we could turn this “Red Dwarf star” of 19% the Sun’s assumed diameter (865,370 mi) to 0.000445664% of the same, making it 3.8566 mi in diameter, or slightly wider than a flattened hike through the woods. Is that right?

I am curious about the fact that Barnard’s star is seen visibly crossing the starfield. I can’t quite tell based on Stellarium but high in the North and kind of heading “East”? So small and close, it would make sense that it’s kind of some asteroid or similar object with a binary companion. Could that be?

It would make it seem unlikely to be the Sun’s binary companion and lend more support to the Mars-Sun binary relationship proposed in TYCHOS.

Not necessarily so, dear Maxeem. As expounded in the below section from Chapter 23 of the 2nd Edition of my book, the TYCHOS 42633 reduction factor for the star distances does not necessarily imply that the current estimates of stellar diameters are inflated by a factor of 42633.

As we saw above, Vega is reckoned today to be 2.3X larger than the Sun - and to be located 25.04 light years away from the Earth. You will thus probably be asking yourselves this question: “if Vega is 42633X closer than currently believed, does this mean that it is also 42633X smaller?”

No! Vega may still be about 2.3 times larger than the Sun. Let’s see why:

  • TYCHO BRAHE’s estimate of VEGA’s angular diameter: 120" arcseconds
  • MODERN ASTRONOMERS’ estimate of VEGA’s angular diameter: 0.0029" arcseconds

We see that 120 / 0.0029 ≈ 41380 (or quite close to the TYCHOS’ 42633 reduction factor).

In the TYCHOS model, 1 light year = 1.4834 AU (i.e. 42633X less than 1 light year). This would put the Earth-Vega distance at about 37AU (25.04 X 1.4834 = 37.144 AU). Remember: Tycho Brahe estimated VEGA’s angular diameter to be about 16X smaller than our Sun. Thus, if Vega is truly 37.144X more distant than the Sun (and appears to be 16X smaller), it would indeed be about 2.3X larger than the sun :

37.144/16 = 2.3215 (as the Latin saying goes: “quod erat demonstrandum” - or “Q.E.D.”)

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Hi Simon, I find locating true, naked-eye stellar angular diameter data quite a frustrating affair: do you have any link to a stellar database with stars listed by their observed angular dimensions? it seems as if only ‘corrected’ angular diameters are available online, as if naked-eye forms and shapes of the stars had become irrelevant since the days Airy’s disk discoveries and other atmospheric refractions had forever put our own, personal, ‘un-initiated’ night-sky observations to the dustbin of astronomical history.

As far as I searched, I could not find a naked-eye angular diameter of Sirius, which I discovered is 0.005936″ in diameter while it is commonly known as the brightest star in the sky; which if my meager computational powers are correct, is about three millionth the angular size subtended by the Moon (31 minutes arc or 1,860 seconds or the width that can fit in half the width of a pinky finger held at arm’s length).

Anyway thank you Simon and Patrik for all your valiant efforts in the past years, I’ve truly been observing the skies with a keen eye since discovering your model! Walking along a beach looking up at the night sky has been a totally new and energizing experience. Keep up with the discoveries and never lose heart: change may not come in our generation, but the ball is rolling and nothing will ever stop it.

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Indeed, dear Greg, the ‘official’ angular diameter of Sirius (the very largest / and most spectacular star in our skies) is beyond absurd…

As I mention in Chapter 23 of my upcoming book :

Officially, the “true” angular diameter of Sirius is reported to be a mere 0.005936″; again, this is an incredibly small value, for it would mean that the “actual” size of the disk of light that we call Sirius - the most prominent star in our skies - would be as many as 323450 X smaller than the Sun (1920 / 0.005936 = 323450)!

One can only wonder why almost no one has questioned this raving absurdity in the last few centuries. And no, I don’t know of any stellar database that lists the ACTUAL / VISIBLE (non-telescopic) angular diameters of the stars. However, you may find in old astronomy books, for instance, how Tycho Brahe estimated the angular diameters of our largest (1st magnitude) stars such as star Vega. In my below graphic, I show how Vega would look like if its visible diameter were 16 times smaller than the Sun - as estimated by Tycho Brahe:

And here’s another REAL-WORLD comparison of the relative size of our Moon and planets - compared with the observed size of Sirius. And yes, this photograph certainly ‘matches’ with what I have personally observed in the skies ever since I was a kid, as I spent long nights gazing at the formidably clear Norwegian skies.


The idea that ONLY STARLIGHT (and not the light emanating from our planets) would be grossly inflated by the ‘Airy disk effect’ simply makes no rational sense.

Aha, thanks. So with better telescopes and resolution technology we are able to see everything focusing in all at once, hence comparisons that remain true can be updated. Makes sense!