[Buttercup]

Why is the sky blue? What is the firmament made out of? What is the dome above us? The answer may be something known as silica aerogel.

[beauharlan]

This concept seems more consistent with history and mythology than modern scientific knowledge. Also another perspective.

[jimster]

If you believe in UA and a dome, then the earth is accelerating at 32 ft/second/second and, apparently, so are objects in the sky. so a force adequate for that acceleration must be applied to the sun, moon, planets, asteroids, etc to accelerate identically. The material you propose is not strong structurally. The sun produces a huge measurable amount of energy and if the dome model is correct, the sun 35 miles across as calculated from a dome 3500 miles away (or maybe no one knows). Seems unlikely something that produces all that energy and is 35 miles wide would have So if the "dome" is made of aerogel, what holds up the sun? Is it so light that aerogel can support it or is there some other structure we don't know about?

[sandokhan]

If you believe in UA and a dome, then the earth is accelerating at 32 ft/second/second and, apparently, so are objects in the sky. so a force adequate for that acceleration must be applied to the sun, moon, planets, asteroids, etc to accelerate identically. The material you propose is not strong structurally. The sun produces a huge measurable amount of energy and if the dome model is correct, the sun 35 miles across as calculated from a dome 3500 miles away (or maybe no one knows). Seems unlikely something that produces all that energy and is 35 miles wide would have So if the "dome" is made of aerogel, what holds up the sun? Is it so light that aerogel can support it or is there some other structure we don't know about?

It is either/or: you can't have both a dome and the UA. The dome makes the UA superfluous.

The Sun measures 636 meters in diameter, the orbital altitude is some 10-12 km.

[AATW]

The Sun measures 636 meters in diameter, the orbital altitude is some 10-12 km.

That's roughly in the range of cruising altitude of commercial planes. Why don't they hit it? Or at least be noticeably closer to it.

[jimster]

sandokhan, "t is either/or: you can't have both a dome and the UA. The dome makes the UA superfluous."

Why not? How does the dome cause things to accelerate at 32 ft/sec/sec? I bet you many FEs believe in both UA and dome. If there is no dome, where are planets and stars? Is there something like outer space in your model? Do you know the real truth of FE and all FEs who disagree with you are wrong?


sandokhan: "The Sun measures 636 meters in diameter, the orbital altitude is some 10-12 km."

If so, where does the sun appear to be when it is noon and you are 100 km from the spot directly underneath it? Rockets can fly over the sun? 636 meters in diameter?

The total solar energy per second on a surface perpendicular to the Sun is about 1350 Joules per square meter or about 0.275 watt-hours. Taking into account incidence angle and the surface area, the effective energy arriving at the Earth is about 1.75E17 Joules. And you are saying something that powerful is 636 meters across and 12 km away? If the sun is 12 km from the surface of the earth, the inverse square law says energy density varies with the inverse of the distance squared. So a plce directly underneath would get 4 times as much energy as on the surface 24km from the sun and places 1000 km away get almost nothing.