pink_trike Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 Can anyone tell me how close to reality this bit of information is: --- The distance between the Earth and Moon is 108 times the diameter of the Moon The distance between the Earth and Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Sun The diameter of the Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Earth --- Appreciate your help... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyrisch Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 The second bit hardly seems true. Take a look at this to-scale representation of the planets' orbits. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toastywombel Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 Can anyone tell me how close to reality this bit of information is: --- The distance between the Earth and Moon is 108 times the diameter of the Moon The distance between the Earth and Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Sun The diameter of the Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Earth --- Appreciate your help... Diameter of Earth is 12,756.2 kilometers "If you take the above number and multiply it by 108 you get 1,377,669.6 km that is about 20,000 kilometers off, or about 1.5 diameters of the earth off." Diameter of sun is 1,391,000 kilometers take sun divided by earth and you get around 108, its like 109 ish so that part is somewhat accurate. diameter of moon is 3,474.8 kilometers distance between moon and earth is 384,403 Km do the same thing, divide and you get around 110. So its off by a bit there, plus its good to note that the moon is moving away from us very slowly, so a set in stone number like 108 will get ever less accurate. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon I'm not going to do the last one, because I think you can, but by the way this is not totally accurate, if you consider that the orbits of these objects are elliptical, therefore there are fluctuations in the distances between these objects. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_unit Usually nothing in nature is mathematically that pretty. So that 108 thing, is around right, but not totally right and really a slew of numbers such as 115- 105 could be put forth and have the same point, and be considered by some as accurate, especially if thrown into a poem like you sited. It is easy to twist numbers, by just changing them a little. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michel123456 Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 Our ouroborous friend wants to talk about 108 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/108_(number) 108 is also the next Peugeot model. And my trousers don't fall due to the miraculous power of a belt exactly 108 cm long. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Skeptic Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 Can anyone tell me how close to reality this bit of information is: --- The distance between the Earth and Moon is 108 times the diameter of the Moon The distance between the Earth and Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Sun The diameter of the Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Earth --- Appreciate your help... They are all vaguely accurate (all a slight underestimate it seems). Coincidence? Perhaps. Is Earth 108 times the diameter of the moon? Not a chance! Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedThe second bit hardly seems true. Take a look at this to-scale representation of the planets' orbits. Surprise! 2 * radius of Earth * 108 * 108 = 0.994587607 Astronomical Units Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sisyphus Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 Out of all the various distances in the solar system, there are indeed a few that are in ratios of 1 to 100-120 or so. If the implication is that 1:108 ratios are all over the place, then I have to say "fiction." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted April 12, 2010 Share Posted April 12, 2010 Out of all the various distances in the solar system, there are indeed a few that are in ratios of 1 to 100-120 or so. If the implication is that 1:108 ratios are all over the place, then I have to say "fiction." It's more like there are a bunch of ratios, so it's not hard to find several that are in the vicinity of 108. As toastywombel has noted, the moon's orbit isn't fixed, so this was very inaccurate at some time in the past. Numerology. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pink_trike Posted April 13, 2010 Author Share Posted April 13, 2010 Our ouroborous friend wants to talk about 108 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/108_(number) 108 is also the next Peugeot model. And my trousers don't fall due to the miraculous power of a belt exactly 108 cm long. Not helpful. I asked for the science. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedThanks, guys. I doubted the convenient perfection of such a number. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michel123456 Posted April 14, 2010 Share Posted April 14, 2010 Not helpful. I asked for the science. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedThanks, guys. I doubted the convenient perfection of such a number. Sorry, your question combined with your avatar misleaded me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomgwyther Posted April 14, 2010 Share Posted April 14, 2010 I think the number you're looking for is nearer 390. It's what gives us lucky Earthlings such spectacular solar eclipses. The Sun's distance from the Earth is about 390 times the Moon's distance, and the Sun's diameter is about 400 times the Moon's diameter. Because these ratios are approximately the same, the Sun and the Moon as seen from Earth appear to be approximately the same size: about 0.5 degree of arc in angular measure. From Wikipedia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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