Re: Question about galaxy brightness
- From: GSV Three Minds in a Can <GSV@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 3 Nov 2005 12:08:21 +0000
Bitstring <c69jm1lnh2d24a6d7rlibo7ip95vafb2p9@xxxxxxx>, from the wonderful person r.rice@xxxxxxxxxxx said
Ok, I'm reading the Coldfire trilogy. In this series, the planet was settled by a colony ship that set out from Earth, and kept traveling until it was just about to run out of planets and head off in to deep space. Here's some descriptions of the night sky as seen on the planet:
"The cloudless sky was still half-filled with stars, a thousand brilliant point of light that twinkled in the cobalt heavens like diamonds on jeweler's velvet. Toward the west there were so many of them that their light ran together, pooling like molten gold along the horizon, crowning the sea with fire. Soon Erna's second sun would set - a false sun, made up of a million stars - but until then the Ernan colonists need have no fear of darkness. Only the creatures who feared true sunlight would call this time night."
It's explicitly mentioned that these people set out from Earth, so this is the Milky Way galaxy that we are talking about. Given that the Milky Way appears as a relatively faint band of stars here on Earth, which is closer to the center of the galaxy than Erna is, is this description of what they call "the Core" as unrealistic as I think it is?
You have to understand that any 'science' in the Coldfire trilogy is there purely by accident. This is a Fantasy series.
However if I have to retcon this back so somewhere near believable, maybe if you set off at right angles to the plane of the galaxy you could achieve this effect (especially of a planet with little/no light pollution) - the only reason the Milky Way doesn't look like nearly solid star-stuff from here is that there is immense amounts of gas/dust between us and the core.
So if you were above/below the plane of the Galaxy (where there are relatively few stars to be sure) you might get a view somewhat like 'Andromeda galaxy, face on', but rather bigger/brighter. Of course I can't imagine that anyone leaving Earth would head in that direction..
Or maybe they headed out to somewhere near a globular cluster? Anyway, don't worry about it. If minor stuff like that upsets you, the rest of the book will freak you our. Get a larger hawser to suspend your disbelief from ...
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