secundusmovens:
jul-likes-magpies:
perplexingly:
misbehavingmaiar:
Nerds, help me out here:
I am not a science person, but my understanding is that sunsets are caused by Rayleigh scattering as light passes through a relatively larger amount of air molecules when it is low in the sky and the light travels perpendicular to the earth’s surface; the light then bounces off the clouds and reflects fancy colors into our eyes all pretty-like.
So, if you had your primary light source actually affixed to the surface of the earth, with light emanating radially from a central point (say, two massively radioactive glowing trees):
A) Would you see sunsets the farther away from the trees you got, with clear light and blue skies the closer you got?
B) Would you see sunsets only at a certain elevation, and from a distance?
C) Would there be insufficient air molecules to scatter the light?
D) Would you have to be like, WAY far away to see sunsets? Like on another continent? (Assuming the earth isn’t curved.)
E) I guess shadows would always point the same direction and it would vary depending on where you were relative to the trees?
F) HOW DO YOU GET A LIGHT SOURCE BRIGHT ENOUGH TO ILLUMINATE A WHOLE LANDMASS WITHOUT BLINDING ANYONE THAT LOOKED AT IT?
G) …Okay, would only Manwë and Varda ever get to see Sunsets from their stratospheric perch on Taniquietl?
H) The trees would have to rotate somehow. I mean. They just would have to. Otherwise you’d have one always casting a shadow on a certain part of Aman. And everywhere else that had something blocking the path of the light, for that matter. Some bits of vegetation would get all the sunlight forever and then it’d be like WELCOME TO THE DEADZONE as soon as you hit tree shadow.
I) Would the lighting situation improve if Varda put like a big ol’ mirror in the sky to reflect the light back down?
J) Should I give up trying to make actual giant glowing trees work as a viable world building element and stick to a magical/metaphysical/non-literal explanation? orz ;; trees tho
reblogging here because i’m extremely curious about the answer
I’m no expert on anything but re: H) I think the constant-tree-shadow area wouldn’t exactly be a dead zone for plants, but rather no-direct-sunshine loving plants would thrive there? If we’re going by the thought that Aman is the only continent getting Tree light and is supposed to be the “blessed realm”, we’re also supposing the Powers That Be make it so to the best of their ability, ergo Yavanna would make sure the constant-shadow piece of land would be able to nurture plants that require different light. Also, the part that doesn’t get light from Laurelin WILL get light from Telperion during its shine time. and vice versa. So it could work that way? Again, not an expert. At all
So then, let my try:
A)Yes, pretty much. The color distribution as you said is caused by the amount of air the light passed through, so closer to the trees they would act more like a regular light source. The only other effect that comes to my mind is that the ground would be super bright as well since it’s really close to the light source.
B)Depends. Is your world flat or a sphere? If it is flat and the trees are the highest things around you would of course see them from anywhere, barring stuff like clouds getting in the way.
C)Not sure if I understand. It depends on from where you’re looking, but if it’s far enough, the light will travel through pretty much the same amount of atmosphere a sunset would. Look at pictures of nulcear explosions like Castle Bravo for examples of terrestial lightsources with lots of scattering. It’s hard to gauge what the original color was but on most pictures it looks very similar to a sunset from just a few dozen kilometers away.
D) Ah, here we go. No, I wouldn’t say so. Light from a regular sunset only travels trough a few hundred kilometers of air, not quite continent range.
E) Sure, just like with every point light source.
F) Eh… By it not being a point source but a distributed that illuminates the whole thing from a wide area. For magic trees, that might mean have a gigantic treetop that fills the sky. But then the whole train of thought above derails since the light doesn’t come from a single place anymore.
G) Thinking about a relatively small lightsource again, I’d say no. Not sure about the precise position of them but if they are high enough, the light would travel through relatively little air on the way to them. You’d have better sunsets on the ground.
H)Mmmm. So you say the trees are pretty much giant flashlights/lighthouses that always point in a certain direction? The vegetation bit interesting and there are some thoughts like that regarding life on tidally locked planets, where the sun doesn’t ever move either, but you are right. You don’t have a day and night cycle. But you don’t solve that problem just by rotating them. The Trees would have to actually move around the world – much like the sun does. (Or, alternatively, be so gigantic that the light still comes from above)
I) Now that is a very good idea to save this world. Indeed, that would ensure a much better distribution of the light, and you’d have intersting double light effects in visual range of the trees.
Reblogging for further excellent input! Thank you, especially for answer G, which I still wasn’t sure about, as well as C and D.
I absolutely hadn’t thought about the connection to nuclear blasts, I’ll have to hunt some down for reference! 😀
MisbehavingMaiar: Tumblr Archive 